jersey cubs fan

what are obp2 and slg2?

So just a loser whose life went to crap and he blames the football coach for not fixing it?

The suspect is 24 years old. Seems like six years later is a weird time to go crazy about not getting a scholarship Seems to me the perfect time for the rage to come out. Maybe the person thought he'd be a pro by now, instead, he's a low-paid worker in debt from school and other things. Plus, from what I know of Iowa high school and college sports, there's a heck of a lot of complaining about playing time and coaches having favorites and whatnot. that's just high school sports in general Well, I'm personally familiar with Iowa, Illinois and NJ high school sports, and I have noticed that issue with Iowa in particular much more than the rest. But it could just be the people involved.

The suspect is 24 years old. Seems like six years later is a weird time to go crazy about not getting a scholarship Seems to me the perfect time for the rage to come out. Maybe the person thought he'd be a pro by now, instead, he's a low-paid worker in debt from school and other things. Plus, from what I know of Iowa high school and college sports, there's a heck of a lot of complaining about playing time and coaches having favorites and whatnot.

Gamecast has 79th minute. 83:45

I liked the Say No to Racism adverts. Shouldn't they have been in Spanish?

Somebody pick up the baby in the mud puddle outside. Just because it's not perfect doesn't make it useless. It's just another tool that when used properly works well most of the time. He says in the article that it's still fine to use OPS for quick analysis. He just thinks it should stop being used for any serious, in-depth analysis, which I think is totally reasonable. He says that at one point, but he contradicts that sentiment before and after that throwaway line. The notion that there is no defense is kind of silly. The defense that for the most part it can tell us a lot about a guy. It "breaks" on the extremes but it's not at all impossible to see the extremes coming. There's really not a real world situation where all you have is OPS to view, at the minimum you probably know the component parts, which can tell you if you have an extreme or are even approaching it.

I'm going to guess the player felt the coach didn't do enough to get him a college scholarship or something.

Good luck to him. I understand why the Bears didn't keep him, but it's still tough to let Mike Brown go. I didn't think he was coming back last year, so I don't view it as all that tough. But I still think it's a little weird that they just let him walk away when they had a need at the position. I still wonder what the full motivation is.

Really? 30 year old Antonio Alfonseca threw 74 1/3 inning for the 2000 Chicago Cubs with a 4.00 ERA, 1.466 WHIP, 61 K, 36 BB and allowed 5 HR. Kevin Gregg is much better than that? Gregg is essentially what Alfonseca was before coming to the Cubs. A wholly unimpressive relief pitcher who had the fortune of being used at the end of games for the Marlins, thus earning the tag "proven closer" and therefore being a justifiable choice to finish games for the Cubs. Mel Rojas was actually a bit more effective reliever earlier in his career who had one partial season with the Cubs that was fairly similar to what Kevin Gregg has done in his partial season with the Cubs. Kevin Gregg is not "much better" than either guy, he might not even be any better. And if either guy is an indication, his unimpressive career is likely going to be imploding soon. Gregg put up in the last two seasons better numbers than Alf. Until last night's blown save, his numbers this year were better as well. He's also saved a better percentage of his chances than Alf did as a Cub. Much better may be overstating it, but Gregg is a better closer than Alfonseca. Rojas was also worse in his time as a Cub than Gregg has been as a closer. Sorry, but you're wrong. You can't just erase his bad outings and then say 'see he's better'. He's the same uinmpressive relief pitcher who is overcompensated because he was a closer. And how do you justify defining Gregg by his last two years but limiting those guys to only their time with the Cubs? Gregg's the same freaking guy. He lets too many guys get on base, gives up too many runs. Maybe the Cubs can get by with that by surrounding him with a better team than those guys had when they were Cubs, but he's not much better than either, if any better.

