UMFan83

What? No. Finish by year: 1999: 6th 2000: 6th 2001: 3rd 2002: 5th 2003: 1st 2004: 3rd 2005: 4th 2006: 6th 2007: 1st 2008: 1st 2009: 2nd 2010: 5th 2011: 5th (currently) Now that's a run of dominance. Finishing 1st or 2nd 4 times while finishing 5th or 6th 6 times.

Yeah they are creepy. Lennon later said it was the song he most regretted writing and was his least favorite Beatles song. Supposedly there were 2 other songs written in the same vein, Set Free and The Good Doctor, that were never released. I read somewhere they are on the German import of Live at the BBC. Who knows if its true, but if it was it was likely just some weird jealous phase Lennon was in.

So according to that, they have 13.7M to spend on 8 players (including RFAs) correct? Much better than last year when we had like 4 million to spend on 12 guys or something. ~45 million on 9 players, and ~19 million on the other 13 players

Wow I got Laura out of hiding! Thanks for the props.

Honestly didn't hear that (ironically i get a lot of my Bulls/Bears/Hawks news from NSBB threads), but that's [expletive] awesome. There are several people here who are avidly following the Hawks. I'm pretty sure not bumping a thread on a baseball message board to report news indirectly about a hockey team during the slowest part of the offseason is not a basis to call people bandwagon jumpers.

Wow, the cap went up to $64 mil today. That's better than I expected. This plus getting the incentive bonuses back is going to give us room to operate this offseason. Anyone want to do a full breakdown of the Hawks cap situation like last offseason?

Written by a White Sox beat writer but still, this is rather harsh. http://www.suntimes.com/sports/6054532-417/crosstown-classic-is-the-only-series-cubs-fans-have-to-look-forward-to.html Please, tell us how you really feel

I'm starting to like Pena. .250/.385/.529/.914 since May 3rd before tonight.

[expletive] RIGHT! Why doesn't he do that all the time!

OK I had to do it since I was bored waiting for my dinner to get here:

I I ain't sayin' it's right......but I understand. I can't think of many bands whose sound changed as dramatically throughout their run as the Beatles. They went from teenybopper pop to psychedelic rock to bluesy rock (Lennon) and in between found time to record mainstream pop, vaudeville, country western, hard rock/primitive metal (supposedly Helter Skelter), children's music, soul, folk and whatever the hell Revolution No. 9 is. Maybe there's a standard stereotypical Beatles sound which I would guess would be taken from the Rubber Soul era, but to suggest all their songs sound the same is either idiotic or ignorant.

I'm a terrible fan and Bartman is overplayed. He might be overplayed, but that's quite different from insisting that it wasn't a critically important moment in an historic game. Calling it a critically important moment in an historic game is overplaying it. IMO. And it ignores that Bartman did what any other fan would have done in the same circumstances -- and every other fan in his vicinity was trying to do. Also the point that, the end result of that play was a 3-2 count. He didn't even lose the batter because of Bartman. In fact, he gained a strike on the play, which very slightly altered the Cubs odds of winning the game. Even if you look at it with the end result of the AB, which was a walk, it is still 3-0 with 2 runners on and one out. Prior still got a double play grounder to end the inning. If you want to argue that Bartman slightly messed with the Cubs composure which tightened everyone up and began a chain of events that led to a collapse as I did above, then you have an argument. Add to the fact that there was a play that inning that had infinite more effect on the game than Bartman's gaffe (Gonzo's error), it seems strange to focus any of our attention on Bartman.

I'm a terrible fan and Bartman is overplayed. He might be overplayed, but that's quite different from insisting that it wasn't a critically important moment in an historic game. Calling it a critically important moment in an historic game is overplaying it. IMO. By itself it can't be a critically important moment. Maybe in hindsight with everything that happened after it.

I'm all over the place on this. On one hand I do think the play had an effect on the collapse, but not because Bartman necessarily interfered. We have no way of knowing for sure how much this changed things, but Prior stepped off the mound and started shouting and pointing at the fan, an odd reaction considering Prior usually had a fairly calm demeanor on the mound. So now a play that doesn't have much of an effect on the game (worst case is a foul ball and strike 2 with 1 on 1 out and a 3 run lead) is blown up by Prior's (and Alou's) over the top reaction. Who knows if that causes anyone to lose composure. If the next pitch is a strikeout, everyone eases up and the play is quickly forgotten. But the result of the AB was a walk. The next batter singled. Now you start to feel the pressure a little and start looking back to what could have been out number 2. A ground ball goes to Gonzalez. He knows he has to get 2 here and takes his eyes off the ball a little. A play he's made with amazing consistency 100 times this year (many thought he could win a GG at SS). This time he boots it and everyone is safe. Bases loaded and tying run in scoring position. Derrick Lee comes up, and a gassed and suddenly aware of the stakes Prior hangs one which is ripped in the gap for a double to tie the game. The collapse is on.

