caulfield12

Actually, you're forgetting the Missouri caucuses this Saturday, which Santorum should dominate, just like he did KS. Illinois has a 35-31 spread for Romney, although many believe the real lead is in the 8-12 percentage region. It was pretty much acknowledged that Romney was trailing Santorum in MI and OH with about a week to go in both states until the SUPER PAC money and campaign organization overwhelmed the underdog, but just barely. Another big factor will be the turnout of the really conservative members of the party for the down-ballot local/regional spots. That would tend to favor Santorum. Gingrich is only at 12% for Illinois. While it's true that the winner take all format would tend to favor Romney, an IL loss would be very hard to overcome psychologically. You'd have to also assume Louisiana would go for Santorum on the 24th of March. It does make the strategy of Paul and Gingrich trying to "contain" (by splitting the vote 4 ways) Romney an interesting one....according to exit polls, 3-4X as many Gringrich voters in AL and MS would go to Santorum, compared to Romney, if it was actually a two-way race between just the two of them and Gingrich's voters had to choose one or the other. Of course, outside of the Deep South, electability concerns are higher, and Romney has an advantage on the economy as well over Santorum. Santorum really needs to deliver a more detailed economic plan that caters more towards the middle class and also fill in the gap on energy policy/gas prices, where Newt has been trying to make headway in the south over the last 7-10 days. Very good Friedman/NY Times article on the future of capitalism in the US and world... http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/14/opinion/...on-2012.html?hp http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0312/73987.html Five takeaway lessons from Tuesday night

QUOTE (greg775 @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 10:28 PM) Lilly turned into a good outfielder. He was good out there. The problem is that Fukudome was signed to be the 4th OF for now. Ventura wants to play Lillibridge at 3B/SS/2B. And it's true, they did need some more left-handed balance from the bench.

Yeah, Ebert had a hard time reviewing it (Act of Valor) as well. On the one hand, your expectations for the acting are almost ZERO. On the other hand, the bad acting really kills the film when there's no action going on. In particular, there was a nearly comical scene where the team leader is questioning a detainee on a yacht and half of that scene made me laugh out loud...maybe most community college acting classes could have topped it.

If Viciedo doesn't put up an 800 OPS and 20+ homers and 75+ RBI's, this team is nearly sunk for the future, almost irrespective of what Dunn/Rios/Beckham do. I suppose it's possible to imagine the White Sox competing with Fukudome and/or Lillibridge starting (for Viciedo) and the DUBIOUS 3 all contributing (along with Morel) at an All-Star level with the bat, but I'm not buying it.

Romney would be a fool to name Paul because there's no way that guy can be a heartbeat from the presidency. Rubio's already semi-campaigning for the VP slot. Santorum has to get Gingrich to pledge his delegates to him...if he (Newt) doesn't win either primary tonight. There's not great odds of that happening, yet, but the odds are greater than Gingrich jumping on board with Romney, that's for sure.

It's reminiscent of the kind of bone-headed play that Rios made over and over against last year and faced what consequence from Ozzie....a mini-benching for 1 or 2 games that disappeared as if it had never happened. Then Lillibridge makes ONE similar play in CF (letting a runner score from 1st on a long long single) and Ozzie's all over him about it...or pinch-hitting Dunn for him when Brent had been hot.

Well, I'm sure Brooks would prefer something a BIT better than a 2-8 record so far. That's next to last in the major leagues, ahead of only the Braves at 1-10. Four teams are 3-7. It would be nice if we actually made some cuts like the other teams have already done so that the Sox would be more competitive with the rest of MLB.

Goodbye, Mitchell. Off to minor league camp for you. You never, ever, try to steal 2B down by this many runs in the 9th unless you're 100% sure you're going to get the bag.

Well, so far the results are not encouraging for the regime change. Let's see where we are in 2 more weeks. Lillibridge, for a natural SS with the Braves, has made some Ramirez-esque errors that make me question whether he could ever be an everyday player at that position. Leesman, goodbye. Bruney getting a leg up with Hector Santiago on the 5-6 bullpen jobs. #7, well Castro and Axelrod haven't impressed, up in the air. Maybe Stults. Maybe a late in the spring waiver wire acquisition. Padres, by the way, have 6 Top 100 BA prospects. And yeah, that Padres announcer....the way he hesitates and pauses while he's annoucing, almost like he's breathless, is driving me absolutely crazy. Almost impossible to listen to.

