DBAHO

My guess is it's Barker. With the signing of Campbell, there's no need for Barker to become the point man on the PP in the future. Would this make Robert Lang expendable at all as well? But getting Kopitar and Neil for Khabibulin and Barker is a very good salary dump (albeit losing Cam would hurt).

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jul 16, 2008 -> 02:55 PM) DB, Where are you staying, and do you really want to do all the "tourist" things or are you looking for a different experience? At a Hostel on East Congress Parkway and Wabash. To be honest, I wouln't mind checking out the Chicago Nightlife while I'm here, but I'd look to do at least 1 Touristy thing (whether it's a boat tour or something).

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Jul 16, 2008 -> 01:38 PM) New York Pizza is disgusting imo. Some New York Pizza's are, you can just taste the fats and oils as you eat them. But there are some places which just make a really, really good thin slice pizza. You've just got to know who and where they are. Jason, I will be trying out Lombardi's pretty soon I think. It's close to an Aussie Bar that I frequent at quite often, so I think it'll "come in handy".

Kopitar would be great, but do you want to lose a potential #1-2 d-man in either Seabrook (who's already argubly there) or Barker to do so? I'd probably rather stand pat. I think we need a 2nd line LW (especially if Ladd's playing on the 3rd line with Bolland and Dustin) to play with Lang and Havlat more anyways.

Didn't iamshack have a great drunk story about something in Tampa? Maybe he'd be a good person to ask?

QUOTE (jackie hayes @ Jul 16, 2008 -> 10:46 AM) And that would have been bad because...? I don't really care much, as I don't see the Bulls competing next year, regardless. But short term, Camby's a nice player to have, and long-term, you get out from Hinrich's contract. Not sure if they would have wanted Hinrich, though. Well I mean they would have had to have done a salary dump to get under the cap so they could acquire Camby (and maybe renounce the rights to Deng and / or Gordon also). The only team really out there with cap room was the Clippers (originally) and Memphis. Memphis doesn't need Hinrich with 3 PG's already on the roster, and Hughes has what 2-3 years left on his deal for around $15M?

QUOTE (knightni @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 03:48 PM) What's wrong with Rover? You get to go everywhere. I'd rather be lazy and be the DH.

The Nuggest were desperate to dump salary so that they didn't have to pay the luxury tax. That's what you get when you resign Nene to a 60/6 deal though, and have Kenyon Martin making close to a max contract. The Bulls would have had to trade either Hinrich or Hughes to be able to acquire Camby.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 04:38 PM) Remind me to walk you through the musts of Vegas when we are at the game or tailgating. Hell, I'm going to be out there again in August, when are you going to be there? August 2-5.

QUOTE (Harvin4Heisman @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 02:54 PM) and when you have the worst farm system in all of baseball, No, that would actually be Houston (they did take Jason Castro 10th in the draft ahead of Justin Smoak after all).

QUOTE (TCQ @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 11:01 AM) Gustavo Chacin was in that harden deal?>??? howd i miss that i love me a hefty glasses wearing lefty I think Jason meant Chad Gaudin.

QUOTE (mreye @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 02:56 PM) I would suggest staying downtown (Binions, Fremont, 4 Queens, Fitzgeralds) - cheap hotels, beer, food! They have a shuttle (Called "The Deuce" because it's a double decker bus) that can take you to the strip all day and most of the night for $5 per day (unlimited rides). Ok I might suggest that then. It's just the lure of that we've never been to Vegas before, and you'd love to stay on the Strip, but getting a bus for only $5 a day there is good value.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 03:37 PM) Just got back. Need a lot more details to answer this question. What are you looking to do? What sort of clubs/bars are you looking for? How much are you looking to spend on the hotels, casinos, clubbing etc. Are you a gambler or are you looking for other entertainment? Will you have a car? The good news on Vegas right now is there are an insane number of deals cropping up on hotels, since pretty much every company embarked on a major building and expansion project within the last year or because they had such success during the housing market boom, and now it's turned around and gas prices have gone the other way so they're all suddenly caught having more rooms than they can fill. Ok I'll try my best here; 1 - Looking to gamble mostly, and then get drunk at bars. Both are the highest priority. Don't think we want to do much sightseeing (e.g Hoover Dam, too far away). Getting drunk cheaply is probably more ideal though, I don't want to be paying $8-10 a beer now. I'm into poker, but some of the other guys are more in to blackjack and roulette. 2 - Hotels we're looking at $50 a night for the most. There's probably 4-5 people going, maybe more, so if you know any really good hotel deals (otherwise we're probably staying in a hostel, and I'll be doing enough of that over the next year). 3 - No car. Will be walking, and maybe getting taxi's if we have to.