Hardaway has done a lot to try and turn things around. How much of it is purely PR is unknown, but I know he's done something with the Trevor Project. And yeah, it's too bad they couldn't get more players. I'm kind of surprised Carlos Pena wasn't in it. Out of curiosity, why Carlos Pena?

Good on the Cubs! Bad on stupid White Sox fans that will surely add this to their "World's biggest gay bar" shtick.

Meh maybe. Other than Beckett, they had some pretty good pitchers but not great (Penny, Willis, Pavano, Redman). Don't get me wrong, there are no gimmies there at that point and time, but the Cubs obviously didn't see to have trouble with any of their pitchers, save Beckett after the 1st inning of game 1 (1.42 ERA after the first inning of game 1) Their hitters were pretty damn good but again, our starting pitching was supposed to be our strength with Wood, Prior and Z starting 6 of the 7 games. (and we won the other one). Breaking it down, we won games 2 and 4 handily, so I don't know if you can say they should have won the series 4-0 or 4-1. Then you have games 1 and 3 that could have gone either way, not to mention game 6 that would have went the Cubs way if not for a late game epic collapse So I dunno, I think we would and did hold our own again them. It was more or less running into a team that was red hot and clicking on all cylinders, and them running into our top 3 starting pitchers who had been ridden hard the last 3-4 months of the season and were gassed. Z and Wood especially.

Yes, and the media went apeshit on Bartman, finding out his name and address and staking out his house for days. Now 8 years later I still get teased by friends about Bartman, who is someone I don't really think I ever blamed for anything for more than an hour after the incident occured and I started my long emotional cooldown from the collapse. Yes, Cubs fans were rough on him at the game, throwing things at him and swearing in his direction, but its at least somewhat understandable given the stakes of the game and the emotionally destroying events that happened immediately after. Not saying it was justified to throw things at him and threaten physical harm, but thats something I'd expect many other fans to do in the same situation. That said, the majority of Cubs fans I knew at the time, including this board, was over Bartman within an hour or two of the game and placed the blame on everything else (Gonzalez, Dusty, goats, etc). But the media just took the story and ran with it and now because of that it's part of Cubs infamy, and I have to hear about it from people as if its supposed to enrage me to bring up his name, a la Buckner (which if you hear from Red Sox fans, supposedly that was another media generated scapegoat). Truth is, I don't really hate AGonz either. Maybe its because it was only one of several miscues and gaffes that led to the collapse (albeit the biggest), or maybe its because the media didn't remind me about it constantly for years, or maybe its because he had been in my good graces with some clutch late game HRs in the regular season and had hit 3-4 home runs in the playoffs thus far. I don't really hate any one specific thing or person from that game, other than my overall general hate of Dusty Baker. But I guess I probably have various degrees of dislike. And on that list, Bartman is far far away from the top.

Meh, I mentioned that Dusty finally decided prior had enough and that he wasnt sharp in the 7th despite a 1-2-3 inning. There is so much you can discuss about that game and series, it would fill a book.

Honestly I don't think he catches it. Even if he puts it in his glove, it would have been a snow-cone catch and I think the ball pops loose after his glove hits the railing on the way back down. Man all these years and I feel strongly that he was going to catch that. My thought back then was, it looked on line to his glove, and at that point in the season things like that just seemed to go our way.

I buy the "series of events" thing. The Bartman play happened, causing Prior to point and scream at the guy from the mound. Maybe he was finished (although he went 1-2-3 in the 7th, I believe 2 of the 3 outs were to the warning track or thereabouts), maybe that caused him to lose his composure or maybe both, but immediately after that you get the walk, the run scoring hit, the Gonzalez play, the double to tie the game and in the blink of an eye the game is tied, and Dusty finally decides Prior has had enough.

Well it might make sense to have an 80 year old not wanting to go out to the mound 400 times a year.

There are 10 teams that have a better 5th starter than a guy with a 3.77 career ERA in 3 seasons?

I keep waiting for Soto to get it going..

That's clearly a flop. Damn you, I was all ready with my "What is Chris Bosh doing in Vancouver" reply.