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Gerald McGrath is suspended for four games and David Thornton is on the PUP list. After the top three LBs (Tulloch, Witherspoon and Collin Allred) our backups are Jamie Winborn and Rennie Curran. Please don't get hurt linebackers.

Yep, that's one of them. I remember a couple of others, but they may have been reports on TV as opposed to internet stories. I don't agree with all his points in there, but if Boise really is offering to do a one-time game with any team out there and is still getting turned down, there's really nothing else they can do. It's simply a fault in a bad system.

Kevin Sumlin should get a major BCS job soon.

You definitely have to take that into account, but what are the percentages on a lot of those plays? I'd say more often than not teams are looking at 4th and 5 or more and the conversion rate on those can't be very good. There are definitely plenty of times when a team gets to 4th and 2, goes for it and gets it when they otherwise would have punted, though.

I'm not lumping "prevent" defense into simply rushing four and dropping seven. The prevent part of it is playing super soft with the corners. Giving 10-15 yards of cushion to ensure nobody gets past you is a fine concept if the offense has limited time or needs to score twice. You simply shouldn't play that soft in the coverage if there's really more than a minute left in the game and it's a one-score ballgame. I'm not looking for blitz packages and whatnot at the end of games, I just think DCs go to the super soft coverage way too early oftentimes. John Chavis was bad about that at Tennessee. I can think of a few games we lost because we allowed teams to move down the field 15-20 yards at a time before we'd challenge them. As far as the successful times, there certainly are times when it works. My assumption is, however, that it fails far too many times for it to make sense to use all the time late in games.

I'll bet if teams quit running the prevent defense, the number of late comebacks would decrease – and perhaps significantly. Prevent should really only be used if you're up two or more scores late in the game.

I don't know where the veteran tag came from for this year's Titans defense. We dropped a bunch of veterans and have young guys filling those roles. We'll have players getting significant snaps at end, OLB and corner who have never played in an NFL game. Also, however, the pass defense should be much improved over last year. Early on in the season we were missing Vincent Fuller and Nick Harper got real old, real quick. As soon as Fuller got back, the secondary got much better, but still had the awful stats from the 0-6 start holding it back. With Fuller healthy this year and Harper gone (with good young players replacing him) the Titan secondary ought to be better – not great, but better. As raw said, I'd go Stafford without much hesitation.

Good point. Though Kosuke does have a .900 OPS against lefties this year . . . (though in just 39 PAs)

why? Because Joe sent Johnson out after a 50 minute rain delay to pitch causing him to have Tommy John surgery. Thus ending his career. The End. It didn't end his career, but it was still a really, really bad decision and should be considered when looking at managerial candidates.

Value and production are different things, though. Kosuke is likely to be just as productive as Crawford if the Cubs hadn't decided to bench the superior player for an extended period of time - that's not Kosuke's fault.

Angel Pagan Jim Edmonds Is Augie still in their system? I think he is, but I'm not sure.

That seems highly unlikely, since Kosuke has 200 fewer plate appearances than Crawford. Kosuke OPS: .844 Crawford OPS: .845 Kosuke wOBA: .367 Crawford wOBA: .374

My guess would be players don't do that because they have to pay back the loans. Whereas if you sell your jersey, the money is completely yours and you don't have to pay it back.

I simply don't really see a benefit in it for the BCS programs. The Alabamas, Penn States and Ohio States don't really gain much from it and the Wake Forests, Kentuckys and K-States have enough trouble beating the major programs they already have to play. Adding in the factor that it's not profitable for the program to travel for 4 OOC games instead of getting 1 or 2 at home, I can understand why they haven't played more prolific opponents.

That's the problem. In the current system, their only hope to make the BCS title game is to put together a schedule that will make it almost impossible to go unbeaten most years. But as soon as they lose one of those games - no matter how many others they win - they're out of the title race. Whereas other teams (Bama, Ohio State, pretty much any premiere BCS program) could lose 1-2 games with the same schedule and make it.

They're reaching 3rd or 4th by playing the schedule you're saying they should beef up. I'm talking about shooting for the BCS title game. Playing TCU/BYU/Utah won't do that. That may very well be what they're doing, but scheduling 4 premiere BCS programs every season isn't realistic anyway.

Most of the major schools don't have a need to strengthen their schedule because they have SEC teams or Big Ten teams or whatever on their schedule already. If an Alabama or Penn State or Miami needs to improve their schedule, it's more prestigious to play another major program in a major conference rather than Boise. It shouldn't be, but it is because there's still more name recognition with USC/Ohio State/etc than there is with Boise, but the game is just as tough. If Boise wants widespread respect and a chance to play for a BCS title, they can't play 1-2 BCS programs and then Western Michigan and Tulsa every year. Especially not with how awful the WAC is. To be able to get into the BCS title game, they'll pretty much have to face major programs in major conferences. Voters aren't going to give them a ton more credit for beating Western Michigan instead of Toledo (though they should) and the coaches' poll is a huge part of the BCS. TCU, BYU, Utah, etc. would help, but it'd be just like last year's Fiesta Bowl – voters and many fans would write off the win as just two overhyped "minor" programs beating up on each other. To have a chance to crack the BCS title game, Boise has to play and beat the elite programs or move into the Pac-10, Big 12, etc. If their concern was simply to finish undefeated every year, they'd schedule Toledo/Wyoming/1AA/Arkansas St every year and not be trying as hard as they reportedly are to play the top teams out there. If it's true that they offered to play one-time deals with elite programs, that tells me their interest is garnering enough national attention to reach the BCS title game, not simply to go unbeaten.

I've heard it reported (on Sportscenter and the like, no links as proof however) that Boise has offered to play one-time games on the road with more prolific schools and has been turned down at each offer. From the reports, they're not content with the softer schedule. As far as simply getting teams better than Wyoming and Toledo, would people really give them credit for beating Kentucky at home or Duke at a neutral site? And what motivation do those teams have to play Boise when they have their own tough conference schedules to play, which they generally don't win much in anyway? Boise is in a unique spot (kind of along with Utah, BYU and TCU) where there's really no positives for major programs to play them, yet they need to play as many major programs as possible. As long as we have the BCS, there will be no reason for a major program to schedule Boise. Why a few do now I have no idea, because there's no real gain to it (except perhaps some monetary gain).

The Bears are probably a weaker defense (especially secondary) than the Packers, so I'd probably go with Stafford. Kolb has better weapons, though.

He's not currently on a team, but Renyel Pinto has also seen significant major league time.

The positives about Soriano are that even though we'd overpay (we will with any big name FA reliever) he's been pretty consistently solid and sometimes great, his presence would make Hendry more open (most likely) to moving Cashner to the rotation and his presence would also allow the Cubs to trade Marmol should the right deal come along. That doesn't mean I'm in favor of going after a significant FA reliever, just that if we do, I'd target Soriano.

I think it was something like $1,200 for his Independence Bowl jersey. I wonder what he'd get for a BCS bowl jersey?

Who would close - Soriano or Marmol? Marmol. I don't know that Soriano would agree to it, but I'd at least get an idea how open to the idea he'd be.

This is very true.

The rumored trade was Marmol to Cincy for Chris Heisey (I think it was). A lot of people on here were wishing for Alonso. However, that was a very unreliable website, so I don't know that any credence should be given to that rumor.