Mephistopheles

I didn't expect people to like my realist down-to-earth analysis of Tyler Colvin's abilities. In the end that's going to be the most likely scenario, and honestly it's bordering on the optimistic side. Of course I used EqA not BA or HRs. I can do that.

I figured they be relatively consistent. In the low minors you have bad runners stealing and bad defensive catchers throwing, so they cancel each other out. By the high minors you only have decent defensive catchers and decent runners stealing canceling it out again. Of course in the majors you have only the elite arms behind the plate for all teams outside of Wrigley.

colvin will never be anything better than a .275 eqa CO with average defense. sometimes he will be stuck in cf where his defense is well below average. he will be alright against righties but will be thoroughly manhandled by southpaws. in otherwords. he's a white jacque jones at best.

bullpen help

So if Z is an Ace does that make Traschel the joker? Z has the potential do be dominant every time he goes out there. Hey Saber dudes, numbers wise who's been more productive, Lilly or Z? super meph adjusted vorp Lilly - Zambrano 40.9 - 30.3 -0.9 - 8.2 -2.6 - 1.4 37.4 - 39.9

IMB assured us of a Cub fan in the final. He beat ThreeAces in the quarters 6-3 6 seed Lazy Bums beat the 3 seed Minneaps Ballers It's IMB vs Me for one semi - The Cub semi It's St. Lunatics vs Lazy Bums - The Cards semi Im up 8-0 after one day

beating UCLA every year right?!

Or Fresno.

Anyways to get back to the present future.. Andre Caldwell is out for the Tennessee game. The Gators have capable but inexperienced skill players to step in, but its still a blow. Expect some solid PT from true fish Deonte Thompson and more PT from soph Jarred Fayson as long as his knees alright. Both guys speed rivals Harvins and Caldwells.

Ha ha, nice cheap shot. The Rose Bowl likely isn't bigger than the Cotton Bowl is in Texas or the Orange Bowl is in Florida or the Sugar Bowl is in Louisiana. However, the plurality, if not the majority, of the country considers the Rose Bowl the biggest. I am not saying the Rose Bowl is biggest in every region, but, overall, it is. Besides who wants the Rose Bowl to be bigger. It's about ****ing flowers. Who the hell cares about flowers? This isn't the estrogen championships. Now that's funny. *Though I think a Big Ten team could win that one... Michigan is in need of some flowers. They're certainly girly up the middle on defense.

Its the person who is most likely to be the best in the near future. If Lord of Khemennu says so, it must be so. :roll: What a stupid post. youre right it must be true. the ace of a staff is the best pitcher any other definition is trying to make an argument about nothing

Ha ha, nice cheap shot. The Rose Bowl likely isn't bigger than the Cotton Bowl is in Texas or the Orange Bowl is in Florida or the Sugar Bowl is in Louisiana. However, the plurality, if not the majority, of the country considers the Rose Bowl the biggest. I am not saying the Rose Bowl is biggest in every region, but, overall, it is. Besides who wants the Rose Bowl to be bigger. It's about ****ing flowers. Who the hell cares about flowers? This isn't the estrogen championships.

No. Youre saying its bigger across the nation when its not. Its bigger in its pockets. its equal to the Sugar and Orange. Ratings dont mean much. It just shows that its bigger in California. Wow! Is it the Sugar Bowls fault people in Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana can't afford TVs?! (Cheap shot!!!)

Actually its called latching on to the California market. Id like to see those broken down by people outside of the region. Of course people inside the region are going to care. thanks. im not saying its not the biggest. im saying that in general its not OMG I WANT SCARLETT JOHANSSON IN MY BED biggest. its pretty much equal to the sugar and orange. maybe not the fiesta but to the sugar and orange yes.

those are forbes valuations on the the teams from last december. im not saying its the correct measurement. it is a regional thing as well. outside of little-ten-plus-michigan (1-AA)-land the michigan coach doesnt have aura attached to it. in mil 97 Notre Dame 88 Texas 84 Georgia 81 Michigan 76 Florida 71 Ohio State 70 Alabama 69 Tennessee 67 Oklahoma 66 LSU

People outside of California, the Midwest and pockets of uncharted lands in the west dont give a damn about the Rose Bowl. It's a regional thing. None of the major bowls are bigger than the others. Before the BCS came along if you asked people 'round here what was the biggest bowl youd get Cotton Bowl every time. You ask people in Florida and your likely answer was/is the Orange.

