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Enough everyone. Back on topic please.

Pointless semantics. In this case, "value" and "status as an asset" are interchangeable. Because it's the only way you can try and defend your pointless stance? Because I'm a native speaker of English and I understand the words that I'm using. I'm beginning to wonder about you. It should be noted that while value and status as an asset should be interchangable in baseball, it sometimes isn't. And a star pitcher making big money is probably the most overrated thing in baseball. They shouldn't have that much trade value because of the risk of the big contract, but they frequently do. So if/when Garza signs an extension with the Cubs, his value will drop, but his status as an asset will probably not drop nearly as much.

In sumarry: Boise St and San Diego State to be invited for football only. Houston, Central Florida, and SMU to be invited for all sports. All by 2013. After that, the plan is Navy and Air Force a year later to make 12. They shouldn't get to be a part of the BCS anymore. I would agree, but only because the Big East shouldn't have been in the last several years. This new conference is as strong (or maybe stronger) as the Big East has been since Miami, Va Tech, and BC left. It isn't that much weaker than the ACC either, but the conference has been consistently bad for long enough that it shouldn't be getting automatic bids.

To be fair also, it seems very likely that ESPN doesn't get the pick of the litter when it comes to choosing games. The NFL seems to fill the second half of the doubleheaders and the Sunday night games first, and then comes Monday Night and the other CBS/Fox games. It becomes a lot harder to pick good games when you don't have the access to most of the games between the traditional powers that are almost guaranteed to be good matchups.

Actual BABIP: .339 small math error on dave's part, too. the road expected babip number using his formula is .338. Isn't 18.8% +.140=.328? Besides, I thought the "standard" for correlating to LD to BABIP was .120 not .140. For someone who can run the math (I can't at the moment) can you project what Headley's OPS would be if he managed to keep his .339 BABIP but his HR and double rate from the road was applied to his home numbers? I think that's about the highest we could reasonably expect without some sort of swing change (which still might be possible if the reports are true). Headley with his .773 OPS last year had the 5th highest BABIP in baseball among players with 400 PA's or more. You might be surprised to hear that the correction you suggest isn't all that impactful. As a percentage of all hits: 2B 3B HR XBH Home 19.9% 2.0% 7.5% 29.4% Away 22.3% 1.3% 6.9% 30.5% He basically has 1% more XBH on the road than at home. His road OPS @ .339 BABIP is .744. Oh, I knew it wasn't that much (although I was surprised when I saw his career numbers earlier in the day). Thanks for doing the math. So basically for Headley we either have to hope for more than a .339 BABIP (which is kind of fanciful-it's more likely to go down at that level than up) or hope for an adjustment he makes that results in a higher ISOP.

Actual BABIP: .339 small math error on dave's part, too. the road expected babip number using his formula is .338. Isn't 18.8% +.140=.328? Besides, I thought the "standard" for correlating to LD to BABIP was .120 not .140. For someone who can run the math (I can't at the moment) can you project what Headley's OPS would be if he managed to keep his .339 BABIP but his HR and double rate from the road was applied to his home numbers? I think that's about the highest we could reasonably expect without some sort of swing change (which still might be possible if the reports are true). Headley with his .773 OPS last year had the 5th highest BABIP in baseball among players with 400 PA's or more.

It's absurdly conservative, needlessly frugal, and no doubt, stubborn. But I don't see how putting all his focus on developing from within while punting the next several years is short sighted. I was using it as the inability to see the future, so being his inability to see that his plan (which is supposed to be about sacrificing now to go for the future) actually doesn't make us any better in the future unless we are extremely lucky, makes it short sighted. Anyway, we agree on the things that are relevant, so no point to have a grammatical debate over minor details. My plan is not about sacrificing now to go for the future. My plan is about not making poor decisions with longterm consequences out of desperation to return to respectability ASAP. Let's not get into that debate in this thread please. I'm not splitting the Headley discussion for now because the pursuit of Headley is connected to the original topic.

