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Not angry... more like just sick of trying to justify. I should be use to KSU getting no respect by now, but I just can't seem to let it go and sit back and just see what happens. Passionate fan I guess.... Their schedule sucked. It's not that every person on this board has an irrational hate for K-State, but they just played a cupcake schedule this year. That being said, they probably earned their way in with the win over Texas Tech yesterday. Agreed-K-State fans want to watch these tournaments closely: Conference USA final-they need a Memphis win SEC-they'd prefer Florida and Mississippi State advancing to the final-most important thing is that Florida wins the tournament. Big 10-Can Purdue or Illinois shock one of the top 2 seeds? Right now, I do believe that K-State is one of the last teams in. They do not want to be blown out by Kansas today though-the margin is razor thin between teams, and they do not want the committee to give them a reason to leave them out. A close loss against Kansas should be fine for them as long as most of those other tournaments work out-if Houston steals a bid, along with 1 or 2 of the SEC teams, then it could be bubble trouble for K-State.

Yup, it was very nice. They already have the historical highlights section up to view-so Raisin can feel great by watching the UCLA vs Missouri highlight, then torture himself by watching Princeton/UCLA, then feel better when watching UCLA/Gonzaga from last year :D.

Nah, worst case scenario is that you air it over his head and throw it out of bounds with no time running off the clock. Congratulations Illinois on a hard-fought victory, even if it was a contest on if you could miss more free throws or we could miss more 3 pointers :D. Good luck in the rest of the Big 10 tourney and the NCAA tourney, although I have a feeling that neither of our NCAA stays will be very long.

Maybe they wouldn't be interested in what the Cubs are offering and would be interested in somebody else's offer. I was just pointing out that opting out of his deal gives ARod the biggest freedom, without too much of a risk of throwing away money. That's true, but he'd have to take a discount to play for the Cubs. I can't imagine our budget could handle a 20M dollar player, not at least without trading one or more of Lee, Ramirez, Soriano, Marquis, Lilly and not re-upping Z. If he wants to play for the Cubs as this rumor suggests, his best shot to do so without giving up much cash is to get the Yanks to eat part of his remaining contract in some trade scenario. If he cares more about the money, he should opt out and sign with Boston, who would love the opportunity to pay back the Yanks for Clemens. I obviously don't know Arod, but I'd think after being the highest paid player and being unhappy for so many years, taking 15-17 per for 4 years or something like that and playing in a town that will worship you and a manager that you respect would be something he could swallow. Yes, but the Cubs couldn't. At least not if they resign Zambrano, who will very likely make about 15-18 per season. Now, if the Yankees were to pick up about 4-6M per year of ARod's remaining 3 years, that, combined with what Texas is paying, puts him down into the 12-15M area, and the Cubs might be able to afford that and Z also. If the Cubs don't resign Z, it becomes easier to sign ARod at the price you mentioned. That's really a difficult choice. It's hard to stomach paying any pitcher what Zito got, even one who's young and effective. If the Cubs let Z go, ARod would be a great alternative this offseason, if he indeed does opt out. I don't see the Cubs getting both barring an absolutely brilliant trade, and even then, it would probably mean putting the Cubs into the 110M range with payroll in a couple of years, and I doubt the Trib is going to go that high. 110 mil is the payroll this year-did you mean higher than that?

You did at the beginning of the game

Yup-that was pretty horrible, that was a freshman mistake by Bassett. He started the offense about 4 seconds too late, and it cost them.

Ratliff or Bassett-one of those needs to take the shot here-possibly Wilmont. I'm not much in favor of throwing it into the post on this possession.

The free throw disparity isn't that large-any difference in free throws less than 10 and it's really not that big.

Which 4? IU is already safely in, and so most likely is Mich State. If Illinois wins, they'll be 5, and Purdue still has a chance to make it 6. The four teams who make it to the semis. I'm not sure Mich.State gets in and if Indiana loses tonight, at best they're one of the last teams in, barring some other team like Baylor winning their conference tourney. I've looked at all the different sites that you can, and I haven't seen anyone that says IU is in any danger even with a loss. The key is that IU's losses are all so good-single digit losses (except for 1 game) against good teams. There isn't a single bad loss on the resume, and a couple really good wins (Wisconsin, Southern Illinois) to go with pretty good wins like splitting with Mich State, Purdue, and Illinois. Their schedule strength is also pretty high-I don't see any way they miss the tournament at this point.

