CubinNY

It's not just ERA+ that goes into the equation. Check out his other graphs. He's right around league average and has been for a couple of years now. Yet, he's compensated quite well. Here is a compairson to Maddux http://www.fangraphs.com/comparison.aspx?playerid=840&playerid2=104&playerid3=&position=P&page=0&type=full

Not really. It's a one year deal, and Pettitte got his home run rate back in check in the second half, allowing him to post a 2.80 ERA. I'd rather have that deal than the Lilly or Marquis deal. There's almost no chance Lilly or Marquis earns their keep over the next few years, but there's a significantly higher chance that Pettitte can do it for next year only. If it would have worked out, fantastic... if it didn't, he wouldn't be blocking Guzman, Veal, or Gallagher in 2008. I wouldn't... Pettitte is only about 15% better than the average pitcher over the course of his career. Is that worth $16M? I sure don't think so. You'd rather have Lilly for 4 years and 40 mil, when he's never been anything special, or Marquis for 3 years and 21 million fresh off an ERA over 6? Both of those guys have a pretty high chance to implode and become impossible to move. At least with Pettitte you retain roster flexibility and don't block your best prospects. It's not about who I would rather have. Lilly and Marquis are not part of the equation. Pettitte is right around a league average pitcher, and he's paid like a superstar http://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.aspx?playerid=840&position=P&page=0&type=full

Two years ago when the Cubs were in NY to play the Yankees, who is walking around Yankee stadium yelling CUBS WOO!, none other than Ronnie. How does he make it anywhere? The guy has some sort of super power.

IBL See transactions

Holy crap, the Yankees are paying Andy Pettitte $16 million this year. Now that is a bad contract.

D-Lee had a hit in the first.

Overrated. You are being sarcastic when you keep repeating this, right? Probably, but it is highly overrated. Highly. Defense in baseball is the least important of the three (offense, defense, and pitching) becasue the difference between an elite defender and an average or poor defender is extremely small. While the differene between an elite pitcher or batter and the average or poor one is huge.

Dope got nailed in the shoulder

New year same story. The Cubs are a' swining mad men.

is that the kid from Clemson? yes

nice!

"The flu" is another word for didn't want to travel.

Who's drinking with me?

"Somebody is punching a wolf ticket"

Ya know..... last year, the CUBS were 32-22 when they scored in the first inning...... 34-74 when they didn't. :wink: Man, I'm really getting excited about baseball !! No game thread would be complete without a stat quote from Fred. Let the game begin! Less than 24 hours.

YEA, A GAME THREAD!

I agree. A statistic is simply a way to measure some portion of the game. A stat neither necssarily detracts nor enhances any part of baseball. If a stat is meanigful (i.e., useful) then why not use it? It's like arguing that learning something new about baseball is a bad thing, which Joe Morgan does every chance he gets.

My favorite is the great Grudz/Walker debate of 04. "You don't dump your new girlfriend just becuase your old girlfriend wants to get back together with you", or something like that

Usually when I'm posting I'm also doing other things as well. I'm very good at multi-tasking. However, multi-tasking creats errors and this is a message board for baseball and not an English class. Most of the time it's not hard to get the jist even if all the words aren't spelled correctly and the grammar is poor.

But Morgan's claim is he didn't change his vote because he has recently voted yes. I've never liked Morgan so I'm not going to claim he's telling the truth - but he is claiming he voted for Santo to get in. Morgan may well have voted for Santo, but not enough of the people who didn't vote for him in 2005 changed their vote. I'm pretty sure Santo got roughly the same % this year that he got the last time they voted. That means either the new guys voted for him but the one who didn't last time didn't this time. or The news guys didn't vote for him but some of the people changed their vote. or some combination of the two. My guss is the first one.

Morgan says he voted for Santo and Shmidt said he would vote for Santo. Hmm. what to believe Santo didn't receive any "new" votes from past members who voted on him or the new guys who entered didn't vote for him but the a few who didn't last time decided to change their vote. I'm going to believe that the old guard didn't change their vote. At one point in time Shmidt said he didn't think anyone should get elected by the vetrans committee because if they were good enough they would have gotten voted in by the writers.

If the CBA allows for such a maneuver, what would be the basis for their greivance? The article doesn't say. My guess is that arbitration must be entered into with good faith. The PA could argue he's only being released because he won his hearing. They might argue if the Padres didn't want to take the risk of losing arbitration they should never have offered. I'm not sure of the nuiances of the CBA, but my guess is it would revolve around a "good faith" clause. I don't buy the good faith argument. Clearly the CBA has an out clause for exactly this situation. It is not like Walker is going to walk away empty handed. He is going to get 1/6 of his salary without having to do a thing. How would you feel if your boss fired you for getting a raise and decided to give you two months salary when he fired you? Walker's agent should have informed him this was a possibility of happening before he accepted arbitration. His union gave away that right, and they can't be upset about it now just because it might possibly be used. I would feel bad about it (your analogy of getting fired, but I would have to accept it if it was in my contract, and I can't see how their challenge will result in anything but possibly eliminating that in the next CBA. The process of arbitration is agreed upon by both parties, on good faith that the result of the hearing will be abided to. Releasing Walker after he won an arbitration case is not bargining in good faith.

If the CBA allows for such a maneuver, what would be the basis for their greivance? The article doesn't say. My guess is that arbitration must be entered into with good faith. The PA could argue he's only being released because he won his hearing. They might argue if the Padres didn't want to take the risk of losing arbitration they should never have offered. I'm not sure of the nuiances of the CBA, but my guess is it would revolve around a "good faith" clause. I don't buy the good faith argument. Clearly the CBA has an out clause for exactly this situation. It is not like Walker is going to walk away empty handed. He is going to get 1/6 of his salary without having to do a thing. How would you feel if your boss fired you for getting a raise and decided to give you two months salary when he fired you?

Mac, Jurko and Harry played a soundbite from a brief interview Bruce Levine held with a member of the Hall of Fame board (Jane something) and Joe Morgan. Levine kept calling out Morgan and saying that perhaps the players on the veterans' committee aren't intelligent enough to vote in the right players. Hopefully they make it available on espn1000's website. If Levine actually said that he's earned a gold star in my book for asking a tough question. Making Joe Morgan the Vice Chairman of the committee is a perfect example of what is wrong with the vetrans committee. It's like making Ralphie Wiggum the Mayor.

Why even have a vetrans committee if their sole purpose is to keep people out. No one even came close.