Davearm is right about one thing. Headley's BABIP is pretty highly unusual. There are 3702 career players with at least 1000 PA's listed on Fangraphs. Headley with a .339 has the 70th highest BABIP among those players. While in career LD percentage (since 2002) Headley is 338th out of 552 qualified players. That's a highly unusual combination. Does that mean it's automatically not sustainable? No. But it is something to be highly skeptical of even with the decent sample size already out there. And that of course includes the depressed numbers from Petco in there. Now what Davearm has not brought up (at least I haven't seen it yet so correct me if I'm wrong) is that the key to a Headley acquisition is just not to translate his away numbers across the board, which I agree with him in their current form are completely unsustainable. Instead, People expect Headley to be able to develop his power when completely away from Petco which would make a normalization of his BABIP immaterial. I can understand the skepticism about that as well since Headley's power has been better on the road but not hugely so (.138 ISOP vs .107) but if the talks about a swing change are true than that could give reason for a huge breakout when getting out of that ballpark. But those signs of a breakout aren't present in his numbers so far, home or road.

9 teams? There were only 7 teams left in the top 14 at that point-Arkansas, Boise, Kansas State, South Carolina, Va Tech, Baylor, and Georgia. And only 4 of those teams were even eligible. Other 9 teams = teams playing in BCS games My mistake. I'd put Va Tech on about the same level as West Virginia or Clemson. Tech had matchup troubles against Clemson but played very well against every other team on their schedule while both Clemson and WV struggled for large stretches of the season. It is interesting to see that there are no real mismatches in the BCS this season (which of course was entirely random-the selections were all about money just like always).

9 teams? There were only 7 teams left in the top 14 at that point-Arkansas, Boise, Kansas State, South Carolina, Va Tech, Baylor, and Georgia. And only 4 of those teams were even eligible.

The default tiebreaker for ESPN leagues is points scored unless your league manager has changed it. The default in standard leagues (maybe in custom leagues as well) is for division winners to get the top seeds regardless of what record they have.

That's not going to change anytime soon if the Big 10/Pac 10 have anything to say about it. I think they were the ones who pushed hardest for automatic qualification to try to preserve the Rose Bowl or else they weren't going to participate in the BCS.

Little bit of a different scenario in 2006. First, the margin between Michigan and Florida in the polls to begin with was much, much smaller than the margin between Alabama and Oklahoma State. It's possible that more voters switched this time the final week than did in 2006, but since the decision was much more split to begin with in 06 tipped the balance. Also, Michigan after they lost was never #2 in the polls. After the Michigan loss, it was USC 2, Michigan 3, Florida 4. So the voters never had to decide whether they were willing to put Michigan 2 until the final week when USC lost, and that's when they decided to leave Michigan at 3 and flip Florida at 2. In Oklahoma State's case, they lost after Alabama did. Finally, a small factor might have been that Michigan was done after their loss and Florida still had 2 more chances to impress the voters. Now, the SEC thing probably did have something to do with this rematch. I agree with that. But it's not a straight comparison to 2006 whatsoever.

The Colts had a 19 play drive that took over 10 minutes. That's really shortened the first half.

Of course, that's just the projected computer rankings (although it's usually easier to reverse engineer those than to try to figure out the voters). I think the only computer ranking we know for sure is Sagarin. So it looks like it will be close but probably not close enough. 42 of the 59 coaches had Alabama 2nd. And it looks like 7 coaches had Oklahoma State 4th. Last week 111 of the 115 Harris voters had Alabama 2nd. So Oklahoma State would have to flip around 60-65 voters because some voters will leave Oklahoma State 4th just like what happened in the coaches poll. That's a tall order.