Nobody said they didn't help. The issue is that people seem to think one kind of illegal help is too far, and any other kind of illegal help in the past is ok. I don't know. Some people seem to be suggesting that today's PEDs aren't much or any more effective than greenies. I'm struggling to see how that could be true. The evidence seems to suggest that, at a minimum, some PEDs were really effective at making really good players, really really great. Also - that seems to be your issue. You seem to have an issue with people thinking one kind of PED is worse than another kind of PED. Others don't seem bothered by such a belief. What don't you know? Abuck is wrongly accusing people of pretending they don't help. We agree they help. But so did stuff back then, and if they had the stuff they have now back then there is no question they would use it. It is completely naive to pretend the "anything to get ahead" mindset was more ethical back then than it is now. They just didn't have the access. You're saying PEDs aren't any more helpful than greenies and I think that's bats-it insane. abuck doesn't seem to be wrongly accusing anyone of anything. It's pretty clear he's saying PEDs helped Clemens and Bonds immensely. You seem to be suggesting that you disagree. Other than that, your knowledge of what players would have done in the 50s and 60s if these advancements were available is pretty astonishing to me. In addition to the fact that it's speculative, there's also evidence that some roids were available, and not nearly as large a % of players took them at the time (for I assume many reasons, but I really don't know). I am?

Nobody said they didn't help. The issue is that people seem to think one kind of illegal help is too far, and any other kind of illegal help in the past is ok. I don't know. Some people seem to be suggesting that today's PEDs aren't much or any more effective than greenies. Who is saying that? This is just on the last page and one I remembered. Did you even read what you quoted there?

I'm not asking you to. Feel free to get your panties in a bunch about today's players while romanticising the past, you're a movie guy so that sort of myth making is probably endearing to you.

Nobody said they didn't help. The issue is that people seem to think one kind of illegal help is too far, and any other kind of illegal help in the past is ok. my point is steroids are illegal and helped A TON, while greenies (whatever the hell they are) were illegal and probably didn't help all that much (at least compared to roids). A) So what? B) How did they probably not help? These guys were so stupid they thought working out was bad, so they were not elite physical specimens, but they had to play a very draining schedule with less comforts of today's players.

Nobody said they didn't help. The issue is that people seem to think one kind of illegal help is too far, and any other kind of illegal help in the past is ok. I don't know. Some people seem to be suggesting that today's PEDs aren't much or any more effective than greenies. I'm struggling to see how that could be true. The evidence seems to suggest that, at a minimum, some PEDs were really effective at making really good players, really really great. Also - that seems to be your issue. You seem to have an issue with people thinking one kind of PED is worse than another kind of PED. Others don't seem bothered by such a belief. What don't you know? Abuck is wrongly accusing people of pretending they don't help. We agree they help. But so did stuff back then, and if they had the stuff they have now back then there is no question they would use it. It is completely naive to pretend the "anything to get ahead" mindset was more ethical back then than it is now. They just didn't have the access.

The only reason those earlier eras were "more open" about their drug use in the clubhouse was because they were exremely confident it would stay in the clubhouse and they would suffer no repercussions. The concept of "one of their own" ratting them out to the public was not considered, and the media would never consider touching those stories. Drug testing became a huge issue in sports in the 80's, probably starting with Olympic competition but continuing into high school and college sports and then pro football. Tell-alls were very common and guys could no longer be confident that their bending of the rules would remain quiet from the public. They were forced to be more secretive, but a hell of a lot more people were aware of what was going on than want to admit it now.

Who is saying they didn't help? They still competed against other players who took the drugs. Sammy never would have hit 60 if he didn't start being more selective at the plate. All the roids and power in the world wouldn't have made him layoff the low outside slider. The elite players got more elite with some roids, but a whole hell of a lot of guys stayed mediocre with steroids.

Raw I agree with what you are saying, but I don't think there is much, if any benefit of having your RB be a 2nd year guy instead of a rookie. If anything, it just means more wear and tear on the body. Rookie RBs can produce out of the gate because it is such a physical/instinctive position, and not really a tactical position, like QB and WR. Frankly, after all the touches he had in college and his rookie year, I'm concerned about Forte's future. He was a sub 4.0ypc guy last year and doesn't have the "liveliest" of legs. He could improve on those numbers this year simply because of Cutler's presence, but I don't think it's a matter of becoming "established" as a veteran or anything. Strength and conditioning can be big differences from rookie year to 2nd year. College players work out, obviously, but it's nothing like an NFL weight training program. A 2nd year player going through his first full NFL offseason program can see a big difference. Not necessarily always, but that's the biggest difference for a RB. Strength and conditioning programs at the better college programs are fairly similar to what the pros have access to, but even if there is an upgrade I don't think that will do anything to help a RB. RB's succeed based on natural physical ability at that position, and the quality of the rest of their offensive teammates, not by more experience as a pro.

