Jake

Cespedes isn't that good. This loss isn't about losing Cespedes. It's about having a team built on a lot of iffy parts and those iffy foundations crumbling down the stretch. When it came down to it, they're a fortunate bounce of a ball away potentially making a run in a playoff series.

Boo. f*** the Royals

This game has been good.

Windows 8 was measurably faster than Windows 7, especially on boot-up. I don't think it was hard to use. Launching programs that I didn't have shortcuts for was in effect no different as I was just tapping Windows+S and typing a search term. It's just a matter of where the search terms appeared. I like the live tiles, but they'll be better served in the hybrid start menu they showed off today. MS Office is such a superior product, though, that I decided to dual boot with W8.1 on my Macbook because I loathe the Mac versions so much. With that said, I do like iWorks. They didn't try to make them into MS Office. They made them simpler, different, elegant, and easy to use. I can't do serious work on there, but they're fun to use for simple things.

Seems like they should have elaborated on that. Apparently Windows 8.1 = 9.

Appellate court just ruled that federal exchanges cannot issue subsidies. This is very bad. Without Congress amending the wording of the law, which seems ludicrously unlikely, this could effectively destroy the law. Let's hope that at least the Democratic states like Illinois will set up their own exchanges since nobody really anticipated the creation of the exchanges to be a big battleground in the first place.

All of this stuff is really tempering my enthusiasm for getting a pet. I'm getting emotional just reading about your pets I don't know if I can handle seeing one of my own go after losing my childhood pets

My fantasy week in one league was basically decided by the fact my opponent had NE DEF and I had KC DEF

QUOTE (shysocks @ Sep 29, 2014 -> 03:18 PM) AL 1. Orioles 2. A's 3. Angels 4. Royals 5. Tigers NL 1. Pirates 2. Nationals 3. Giants 4. Cardinals 5. Dodgers If we're talking about rooting to win it all, put the first four AL teams 1-4, then all the NL teams, then the Tigers at 10. This, verbatim, short of the last bit. I think I'd like to see Pirates win.

QUOTE (gatnom @ Sep 29, 2014 -> 11:05 AM) How do they account for mistakes and bad play? For example, if a team is generally a bad running team and the defense "plays well" against the run, do defenders still get a lot of positive credit for their performance? Generally speaking, yes. It isn't like WAR, which tries to give you a value that allows you to compare players across contexts. PFF is outcome-oriented. For instance, in their write-up about yesterday's game, they mentioned that Michael Ola went from worst game of his season to best game of his season/career in part because the GB DL isn't nearly as good

QUOTE (LDF @ Sep 29, 2014 -> 09:29 AM) I got a HUGE b**** about ESPN this morning. I was watching the top 10 plays and the play that the 3b of the Pirates came in 8. there is no freaking way that should came in 8th. It should have been the top 2 with the hole in 1 golf shot being #1. The entire process is shrouded in secrecy. The anchors are always openly questioning the order and stuff. It's a little silly

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Sep 29, 2014 -> 09:54 AM) everytime you post this stuff, it makes me feel like these numbers are total bulls***. Bostic and Briggs graded positively? Alshon negatively? I read that Bostic, Briggs and Williams got a combined 9 tackles yesterday. Its like they watch a different game and apply grades however they want It's about how multiple raters grade the impact of each player on each and every play. So each rater watches each player for each down and assigns a numeric value to what they did that play - most plays, a player gets 0. If there is disagreement on a given play, they have to work it out. The reason Alshon's grade is low, now that I'm looking, is because he fumbled. Marshall gets a poor grade for having a drop and Cutler's general lack of success passing to him. Grading defense is going to involve fewer concrete numbers, but they still use concrete criteria. Run D is going to involve doing things that affect the run game - did Bostic and Briggs read the play better than expected, fill the gap quickly and force the play to a different gap, blow up the lead blocker, etc. We did really well against their run game, you have to expect that somebody will be responsible in terms of being given credit. One thing that PFF is willing to say is up for debate is the overall grade. So, Marshall and Jeffery were so fantastic grade-wise last year due in part to the fact that they were both in their own world in terms of run blocking as WR. You might not think run blocking is that important for a WR so you won't think their overall grade is as indicative of their ability as their pass game grade. You might think a nose tackle should have no influence on the pass rush whatsoever so you won't factor in his pass rush grade. Etc.

