caulfield12

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 8, 2014 -> 09:28 AM) Do they give up a first or 2nd rounder? If he has a good year, the give him a qualifying offer, and they get a pick after the original first round. If they are giving up a second rounder, if he performs, they get his services for a season and basically trade a second round pick for a comp pick. Next year the FA pitching market is going to be a lot thinner when many of the pitchers on the board ink extensions. If he pitches well, this will be a win/win for Santana and Toronto. Not exactly jumping for joy in Toronto over the signing. http://www.thestar.com/sports/bluejays/201...ana_report.html By the way, he fired his agent last week (the one originally projecting a $100 million contract). Santana is representing himself. The other team in it is Baltimore, with Santana supposedly waiting until a 5 p.m. deadline for another team to swoop in and take him away from Rogers Centre. But Santana is not without his own question marks. Though he has pitched more than 200 innings five times in his career, his medicals reportedly suggest potential for an elbow injury. He threw more sliders last season — a pitch that is believed to strain the elbow if overused — than any other pitcher in the majors. He is also a fly-ball pitcher, which could be dangerous inside the homer-happy Rogers Centre, which averaged the most home runs per game of any American League ballpark. Santana has also been inconsistent throughout his career. Though he enjoyed a bounce-back season with the Royals last year, in 2012, he was among the worst pitchers in the majors, posting the fifth-highest ERA at 5.16 and giving up the most home runs (nearly two for every nine innings pitched).

They've got to tighten things up. 3 caught steals today, some in very inauspicious circumstances. Yesterday, we had Ramirez and Beckham failing to cover 2nd on a steal with Flowers' throw going into CF for the error, Viciedo out by 15 feet at 2nd base trying to stretch a single into a double, Trayce Thompson with a bad error and Eaton out stealing 3rd as well, running us out of an inning where we should have had 3-4-5 runs instead of just 2. Maybe Carlos Sanchez was trying to add weight this off-season in order to show more power at the dish? Seems like a net loss if he's lost some of his range and speed. Nieto, supposedly, has been impressive catching and hitting so far.

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2014/03/...partner=ya5nbcs Nice to know Santana's looking for a high scoring offensive team.

QUOTE (gatnom @ Mar 6, 2014 -> 08:02 PM) Iowa is pretty good in transition. And they get stopped in their tracks by physical play, hand checking (MSU/Wisconsin) and taking Aaron White out of games.

http://socialistworker.org/2005-2/562/562_04_RedCross.shtml Having done charity work for 5 years, I wasn't surprised to read some of the allegations/accusations against the Red Cross. There's the political/non-partisan nature of the organization, the CEO salary and administrative salaries being so high, the response to Katrina...even if 1/2 the stories in this article are untrue or exaggerations, there are a ton of allegations which are damaging and downright embarrassing. Especially here in China, the "Red Cross" name is ridden with B list celebrity scandal, greed and corruption. http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/122...-meimei-scandal

Hmmmm....Eaton overaggressiveness running them out of what could have been a huge inning. Thompson with a 2 bag error. Still have a 4-3 lead. Maybe Surkamp's going to take the bull by the horns and impress the coaching staff.

"Multiple times he (Ventura) would bring his team in at noon on the road...and work on fundamentals for hours and hours." Brennaman, saying how the White Sox season with 99 losses makes it seem better than it really was, how brutal the defense and fundamentals were. This times the veterans Ramirez and Beckham not covering 2B on a delayed steal by Brayan Pena...you just don't see that, or shouldn't see that.

The homer that Bruce hit was supposedly the biggest blast they've seen (Brennaman and Co.) this spring. Paulino just doesn't seem to have much life on his fastball yet, and his location has been getting him killed, as he's been throwing strikes for the most part.

QUOTE (staxx @ Mar 6, 2014 -> 09:09 PM) Good day for the future today. Keep it up jose and spanky. Lavalliere?

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Mar 6, 2014 -> 08:15 AM) Taking anything from a Spring Training game other than "hey look, they're alive" is wrong. Still, quite a bit of attention will be paid to Eaton, Davidson, Abreu, Paulino and the battle for the closer's spot.

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 11:42 PM) Adam Woodbury sucks. It'd be nice if both schools didn't let the top talent leave the state. Marcus Paige, Harrison Barnes and the like. But back to the Big 12 tournament....I would imagine we'll see a Kansas/OU finals. Not to mention Hinrich, Collison, LaFrentz, Jason Bohannon, McDermott... Seems it's always Roy Williams winning those recruiting battles. As far as the Sooners go, Kruger is one of the most underrated coaches over the last 20-25 years of college basketball, but they don't have the horses. Oklahoma State for now is looking like the most dangerous team...other than KU, of course.

