Jake

I'm so glad Hoffman is out of the question. Last thing we need is a righty with good velo, control problems, and no track record of success in a non-elite college conference. Aaron Nola is and was an infinitely better choice. For me, Rodon - Kolek - Nola - Aiken. I'm pretty cool with any of them at this point.

Almost every time fathom makes a post about how bad Davidson is hitting, he hits a home run. Keep it coming!

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 5, 2014 -> 12:28 AM) Why wouldn't it be surprising to me (at all) if Aiken doesn't have a huge impact at the major league level? He would be the 4th pitcher on my list at the moment. I'm not super high on Aiken, either.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 4, 2014 -> 10:31 AM) Surely, the presence of Harrelson in the booth has much more of a direct impact (both positively and negatively) on team marketing than anything Farmer and DJ do. They're actually okay together now. Nothing like the guys we've had in the past like John Rooney, Wayne Hagin...or even Dave Wills, now with the Rays. Just okay. And still way better than Chris Singleton on radio. The more interesting survey would be how well Harrelson does with both men and women under age 40...especially teenagers. I have a feeling a lot of the teenagers' parents grew up with Hawk and pass on their love of the Sox through his broadcasting anecdotes, but there's that other side....the kids growing up without an affiliation or without parents who are huge baseball fans. What do those kids think about him...and how is he perceived? I have a feeling those stories from the 50's, 60's and 70's are going to be of little interest to kids of today's generation, that are so addicted to their ipads, computer games and cell phones. My anecdotal experience is that the younger people are more into because he makes the game more fun and interesting. You can actually tell when important things are happening.

QUOTE (Soxfest @ Jun 1, 2014 -> 12:31 PM) Not going to work anymore since early May. MLB has followed the procedure from their Android app and changed the At Bat app for iPhone, iPod and iPad to force the use of location services. These can’t be bypassed by any vpn or proxy service. These devices now require the location services to be enabled in order for the app to function. This will give away location regardless of the DNS changes. I've gotten around blackout on a rooted Android tablet. I converted my location spoofing app to a system app and used a VPN from the same location. The trick is that if "allow mock locations" is enabled in developer settings, MLB At Bat will not let you watch. Converting the GPS spoofer to a system app allows you to spoof location without enabling mock locations.

I don't think it is completely unreasonable to take issue with team names like Illini, Indians, etc. It is not as offensive as Redskins. To call yourself Indians and use Chief Wahoo is worse than to call yourself Indians and use a chief or a tomahawk or something. Of all things, though, Redskins is the easiest to say, "that has to go." And yes, Pekin Chinks is pretty ridiculous but I remembered that one. Kinda funny they went with Dragons to replace it, but again, that's not so bad since Dragons are meaningful to and symbolic of the culture of Peking, China

QUOTE (Brian @ Jun 4, 2014 -> 08:36 AM) But there wasn't because it's ridiculous, like that analogy. Changing from the Bullets to the Wizards to get away from a violent ideology would've been more suitable. If every school or team changes their Indian mascot names, fine, but why is Washington being singled out? Because "redskin" is a particularly derogatory term that cannot be construed as deferent or respectful

My gut: 1. Rodon 2. Kolek 3. Nola 4. Aiken

Most of us don't know Native Americans, so we don't realize what things do or do not bother them

QUOTE (Feeky Magee @ Jun 3, 2014 -> 09:46 PM) By far the biggest factor, perhaps the only one, was the Sox having the highest bid The key is knowing that the bid will be worth it.

Sale looked really f***ing bad with that beard. For that reason alone, I'm glad to see it go. I don't want to watch the kid go through puberty on TV

Abreu really makes you feel like you're watching something special in progress. How can someone hit homers on a pace like this? It's crazy to think that it's been done before.

26.6% K% for Kris Bryant could stand to go significantly down. No need to rush him when he has an obvious thing to work on.

Maybe I'm just being a non sequitur, but I just can't get myself excited about Aiken the way I can for Rodon and Kolek. Must be a preference for upside - not to say Aiken has low upside, but he doesn't have the wow physical traits nor the MLB ready repertoire. You see Rodon's talent and success and you know you not only have a guy with a pretty high floor, you also have Chris Sale upside. Kolek has a lower floor, but has arm talent velocity-wise to go with a big body like we haven't really seen, especially for someone his age. Aiken is more of a classic "really talented, pretty refined, could be an ace but more of a sure thing for mid-rotation" guy.

Yeah, that's a big joke. You can have Andrelton Simmons, I'll have Abreu. I'll also have Sale. I'd probably take Quintana over several guys on that list.

Nobody's given up on Semien except Soxtalk. It was clear as day before the season that he needed more than a 30-day trial in AAA and that remains true today.

It isn't like we haven't given up the responsibility to find that this guy did desert. The fact is that we don't know and it's probably better not to err on the side of "this guy is going to be mutilated by terrorists"

The original "blame Seth Rogen" editorial was a hell of a lot more nuanced

Semien was rushed up here. It was obvious from his time in AAA and MLB last year that he wasn't quite ready for the big time. That's okay, most players need more than a handful of games at AAA before they can hit big league pitching. This will be good for him and should provide a chance for the Sox to assess his accumen at SS.

It's a beautiful thing that it shouldn't be too difficult to put a really great team out there again for next year

I was ready for us to lose when we were down 3-1 because we just appeared to be the inferior team. It's frustrating to look so good over the next 3 games but still lose.

Gangs really benefit from straw purchasing and gun shows. You should go to a gun show in my old town, Memphis. Holy crap is it terrifying.

I think Hillary is wisely being as quiet as possible on most substantive issues and questions like her "plan" but it's easy to have an ass made of you over the course of two years. Wait to see what matters, what people want, etc. when it's closer to time to actually run

QUOTE (Soxfest @ May 30, 2014 -> 06:16 PM) Looks like I will not see many Sox games. It is a joke to live 90 miles south of Chicago and no way to see Sox play many games on tv. And it will probably be impossible to stream those games, even if you're willing to pay

There's a lot of money to be made being good at what you do. The guy who comes up with the way to prevent pitching injuries is going to make a bunch of money