caulfield12

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 02:28 PM) If the punter were owed the 5th most money on the team . . . Dunn $15.0 million Peavy $14.5 million Danks $14.25 million Konerko $13.5 Rios $12.5 Floyd $9.5 Ramirez $7.0 million Thornton $5.5 million Crain $4.5 million And yet Ramirez's contract is the biggest issue on the team. Sure. Keep thinking that.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 01:35 PM) Part of this comes from many of the posters here "grew up" in the steroid area of baseball. This means everybody should have 15-20 HRs and a slugging% of 450-500. They really don't remember the time when SS,2B and CF commonly were defense first and a 260 ave. was commonplace. Not that the standards should be lowered as players have gotten better over the years. It's just that the value of that type of player isn't recognized as much. With defensive metrics beginning to catch up with offensive metrics this may start to change some. Blame it all on that AL group of shortstops in the late 90's....Nomar, Jeter, A-Rod and Tejada.

It's better as is.... Half of the fun of tournament selection Sunday is arguing about the teams that weren't included, the mid majors being hurt by major conference teams refusing to play them, but the overall parity has increased with the NBA exodus for most superstar level players...so getting in is a pretty fair bar and standard. The NBA and NHL let too many teams in and it waters down their regular seasons, compared to the NFL or MLB.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 01:35 PM) Bump for the addition of first basemen. I expected us to be a touch higher than #12, but I can admit that I probably overrate Paulie. However, it is very interesting to note that we're substantially higher than KC and CLE. Hosmer's going to have to put up a sub 700 OPS 2013 for anyone to give up on that talent....especially with his plate discipline. Even then, guys like Carlos Pena have hung around and finally matured. Or, on his own team, Alex Gordon.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 12:19 PM) I saw one of those "bracketologists" on TV the other day. He claimed not only would Iowa have to beat MSU, they would have to get to Sunday to get in. They were so close to being a really good team this season. I think they lost 5 conference games where they had the lead the last 2 minutes. Its one of the pitfalls of having a young team. They should be really good next year. Only losing May, and supposedly Uthoff has been their best player in practice, although that usually is the standard line for guys who aren't playing, and Jok seems to be a pretty good recruit. He was really highly thought of as an 8th grader. Supposedly Weber offered him a scholarship. Injured his knee, had surgery and really struggled. Apparently the surgery was botched up. Had another surgery and was really good this year. He lives in Des Moines but I think he's from the Sudan. Maybe he can be Loul Deng II. Basabe looked like a monster his freshman year and regressed. Marble was injured for a key game they really needed him. All those early painful losses by razor thin margins and the horrible January conference start. White and Oglesby have been up and down all year, and then you have two freshman in Gesell and Clemmons, and they've battled some injuries as well. All things considered, things are still looking so much better than the end of the Lickliter years...but it is quite annoying to see how well Alford is doing in New Mexico after he just up and abandoned the program and left it in horrible shape and perhaps the legacy of the most unpopular coach in school history after replacing the most popular in Dr. Tom. Losing Ben Brust, Cody Larson and Aaron Fuller was another crushing blow. So the one year Lickliter was successful recruiting and they lose those kids to Wisconsin and Florida. They definitely have to make the tournament next year...those are fair expectations, it will be Year 4 for McCaffrey and seven years removed from an NCAA appearance if they miss again with a loss to MSU.

While we're at it, we might as well trade DeAza to the Yankees. We might actually get something back for him. But that goes in the trading Alexei Ramirez bag of tricks...punting on the 2013 season before it has even started.

I wonder if an Iowa win against NW gets them in, with Minnesota now out? Seems the Gophers are usually in the Top 20 at some point in a season and completely fade out. Probably, Iowa would need to be MSU to seal it, a huge task. If they would have only beaten Nebraska on the road or not had a ball that was halfway down rim out against WI and then go on to lose in double OT, it would already be a done deal unless they somehow managed to lose to the Wildcats. It would be the first time in the NCAA's since 2006, when we lost to one of those direction Lousiana schools with an almost 20 point lead in the 2nd half and a 3 seed (Horner, Brunner, Haluska team, can't remember if Tyler Smith was also on it).