Which 4? IU is already safely in, and so most likely is Mich State. If Illinois wins, they'll be 5, and Purdue still has a chance to make it 6.

Well, NC State takes down Virginia-I hope that Wake Forest can take down Va Tech-I always like when a team is actually playing for something on Selection Sunday itself, and a NC State-Wake Forest semifinal makes sure that at least one of those teams makes the final and would need to win it to get the auto bid at the last moment.

Yeah-the bids are shrinking late, but the number of available bids are definitely shrinking. These bubble teams are doing what they think they need, but with the number of bids going down that may become harder and harder. Xavier is going to take one of those precious at-large bids. Another bid or two could come out of the SEC.

Just 3 Oh. How many walks does Murton have? He seems to be walking every other PA and he's beeng having a very solid spring so far. Is there a site that has ST stats? http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/stats/sortable_player_stats.jsp?c_id=chc Murton's having a good spring-his OBP is 8th best on the team (I'm taking out both the two people with 1 AB and Koyie Hill with 5 AB's to get that figure) and he's 6th in SLG.

Just 3 Oh. I can understand the confusion-all the middle infielders have been doing a really good job of drawing walks so far in ST-Cedeno, DeRosa, and Izturis are 3 of the 5 top Cubs in walks so far (Izturis in fact has 3 walks and only 12 other AB's). With all the flux, it's pretty easy to mix those middle infielders together.

Just 3 so far-his OBP does lead the team though. Yeah I thought he was supposed to be Neifi #2. :roll: (not aimed at you). Well, I would wait until he puts some of these results up in the regular season before proclaiming anybody to be wrong on this, but these signs point to hope that Izturis can continue the path his development was on before the injury. He'll never be a big SLG guy, but I do think he can be a pretty good OBP guy (.330 to .350) especially working with Perry. That's where his OBP was the last year and a half before the injury anyway, and his already improving plate discipline should take another leap with Perry as his instructor.

Just 3 so far-his OBP does lead the team though.

Here's the box score of the Padres game-a 10-6 Cubs win. The Cubs had plenty of baserunners in both games-in fact, they probably should have score d several more than the 17 combined than they did. http://mlb.mlb.com/news/boxscore.jsp?gid=2007_03_09_sdnmlb_chnmlb_1

Sosa is hitting 500 this spring. He's made the team for certain. I'm going to enjoy watching him as a Ranger this year. I definitely agree that he's made the team, and I'll be happy to see him play. I'm happy to see 3 different Cubs starters hitting .500 or better also. Especially since they all were injured last year, and people questioned if they could return to the career year they had right before being hurt (Lee, Barrett, Izturis). The fact that they are hitting so well does suggest that the injuries are healed for the most part-if they were hurt, they probably couldn't have hit this well, ST or not.

The Cubs pick up 2 more runs in the 9th, but lose to Texas 11-9. Here is the box score of that game. http://mlb.mlb.com/news/boxscore.jsp?gid=2007_03_09_chnmlb_texmlb_1

Now Arkansas has upset Vanderbilt. Florida is the only thing between there being an automatic bid from the SEC that wasn't expected-if they go down, that bid could cause problems for those squarely on the bubble.

Wells gave up 3 runs, none of them earned-largely due to 2 errors in the inning. 11-7 Texas after 8.

That's not their only pretty good win non-conference. They also have wins over tournament teams Air Force, Indiana, Georgetown, and Holy Cross in addition to their ACC wins-that will get them into the tournament.

Soto adds a sacrifice fly-it's 8-7 Texas, middle of the 8th inning.

Colvin just hit a HR against Texas-it's 8-6 Texas, still top of 8th.

In the Texas game, end of 7, still 8-5 Texas. Rapada gave up a couple of runners, but managed to get out without a run. Texas has also turned 4 double plays today.