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 10:19 PM) I'd never let Aaron White off the court if I was Fran. They finally went to an 8 main rotation when Basabe was out, with Olaseni, Uthoff, Oglesby and McCabe getting minutes but backing off trying to also incorporate Jok and Clemmons as well. That's been a big criticism....using too many players and "line rotations" like a hockey team does, rather than putting the emphasis on White/Marble and Gesell to a lesser extent winning games at the end. Marble and Gesell in particular have both been spotty with their FT shooting. Next year, the top six would be White, Gesell, Uthoff, Olaseni/Woodbury and Oglesby. They haven't exactly lit the recruiting trail on fire, considering they had a very high scoring/exciting/dynamic/fun to watch team and Top 10-25 ranking for almost the entire season, so you'd expect better than a couple of 2-3 star recruits. In the 80's and 90's, Iowa and Iowa State used to get their fair share of McDonald's All-Americans or at least Top 50-100 talent (other than Recker/Reggie Evans/Brunner/Haluska/Horner, Alford lost roughly 50% of his recruits). Ironically, Woodbury's probably the highest rated recruit and has been one of the bigger disappointments...along with Basabe looking like the best freshman in the Big 10 and regressing his sophomore and junior seasons.

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 10:07 PM) There's absolutely no reason that both teams can't be consistent tourney teams. Both have excellent coaches. Iowa fans are blaming all the close losses the last two years, and the inability to finish out games about 90% on McCaffrey. Fair or not. I think part of it's talent, obviously. And they have managed to win 3-4 road games in the Big 10 this year, which they failed to do last year (at Illinois, at NW, at Ohio State, at Penn State).

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 09:48 PM) Thirteen years ago, but okay. I guess Iowa's never been upset by a team ten seeds or more lower than them. That doesn't count. Steve Alford was the coach. I was just messing with you. Iowa State has done a great job revitalizing that program, and they're bringing in more overall talent than Iowa and somehow making all those transfers and JC players blend together in a manner a bit reminiscent of the old Cincy and UNLV programs. But nobody quite remembers 3 seeds losing like they do the 2's in history. The sad thing is Iowa has only won one NCAA tourney game (against Creighton) since 2000. That from a team that perennially made the tourney and usually lost in the 2nd round under Tom Davis (and Lute Olson), I think they had made it something like 16 or 17 times in 23 years but this year would be their first bid since 2005-2006. Anything's better than the disappointment of the Alfraud and Lickliter years, though.

It's going to be really interesting to see if Wisconsin can win at Nebraska, who wins the Michigan State at Ohio State game and I'm not even feeling 100% confident that Iowa can beat Illinois at home to guarantee a bid with a 10-8 mark. Illinois had Iowa dead in the water in the 2nd half in Champaign and let them rally back...and beating MSU at East Lansing, despite getting blown out so badly by Michigan, you just never know what way they'll respond with how wacky this season has been, with PSU and Northwestern looking quite dangerous at different points in the season. Iowa has narrow losses at Iowa State and against Villanova, two losses against Wisconsin (another game they should have won, at Madison)....Michigan St./Michigan/Ohio State split with road wins for both teams....then recent losses at Minnesota and Indiana, which are probably their two worst losses of the season. On the other hand, they've only won at Ohio State (when they were #4 in the country) and throttled Michigan at home. Those two wins, along with no bad losses and beating Xavier. It has been a terribly disappointing finish to the season (losing to Michigan State, Wisconsin and Ohio State at home), when a lot of fans were getting ahead of themselves and predicting Final Fours and Elite 8's.

Hampton.

Nebraska definitely put themselves on the Bubble after winning at Indiana. The question is whether they can beat Wisconsin at home this weekend...they do that, they're probably in the tournament with how well Wisconsin has been playing the last 2/3rd's of the BIG 10 schedule, as they would be 11-7 in conference (and Iowa and Ohio State would both be getting in at 10-8 or 9-9 in all likelihood). Or perhaps they would need to win at least one game in the Big 10 tourney, which could be a challenge since they would end up with a 4 seed (just guessing, since I don't expect Iowa to win at Michigan State tmrw night) and have another big game after the bye with either Ohio State or Iowa on a neutral court. Just looked up their Big 10 schedule....winners of 7 of their last 8, albeit mostly over softer competition, and the lone loss coming in Champaign. They won at Northwestern and of course at Michigan State, the huge one.

