goonys evil twin

What do they gain besides making people "feel better?" It's completely arbritary as to whether or not "hustling" would actually change plays significantly and often enough to alter a team's season or even the game being played at the time. Are you just really, really lazy or something? I know "hustling" and "little things" are often not difference makers, but they absolutely cannot hurt a team. I realize Dunn, Ramirez and, well, Ramirez are who they are, but would it hurt them to run a little harder to first? To show they're teamates that they're giving their all? Hustling, like aggressive, can hurt a team if it's not applied smartly. Some might call trying to stretch a single into a double a hustle play, but it's only hustle if you're safe. Otherwise it's stupidly running into outs. Baseball is not a balls to the wall sport.

I agree with most of your point, however, smart big market teams do indeed build from within. They are just more capable of keeping those building blocks and surrounding them with outsiders at the same team.

If we could get Lugo signed rather than Pierre, Pie's position for the next 10 years won't be blocked. There's your lead off guy. Either Izturis or Lugo can play SS or 2nd. But I can easily see Hendry viewing Soriano as a lead-off man, negating the need to pay for Pierre's services. If Soriano is signed to play second, I don't see Hendry going after Lugo. He'll have his SS in Izturis, and I think if Soriano is brought in, it will be to play secondbase. I don't see Hendry slotting a 40 HR at the lead-off slot, speed or not. I wouldn't think so, but speed is Jim's number 1 priority for that position. And he's pretty much followed the "make the player happy" strategy. Soriano sees himself as a leadoff man, and has practically demanded the spot, hitting there all this year (and wasting his .600 SLG in that spot). I would guess Soriano would demand the leadoff spot in his negotiations, or at least make it clear that's what he wants. And Hendry is exactly the type of GM that would greenlight misusing a player.

Marshall and Mateo have done nothing to indicate they could outperform Padilla next year, and neither is a safe bet for 200 IP (probably Hendry's biggest desire). I'd be happy with giving Padilla a 3/21m deal, it's not like his signing will mean there is no room for anybody else. Even if he's here, there would be 2 spots open. The Cubs can't ignore other pitchers because of the guys they already have. and padilla is? i beg to differ. they can however avoid overpaying for often injured veteran's when they have plenty of talent in the system ready to contribute. That was the plan this year and it didn't work. There's a difference between having arms that are ready to contribute, and having arms that can go give you 32 starts 200 IP and a 4.00 ERA. If you're going to ignore what I said about Padilla's injury fine, but he's a much better bet to go 200 solid innings next year than Mateo or Marshall. It's not even close. But even if you have to combine starts from Mateo and Marshall to get to the 200IP, would they perform any worse? I think so, but it's not a completely sure thing. I think something that is being ignored, or at least glossed over, is the fact that the Cubs have numerous rotation holes to fill. They've got Zambrano and Hill, then 3 questions. If you signed Padilla, or something similar, you'd still have 2 spots open, not to mention a need for a 6th, or maybe 7th capable starter to call-up from the minors. Even if you get a healthy Prior back, there's still a spot for the imagined Marshall/Mateo combination.

Really? I thought Quinn looked rattled and overmatched. I agree. Getting back up even when you're getting beaten sounds more like a description for Jon Kitna than a franchise QB.

But the question is, how many other teams have had more stable coaching regimes? Baker has had basically the same staff for 4 years. Rothschild has been here for 5 years and the results keep getting worse. The Cubs have a stable staff, and have been pretty stable ever since Andy took over, and it hasn't helped.

Practically everybody I've ever taken to Chicago has commented on the cleanliness issue. NYers often marvel at it. I never really noticed before, but maybe that's because I'm a slob.

*Cue the drum roll!!* I like Jacque in the sense that he appears to give his all. I just wish he would try and have the ability of say, Abreu. That said, we knew what we getting here, and like some other folks said, he's a decent complimentary player if surrounded by studs and hitting 7th. How many players play at 100% and have the ability of someone like Abreu? Players like Abreu are probably in the top 5 - 10% in the league. Unfortunately, when a player reaches "superstar" status often they don't need to show the 100% effort anymore. That's why Jeter is so respected by everyone. I'm wondering why Jacque is getting the "100% effort" label. I sure don't see it. The repeated pickoffs and throwing issues scream lazy to me.

I was always under the impression Jones could have started in CF all along, but got moved because Torrii Hunter was better there. Maybe I'm way off. Admittedly, I really don't know if Jones could handle CF, but have always just assumed he could. I seem to think lots of other teams have moved guys to CF when the need arose. I think teams can survive with less than ideal defensive CFers, especially if you are getting solid production, relative to the position.

Wait, so now only doctors are allowed to speculate on injuries and the potential effect on a pitcher going forward? Okay, well Marshall's injury history makes him a much bigger risk than Padilla, but I guess you aren't speculating that he's past that and will do just fine next year.

If that's true, I don't see why it would be any harder to call a guy offsides based on being past or being a yard past. Because you don't have a yardstick to tell you exactly what a yard is. The way it is now, either the attacking player is past the defender or he isn't. Making it a yard would bring a lot more judgement into the decision. Well, it doesn't have to a yard, it could be something like "significantly past". I've seen quite a bit of controversy over the current calls with the "he is or he isn't" system, I don't see why it would be anymore with a different system.

The Cubs drafted the wrong receiver.

That'll only be true if you actually "played the game."