Alabama's loss is much better than Oklahoma State's. And their best win (Arkansas) might be better than Oklahoma State's best win (Kansas State). Their second best win might be comparable by some (at Penn State vs home against Baylor). Alabama was also never challenged in any of their games (their closest game except LSU was a 16 point win over Penn State) while Oklahoma State had a 1 point win over Texas A&M and a 7 point win over Kansas State. Oklahoma State's strength is that the depth of their schedule is much stronger than Alabama's. Alabama has a legitimate argument for #2. I tend to like the team with the stronger strength of schedule overall which is why I lean to Oklahoma State, but Alabama has been pretty dominant all season long.

Sagarin is updated. LSU 1, Alabama 2, Oklahoma State 3. Houston dropped from 8th to 26th. TCU is 19th (same as last week) and Michigan dropped one spot from last week to 23rd (but Sagarin is by far Michigan's worst computer rating so it will be dropped anyway). Georgia moved up 3 spots to #11 and Kansas State, Oklahoma, and Baylor are 5, 6, and 7.

Here are Palm's latest BCS projections: http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/rankings/bcs Some thoughts on the title game matchup: And for the at-large spots: Here are the rest of his thoughts: http://rpibcsguy.blogs.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/26191645/33662236

You in particular should probably not root for Georgia, because a Georgia win likely takes Michigan out of the BCS. You would have to root for TCU not to make it up to 16 at that point because that would be the only spot available.

Doesn't really matter though right? Southern Miss is the Conference USA champions now not Houston. The question could be if blowing out the #6 team could somehow get Southern Miss into the top 16 and ahead of TCU. Highly doubt that's even a remote possibility though. It would really help both Michigan and TCU if Houston dropped below them.

TCU is definitely a long way down. I think Houston will probably get close to that but settle in at 15/16. Lots of scenarios still possible this year with some upsets. If Va Tech and Oklahoma State both go down, who gets the #4 spot in the BCS? Oklahoma? Oklahoma State? Boise State? Arkansas? Oregon If it's Oklahoma State or Boise State, that would be significant because either one would end up stealing a bid If it's Oklahoma, Arkansas, or Oregon, it won't end up mattering. I'd guess from looking at the polls/computer rankings that Oklahoma State and Arkansas would not make it to #4 in that scenario but each of the other 3 could. Then of course you still have the 3 bids from one conference possibility if Georgia pulls off the shocker and questions about both Michigan/TCU's eligibility. And then of course still 4 automatic bids up for grabs. Lots of questions remain for halfway through Championship Saturday.

TCU Or the other at-larges if TCU can't get up to 16th this week. That's what they would need to automatically qualify with a Houston loss. TCU is 18th and 13-17 are all in action this week(and at least 2 of them are underdogs), I think there's probably better odds that TCU loses than they don't rise to 16 with a win. Michigan at 16 isn't playing, but the other 4 are. They would definitely need some poor things to happen to them for them not to move up. Clemson over Va Tech for example would hurt. Baylor winning would hurt, and Wisconsin over Michigan State in a close game might leave Michigan State ahead of TCU. Oklahoma either beating Oklahoma State or losing close to them would also be a problem. And of course Georgia somehow winning. If 3-4 of those 5 things happen today I could see TCU only slide up one spot (maybe Clemson moving ahead of them and Michigan/State Wisconsin and Georgia moving behind them. That's plausible IMO). A TCU loss still wouldn't help Boise State right? There's no co-champion provision from what I've seen.

TCU Or the other at-larges if TCU can't get up to 16th this week. That's what they would need to automatically qualify with a Houston loss.

Juan Pierre-12 seasons, 6823 AB's, 16 HR Starlin Castro-2 seasons, 1137 AB's, 13 HR Castro has substantially more power and also plays SS which is more valuable then CF. Those two aren't a great comparison.

Yeah, I don't see how Roy becomes a Bull. He'd have to be amnestied, and then all of the teams under the salary cap would have to pass on him at the minimum for Chicago to get him (of course, the bidding could go up from there if multiple teams end up wanting him). And if he does pass through all those teams, wouldn't that be a sign that he really has nothing left?