erik316wttn

I am with you on that one...(and I even reside in the state of Wisconsin) You, sir, are dead to me.

I made one more, so if you didn't get in the last one, you can get into this one. Even people from the last one can get into this one if they want. Same as before, only this one has 14 teams instead of 16. 6x6 scoring (OBP and BB), h2h. Live draft. IM me if you want a spot. First 13 are in.

I agree some ppl around here can not drive and it pisses me off because I work for the AHL hockey team in Milwaukee so I am constantly on 94. But, god forbid you are forced to drive only 5 over the speed limit. Admirals games are a good time. And I know it as FIB's. Freaking Illinois Bast.... You know the word. Freaking? I've only heard the more vulgar replacement for Freaking. Well, yes. I had to censor myself.

Nice to know that the FIB's still have that inflated sense of self-importance.

I agree some ppl around here can not drive and it pisses me off because I work for the AHL hockey team in Milwaukee so I am constantly on 94. But, god forbid you are forced to drive only 5 over the speed limit. Admirals games are a good time. And I know it as FIB's. Freaking Illinois Bast.... You know the word.

Are there any websites that run keeper leagues?

I'll always remember where I was the day I heard that the Cubs signed Brian Boehringer, future Cy Young winner and World Series MVP. I can gather my grandkids around one day and tell them how Brian (hereafter known as "The Savior") started 20 consecutive games in September, won 19 of them (he lost on one bad call by the home plate umpire), and won all 11 postseason games in route to a Cubs sweep of the World Series. During the World Series parade, The Savior rescued a kitten from a tree, and delivered twelve babies. He also fought Chuck Norris to a draw.

Wouldn't hurt if a couple did... If this was there, my bad.

I think Murton could be that guy. I think he will develop a little more power and fit nicely in that 5 spot. But I am betting Dusty will stick the lefty JJ in that spot. I think Barrett should be that guy. 3 years batting 5th: 345/433/672/1.105 Hell, works for me Pierre Walker Lee Aram Barrett Jones Murton Cedeno Pitcher Woo hoo!

Wrigley is one of few stadiums in all of baseball that has as much to do outside the stadium as inside. It would take away a great deal of the experience for me. I only get to Wrigley about once a year (maybe not at all this year. :(), and the sidewalk vendors are one of the things I most look forward to.

I think Dusty is feeling the heat. He owes all that money to the IRS, and really needs a job. Maybe he visited the best proctologist in the Chicagoland area to remove his head from his rear end.

Assuming Pierre and Walker bat 1-2 in the lineup, should the 3-4 spots be Ramirez/Lee or Lee/Ramirez?

Stay safe, and we'll all be picking up the slack left by your cheering. Although this is the Cubs, after all. I think you'll be alright.

Read this and be disgusted... http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-wrig23.html I can't believe they want to get rid of the sidwalk vendors outside the stadium. To me, that's half of the fun. I love shopping at all the sidewalk stands before a game, then going in, gorging myself on hot dogs and cheering the Cubs on. Wrigleyville is part of the Wrigley Field experience. I think I'd go less if this happened. I really would. I'd just wait for them to come to Milwaukee.

The timing is bad. If it was in November or something, there would be a lot more interest. Right now the main concern is injuries.

That's true after you get to the majors, but I suspect many a player in the minors could make more in a real job, and some for whom the probablity of getting to the majors is low probably quit because of it. You probably don't see many Stanford grads coming back to the same level in the minors for 3 years. choices for alot of 18 year olds 1915 - help the family not starve or go play baseball 2006 - flip burgers for minimum wage or go play baseball what would you choose as an 18 year old in 1915? how about in 2006? also, not sure if he graduated, but here's one http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/G/john-gall.shtml There are more options than flipping burgers or playing baseball today. Anyway, if you're an athletically gifted teenager now, you're usually pushed more toward football or basketball. Back in the 30's up through the 70's or so, the biggest sport was baseball, far and away. The best athletes all wanted to play baseball. I'm not at all saying that there aren't some damned good atheletes in MLB today. There are quite a few of them. But not a vast majority of the best like there were back in the day.

One pitcher from back in the day who I think would be elite today is Walter Johnson. He threw gas, and with the strength training and everything of today, I think he'd still win 20+ games every year. I wonder how a hitter like Lou Gehrig would have been in today's game. He was just as good if not better than Ruth for a few seasons. It's too bad ALS slowed him down.

