CubColtPacer

I was never one who was very worried about money just for 2008 (although still worried about money for 09, so if we can dump salaries to make the payroll less for next year, that's still a good thing). If the Cubs can absorb Payton's salary, then I think he is a good throw in. The Orioles will probably just give him away, and he is a pretty good example of the platoon partner that Hendry is looking for in CF. He also doesn't hit right-handers well enough to really be a threat to take away Pie's job. If Payton gives the Cubs a .750 OPS against left-handers (which he's been at or above each of the last 5 years) that will be a big help to what Pie would likely do against those same pitchers. Now if Payton's salary precludes them from making another move, then I wouldn't take him. He is way overpaid, and if they actually plan to use that money on somebody else than I'd rather the Cubs do that. However, in the middle of February that becomes more and more unlikely that they would be using the budget somewhere else.

I'm pretty sure those are EqA's.

Yeah, the only way Voyager works is if you disregard series continuity completely and hope for good individual episodes. Sometimes they delivered, many times they didn't. It was basically TNG-Lite, while DS9 had actual story arcs and showed signs of foresight and planning.

I wouldn't want to count on Piazza either. 39 years old, had a bad season last year, injury prone, and was terrible defensively in 06 and didn't play an inning in the field in 07. He would likely be better with the bat than Blanco, but he would break down very quickly if he was put back in the field again. He might be a slight upgrade over Blanco, but not really enough to sign him. My guess is Blanco comes back to his regular .620-.640 OPS this year.

If the Cubs traded Murton, I might be interested in Kevin Mench as a right-handed bat off of the bench. I'm not sure he would accept the role though because of how few starting at-bats he would get.

I'd give up Marshall in a second over Gallagher. I have no idea what use the Orioles would have for him though. Starting pitcher is a good guess. The last thing you need when rebuilding though is low ceiling ML ready players. Marshall's a good cheap back end starter for somebody who wants to contend soon. The Orioles have plenty of those types of guys though. They need either positional players, or pitchers with a high upside (Gallagher or Veal). Out of all the teams in the major leagues, Marshall might have the least value to the Orioles. He's almost worthless with what they are trying to do and the current contents of their farm system. By the time the Orioles were possibly getting good in 2010 and 2011, Marshall would be getting expensive and still wouldn't be any better than he is now.

I'd give up Marshall in a second over Gallagher. I have no idea what use the Orioles would have for him though.

The Baltimore Sun writer was on the radio and said that if the Cubs don't up their offer for Roberts then he doesn't think he'll be traded. I don't see us putting both Gallagher and Marshall in the deal. Maybe Gallagher and Marquis. I see something like Gallagher, Colvin, Cedeno for Roberts and Payton. I would take that! I know some of you guys would be apposed to it since the need at SS, but payton could probably platoon with Pie right? I could platoon with Pie, but just like Jay Payton, I would suck at it. Pretty sure as bad as Payton is hes much better than you haha jk no offense. How much worse is he than Bryd? Probably worse than Byrd overall, but much better for what the Cubs would use him for. Payton has put up at least a .750 OPS against left-handers each of the last 5 years. Byrd's better against right-handers than Payton, but the Cubs should be playing Pie against right-handers anyway. Payton is way overpaid this year, but as long as the Cubs were willing to take on that salary he'd be a useful piece to the ballclub.

It's an interesting theory, but what this person doesn't really realize that the officials both cannot stand over the ball like they did at the end of the Jacobs play and also keep the time running. They either have to signal a first down immediately and let the Giants snap the ball, or they have to stop the clock. On the next play, They also have the ability to stop the clock on a pileup to make their possession call before restarting the clock. When they determined that the ball was down by contact, Coughlin then called the timeout. I might agree with the video that the Giants got 10-15 seconds extra time, but certainly not enough to change the game.

Colvin is blocked in the Cubs system, and his value as a prospect isn't suddenly going to get a whole lot bigger while playing in the minors. It could get a little bigger if he has a huge season, but it's already pretty high and it could come crashing down with a bad year. I've been a big Colvin supporter, but if you're going to stick with Pie in center than there is no room for Colvin anywhere. Veal is showing the first signs of becoming the pitcher who is always long on potential and low on production. Could he get his control together? Sure, but the chances of it are becoming less and less. You're not going to get anybody better than Roberts using those two players. In fact, I doubt those two would get Roberts. Roberts isn't a superstar, but he is a very valuable player.

They probably won't, though. Is it even possible that the Orioles could ask for more than 2 players from the Cubs for Roberts? So far this offseason, the Orioles have traded Miguel Tejada for Luke Scott, Troy Patton, Matt Albers, Dennis Sarfate and Mike Costanzo, in which at least 3 of those guys are 40 man roster guys. They've also signed Roberto Novoa, Guillermo Quiroz, Greg Aquino, Chris Roberson and a few other guys that may or may not be 40 man roster guys, then add in another 5 guys in the Bedard trade with only Kris Benson being released. How many 40 man roster spots could they possibly have available? And the team still would love to be rid of Mora, Hernandez and Payton. Just thinking about it from this perspective, if Baltimore isn't interested in a Marquis/Colvin package (with Colvin not required to be protected yet), I'm not sure how these two teams work a deal that the Orioles can be happy with. The Orioles only have to clear 1 roster spot from the Mariners trade. If they do a 3 for 1 with the Cubs and all 3 players have to be rostered, that's 2 extra roster spots that need to be cleared (making a total of 3 from the 2 trades). The Orioles still have enough bad players on their roster that 3 openings isn't really a huge deal. They'll probably take 1 or 2 questionable young guys off, and then trade a player like Payton or Gibbons for a low minor leaguer to clear the other spot.

