Balta1701

QUOTE(Buehrle>Wood @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 04:02 PM) Why not? Because they did not have such a large ESPN profile? I mean, what more did they have to do? Was being only the second wire-to-wire 1st place team while holding the mark for best ever postseason run(With the '98 Yanks) not good enough for you? I would have liked to see a larger regular season win total before counting them up there.

Update

QUOTE(DBAH0 @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:59 PM) So who'd be left for you guys at DT if Johnson and Harris didn't play in the playoffs, and how much does that impact the Bears's ability to stop the run? Let's just say that the Bears would probably be hoping they didn't wind up facing the Chargers.

QUOTE(Balance @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:02 PM) This is a welcome development. Additionally, Barack Obama is sponsoring a bill that would list the details of various spending bills on a website so that voters can instantly see who's trying to "emporken" a given bill. That should be supported as well. And I think I just coined a new word. I demand royalties! Didn't they already pass that bill? I believe that was the one that Byrd and Stevens put a "secret hold" on last summer, and wound up with the entire political internet going around trying to find out who it was holding up the bill.

Joey Porter fined $10k for his comments about Winslow ?

QUOTE(WHarris1 @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:44 PM) I have heard that a man left the house in handcuffs that was NOT Tank. Don't overreact just yet, it could easily be a friend of his. A couple years ago, Congress passed a law such that if someone is in possession of drugs on your property, you can be brought up on charges and jailed. I believe that it would be applicable in this situation if that were the case.

QUOTE(ptatc @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:47 PM) If they sign Zito it won't matter. Let's hope someone else beats them. Even if they sign Zito, their rotation still looks very weak on paper. Zito, Glavine, El Duque, then you've got Oliver Perez, John Maine, and Pelfrey/Humber for the last 2 spots, with maybe a Pedro sighting someday. That might be good enough to get to the playoffs in the NL, but it still looks like it could use a righty who can give you 200 innings.

QUOTE(fathom @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:41 PM) I thought I remember hearing that Greene is one of the worst throwing catchers in baseball. Is Preston Wilson really a FA? Also, don't be surprised if Erstad is a possibility. KW loves him. Yes, Wilson is a Free Agent, he signed that deal with the Astros and then was cut mid-season, the Cardinals signed him for the rest of the year as a stop-gap measure.

QUOTE(fathom @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:44 PM) I'd love for the Sox to get Lastings. He has that super high ceiling which is a little different from our typical draft picks. I've been wanting him all offseason. He fits in perfectly into that OF slot with the potential to steal a lot of bases, and he clearely has worn out his welcome in NY to the point that they brought in Alou so that they wouldn't have to count on him (and most of that was not based on performance).

If the White Sox are dealing away another starting pitcher, then they need a guy who is ready to step into the rotation right now. That means Pelfrey. And the Mets really don't want to give him up. And I would still love to get my hands on Lastings Milledge as a potential replacement for Podsednik, especially since he has no place on that Mets roster and the Mets veterans weren't to thrilled with his act last year (but which I think would work well alongside Ozzie, AJ, and our other guys)

QUOTE(IowaSoxFan @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:30 PM) What about Sanchez instead of Hughes? If the White Sox were willing to take on ARod's entire contract, and ARod requested/demanded a trade behind the scenes, I could see that as a possibility, but that's only if the Yankees have been told that ARod is leaving and no one else offers anything better.

QUOTE(winninguglyin83 @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 02:21 PM) dunno how that would work. Counting on two rookies BMac is not a rookie first of all, and Hughes is either basically ready for the big leagues or will be within a couple months. It's not a bad thing to have youth in your rotation if it is the right youth, and those two would be beautiful. But yeah, the Yankees wouldn't do that.

Carlos Zambrano has a new friend. Seriously, I was scared that when I clicked on this thread, based on the title, it would really be not safe for work.

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 01:56 PM) 5.) Hire Walt Hrniak as a special hitting instructor for problem cases. Bring him in for ST to work with Juan and Brian specifically. He wont want to work full time again. After ST, he can come out once in a great while when a player gets into a funk again to go over what they learned. Both hitters can be good if they keep their swings in check. Juan needs to get his leg kick back, it kept him centered and allowed him to close off and drive towards the pitchers plate. When he ditched it, he was flying open and he had a hard time centering the ball up. Walt can work with Brian on centering the ball up more. Juan was still flying open off the ball with his leg kick within a few weeks of adopting it as a technique. Greg Walker had the right idea with Uribe last year, it just didn't work. The leg kick is a bandaid on a gaping wound - it's trying to fix the poor design of Uribe's swing in 2005. Last year, Walker had Uribe spread his legs apart to shoot for better balance and better ability to see the ball, which is the right technique. It didn't work with Uribe, because he still kept his batting stance too closed and kept the tendency to pull off the ball, and because it sure seems like he is very, very stubborn about wanting to swing at everything.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 12:28 PM) It's certainly not all roses and flowery crap that the right wing blowhards like to say, but it's not as bad as the other side claims it is, either. It's war. It will suck. Of COURSE it's not that great over there. Hell, sounds to me like we should all pack up for a glory trip to Baghdad, don'tcha think? Riiight. We're not that dumb, Laura. You're right for the most part, but I also think that going around throwing 600,000 people killed around and generally insinuating that we're the single cause of it, is not correct, and I also think that number is inflated to gain more ammunition to "get out". When you say it's not as bad as I claim it is, here's my counterpoint. The ISG report, as a case study, did a detailed look at one day last summer. The official report for that day, just chosen at random, was about 90 attacks/civil war incidents. But when the ISG sat down and analyzed the actual results of that day, they were able to find over 1100 incidents of violence, over 90% of which weren't being reported. In other words, if I say it's as bad as what is reported in the media, in terms of total amount of violence, it's actually about an order of magnitude worse. If each one of those on average wound up with 1 person dead, that would result in a greater casualty rate than what came out of the most recent Lancet study.