Really? 30 year old Antonio Alfonseca threw 74 1/3 inning for the 2000 Chicago Cubs with a 4.00 ERA, 1.466 WHIP, 61 K, 36 BB and allowed 5 HR. Kevin Gregg is much better than that? Gregg is essentially what Alfonseca was before coming to the Cubs. A wholly unimpressive relief pitcher who had the fortune of being used at the end of games for the Marlins, thus earning the tag "proven closer" and therefore being a justifiable choice to finish games for the Cubs. Mel Rojas was actually a bit more effective reliever earlier in his career who had one partial season with the Cubs that was fairly similar to what Kevin Gregg has done in his partial season with the Cubs. Kevin Gregg is not "much better" than either guy, he might not even be any better. And if either guy is an indication, his unimpressive career is likely going to be imploding soon.

Why? The difference is back then they did it and nobody cared. You didn't "rat out" your fellow players and the media didn't touch the subject. One guy wrote a book and was ostracized, with the help of the media. They pretended it was milk and vitamins and living right. But they took what they could get if they thought it would help. And no, there's not a lot of speculation in assuming they would have taken it if they had access and thought it would help. That's just how sports works. Always have, always will.

I partially agree that Hendry has nobody to blame but himself for how he has committed a generous payroll. At the same time, I can't blame him for committing all his available resources up front. If the Cubs' budget is run anything like other corporations, unspent dollars are often removed from the budget altogether. Maybe he felt that if he didn't spend the money, he was going to lose it anyway. Yes, if he was given a $105m budget in 2007 it woulddn't have made sense to only spend $80m, but that doesn't mean he had to commit future dollars. Hendry operated under the assumption that he had to win in 07/08 to remain employed past that point.

You don't see an appreciable difference between taking greenies and taking PEDs today? You don't think one improves performance at a significantly greater clip than the other? Or you just don't care? Regardless of the difference, the intent of the player is the same: to gain an advantage. Seems hypocritical to me to give players from previous decades a pass on taking one substance but condemning more recent players for taking another. why? one gives the player a MUCH, MUCH bigger advantage. do people really not think there's a difference? How much more of an advantage did they have when so many others were using the same thing? And again, the only reason for that is because baseball people finally realized muscles weren't bad and the stuff got better. Those who cheated with what illegal substance they had access to and thought could help them would have used this stuff if they had access to it.

You don't see an appreciable difference between taking greenies and taking PEDs today? You don't think one improves performance at a significantly greater clip than the other? Or you just don't care? Regardless of the difference, the intent of the player is the same: to gain an advantage. Seems hypocritical to me to give players from previous decades a pass on taking one substance but condemning more recent players for taking another. In 20-30 years the steroids people took in the 90s/00s are going to be considered quaint novelties from a bygone era.

What a giant load of crap. Like those previous guys were anything special? They're freaking baseball players that put up good numbers. The vast majority were probably unethical jerks and complete morons.

You don't see an appreciable difference between taking greenies and taking PEDs today? You don't think one improves performance at a significantly greater clip than the other? Or you just don't care? They may improve it as a significantly greater clip, but if so it's because of a science, not an erosion of players character or anything. If they knew in the 70's what players in the 90's knew, and had access to the same stuff, they would have taken. Hell, it's all but a guarantee some of them at least experimented with the less evolved roids back then. The biggest difference is baseball people are so stupid they were convinved muscles were bad for a long time. But I'm not even sure steroids improve players at a significantly greater clip than greenies. The toll of 162 games over 6 months is real and those guys took all that crap for a reason, they felt they needed it. It's still using chemistry to improve your performance, the only difference is advancements in chemistry.