Performances of note yesterday per PFF: Top O: Martellus Bennett (+6.4 overall, +4.0 pass) Michael Ola (+5.2 overall, +3.5 run block) Eben Britton (+1.8 overall, +1.6 run block) Worst O: Jay Cutler (-2.2 overall, -3.4 pass) Alshon Jeffery (-1.6 overall, -1.2 rushing) Brandon Marshall (-1.0 overall, -1.5 pass) Alshon's rushing grade is a little bit of a head scratcher. I don't actually remember his rushes, but maybe I've just blocked it all out. Top D: Jon Bostic (+2.7 overall, +1.9 run defense) Lance Briggs (+2.2 overall, +2.4 run defense) Worst D: Chris Conte (-2.7 overall, -3.0 pass coverage) LaMarr Houston (-2.6 overall, -2.5 pass rush) Stephen Paea (-1.3 overall, -0.9 pass rush) Season leaders: Best O: Brian De La Puente (+7.4 overall, +5.6 run block) Martellus Bennett (+7.1 overall, +6.2 pass) Michael Ola Kyle Long Jermon Bushrod Worst O: Jordan Mills (-5.0 overall, -3.2 pass block) Jay Cutler (-3.2 overall, -5.0 pass) Santonio Holmes (-2.6 overall, -2.4 pass) Top D: Jay Ratliff (+5.3 overall, +3.7 run D) Kyle Fuller (+4.9 overall, +4.6 pass coverage) Jon Bostic (+3.1 overall, +3.0 run D) Worst D: DJ Williams (-4.9 overall, -2.1 run D) Chris Conte (-2.7 overall, -1.8 run D) Ego Ferguson (-2.6 overall, -1.0 run D) Isaiah Frey (-2.3 overall, -2.9 pass coverage) Positional notables around the league: Top QB: Rodgers Top WR: Jordy Nelson Top RB: DeMarco Murray Top TE: Larry Donnell (4. Martellus Bennett) Top OT: William Beatty (LT) Joe Barksdale (RT) Top OG: Michael Yanda (6. Michael Ola 8. Kyle Long) Top C: Nick Mangold (2. Brian De La Puente) Top 4-3 DE: Cameron Wake Top 4-3 OLB: Jelani Jenkins Top 3-4 DE: JJ Watt (he consistently gets scores so absurd that it makes all players look worthless by comparison) Top 3-4 OLB: Terrell Suggs (5. Julius Peppers) Top DT/NT: Kyle Williams (Buffalo) Top ILB: Donta Hightower (12. Manti Te'o) Top CB: Brandon Flowers (6. Kyle Fuller T22. Richard Sherman) Top S: Antoine Bethea

The problem may well have been that Hester had to get let go before he'd change his work habits (whatever they were) to get better on O. We know he seemed to be limited on which plays he knew and always seemed to struggle to balance preparation for kick returns and offense

Moto 360 users reporting that recent software update has more than doubled battery life, especially when in heavy use. One user had the backlight turned on for over 24 hours straight before battery died. With normal use, people are now reporting 48 hours

I'm going to go ahead and tune into the White Sox. The Bears are perpetually disappointing

I don't know what Cutler could do to give me any faith in him. Love that we're attached to him for the next 3 seasons

The refs have consistently f***ed our defense. This is at least two TDs gifted to GB by officials.

Cutler has consistently had INT due to he and receiver not being in sync. It was always about bad coaching or dumb WR. Have to start thinking it's him at some point.

Awaiting the anger at the defense for not stopping GB with a short field

Cutler steps in to remind us which team has the better QB

My NFL Sunday Ticket stream is less reliable than the Bears

Cutler has been very good so far today

The call against Peppers was mystifying on the Bears first drive but they've been victimized by the refs several times since

Remember defense is missing its best DT, their starting DE, and their best CB. Starting safety is also gimpy