bcl412

But I don't wanna be a pirate

I question the term "shorten your swing" because it really isn't a term that is defined or has a single definition. One person could use it and mean one thing and someone else could use it and mean another thing. Yes, major league players can have more than one productive swing. I just question (notice the word question and how that is not an assertion) how taking a less than full swing can equate to any success that isn't luck. If the most productive thing one can do is hit a home run, how one be attempting to attain full productivity when you intentionally take away that the option of hitting a home run? If one is intentionally making it so they can't attain full productivity how can they be an asset to a team?

I could see the NL central being the weak division it was supposed to be last year. The only teams who were great last year were the Cubs and Brewers, the Cubs could be as good as last year but as others have said they overacheived a bit. The Brewers probably won't be as good.

I never realized that doubting the term "shortening your swing" was a sign of immaturity. Learn something new every day.

The shorten his swing thing was more contending the original posters point. I don't want him to either because the idea of shortening your swing doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Swing a normal swing at good pitches seems more productive which ties with OBP

It's not a bad thing, but depending on the lineup he's in (and I'm opening a big can of worms here - and this somewhat goes against what I usually would argue because Dunn is such an extreme case), it's not all that great of a thing either if he has, say, Jeff Keppinger or Paul Bako, coming up behind him. It kinda blows to have a guy of Dunn's caliber taking a walk in that situation. I'd almost rather he swing at balls he otherwise would consider borderline, there. Who knows if that's not what he's already doing, though. It very well could be. In a lineup like ours, though, I feel like he'd be a great fit (offensively, at least). When you have solid hitters throughout, walks are an awesome, awesome thing, and a hitter like Dunn fits better in that type of lineup than anywhere else, IMO. But then him walking isn't really a knock on him. It's a knock on his team for sucking because they don't have the talent to drive him in. "Shortening your swing" (whatever that means) isn't really a measurable statistic. What if he has done that the entire time he has played with Cincinnati and Arizona because bad managers told him to? What if him attempting to "shorten his swing" is accounting for the "poor numbers"?

Why does this game have to be on while the Iowa football game is on?

So MSU is only beating the Citadel. by ten with 9 minutes to go at home. To put this in perspective Iowa beat the Citadel by 22 on the road.

Kyle Bloom went to my high school. Not many professional atheletes come from my high school.

I want Bob Sanders (D-Cordinator) to lose his job. Badly. As do I. A loss against the Lions should make that a reality as well as possibly putting McCarthy and/or Thompson on the hot seat for next season. I give Thomson and McCarthy a bit of a break because of last year (although last year was mostly Brett's doing). McCarthy has showed potential but he still makes horrible mistakes that he shouldn't be making at this point and if Thompson doesn't get some O-line depth this offseason I am going to be really upset. But Sanders is a big problem because there is too much talent for the D to struggle this badly.

I want Bob Sanders (D-Cordinator) to lose his job. Badly.

Which Chicago team do you think has a better chance of catching Detroit Blackhawks (37 points in 28 games) catching the Red Wings (44 points in 30 games) or Bulls (11-12) catching the Pistons (13-9) Both have a shot but I think the Hawks have a better chance because they are more likely to have long winning streaks.

Anyone else think we can catch Detroit? I have a good feeling for some reason.

A true Bears/Packers/Vikings fan would not root for the other to win under any circumstances, unless it benefited the greater short term good of your team (meaning playoffs, NOT draft picks). I'm not rooting for the Bears, I saying I wouldn't care that much if GB lost.

While I can never completely root against my team, that breaks some kind of rule, it would probably be better for the Packers if they lost so I will cheer for a win but be completely unfazed by a loss.