Not to nit pick but I consider Ted Williams the best hitter of all time. even so, he had a good mentor. Cobb actually got mad at Williams often times and thought he swung for the fences too much. Cobb had a serious dislike for home runs, he thought they cheapened the thrill of the game. Wouldn't that make Williams a better hitter because he hit more homeruns? His average didn't suffer and he hit home runs. I think that makes him better than Cobb. That was why I put Gehrig and Ruth ahead of Cobb also. I never said Cobb was a better all-around hitter than Williams. Clearly Williams or Ruth are the best all-around hitters of all time and that's why i put them higher on my list than Cobb. Cobb is just the best pure hitter ever, in my opinion. And as much as this man knew about the science of hitting, I refuse to think that he'd be overmatched by any pitchers today. He was intelligent enough to hit any pitcher back then, and I have no doubt he'd study up and do the same today. This is true, but the thing you seem to be glossing over about the good pichers of his time is that there were far fewer of them. Today, there are a lot more good pitchers, and as much as you study, you cannot maintain the intensity that allows you to hit .435 against a guy like Johnson as well for far greater periods of time. Today there are better pitchers, more great pitchers and you have to face them more often. Expecting a player, no matter how tenacious, skilled or studious, to transition from weak to strong competion while maintaining his performance is just unrealistic, IMO. Not true. The Cubs maybe will face Pedro twice this coming year. Same with Hudson, Peavy, etc. Even with the good pitchers within our division (Perez, Carpenter, Oswalt, etc) we'd only face about 4-5 times on average. Back then with your team facing only 7 other teams during the season, and 3-4 man pitching rotations, you could realistically face a guy 8 times during a season.

I think he'd be right up there, actually. Babe Ruth hit 714 career home runs in some of those ballparks of yesteryear. He'd hit 800 without breaking a sweat in some of the bandboxes today, hitting against some of the pitchers of today. He just knew how to hit. Period. Cobb used his greatest strengths: his knowlege of the game and blinding speed, and turned them into deadly weapons. Cobb was easily one of the smartest players of all time. He understood the game like few ever have, and it showed. He knew all of his opponents strengths and weaknessess, and exploited them mercilessly. Few players are that smart today. I'm not saying that none are, just very darn few.

You're saying Babe Ruth would be a 5th outfielder in today's game? I think it was harder to put up good numbers back then. Yes, the weight-training and such is greater than it was back then. But there are also 30 teams. Imagine if you conducted this experement: Contract 14 teams. It doesn't matter which 14. Then have the remaining 16 teams draft from the entire MLB pool. Then put 8 teams in the AL and 8 in the NL and see what it does to statistics. Things would be a lot more evened out because the talent level would be so great. You wouldn't see too many 40 home run seasons, IMO, because a lot of those mediocre pitchers would be gone. What I'm saying is that the talent level is really watered down. It was harder to succeed in Babe Ruth's day (even Williams, DiMaggio, etc) because there were fewer teams, and therefore there was far more talent. Add to that that players were more well-rounded back then. You had sluggers that routinely stole 20 bases. Sluggers would lay down bunts, and could take walks. Babe Ruth never, not once, struck out more than 100 times in a season. That's nearly unheard of today for power hitters. I'm not saying that all of the "greatest of all time" played 50 years ago. Maddux certainly belongs among the elite, as do many other players of today. But, to say that Ruth, Cobb, etc wouldn't succeed in today's game is wrong, IMO.

Cobb played in a far different era, though. Cobb debuted in 1905 IIRC. For the first 15 years of his career, they essentially played with a rock. He won the triple crown one year with something like 9 homers. Nine. Ballparks were huge and the ball was rock hard. As it was in 1920 when Ruth hit 54 homers, making his feat nearly God-like. Ruth revolutionized the game with the home run, and by the time baseball figured out that home runs put fans in the seats, they made the ball much more lively, which made the home run more common and power became almost a necessity. You didn't need power to win back in Cobb's day. He got on base and did his job. He was a pitchers nightmare and the most feared player in the game. Even today, if you could somehow take a time machine, take Cobb in his prime and put him smack dab in today's game, he'd still hit .380. Cobb was one of the most baseball-smart players there ever were, and added to his natural athletic ability, made him the best player of all time, IMO. He barely edges out Ruth, though. Cobb Ruth Ted Williams Hank Aaron Stan Musial I guess if you wanted to argue about it, you could put Gehrig in there somewhere. Maybe at #5. He was definately one of the most underrated hitters of all time, and looking at his career numbers, that's saying something.

Walker is a very good #2 hitter. Pierre Walker Lee Ramirez is a pretty good 1-4, IMO.

I'd still be in favor of the Senators.

Hoops is Juan Gonzalez. It makes sense. You've never seen them together.

I'd say so is 15% of SoCal. Including me. :( Aaah!! Unclean! Unclean!!