I was hoping for a better response. :( i just love that reference. i had to post it! :-k Not sure I can agree that it doesn't take a special ability to recognize talent. There are a lot of college players that put up great numbers. Being able to map which of those players will be able to successfully transition their skills to the pros is not straightforward, though, otherwise first round picks wouldn't fail at such a high rate. If a scouting department can find players that have a lower failure rate, that is most certainly valuable. It is difficult to separate the quality of the inputs from the process, though. Hmm...I wonder if some of the tools I use in business to do that could be applied here. I'd actually argue that drafting players in the last ten years has become much more numbers oriented and that the success rate of first rounders is increasing. Besides most of the pitchers who fail fail because of injuries. The analyst in me says avoid at all costs. The eye can catch the bad mechanics that cause injuries -- but more often than not it doesn't matter: Mark Prior. In sum drafting pitching is bad. Pay for it on the open market. Or draft it late hoping you get lucky (rich hill etc) With your last statement then, you would agree with the way the draft went with the Cubs selecting many more players than pitchers earlier in the draft. Only 4 pitchers selected in the 1st 15 rounds, 6th/11th/12th/14th with those being Lambert , Siegfried, Acosta and Russell and three of those being left handers and all having decent moments at times this summer. drafts arent won and lost with picks 5+. If you get one of those right you're either lucky, have great player development or threw a lot of money at a guy who was a tough sign. Really rounds 3-4 arent useful much either. You win on picks 1 and 2. I wouldnt have made the picks he made thats for sure.

I'm pretty sure the Cardinals weren't the best team in baseball last year. Thanks for proving to me that you can't read. I didn't say that the best team wins. I didn't say that the best teams usually wins, CR. I said the best team usually has the highest probability of winning (in the MLB playoffs thats normally around 20 or so percent). So in a tournament the best team usually does not win.

Lets compare revenue and profits generated from the UM football program to NU and Bama and see who is bigger. Its not even close. the hell does this have to do with anything? but if you are stupid enough to go this route.... 1. Notre Dame 2. Texas 3. Georgia 4. Michigan 5. Florida 6. Ohio State 7. Alabama 8. Tennessee 9. Oklahoma 10. LSU Notice who is not on there. Is Michigan a bigger job than USC? Probably not. Going the revenue and value route is dumb. So Georgia's the #3 job in America? Get a clue and come back to me plz. And Alabama is close and so is LSU.

What makes the Rose Bowl bigger than the Sugar Bowl? Just because Big Ten and Pac Ten biased fans say so? Is Michigan a bigger job than Notre Dame? Probably not. Is Michigan a bigger job than even Nebraska? Probably not....Is Michigan a bigger job than Alabama, probably not.

That's awesome. Anyway, UCLA could play unworldly and win (maybe), but that's not the way it turned out. Theoretically, you're right, but I was referring to a specific game that occured last year. UCLA played very, very well, but unworldly is quite an overstatement. Theoretically, though (which is how I think you're looking at this), you're right. of course im looking at it theoretically. in theory NO team brings their best game every time out. You just have to hope your struggles come against bad teams not decently average teams. remember when UF almost lost to SC and needed a miracle. its kind of funny im making these arguments. going into bowl season the gators had little business being in the NC and these faults in the system allowed them to win the NC and im a gator fan. of course the gator rape of osu may only lead to the discussion is if the sample is too small to analyze statistically? but if you accept that to be true you have to look at W-L even less. Obviously a team doesn't always play it's best, that's the point I've been trying to make. USC was the most talented team in the nation last year, they're losses to UCLA and Oregon State doesn't change that. It does mean that they played below they're potential in those two games, though. so in the end we didnt crown the best team as NC. we crowned some other team. so in reality the NC then is meaningless. you have to be lucky.