They've done better than I thought. I woulda had them losing to Cornell. Northeastern too, though I still think that'll be a game. The bad news for IU is that the Big Ten's bottom looks better than expected. I had them beating Iowa in Bloomington, but after Iowa's play thus far, I'm thinking that game's more of a toss up. The other teams I thought they'd have a chance against(UM and NU) are probably the 2 most overachieving teams in the conference. People on here make fun of this IU team, but they've done much better than expected. I thought a split between Cornell and TCU would be a good result, they won both with relative ease. Yesterday's game was ugly to begin with, of course, but that was probably only one of two halves I've been terribly disappointed with (the second half against St. Joe's being the other). According to Sagarin, IU has played easily the most difficult schedule in the Big Ten (No. 37 to Michigan's No. 80 then Michigan State's No. 116). That's made them look worse, too. Problem is, as you said, the Big Ten is much better than anyone expected. I figured on 2-4 conference wins. That has become a more difficult goal than I would have thought, but one I still think reasonable. I'm not sure there will be a single game they're favored in, nor a game I will expect them to win. Still, it's college basketball and upsets happen -- especially with a strong homecourt advantage. Based on current (early) Sagarin data, IU wouldn't be favored to win a single game in conference at this point. They would, however, be predicted within 10 points in all but one home game (Ohio State). The other team that's far enough ahead of them to be favored by more than 10 points is the only team they don't have a home game with (Purdue...wtf?) EDIT: For no other reason than I think it's interesting, here are conference predictions based on Sagarin data: Team W L ----------------------- Ohio State 14 4 Purdue 14 4 Illinois 12 6 Michigan State 12 6 Northwestern 11 7 Wisconsin 9 9 Michigan 8 10 Iowa 8 10 Penn State 6 12 Minnesota 5 13 Indiana 0 18 8-10 for Iowa. That would almost equal a 20 win season, depending on how they did vs Drake and in the BTT.

Tate seems to step up his game when he is challenged with facing a good player. He never does a whole lot against the poor teams but when he is facing someone tough he more than holds his ground against him. Brackins really wasn't impressive, he forced a lot of shots and you could tell he was frustrated, that had a lot to do with Tate.

Iowa wins 73-57. It wasn't even that close they were up 25 in the second half and kind of stopped trying to score 9-2 now playing Drake a week from tomorrow for the "state title"

Reading 100 words into the article instead on simply looking at the pictures sure is hard. Good to see you getting your daily self esteem boost out of the way. You make it easy. I'm happy to oblige. You see, i'm a giver and sometimes I just want to help the humans.

Reading 100 words into the article instead on simply looking at the pictures sure is hard. Good to see you getting your daily self esteem boost out of the way.

please beat Iowa State :beg:

They've always used the haning sox, how is this different from there old logo? What is their old logo? I'm confused.

I'd think defensive players of the year would be a good place to start: ACC - Mark Herzlich, LB BC - 105 tackles, 11 TFL, 3 sacks, 6 INT for 121 yds B12 - Brian Orakpo, DE Texas - 40 tackles, 18 TFL, 10.5 sacks, 0 INT SEC - Eric Berry, S Tennessee - 72 tackles, 2.5 TFL, 3 sacks, 7 INT for 265 yds BE - Scott McKillop, LB Pitt - 126 tackles, 16.5 TFL, 4 sacks, 1 INT for 18 yds P10 - Rey Maualuga, LB USC - 73 tackles, 2.5 TFL, 2 INT for 48 yds B10 - James Laurinaitis, LB Ohio St - 121 tackles, 5.5 TFL, 4 sacks, 2 INT for 0 yds Obviously not all of them would be invited. If any were to go this year, I'd probably be in favor of one or two of Berry, Herzlich and McKillop. None should win it this year, though. I wish defensive players and offensive linemen would get more consideration for the award.

Shonn Greene (not going to happen, nor should it but I hope he gets invited.)

As I expected, the offense is light years ahead of where it was last year. We played 32 games last year. Our highest offensive efficiency rating was 117.5. In just 10 games this year we've already topped that 6 times. 3 times we've been over 127. Granted we've played some major cupcakes but this team ranks 4th in the nation in effective FG%. They're shooting over 42% from 3 (where half our field goal attempts have come from) and 56% from 2. This team can shoot it and play efficient basketball on the offensive end. However our defense is worse than it was last year. We need to be a better defensive rebounding team to make overall improvement in the Big Ten. As weird as this sounds, if we had Seth Gorney this year, we might be an NIT team at least. He couldn't score too much but to have him defensively would be nice.