Yeah, Belichick was already a good ways up the tunnel before the final snap was made. That's what people were upset about it. And yup, it's just another thing to add on the long list of Belichick's classless behavior. It just makes it even harder for people who aren't fans of the Patriots to root for them in any game.

Every feature that has ever been in Premium is present now. The only difference is that I'm now able to do it within a single set of web pages instead of having to have separate links for everything. so can you clarify what the current and future differences between regular and premium are/will be? I saw Tim say this somewhere, so I'll help him out here: Right now, the only difference between premium and regular is that premium members don't see ads. Tim doesn't quite know what improvements and mods will be added on to this version of the board software, but he'll investigate and as they're added he'll add more features to premium.

He definitely couldn't have been confused. As he walked out to shake Coughlin's hand, Mike Carey stood in front of him - stopping him - and told him the game wasn't over yet. At that point, Belichick either said screw you to Carey or just ignored him. Either way it shows a lack of class. There's no excuse for the Pats to not show a little respect (for the first time ever) and stay on the field for one more second. I disagree and see Mizzou's point. He obvioulsy thought the gmae was over, and by the time he made it all the way across the field, why turn around? just shake the mans hand let the game be over. The coach has to be the leader of his team. What if his team decided to follow his example and walk off the field? Then the Patriots would have forfeited the game. Instead, Belichick decided to abandon his 11 players that were on the field. Even if it's for one meaningless snap, your leader shouldn't bail until everybody else is ready to go.

Welker is completely classless too. Yeah, and I sort of agree with raw's point that Brady and Bruschi have talked a lot of trash. They're certainly almost all very arrogant to the point of absurdity. That doesn't bother me as much as hitting people after the whistle and trying to hurt people like Harrison and Wilfork do on a routine basis. Belichick I think it's pretty obvious why I think he's classless. So while I wouldn't put up any of the Patriots as role models, the ones on my first list just haven't done enough to warrant me not liking them, while the ones on the second list have done that and more.

i think free agents would be thrilled to fill in for the retired players Free agents that are as good as Bruschi or Harrison (or even Seau) are likely to cost a lot more than those 3. It will be hard for N.E. to get quality people to fit under the cap if those 3 retire. Maybe they'll be able to pick up a good free agent for one of those spots, but not all 3.

Next season will tell if this is just the greatest run of his life or his transformation into one of the great quarterbacks in the NFL. I think it's going to be more of the latter though. His decision making has improved so much from even earlier this season. I doubt he'll make it on to the Manning/Brady level, but I do think he'll be on or very close to the next level down next year.

Is this the only time we see this Patriots team? They have a lot of possible retirements, and both Moss and Samuel are free agents. They are complete cap experts and have a high draft pick, but I think it's going to be hard for them not to get worse this offseason. Samuel is almost certainly gone. Moss is gone unless he's willing to sign a team-friendly deal just to stick around, which is possible but would be so unlike most of Moss's career (and him changing his contract this past offseason doesn't really count, he was desperate to get out of Oakland). The funny thing is I still like a lot of individuals on this Patriots team. I've always been able to respect players like Brady, Faulk, Welker, Bruschi, Vrabel, etc. It's too bad they have so many of the absolute most classless people in the league to balance those out (Belichick and Rodney Harrison being the two worst examples, and Wilfork and Moss being 2 more. When Moss is only the 4th worst player on your team as far as character, you know you have problems :D).

They should be playing the Hail Mary defense on this play. Even if they pick up the first down, they'll use up half of their time and still won't be anywhere near a field goal. Their only chance is to throw it 40-50 yards down the field on this play like the last play.

Not quite yet...the Patriots still have 3 timeouts. I wouldn't put it past them to get into FG range, although it won't be easy.

I am a little shocked replay didn't challenge that 3rd down spot. It might not have been a first down, but it was much closer than they had it.

Well, you have two downs to make this. If you don't, you save your three timeouts and use them on all three Patriots downs, forcing them to decide what to do, and you may get one more shot. One thing you absolutely do not do is call a timeout between third down and 4th down here...you need to have both plays called during this timeout.

It was legal then, though. No, it wasn't. Those rules have been in place since the early 1980's. They had just started to be called less and less until the referees were instructed to start calling the rulebook again in 2004.

Even as a Colts fan I can admit that the Giants have been mugging the Patriots receivers all the way down the field. Of course, that's the same thing the Patriots did in the Patriots/Rams Super Bowl and the Colts/Patriots AFCCG in 03, where the Patriots were only able to win because of just holding on to the receivers constantly. So I can't feel too bad for them.

The Giants guy moved, but he never went in to the neutral zone so he was fine. Does this feel like the Patriots-Rams game to anyone else? A great offensive team faces a huge underdog, and both times the offensive team faces pressure they have never had before which causes a defensive struggle.