Balta1701

QUOTE(RockRaines @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 12:11 PM) As long as AJ catches tonight, I feel pretty good about our chances. Does JV not work well with Widger? I thought those 2 worked together in Montreal. Meuh.

QUOTE(rventura23 @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 12:04 PM) let go javy on a side note: anybody know if theres a video of the BA homer somewhere? whitesox.com did not put it up It was up @ WhiteSox.com when I went there. It was on the auto-play video option.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 11:36 AM) They released a bunch for Katrina relief right? Yeah I think they did then (correctly btw), but I didn't realize we resumed filling the thing afterwards.

QUOTE(Soxbadger @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 11:43 AM) As to the Ruth argument, once again Ruth was playing against much weaker competition. First, Ruth never played against a single minority. Black's were not allowed in MLB, there were no latin american players, there were only white people. This greatly diluted the talent level and made it so that the few great athletes were that much better. Was Ruth a better pitcher than Satchel Paige? Probably not. Was Ruth a better hitter than Josh Gibson? Maybe, but this just goes to show that since there were 2 leagues Ruth had the great benefit of never having to face many of the most talented players in the game. If you look at your own article that you gave me in which Bird says African American's are better athletes, and then look at Ruth having the fortune of never having to play in an integrated league, it is not very hard to understand why Ruth's numbers may be inflated. On the other hand, there are 2 sides to every story (btw, I'm ignoring the racism debate because I don't care). Ruth never had to pitch against Satchel Paige or any number of others. But Ruth also had enormous disadvantages then too. How about, for example, the dramatic increase in number of teams since Ruth's day, such that the talent is less concentrated? Aside from the White Sox, how many teams are really able to run out a great pitcher every day? If there were 10 teams in the league, I bet you they could. Or, how about the ballparks? Some of the places Ruth played were absolutely cavernous. What would have happened had he played in Minute Maid, or Coors? Who knows. On top of that, Ruth never had anything close to modern strenght and conditioning techniques. Instead of performance enhancing drugs, he had to overcome performance hindering drugs. The reality is this; it's almost impossible to really even guess how one hitter could do during one time compared to another. The differences are just too extreme. The fact is this; Babe Ruth dominated his era as much as any player in history. Barry Bonds did the same in the steroid era. Anyone who tries to really say anything beyond that is just blowing smoke.

Let's go Javy! Keep up that s*** you were throwing last time, and let's get another streak started.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 07:35 AM) I heard on the news this morning that the gov't is suggesting reducing tax breaks on "research" - as a 'penalty' for the high profits. WAKE UP, GOVERNMENT IDIOTS! THEY WILL NOT SPEND THEIR OWN MONEY IF THEY DON'T HAVE INCENTIVE TO DO SO!!!! Of course, some would counter by saying that there's enormous incentives for energy companies to invest their own dollars in "research"; the profits of those companies in the future.

You're kidding me, I thought they finally topped off the SPR a few years ago? They've seriously still been filling that thing this whole time? Yowza.

QUOTE(T R U @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 11:17 AM) I was at the game last night when Lidge completely choked, then gave up the granny to Nomar.. Me and my brother saw that s*** coming before Lidge even stepped out of the bullpen.. man, every since the St. Louis series last year he has been goin downhill "I don't think that taste is there."

QUOTE(BigSqwert @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 09:03 AM) I can't blame Uribe on the loss. I think it was one of Ozzie's worst managed games this year. From the lineup choice to his handling of pitchers. The offense was very non-clutch as well for the most part. I will grant Ozzie 1 mistake last night. If you're riding with 3 lefties in your bullpen and a lefty is leading off the 8th inning in a tie game...you better put a damn lefty in. Other than that...I still can't complain about Ozzie running out a junky lineup. The Mariners are not going to be challenging us for a playoff spot or home field come September. Teams like the Twins or Angels might be. If we need to rest people and wind up losing a game, I'd rather lose 1 against the M's than lose it against someone who really might give us a run for our money. And it's going to be a hell of a lot easier for our backups to come out with a win against the Mariners than against some of the other teams in the league.

Wait a second, so you mean Carl wasn't the greatest leader in American History last year?

QUOTE(toasty @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:19 PM) but play all but 2 in one game??? thats MORONIC it sounds like something dusty baker would do! No it's not. Think about it this way, you rest 0 guys, you win like 54% of your games. You rest 1 guy, you win 50%. You rest 2 guys, it's like 48%. You rest 3 guys, it's like 46%. The biggest difference comes when you take your first starter out. If you're going to rest people, on average, you win more games when you do rest them in bulk than when you rest them individually.

QUOTE(Misplaced_Sox @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:16 PM) I would have never run out this lineup for the first game... just pure madness Guys, it's ok to lose a game every now and again. You can't play your starters 162 games a year, and keeping people rested worked well last year.

If nothing else, Everyday Eddie has an ERA over 10.

QUOTE(fathom @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:11 PM) Why not have Pods run for AJP, and try to get into scoring position? If you have confidence in Uribe getting a single, you do. I sure don't have that confidence. We'd be wasting both AJ and Pods. And you know that Ozzie, correctly, doesn't like not having a backup catcher on the bench.

QUOTE(fathom @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:02 PM) Really? Our lineup tonight is weak, no doubt about it. If you have 8 of your normal starters, and one bencher in the lineup, you still have your main lineup in the game. We actually looked at this a bit last year. When teams play their full starting lineup, they have a positive winning percentage on average. When they pull the first starter, it drops by a couple percent, but then for every starter you take out after that, the difference between the winning percentages is less. I think, IIRC, that when you multiply it out, you get a slightly better number if you rest your guys in bulk and then play your starters in as many other games togehter as you can.

George Sherrill comes in to pitch.

QUOTE(fathom @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:00 PM) With the way we had Ichiro defended, you can't go slow/low in that situation. He had almost the entire left side of the infield to hit it through. Our lack of hitting tonight put us in a dog fight. Please Ozzie....no matter if we win or lose, no more games where we bench 3 starters. I think we actually have a better chance at winning more games if we bench 3 guys in 1 game than if we bench 1 guy in each of 3 games.

Well, if we can't score more than 2 runs against the Mariners, we don't deserve the win.

QUOTE(SoxFan1 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 08:53 PM) No one is in the f***ign chat room??? It's been vacant all night. Some of us dropped by earlier.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 06:30 PM) But you CAN be fired or suspended from a federal job based on it. Or not hired at all. Doesn't make it right. There's a reason why those things are inadmissable in court. But hey, I guess if you're the federal government, you're big enough that if you fire the correct person 75% of the time, you're getting enough of the bad guys.

QUOTE(Cknolls @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 07:40 PM) 1.34 trillion dollars over 20 years. pretty staggering. I have the source at work. Will post it tomorrow. Over 20 years? Wow, that's remarkable in that it's vastly lower than I would have expected over the last 2 decades.

QUOTE(fathom @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 08:49 PM) The testing in 2004 was quite poor, if I remember. I thought it was after the 2004 season where the testing became "legit". The good news, IMO, is that maybe this MLB investigation might expose the couple percent who did test positive in 04, since I'm not sure there was the guarantee of confidentiality like there was in 03.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 08:46 PM) Just a guess, but I'm thinking illegal substances. Well, that was in 2004, so there was certainly testing...we wouldn't necessarily have known because you had to test positive like 3 times in order to get a suspension.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 08:45 PM) Carl is looking pretty heavy It's all a question of motivation for him any more. And I think last year might have been the last year he really got up for a season, since he was playing to try to get 1 more contract.

God, how the Hell did Beltre go from 48 home runs in a season to not even hitting the Mendoza line?