Andy

How long until we can start speculating on the caliber of prospect we'll be able to flip him for?

How much of the Bulls current cap is being used on Lonzo, who will probably never play again, and LaVine, who will probably never be 100% again? I think "just blow it up" is mostly lazy fan take nonsense, but there's no path to contention if so much of your available money is wasted on utterly useless or hopelessly depressed assets.

If that really is the plan then it's starting to look like we were butt horsefeathering lucky to stumble into maybe the most quickly developing and successful core of prospects I can ever remember in baseball because our ceiling would've been 85 wins without it.

Call me a meatball then, I don't think Swanson is gonna make enough of a difference to bother and I don't want to overpay the 5th best SS just to pretend we care about winning this year.

I don't see a meaningful difference between "worried the money will dry up" versus "worried the money will dry up unless the Cubs hit some undetermined benchmark of performance"

Oh, you're not missing anything. The Cubs need a catcher, a horsefeathering All-Star was available for a prospect and instead he goes to a division rival. Of course he probably doesn't pitch-frame well enough either or something.

Update - so the guy I needed to lose didn't lose. I hadn't even considered the idea that my Patriots defense vs. my opponent's DeAndre Hopkins, when I was down 15 points, would swing the other way. New England's defense scored 20 points in our league. Hopkins had 5.9. I would've won if Josh Uche, who had his mitts on Colt McCoy on Arizona's final play, would've completed the sack. Instead I lose by 0.8. Insane.

My fantasy playoff life is on the line tonight. I lost this week to fall to 7-7 but can back in to the 6th and last playoff spot if the guy poised to pass me for that position doesn't have James Conner outscore the Arizona defense by more than 10 points. I won this league last year so I'd really like to try to defend the title. IF I get in, it actually would've worked out pretty well because the guy I would have played in the playoffs had I just won is the highest-scoring team in the league, but the guy locked into the #3 seed opposite my potential #6 ranks 8th in the league in scoring. (I'm 3rd.)

I drafted David Njoku to start the season and dropped him after 2 or 3 weeks of basically nothing. Since then it's been a revolving door of terrible numbers while Njoku has actually been pretty good.

That's terrible. All the best for him and his family. Given the age of many of these coaches and the nature of their jobs it's a wonder this doesn't happen more often.

Really rather overpay Correa than give Swanson 200M.

Yeah, the end of divisions should definitely be considered a factor. Like you said, basically none of the lesser programs in the B1G can stumble into a title now unless the top few programs all go into down cycles at the same time. Seems like Satterfield never really had the fan base after he interviewed for the South Carolina job that went to Shane Beamer. Was thought to be on the hot seat as recently as this season. Curious hire by Cincinnati, really, which ought to have been able to attract any up-and-comer it wanted given the upward mobility of other recent coaches.

That may go down as the most befuddling turn of events in my Cubs-fan life. It was like for one year, with one guy, we somehow got a hold of the pixie dust ourselves for once.

Heyman has Contreras' deal at 5 years. Wow.

Long overdue.

May as well start shifting December CFB talk to this thread. Jeff Brohm is reportedly leaving Purdue for Louisville.

Watching what pixie dust does to his career should be interesting/depressing. I'm already prepared for his defensive metrics to suddenly become fantastic with no discernible explanation.

I think if Taillon ends up having TJS during this contract it's a disaster regardless of what happens after. Ruling out that worst-case scenario, this seems like a perfectly cromulent signing. Taillon is solid and should continue to be solid.

17.5M seems like an awful lot to bet on someone bouncing back without compelling evidence he will.