QUOTE (ScottyDo @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 12:01 PM) AJ was an objectively poor thrower. Flowers played with the same pitchers in the same year and performed better. Of course we'll still be run on -- nobody's saying he's Ivan Rodriguez -- but the runners will be thrown out at a higher clip. I know you miss AJ, but it doesn't do any good to pretend he was a decent defender. He blocked balls really well for several years, but there is absolutely no case to be made for him being a good CS man. Last year especially, he was terrible and fell into lazy/bad habits with blocking pitches. Part of it was just poor technique. I'd swear it cost us at least a couple of games, although obviously the offense made up for it, overall.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 12:54 PM) I heard it was a visual kid movie with no plot. Well, all fairy tales have essentially the same plot, do they not? Good vs. Evil, finding courage previously lacking, etc. Certainly, it's not a great film, but it was better than I expected...and better than Alice in Wonderland, which was hugely disappointing to me.

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 12:45 PM) Is this a serious question? John Danks WAR 2007-2012 = 18.1 Brandon McCarthy WAR 2007-2012 = 6.4 NOPE.

Even though it's not going to make as much bank worldwide, in the end, Oz: The Great and Powerful is better than Alice in Wonderland. Franco's on quite a roll again now. And Michelle Williams just improves with age. When she was on Dawson's Creek, I hated her. Never would have seen it coming that she would end up the best performer of all from that show in the end.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 12:14 PM) LOL I like how you answered that seriously No more seriously than the Ultimate Champion's last line, lol.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 10:54 AM) I agree but it was because of personnel moves. The Orioles and Indians both got rid of household names that the fans loved. Cleveland inherited a ton of talent with those deals and almost went to World Series because of it. Baltimore has one of the worst owners in the game. They drafted horribly and didn't spend in FA. Your points are well taken. The Cubs have not been trading away household names and fan favorites because there weren't any. They depended on free agency for so long. If the Cubs end up in a 10 year rut of minimal playoff appearances and bad records like Cleveland and Baltimore then it will be just another case in which it happened. I think they will have talent though. If Cleveland or Baltimore would have made better decisions and somehow competed, the fans would have been right back in the seats. This year should be telling for Cleveland. They are better. They made free agent additions. They may still be 4th in the division but they went out and signed players. Players also did not want to sign with the Orioles. They still don't. Players will always want to come to Chicago. The Indians actually succeeded in rebuilding once, but then gave up against after 2007...which really demoralized the fanbase and which they haven't recovered from as of yet, although they're fairly optimistic coming into 2013 for the first time in half a decade. A team with a very successful record and fanbase that has gone into the rebuilding and still hasn't come out the other side is SEA. Toronto's performance in 2013 will be another example of seeing if a team's fans will return when the team has largely been abandoned or given up on. And, on the other hand, teams like Colorado, Milwaukee (the new park helped tremendously, and the connection to the Commissioner) and Atlanta were able to become contenders and bounce back after being down for different reasons...the Rockies and Braves, like the Sox/Indians/Royals, have fanbases that are oriented more around winning than marketing and iconic stadium appeal.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 10:36 AM) I watched the fighter again last night. That movie is just fantastic to me. Even down to Mark Wahlberg's exact duplication of Ward's in the ring mannerisms. In the same genre, Never Back Down and The Warrior are also a lot better than you'd think... And Cinderella Man.

QUOTE (The Ultimate Champion @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 09:53 AM) I'm still wondering why we traded proven workhorse Brandon McCarthy to Texas. Has anyone been able to come up with a reason by now? Maybe he would have blocked man-child Juan Silverio after we convert him to a pitcher because he sucks balls as a position player. I'm still wondering why we didn't draft Granderson/Puckett/Trout, traded Chris Young for Javy or didn't name Wally Backman manager.

QUOTE (farmteam @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 10:04 AM) I've thought for about two years now that if you let Flowers play everyday, he would hit about .260 with 20-25 homeruns. We'll see. KW said exactly the same thing about Brian Anderson. I would be quite shocked by anything over .240.