So, anyone know how accurate that bit on Floyd's fastball is? Most of the other reports have him throwing in the McCarthy range, 91-94 with most of his fastballs. Example. I'd be a little more concerned if he was barely topping 90 than if he was barely hitting 95.

So, let's see, thus far today we've got: Michael Crichton taking a critic of his (on global warming) and turning him into a pedophile in his latest book The AP running as a headline: "Senate Back to 50-50 With Johnson Out" without actually knowing whether that was true or not (they've since come up with a new headline) and fresh off the ISG report that the media/press was reporting less than 10% of the violence in Iraq most days, Laura Bush blames the media for only covering the bad things in Iraq. Guess it's just a normal day.

QUOTE(YASNY @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 10:36 AM) Maybe its because we have too many bleeding heart liberals on the bench ... people like that jerk in Vermont that gave a child rapist probation. What's wrong with a military tribunal? This is war. Our soldier that allegedly raped and killed that girl in Iraq and her family, he's facing a military courtmartial. Why should these assholes get the benefit of a civilian trial? That sounds like a double standard to me. I'm all for a trial if it's it a military tribunal. But no, that's too harsh on these poor mistreated murdering thugs. I don't actually have a problem with these trials being conducted in military tribunals, and I don't believe the law does either. Unfortunately, it's the Bush administration that does. Because, you see, military tribunals actually have similar rules compared with civilian trials, namely, the charges actually have to make sense, the defendent has to be given a right to an attorney, the court must be created by the Congress and in the system below the Supreme Court, and the defendents have some sort of right to see the evidence against them. The Bush administration has tried to set this up in such a way that it's basically a kangaroo court, where the U.S. is judge and jury all at once and the defendents are basically given no right to even know what the charges are, let alone defend themselves. Taking from the Supreme Court's ruling in the Hamdan case: And another section:

QUOTE(YASNY @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 10:27 AM) The last paragraph is a contridiction within itself. They are off the battlefield and no longer a threat. That is the benefit to the United States to continue to hold them. Then give them a fair trial and convict them. If the United States can't prove what should be a fairly simple case, then why should I judge them to be a threat?

QUOTE(YASNY @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 10:15 AM) That vitriol wasn't directed your way. As for the wrong vs wrong question ... I see it as us vs them and they aren't playing by the accepted rules of war, so therefore we have to at least be able to bend the rules. Yes, we humiliated some of the at AG. It wasn't right ... some soldiers got out of hand ... but we aren't executing them, burning their bodies or dragging their corpses through the streets. In fact, I've seen footage of a US soldier or marine get hit with a sniper's bullet .. but his body armor saved him. After retaliation and capture, this very soldier treated the wounds of the sniper. But you never hear about that s***. Yet, humiliation at AG gets thrown in our faces over and over and over and over and over again. I'm tired of it. And I'm tired of kowtowing to liberal agenda in this country. It will eventually be our downfall. There's a difference between bending the rules and breaking the rules. I'll give you a counter-example. A few years ago, the U.S. learned from some source that there were a few Cole bombing suspects in a car in Yemen. The U.S. Blew them up. Was that the right decision? In my view, 100% yes. We had to violate a country's airspace to hit them, and we did , but we eliminated a potentially immediate threat to the U.S. That is a wartime operation, and it's the type you tolerate in this sort of flexible war - the targeting of the opposition's leadership wherever they are. On the other hand, there is a very different thing going on at Gitmo. There we have people who are no longer a threat, who may not have been a threat in the first place, being held indefinately, with years going by before any of them were granted POW status. The law in this country is actually very clear, and it was upheld in the Hamdan case...either those captured are actual criminals, and therefore deserve the simple right of a fair trial before they are shut away forever, or they are prisoners of war and should be accorded as such. The people at Gitmo are off the battlefield. They are no longer a threat to anyone. Some of them may not have even been on a battlefield to begin with. There is simply no benefit to the United States to hold them indefinately without trial. It makes us look horrible, and it gains us nothing.

QUOTE(YASNY @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 10:01 AM) It's getting top coverage on FoxNews. The Channel, not the website. Well, if it winds up being anything actually noteworthy, I will apologize.

QUOTE(YASNY @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 09:52 AM) The level off terrorist ass-kissing on here, at our own peril, is incomprehensible. Giving someone a trial = ass kissing. Remarkable.

QUOTE(YASNY @ Dec 14, 2006 -> 09:55 AM) Hmmmm ... cracking jokes. Some people are more concerned with the safety of terrorists than they are with well being of American elementary school kids. Thus far, these aren't even big enough stories to show up on either CNN or MSNBC, and we know how those networks love to jump at any sign of kids in jeopardy. Somehow, I get the feeling this will be fairly unimportant overall.

That's great, it starts with an earthquake, birds and snakes an aeroplane, Lenny Bruce is not afraid...

The level of inhumanity on display here sometimes is just staggering.