HomeTown Lenders Bahamas Bowl in Nassau, BS – 12/16, 11:30 am (ESPN) UAB vs Miami (OH) Wasabi Fenway Bowl in Boston, MA – 12/17, 11 am (ESPN) Louisville vs Cincinnati SRS Distribution Las Vegas Bowl in Las Vegas, NV – 12/17, 2:15 pm (ESPN) (14) Oregon State vs Florida Jimmy Kimmel LA Bowl in Inglewood, CA – 12/17, 3:30 pm (ABC) Washington State vs Fresno State LendingTree Bowl in Mobile, AL – 12/17, 5:45 pm (ESPN) Southern Miss vs Rice New Mexico Bowl in Albuquerque, NM – 12/17, 7:30 pm (ABC) BYU vs SMU Myrtle Beach Bowl in Conway, SC – 12/19, 2:30 pm (ESPN) UConn vs Marshall RoofClaim.com Boca Raton Bowl in Boca Raton, FL – 12/20, 7:30 pm (ESPN) Toledo vs Liberty R&L Carriers New Orleans Bowl in New Orleans, LA – 12/21, 9 pm (ESPN) South Alabama vs Western Kentucky Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth, TX – 12/22, 7:30 pm (ESPN) Baylor vs Air Force Duluth Trading Cure Bowl in Orlando, FL – 12/17, 6 pm (ESPN2) (24) Troy vs (25) UTSA Famous Idaho Potato Bowl in Boise, ID – 12/20, 3:30 pm (ESPN) Eastern Michigan vs San Jose State Tropical Smoothie Café Frisco Bowl in Frisco, TX – 12/21, 7:30 pm (ESPN) Boise State vs North Texas Radiance Technologies Independence Bowl in Shreveport, LA – 12/23, 3 pm (ESPN) Houston vs UL Lafayette UnionHome Mortgage Gasparilla Bowl in St. Petersburg, FL – 12/23, 6:30 pm (ESPN) Wake Forest vs Missouri EasyPost Hawaii Bowl in Honolulu, HI – 12/24, 8 pm (ESPN) Middle Tennessee vs San Diego State Quick Lane Bowl in Detroit, MI – 12/26, 2:30 pm (ESPN) Bowling Green vs New Mexico State TaxAct Camellia Bowl in Montgomery, AL – 12/27, 12 pm (ESPN) Georgia Southern vs Buffalo ServPro First Responder Bowl in Dallas, TX – 12/27, 3:15 pm (ESPN) Utah State vs Memphis TicketSmarter Birmingham Bowl in Birmingham, AL – 12/27, 6:45 pm (ESPN2) East Carolina vs Coastal Carolina Guaranteed Rate Bowl in Phoenix, AZ – 12/27, 10:15 pm (ESPN) Oklahoma State vs Wisconsin Military Bowl in Annapolis, MD – 12/27, 2:30 pm (ESPN) Duke vs UCF AutoZone Liberty Bowl in Memphis, TN – 12/28, 5:30 pm (ESPN) Kansas vs Arkansas San Diego County Credit Union Holiday Bowl in San Diego, CA – 12/28, 8 pm (FOX) (15) Oregon vs North Carolina TaxAct Texas Bowl in Houston, TX – 12/28, 9 pm (ESPN) Ole Miss vs Texas Tech Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl in New York, NY - 12/29, 2 pm (ESPN) Syracuse vs Minnesota Cheez-It Bowl in Orlando, FL – 12/29, 5:30 pm (ESPN) Oklahoma vs (13) Florida State Valero Alamo Bowl in San Antonio, TX – 12/29, 9 pm (ESPN) (20) Texas vs (12) Washington Duke's Mayo Bowl in Charlotte, NC – 12/30, 12 pm (ESPN) (23) NC State vs Maryland Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl in El Paso, TX – 12/30, 2 pm (CBS) (18) UCLA vs Pittsburgh TaxSlayer Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, FL – 12/30, 3:30 pm (ESPN) (19) South Carolina vs (21) Notre Dame Barstool Arizona Bowl in Tucson, AZ – 12/30, 4:30 pm (Barstool) Wyoming vs Ohio TransPerfect Music City Bowl in Nashville, TN – 12/31, 12 pm (ABC) Iowa vs Kentucky ReliaQuest Bowl in Tampa, FL – 1/2, 12 pm (ESPN2) Illinois vs (22) Mississippi State Cheez-It Citrus Bowl in Orlando, FL – 1/2, 1 pm (ABC) Purdue vs (17) LSU “New Year’s 6” Games: Capital One Orange Bowl in Miami, FL – 12/30, 8 pm (ESPN) (6) Clemson vs (7) Tennessee Allstate Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, LA – 12/31, 12 pm (ESPN) (5) Alabama vs (9) Kansas State Goodyear Cotton Bowl in Arlington, TX – 1/2, 1 pm (ESPN) (16) Tulane vs (10) USC Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA – 1/2, 5 pm (ESPN) (8) Utah vs (11) Penn State Playoff: VRBO Fiesta Bowl Semifinal in Glendale, AZ – 12/31, 4 pm (ESPN) (3) TCU vs (2) Michigan Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl Semifinal in Atlanta, GA – 12/31, 8 pm (ESPN) (4) Ohio State vs (1) Georgia College Football Championship Game in Inglewood, CA – 1/9, 7:30 pm (ESPN) Semifinal Winners

USC does not have much of a defense, ND's very average QB had a great game against them and obviously Utah tore them to pieces just two days ago. Michael Pratt should feast. Obviously Caleb - if healthy - and their skill guys are extremely imposing. But between their defense and the obvious motivational difference I definitely give the Wave a chance.

I came to post this but decided to check fangraphs. Today I learned that in his 154 PAs, he was a more productive hitter than Aaron Judge. Signing former STL players who inexplicably outperformed their talent at their most recent stop has never failed before, right?

At least 4 of the next best 6 teams will probably be pretty clear most years - in fact, a lot of the time what CubinNY is talking about will likely come to pass. Every conference that will be supplying CFP teams will have dumped divisions before expansion except for 1 more year of the SEC East/West split prior to Texas and OU joining. It'll be 1 vs 2 with only seeding on the line in most cases.

That's embarrassing, but in 2 years it's gonna be the coaches of 9-3 teams doing it so we might as well just get used to people doing this

Let's say Georgia somehow loses to LSU tomorrow and nothing else weird happens; does the committee avoid the rematch by seeding Ohio State 3 and Georgia 4? You could actually make a paper argument for it as UGA's best win of Tennessee is (barely) ranked behind OSU's best win of PSU. The teams' second-best wins (S Carolina for UGA, ND for OSU) are similarly closely positioned. I guess alternatively the committee could cheat by vaulting TCU up to 1 and claim adding one more quality win versus Michigan's nothingburger win made the difference.