Act of Valor has some kick-ass action scenes and some God-awful acting. Overall, a 2 1/2 star or 2 3/4 star movie....maybe better to wait for the video, although the explosions and gunfire won't be quite as menacing in a home theatre. The only recognizable actor/actress is the lovely Roselyn Sanchez. You can see how it definitely plays as a short recruitment film which morphed into a big screen money grab. Definitely more interest in this after the bin Laden takedown.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 09:44 PM) Sounds like "appreciate the game" is a message to the players more than the fans. Respect the game by uh, playing hard this year? I think most of us on this board are going to grow very weary of strikeouts and double plays if that is again our offensive ammo this year. Except that has been our offensive MO since 2000. The only difference is we've lost a lot of that power and replaced it with lower OBP guys. We went through that wave where we shed Valentin/Ordonez/Lee/Thomas/Durham...then later, Crede's back went out...followed by the attrition with Thome and Dye and now Quentin as well. Even Uribe was usually good for about 18-22 homers per season.

It's also possible some will take it as a veiled swipe at the Ozzie Guillen regime over the last 3 years....and how it has been more about individual personalities, media, ego, etc., rather than the love each player/coach had for the sport when they first started out playing baseball at the Little League level.

Appreciate the Uniform, Not the Player's Name on the Back (to keep us from getting any more aggravated with Dunn/Peavy/Rios)

Please move if there's already a thread about this...or maybe we can all put our mottos/taglines/slogans together http://chicago.sbnation.com/chicago-white-...e-sox-2012-news http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/201...-backfire-again “When Robin came in, we asked him, ‘What kind of attributes do you want to come out of the clubhouse?' ” Mr. Boyer said. “He said he wants his team to play smart, to play for a reason. He said he wanted them playing for the reasons why they first started playing baseball: Because they love the game. He said, ‘I want them to appreciate everything this game has offered them.' ” Hence, “Appreciate the game.” Mr. Boyer said the upcoming campaign will feature Mr. Ventura preaching this philosophy. “I think it will resonate with our fans,” he said. Perhaps. I asked again, however, wouldn't it just be simpler to not have any kind of slogan? Does it really help sell tickets? Mr. Boyer defended the concept. “If you don't have a campaign, then you're not talking to fans,” Mr. Boyer said. “If we suddenly didn't do a slogan, then people would say, ‘The White Sox don't care. They didn't even put a campaign together.' I'd rather convey a message about what is unique to the White Sox.” OK. I just hope “Appreciate the game” works out better than “All in.” Read more: http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/201...n#ixzz1oxO8hUt0

"Appreciate the Game"...yeah, that will put a lot of fannies in the seats. For what it's worth, Peavy was going a little psycho out there...definitely the right move for Ventura to pull him. He was really jawing with Flowers because apparently Tyler called a 3-2 offspeed pitch and our old friend Brandon Allen (he of the 10+ RBI's this spring already) ripped it for a 2 run single to RF. Of course, why a veteran like Peavy would go with a pitch he didn't feel comfortable with in that situation, I have no idea. But Peavy was audibly yelling at himself...loud enough for everyone in the crowd and the broadcasters to hear. They were a bit surprised he lost his composure so easily during a meaningless spring training game. And at least Morel, and Beckham and Mitchell to a lesser extent, have been hitting well. DeAza, Trayce Thompson and Rios had 2 hits each. Santiago continues to pitch well.

QUOTE (juddling @ Mar 11, 2012 -> 10:47 PM) Saw Warrior last night....i'm far from a MMA fan but i was entertained. For some reason, that movie just never took off. I really liked it a lot, it had two up-and-rising stars in Hardy and Edgerton, but it just kind of flattened out when it expanded to a wider number of theatre chains. Perhaps it was too closely identified with MMA and most cinema-goers thought it was a marketing/PR film rather than a legit film, like THE FIGHTER? I have no idea, because it was getting lots of critical praise and kudos when it first came out and many people were saying they were at least thinking about going to see it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/12/sports/b...ng-arms.html?hp This was always the prevailing wisdom when I was growing up and then coaching LL in the 80's and 90's. Not too many sliders or curveballs should be allowed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/12/business...wanted=1&hp "Ishtar Lands on Mars"

For what it's worth, the Rangers also hadn't been playing well at all when we faced them. Atlanta is 1-9, Texas 3-5, Cleveland 2-7, TB 3-6. The Rockies had lost five games in a row before they beat us...but they were also using a lot more of their regular players.

Lillibridge had a slow moving possible double-play ball to him to him at SS and he tried to hurry up the play, ended up bobbling it, and everyone was safe. That basically led directly to 2 runs scoring, although Danks' control was a mess again. Mitchell had another solid base hit, and it was against a lefty, the 49 year old timeless wonder, Jamie Moyer. Escobar is definitely leading Ozzie Martinez (so far) if they're competing for the final spot on the roster, along with Johnson, McPherson and possibly Danks.