Not really. The larger the playoff is, the more likely the best team isn't crowned champions. No, that's what I'm saying. No one looks at the winner of a playoff and says "well, there's the best team in the nation." They just accept them as the winner of the championship tournament and move on. In a sport where you only play 14 games, it's useless to try to determine who the best team is if you don't have to. Let's stick them in a playoff, crown a champion and go home. Exactly. Crown the team that proves their worth on the field. Enough with this subjective crap we've put up with dealing with the BCS. in reality all youre doing is crowing the team that got lucky. Crap if its an 8 team tournament and USC is the best team and they won they still got lucky. True. Luck does play into it. But it's a better system than what we currently have. im not so sure it is. a playoff has about oh .5^3 chance of crowning the best team as NC. a one game BCS (with SOS and point differential) is probably around .5^2 Where that extra .5 comes from winning the big game in the season. What big game are you referring to exactly? in a hyopthetical scenario. Say LSU goes 11-1 in the regular season is the best team in the nation ranked #2. If they beat Florida they go to the NC. UF beat them the first meeting and the chance of UF beating LSU (Say UF is number 4) is roughly 50 percent. Then at this point the odds of LSU making the NC is .5. The odds of them winning the NC is .5*.5 Now if we had a 8 team playoff. This game isnt going to matter. If LSU loses theyre going to go into the playoff. If they win theyre going in the playoffs. So they have to win three games in the playoff consecutively against top 8 teams in order to win the NC. So thats roughly .5*.5*.5. So its less likely for them to win the NC. Its a hypothetical scenario but illustrates the point. The game matters to the extent that you feel seeding matters (assuming in this hypothetical playoff, seeding would be affected by the game). Also, let's throw a third 1 loss team in the mix - say USC at #3. My problem is that a large part of selecting between the winner of LSU/Fla and USC to play whoever is ranked #1 is subjective. A playoff system eliminates that subjectivity, thus the system is better. this isnt really true. Assume then USC has a laugher against UCLA and they win this time. If theyre close the BCS is going to reward the big win to LSU over UF because of SOS and the nine yards. So they get in. Now if USC is the better team.....then the odds of them getting in is still .5.

That's awesome. Anyway, UCLA could play unworldly and win (maybe), but that's not the way it turned out. Theoretically, you're right, but I was referring to a specific game that occured last year. UCLA played very, very well, but unworldly is quite an overstatement. Theoretically, though (which is how I think you're looking at this), you're right. of course im looking at it theoretically. in theory NO team brings their best game every time out. You just have to hope your struggles come against bad teams not decently average teams. remember when UF almost lost to SC and needed a miracle. its kind of funny im making these arguments. going into bowl season the gators had little business being in the NC and these faults in the system allowed them to win the NC and im a gator fan. of course the gator rape of osu may only lead to the discussion is if the sample is too small to analyze statistically? but if you accept that to be true you have to look at W-L even less.

Not really. The larger the playoff is, the more likely the best team isn't crowned champions. No, that's what I'm saying. No one looks at the winner of a playoff and says "well, there's the best team in the nation." They just accept them as the winner of the championship tournament and move on. In a sport where you only play 14 games, it's useless to try to determine who the best team is if you don't have to. Let's stick them in a playoff, crown a champion and go home. Exactly. Crown the team that proves their worth on the field. Enough with this subjective crap we've put up with dealing with the BCS. in reality all youre doing is crowing the team that got lucky. Crap if its an 8 team tournament and USC is the best team and they won they still got lucky. True. Luck does play into it. But it's a better system than what we currently have. im not so sure it is. a playoff has about oh .5^3 chance of crowning the best team as NC. a one game BCS (with SOS and point differential) is probably around .5^2 Where that extra .5 comes from winning the big game in the season. What big game are you referring to exactly? in a hyopthetical scenario. Say LSU goes 11-1 in the regular season is the best team in the nation ranked #2. If they beat Florida they go to the NC. UF beat them the first meeting and the chance of UF beating LSU (Say UF is number 4) is roughly 50 percent. Then at this point the odds of LSU making the NC is .5. The odds of them winning the NC is .5*.5 Now if we had a 8 team playoff. This game isnt going to matter. If LSU loses theyre going to go into the playoff. If they win theyre going in the playoffs. So they have to win three games in the playoff consecutively against top 8 teams in order to win the NC. So thats roughly .5*.5*.5. So its less likely for them to win the NC. Its a hypothetical scenario but illustrates the point.

no even if they play their best they could still lose (ucla would have had to play unworldy). a team is likely to bring their best game a certain percentage of the games. a team is also going to bring a bad game. In the end they lose the ones when they bring their bad game and their opponents bring their good game. in other words im saying your statement doesnt mean anything.