DBAHO

A speed bag would have been better.

San Diego's a cool city, especially the Gaslamp District, and there's lots of nice beaches and golf courses, plus Tijuana ain't far away at all.

America - Seattle (loved the city even if it does rain too much), San Diego (preferred it to San Fran) or Phoenix (love the heat, even if the city needs to be developed more). I would say Chicago as I really liked the city, but it's just too damn cold there most of the time. Europe - London, Barcelona or somewhere in Germany.

One of Linebrink's main issues is that his BB/G has risen from 1.9 last season to 3.5 currently, which is just a little above his career average. Last season also he had a DER of .741 and that's dropped to .681 currently, so he's obviously had some subpar defense behind him when he's pitched so far this season. However he has a FIP of 4.28, and that's a 2.03 difference b/w that and his ERA. So that indicates what kind of pitcher he's been so far moreso I think. And he had a 4.27 FIP last season. And really, you expect a bit more than that for a reliever you're paying almost $5M a season to.

Unless it's the super greased up deaf guy. Happy Birthday Steve!

QUOTE (shipps @ Jun 17, 2009 -> 10:05 AM) Mahoneys on Ogden,Duggans in Greek town,Morgans on Halsted to start with some of my faves. Certainly a lot of bum cracks showing on St. Paddy's w/k.

Folks have a Maltese Bichon Frise Cross. He's now 15, had 4 teeth out this week, is quite blind and pretty deaf so I'll be surprised if he lasts another year. We also had a cat, that got run over last November while I was over in the States. Going forward I dunno if I'll have pets when I eventually get my own place, wherever that is. If it's a dog, probably want a Labrador, otherwise a cat.

Yeah South Africa isn't exactly the safest country going around and there's a lot of sketchy areas around there. I wish it was back in Germany again.

In an ideal world, I'd like for KW to trade what veterans he could to keep along the rebuilding path. Someone like Contreras for instance who isn't likely to be back next season could net a prospect or 2. However while the Sox are this close to the AL Central lead, I think KW looks to add a bat. One name I think KW should take a look at possibly is Mark DeRosa, but of course trades within the division aren't likely.

QUOTE (RME JICO @ Jun 17, 2009 -> 11:46 PM) If it was the same Swisher who ended 2008 no. Obviously he would be an upgrade over Wise, Anderson, the way he is currently playing. At first I thought he was hitting so well because of the new stadium, but he has actually been raking away from home with a 1.073 OPS. He's become such a valuable player for the Yankees especially since Nady went down with that shoulder injury. But I agree that it was best for both parties to move on, and we had to cut some salary somewhere. It was probably either Swisher or Dye that had to go in the end.

I think so long as the Sox have a shot at winning the AL Central, they'll keep letting CQ rehab and hope he can make it thru the season. However we don't want this to become a long - term problem either. With Podsednik actually hittting decently, and allowing BA to play 2/3'rds of the games in CF, I'm probably in favor of the former scenario.

Did Joe Buck look at the TV Camera everytime the other person was talking, just like he always does with Aikman?

Welcome to ST.

Australia just beat Japan 2-1 here in Melbourne, Timmy Cahill with a double. Finished 5 points up in our qualifying group for the 2010 World Cup. I'll say it now though, we've got no chance of making it through to the 16 unless Mark Viduka decides to play, since our manager prefers the 4-2-3-1 formation and we desperately need Dukes to hold up the ball so the likes of Kewell, Cahill and Bresciano (3 pretty damn good attacking midfielders) can link up forward. If that happens, I think the quarters are a realistic possibly considering how rock solid we have been defensively over the past couple of years.

Does anyone wish that Nick Swisher was still on our roster FWIW?

Both teams won't score more than a total of 10 runs in their upcoming 3 games each.

It looks like the D-Backs and Webb aren't agreeing to a long - term deal either, although it's been reported that there were some red flags when it came to Webb's shoulder. My guess is the D-Backs will end up trading him since they have Haren locked up out of the 2 if they keep playing the way they have, although they'll certainly get more for Haren in return I would have thought.

Well now you know how it feels to be on the wrong end of a bad call against Italy (still have nightmares about that Lucas Neill penalty call in the last World Cup).

Well that was disappointing to say the least to play like that. You live and die by the 3 and we just didn't shoot it well enough this series. Pietrus wasn't an X Factor off the bench as he was in the Cavs series, Lewis was too hit and miss, and Hedo hurt his leg and didn't play that well. Gortat's likely bolting to a team such as the Knicks in the off-season, so we'll need a replacement big and it'll be interesting to see how the Nelson / Alston combo works out going forward.

To be fair, Dwight's shooting at the line in the playoffs has been pretty good, around 70%. Tonight he just choked and there's no excuse for that. And yeah Hedo missed about 4 FT's, but he was by far our best offensive player tonight. If I'm blaming someone, it's Rashard Lewis. Only had 6 points, and he's got to do a LOT better than that. But Dwight's post game is still very, very raw. He needs to learn not to dribble down low, and go left more and spin baseline and use that left hand more instead of always wanting to go to the middle and shooting that hook shot.

If Dwight Howard makes 1 of those 2 FT's when we're up by 5, it's 2-2. So damn disheartened right now.

That's lunacy. I can tell there'd be a LOT of teams out there who would love to have Mike Brown as their head coach. Cleveland didn't make it to the NBA Finals because they're basically a 1 man team. Mo Williams ain't an all-star, West is a good role player at best, Z is quickly declining and Vareajao is nothing but a dirty scrapper. That's Danny Ferry's fault not Mike Brown's. I wonder if they'll go after Boozer if the off-season though, he'd be a very good fit for them down low again, especially if Wallace retires.

He was basically their best SP last season before he got hurt. They'll give him enough time to fix things up, but I'd revisit this in the off-season if he were still available.

Well that would typify our season so far if our best hitter went down with an injury. I'd probably give Fields playing time at 1B with Beckham at 3B if that were to happen. No need to rush Allen at this point.

QUOTE (thedoctor @ Jun 11, 2009 -> 12:17 AM) personally i think it's a lengthy stretch to hypothesize that there's some rift between ozzie and kw. both are passionate guys who want to win more than anything. when they aren't winning they're both surly. we've seen this before. as far as ozzie's treatment of young players i think he's proven from day one that he is going to treat players one way. he isn't going to have a lot of variance. now you can argue whether or not he should and there's no question i wish he'd ease up on some of his comments, but you take the good with the bad. if a young player is going to be scarred or ruined by his manager's comments to the media then i'm not certain he was going to be worth much any way. I think this is definitely the biggest test of Ozzie Guillen's career as a manager right now. He's shown that with a good pitching staff and a veteran ballclub, he can win ballgames and he did winning the World Series in 2005. But now the Sox are rebuilding on the fly, and Ozzie has to show that he has enough patience with the young players for them to ride out their slumps at the major league level. Right now, I think many Sox fans are concerned with what he's done based on the likes of BA and Fields. But this team isn't as talented as they have been in the past, and I wonder if KW and Ozzie are both here next season (right now I'd say the chances of that are good), how many veteran ballplayers they will pursue at 2B, 3B and the OF come the off-season when they have some $$$ to spend.