Because of Chicago and the B10, many still consider Illinois a top 10 job. Of course, for examples like Bill Self and Roy Williams, it was/can be seen as a stepping stone, but Kansas to UNC is such a rare thing, and Williams and Shaka Smart don't belong in the same conversation.

Maybe this will give Obama the cover he needs (just like the famous incident in Somalia depicted in Black Hawk Down) to get the heck out of Dodge. Obviously, it's reprehensible what happened, but continuing this war through 2013 or 2014 just serves no purpose and continues to drain the Treasury. About the only positive is that having some of our troops deployed there has to remind SOME of the war-mongers not to jump into yet another idiotic war with Iran. Of course, despite the Obama administration taking out bin Laden on his watch, they'll instantly be declared "quitters" or "weak on foreign policy" if we withdraw, which will be infuriating.

Foster has a small role in Rampart too, a very good Woody Harrelson movie about an unhinged (to say it nicely) LA police department officer. Saw Conan here in China in 3-D yesterday, god, that was awful. I wonder how many more 3-D movies they can foist on the public before people stop going? The only reason we went is because two of my co-worker's sisters from the Philippines had never seen a movie in this format before, and boy, were they disappointed. I told them movies like Avatar and How To Train Your Dragon were so much better movies to see as an example. Even the upcoming re-release of Titanic in that format, probably. Disney's John Carter made up for a relatively weak $30.6 million debut at home by bringing in $70.6 million abroad from 55 territories representing 80% of the market. But the real story here, of course, is John Carter, which Disney infamously spent $250 million to produce. With that kind of price tag, Carter really needed to open to $50 million at a bare minimum. Other films that reportedly cost around $250 million include Spider-Man 3, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, and Avatar, and those four movies debuted to an average of $99 million. John Carter, on the other hand, collected an estimated $30.6 million this weekend. That’s slightly better than the $25 million or so that most in the industry were predicting, and would represent a solid start for many films. But it’s a dismal showing for such a costly project. Both the movie and its marketing campaign are to blame for the soft opening. The film, which garnered mixed reviews and marked the first live-action undertaking for Pixar’s Andrew Stanton (Finding Nemo, WALL-E), is based on Tarzan author Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 1917 book A Princess of Mars. That book was the first in a series of Barsoom sci-fi novels that later influenced films such as Star Wars and Avatar. However, since the general public is not overly familiar with the Barsoom works, John Carter appeared derivative of the very things it inspired. Also not helping the movie out was its cast, headed by an unproven Taylor Kitsch (Friday Night Lights). True, Avatar featured the similarly untested Sam Worthington, but James Cameron’s name is as big as any movie star, and he at least surrounded Worthington with some familiar faces like Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriguez. The most familiar face in John Carter was… Mark Strong? But it’s really Disney’s marketing that performed a disservice to the movie. For months, John Carter suffered from muddled ads and trailers, none more misjudged than its Super Bowl commercial, which wrongly assumed audiences were so familiar with the John Carter brand that simply seeing the movie’s title would excite them. Also hurting matters was the generic title, which Disney shortened from John Carter of Mars with the reported belief that “of Mars” would turn off female moviegoers. But Mars is the project’s major selling point. Without it, the movie became a sphinx to the general public. Who is John Carter? Where is he? Why can he leap great distances? I understand the desire to not reveal too much of a film’s story, but these are basic questions that weren’t answered by Disney’s advertising until right before John Carter‘s release. By then, it was too late. The film tilted toward men, whom Disney says comprised 63 percent of the audience. It also skewed a bit older than one might expect a PG-13 sci-fi adventure would, with 59 percent of the audience over age 25. Showings in 3-D represented 64 percent of the movie’s gross. And audiences generally liked John Carter, with CinemaScore participants giving it a “B+” rating. One CinemaScore finding is particularly worth noting: Only 8 percent of those polled said Taylor Kitsch was their reason for buying a ticket. Compare that number to 72 percent for Safe House star Denzel Washington.

Simon Castro got bombed out of the stadium by the Dodgers. 1+ IP, 6 hits, 5 runs alllowed...a bit like the first Gustavo Molina appearance. I guess that's good, in one sense, it makes it more likely he'll be sent down to work on things as a starter and not as the 6th/7th guy out of the Sox bullpen.

QUOTE (SoxFan1 @ Mar 10, 2012 -> 01:46 AM) I'm an idiot. Somehow forgot that I watched this last year so I got a 2nd showing. Still enjoyed it. I'm a big Statham fan, and I also like Ben Foster a lot too. He's still never had another role as good as the villain in 3:11 to Yuma. Looks like John Carter's headed for the high 20 millions in terms of box office, rather than the $20-22 million most were predicting. Still, a huge disappointment and a ton of work domestically and internationally to come halfway close to breaking even on that $250+ million budget, which I guess includes marketing costs (hopefully for Disney).