Well I'm going to Vegas in a few weeks also (yes I'm going everywhere it seems), for a boys weekend with about 4-5 guys my age. Hopefully staying somewhere close to the Strip. What are the best Casino's, clubs / bars etc. if anyone's been? Oh and MiddleBuffalo, have you seen that South Park episode where they go to Aspen for a weekend for a 30 minute Time Share meeting? Hope your weekend certainly doesn't turn out like that.

Just going to throw something out there. Adrian Beltre has been made available in trade talks. If Crede did bolt during FA, and the Sox decided to use Fields in a trade package (to say bring in a good CF such as Nate McLouth if Konerko was traded), would anyone be interested in trading for Beltre? His defense has always been very good, and hitting wise he hasn't been great, but he's hit around 15-20HR's over the past couple of seasons with around a .260 AVG in argubly the hardest hitting ballpark for RHH's in Safeco, his offensive numbers would improve from hitting at the Cell.

Miranda needs to start hitting or else he'll become a lower level version of Robert Valido.

There's no doubt that Longoria should have been in automatically, and Dye should have gotten the nomination. But at least we've got 2 guys in there I guess.

I think I am going to go to Giordano's here for the Deep Dish Pizza, seems to be well rated by mostly everyone, even if it isn't the favourite. Is there 1 in the Loop which is better than the others, the one on South Wabash is probably the closest for me.

Look I think it's been a very unlikely "Joe Crede" season than what we expected coming into this year. You would have thought, with his back, that he would have struggled offensively and only hit around .240 possibly, but that he would still give you good defense. Well the opposite has basically happened, where Crede has looked more like Josh Fields out there. Last season Crede was fantastic in defense, so I don't know why he's been so bad this season. Offensively, he's hit for more power than I have expected, but the average is creeping down a little. Overall, it's been a mixed bag, but I'll take what he's done so far, as I think will most Sox fans.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 11:35 AM) Ugh. Don't bother. There are so many other neighborhoods in the city where you'd have as good a time, or better, and for a lot cheaper. Go to Rush Street, or the Warehouse district, or Wicker Park, or any number of other cool areas of town. But if you must see Lincoln Park and go stare at the trixies, take the red line to Fullerton, and walk east. You're there. My boss actually told me about Rush Street, said it was a really good area for nightlife / bars etc. That's just a bit north of downtown Chicago isn't it?

He's having a physical at Chicago apparently today. Think he's going to end up signing with you guys. If he's healthy, him and Forte are a decent 1-2 punch.

QUOTE (whitesoxfan101 @ Jul 15, 2008 -> 02:14 AM) I would be somewhere in between crestfallen and baffled if the Twins trade for Beltre. I doubt that one is going to happen big time. Well he'd give them a big upgrade defensively at 3rd base. The M's might pay $2-3M of that contract, and Twins will have Livan Hernandez coming off the books at the end of the season (and will replace him in the rotation with Liriano). So yeah, I could certainly see this happening actually. Plus they may think, last season in his deal, he produced big time before, they may hope he's motivated enough to do it again.

I actually think if you went out and signed Garcia if he was healthy, the Sox should target an upgrade at an OF (Jason Bay?) spot possibly (but then what do you do with Konerko I guess, because Swisher would most likely move to 1B). But that's the thing where the Sox are at right now. They don't DESPERATELY need anything. The rotation for the most part has been good (except for Vaz and JC in the last month), the bullpen has been excellent (but has faltered a little lately), while the offense is beginning to heat up. Right now, I think standing pat as we did in 2005, is very well what we could end up doing, or just making a minor move to improve a bench spot maybe.

For anyone in NY, I've had John's and Patsy's thin slice pizza, and I thought both were amazing. Pizza is so much better over here than what you get in Australia.

Which line and station would I need to get off at if I wanted to check out Lincoln Park FWIW?