If that's true, I don't see why it would be any harder to call a guy offsides based on being past or being a yard past.

You simply can't put that type of comparison on a player who has only been this productive in such a short amount of time. This is just as bad as being overly judgemental of Hill's small sample of poor major league outings. perhaps, but you also cant overlook what he's done and relagate him to a utility role either imo. I'm not overlooking anything, I'm looking at the whole picture. I see no reason why he can't compete for a starting job, but any competent GM should have him penciled in as utility next year (if anything, his small sample of great numbers shows he won't get embarrassed in the bigs) with a much more likely producer as the starter. There's no reason to settle on him at 2B right now.

What if instead of part of the body or the full body, they gave them a yard? That still prevents cherry picking, and won't force defenders to pack it in tight. Or maybe it would, like I said, I don't really know much about the game. I think that would make it exponentially harder to officiate, since most of the time it's one guy taking off in one direction and the other guy sliding forward in the opposite direction. Yeah, the one yard would make it much tougher because it's hard to tell what one yard is from 50 feet away. Right now either you are past the defender or not, which IMO makes it easier to call. You're right TT in that making it one yard would make offsides way harder to call. Maybe that's a good thing, with the blatant ones getting called and the close ones, that are more about one athlete beating another as opposed to cheating, only getting called sometime. But then again, why can't you just keep a ref back with the deepest players at all time. Sure that's tough in kid's leagues, but at higher levels it shouldn't be a problem, and that's where you'd want more crisp officiating anyway.

Man, if you don't watch the games you can't comment on them based soley on stats in the box score....... I was there, and the feeling I had was they dominated when the outcome was in question, then loosed a bit (but still had some ferocious hits) as the lead widened.

The only thing Pierre has is speed. But he needs it because he doesn't get good jumps, nor take good routes. I really don't think he covers much more ground than what Jones would cover. Certainly not enough to offset the offensive difference.

Theriot just isn't at that level, I'm afraid. just as with hill and murton, only time will tell if he is or isnt. It's not the same. Hill and Murton produced for several years in the minors. Theriot established himself as potential utility player. 100 ABs doesn't change that.

What if instead of part of the body or the full body, they gave them a yard? That still prevents cherry picking, and won't force defenders to pack it in tight. Or maybe it would, like I said, I don't really know much about the game.

I think we got the same feed. I'm not feeling so proud. I like my 1:00 feed: Sunday, September 24, 2006Visiting Team vs. Home Team Time (ET) Channel HD Channel Green Bay Packers at Detroit Lions 1:00 pm 704 722 Washington Redskins at Houston Texans 1:00 pm 705 723 Chicago Bears at Minnesota Vikings 1:00 pm 706 724 Carolina Panthers at Tampa Bay Buccaneers 1:00 pm 707 725 New York Jets at Buffalo Bills 1:00 pm 708 719 Jacksonville Jaguars at Indianapolis Colts 1:00 pm 709 720 Tennessee Titans at Miami Dolphins 1:00 pm 710 Cincinnati Bengals at Pittsburgh Steelers 1:00 pm 711 721 St. Louis Rams at Arizona Cardinals 4:00 pm 712 Philadelphia Eagles at San Francisco 49ers 4:00 pm 713 726 New York Giants at Seattle Seahawks 4:00 pm 714 727 Baltimore Ravens at Cleveland Browns 4:00 pm 715

Marshall and Mateo have done nothing to indicate they could outperform Padilla next year, and neither is a safe bet for 200 IP (probably Hendry's biggest desire). I'd be happy with giving Padilla a 3/21m deal, it's not like his signing will mean there is no room for anybody else. Even if he's here, there would be 2 spots open. The Cubs can't ignore other pitchers because of the guys they already have. and padilla is? i beg to differ. they can however avoid overpaying for often injured veteran's when they have plenty of talent in the system ready to contribute. That was the plan this year and it didn't work. There's a difference between having arms that are ready to contribute, and having arms that can go give you 32 starts 200 IP and a 4.00 ERA. If you're going to ignore what I said about Padilla's injury fine, but he's a much better bet to go 200 solid innings next year than Mateo or Marshall. It's not even close.

I think it's probably very easy for him to get the designer stuff right now. He's not going to have Fed Ex delivering packages from from Mexico like your run of the mill player might try, but he could get them easily. As for Barry's selectivity, it's easy to walk a ton when nobody comes close to the strike zone. He has great judgement, but not nearly as good as his walk rate suggests, due to all the intentional and pseudo intentional walks.

You simply can't put that type of comparison on a player who has only been this productive in such a short amount of time. This is just as bad as being overly judgemental of Hill's small sample of poor major league outings.

First of all, anything as drastic as removing offsides isn't going to happen. The sport is wildly popular all over the world and the rules firmly entrenched, and I don't know of any widespread desire to eradicate offsides. Secondly, and most importantly, eliminating offsides would do the opposite of what you intend. Instead of the cat and mouse game of trying to time runs into open space, you'd have defenses that packed way in, and not doing nearly as much on the offensive side of the ball. So what you'd see would be even more conservative than the play you see with offsides. What about relaxing offsides as opposed to minimizing it? I don't understand the rule all that well, but from what I can tell, I agree with your theory of what would happen if it was eliminated. But what if you just gave a little more leeway to the offensive player? I've seen too many would-be exciting plays stopped by the rule, when all it really was was one player beating another. You shouldn't get punished for that.