Pretty sad when the biggest positive highlight today was Dylan Axelrod. Bill Melton was quite entertaining. He got the wrong Hundley as the father (the Cubs' Randy)....then he went on and on about who researches such a bizarre stat for Andrew Cashner (in his first MLB win, he had a single, steal and run scored along with the decision)...which led to phrases like "wonks" and pocket protectors and SABR geeks....and he also thought that John Danks had Tommy John surgery instead of labrum/rotator cuff work done. Oh, and Jordan Danks is as good as an everyday player apparently...except he isn't. That was another nugget. And the often repeated commentary about Gordon Beckham being deserving of an AL Gold Glove except for the fact that Robinson Cano actually has a hit tool to go along with the fielding one.

QUOTE (Vance Law @ Mar 4, 2014 -> 03:10 PM) Beckham career SLG .380 Moustakas .385 and Beckham out-slugged him last year That's true.... But Moustakas hasn't had 4 1/2 years to create a track record for himself at the major league level. 2nd, his minor league numbers would tell you that Moustakas is much more likely to end up a 25-30 homer type of player than Beckham over the next 2-3 seasons. The stories of Alvarez or Alex Gordon would tell you that they're going to be patient with him...maybe not 3 more years of flailing/struggling patient, but at least 1 1/2 more seasons if not 2. I understand you could probably do the same thing for Erik Hosmer (comparison with Beckham), but that doesn't mean I would take Beckham over either one of those two guys....or two Beckhams for one Hosmer/Moustakas.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Mar 4, 2014 -> 01:50 PM) Remember their recent history. Under Russia, both during the cold war and in recent years, Russian influence meant stability, albeit with tons of corruption. On the other hand, in the years immediately after the USSR collapsed, that was chaos. Now chaos again with the yanking between sides. These people care little for geopolitical concerns, or niceties like true freedom. They just want to eat, and for many, the answer (at least short term) is Russia. Also remember, Crimea (as I think SS pointed out) was formerly Russian anyway, was basically put upon Ukraine in the Soviet years, and is still heavily ethnically Russian. Who do you think those folks would rather align with? http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/04/world/eu....html?hpt=hp_t2

No way in hell Semien gets us Pederson. If they did make a trade for an established 2B, it would be someone much more experienced and with a track record. If anything, from reading the articles in the LA Times, it seems they're leaning towards Dee Gordon, who then would go back to utility (2B/SS/OF/PR) upon Guerrero's call up to the big leagues.

http://articles.latimes.com/2014/jan/31/sp...errero-20140201 http://www.latimes.com/sports/baseball/mlb...y#axzz2v02lyKRp

QUOTE (staxx @ Mar 4, 2014 -> 01:02 AM) I think that's contingent upon who would have replaced Beckham at 2B. Even if the Dodgers are interested (which would be dumb after 4 ST games) we won't get anything for him that will solve our problems. Realistically, Semien is better suited for 2B. If we're pretending to contend, we should at least give Beckham and Ramirez until June/July together. Beckham, in particular, might be able to fetch some interest if he can put up a 700+ OPS instead of his customary 600-650 level. The feeling of most is that Semien/C. Sanchez/L. Garcia and definitely Micah Johnson are at least 2-3-4 months away developmentally (especially offensively), with the possible exception of Semien. Some would argue he would and Davidson both should be capable of starting on Opening Day, but IMO it's about a 60-75% chance for Davidson and probably 10-25% for Semien, and only if 1) he beat out Beckham and/or they traded him in Spring Training or 2) they traded Alexei Ramirez.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Mar 3, 2014 -> 09:06 PM) That crack about the fan base is stupid. There hasn't been a hint of fan displeasure at Beckham. Even on here, when he gets hot and he usually does at some point, we all get excited and think the real Gordo has shown up. If the Sox can trade him for somebody decent, do it. It's tough for GM's to trade first-rounders, though. It's just tough to give up on them. If the Sox do keep him and he is hitting .245 at the all-star break, it's time to let somebody else have him. How bout Beckham for Moustakas if Moose is sucking again this season? I would guess only about 10-20% of the posters here would have been REALLY upset had Beckham been non-tendered this off-season. Nobody is happy with how he performed from 2010-2013, vis a vis our expectations that were largely set in place by his draft position, comps to Jeter and strong rookie season. Moustakas is still more highly valued in the Royals' organization because of the position he plays...it's much easier to find a 2B than a power-hitting 3B. Also, the resurgence of Pedro Alvarez's Pirates career has demonstrated the value of being patient with younger players.

Cate Blanchette is quickly becoming the female version of Daniel Day-Lewis. I will say I wouldn't really be interested in watching Blue Jasmine again, it, just like Reservation Road, Love Liza (P. Seymour Hoffman) or Before Midnight. Too depressing and grating. It's nice to know that a lot of people will be watching Dallas Buyer's Club because of all the honors for Leto and McConaughey.