Halfway through the new OZ movie. Not bad, but certainly not anything to waste money on in a theatre. Maybe the 3D version would be worth it...? And from our "hottest babes" lists, Mila Kunis looks particularly NOT hot. Could be the make-up, something's off about her in this film. Rachael Weisz actually looked better to me in this one. The main point of enjoyment so far to me is the talking monkey sidekick character.

QUOTE (The Ultimate Champion @ Mar 14, 2013 -> 10:59 AM) It's going to be hilarious watching the reactions you guys have once you realize that we're still going to be run on. You all have been underrating AJ's contributions for years. Catching is the hardest position on the field to find a good player. Flowers was excellent last year throwing out runners, and Gimenez is probably even better. Except when Floyd's on the mound, this isn't a huge concern, compared to his ability to make contact and hit at at least .220/.230ish.

For that matter, NOBODY would or could have reasonably predicted that Iguchi, Dye (coming off a major injury), AJ or Pods (also coming off a downward trend and "prematurely aging" with all the pounding from his minor league stolen base numbers) would have played as they did in 2005. I just find it hard to write off Alexei Ramirez based on one season where he still drove in 70+ runs. Alphonso Soriano rebounded offensively last year and how old does everyone believe he actually is?

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Mar 13, 2013 -> 08:41 PM) Where does Ozzie Smith rank on "The Shredder's" outdated list? Seriously, why am I supposed to care what this cheap thought about Alexei before last year? The same reason you would have cared before the 2012 season where Alex Rios was ranked.... Or after his bad/inconsistent 2004, where Paul Konerko was ranked coming into 2005, etc. How can we suddenly say Alexei Ramirez is done when plenty of players like AJ, Konerko and Rios have rebounded when they were the same age or much older? If anything, Alexei is the opposite of the Carlos Lee/Ordonez/Fielder/Cabrera type of body that breaks down over age more quickly. And it's not like Ramirez has been stealing 50 bags a season, like a Pods....and he's hesistant about contact and diving usually, so his body hasn't taken as much of a pounding.

Surely, it's heading into 2012. So you could push him down at least 3-5 places in the rankings. That said, right now....what players do we have in the Top Ten at their positions? DeAza in CF is probably middle ten. Rios, for most of last year, but nobody would expect a repeat. AJ, offensively...for sure. Konerko, he can't be ranked in the top ten anymore. Viciedo was MLB average for LF in terms of OPS but there's a lot of room for improvement. Keppinger, maybe if you base it solely on 2012, but not on his last three years, as he's been more of a super-utility guy.

Gameday Audio isn't live for some reason. Says there's an MLB feed, not either team's normal broadcasters.

QUOTE (flavum @ Mar 13, 2013 -> 10:36 AM) Lineups: http://baseballpress.com/lineup.php Video: http://chicago.whitesox.mlb.com/video/play...96&c_id=cws Rienzo, Heath, Stewart, Omogrosso, Rodriguez, Gray scheduled to pitch. Peavy, Thornton, Jones, Lindstrom, Veal, and Reed throwing this morning in a minor league game. I wonder if the Sox are the most paranoid team about having their pitchers face division foes in spring training. It's mostly attributable to Don Cooper superstition (especially hiding our lefties). We had Gray in spring training a year or two ago and then he caught on with another team for the regular season...maybe the Mariners?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 13, 2013 -> 02:21 PM) Do they wear their hats to the back? That's the best way to get a tan in the bleachers while also protecting your neck from sunburn, lol. However, it is super cool when a cute girl is wearing a Sox cap backwards or at an angle...the Korean style is with the completely straight bill and the New Era sticker still attached. The White Sox cap was definitely the most popular one there (in South Korea), or at least top 3. Japan, not as popular. Maybe the memories of Iguchi and Gong Takatsu have faded.

The opposite is true, as well. The desire to celebrate the "chicks dig the long ball," three run homers and a cloud of dust offense from say 2000-2004 and the 2008 team is out of style, too. The White Sox have always done the best when they had solid defense and Top 5 starting pitching. Period.