Transmogrified Tiger

Leaving at half was one of the best moves I ever made. I lasted all the way to the 4:00 timeout. The 7th or 8th pass over the player's reach out of bounds pushed me over the edge.

Ricky Nola....wait You know who might see ML time this year? Reynel Pi...nevermind Seriously, Juan Mateo.

MSU fans are pissed about the officiating from tonights game. 34 to 10 FT disparity and 27 to 14 foul disparity in UM's favor. Anyone else see the game?

Mizzou gets the crap kicked out of them at home by Iowa St. Just dismal on all accounts. For those curious, Snyder got T'ed up partway through the second half(to give you an idea of the officiating, both teams were in the double bonus before the 10:00 mark), then got another T right before the end of the game.

Is that real? Was it actually proposed? If it is true, and if I was a person who used emoticons, I would use the one with the bug eyes right now. Wow that sucks for the Cubs. Hendry turned it down on Jocketty's recommendation after Walt turned down the same package for Simontacchi.

I read today that if Wisconsin's starting 2 guard played for PSU, he'd be the tallest starter by 2 inches.

Wow. When it comes to the offseason they're on point for the most part, but the regular season carry over they predict ignores our pitching, which is ever so slightly above the Devil Rays caliber.

There's supposedly a strong MSU contingent packing Crisler tonight. Too bad I'll be at the Mizzou/ISU game and won't be able to see any of it. Maybe they'll rerun it on ESPNU.

Tucker's effectiveFG% is 45%, 51st of 60 qualified Big 10 players. Only Krabbenhoft is worse on UW. He's 57th of 60 in PPWS, worst on his team.

What is there to disagree with? If you state that Williams is better than Maddux for the 2006 rotation, you are projecting improvement for Williams, not basing it on current levels of production. Maddux's numbers last year were better (particularly in the stats that matter most for pitchers), and unless Williams improves his control, they project to be better this year also. You're also mistaken regarding a gradual decline with Maddux. Maddux's 2003 was a sharp decline from career norms, but he has almost completely leveled off at that declined value. In fact, his 2005 numbers are nearly identical to 2003, except 2003 hid an extra 10 unearned runs that represents the difference in his ERA. He actually allowed fewer runs per inning in 2005 than in 2003. Maddux's pitching style isn't such that he should start declining again. I see no reason for it, and other pitchers of his style have proven in the past that they can plateua production into their early 40s. Maddux finished 2005 with a 4.24 ERA and an ERA+ of 101. Williams finished 2005 with a 4.26 ERA with an ERA+ of 100. So, while saying Williams will be better than Maddux is slightly projecting, not by much. He was nearly Maddux's equal in 2005 and considering Maddux will be 40 and Williams 24, I don't think it's a stretch to say Williams will be better next season. Also, Williams had a 3.91 ERA(109 ERA+) as a Cub.

North Dakota St. was scheduled to be humiliated by Wisconsin on Saturday. They're without Landry for the rest of the year, and Stiesma will be in his first game back. If they can do what ND St. did, pack the lane and force them to beat you from further away, they may have a chance. I agree. If Penn State can hold the Badgers to 22% from the floor they should be in good shape. Haha, well obviously a huge factor was that UW was awful from the field, and Penn State is a better team than ND State. Big Ten Wonk is more articulate than I: "Here it was: Wisconsin's reductio ad absurdum. Alando Tucker takes more shots than any other Badger and Tucker misses a ton of shots: QED, Wisconsin misses a ton of shots, right? Well, no, not really. At least not until Saturday. UW had managed to transcend Tucker's prolific rim-denting and put points on the board because, like industrious subordinates covering for an incompetent boss, the non-Tucker Badgers had proven to be notably efficient in translating shots into points." The point is that this is the extreme of one end of the spectrum, but considering that there was a bit of a gameplan(the aforementioned packing of the lane) that led to this type of shooting, and the fact that the team was/is relying on good/great shooting to cover Tucker's inefficiencies, it's not that far out of the question for Wisconsin to have another poor shooting night if a similar strategy is employed. Not 22% bad, but enough that a team like PSU(who again is better than ND St.) could hang with and possibly upset UW.

Strange theory ahead. Pagan is a placeholder for Greenberg. That way we have the flexibility of not having Greenberg on the 40 man or worrying about taking him off if something else comes along that needs his spot. If we do need Greenberg to replace someone(for example, Pierre gets hurt and misses an extended period of time), then we just drop Pagan and bring up Greenberg to fill the need. If we need a 40 man spot in a trade or for another need(say Ramirez gets hurt and we need Fontenot), then Pagan is expendable enough to just dump. Meanwhile, worse players than Pagan have graced 40 man's before, and maybe he fulfills his 4th round potential in a different system. I dunno, maybe that's the thought process.

North Dakota St. was scheduled to be humiliated by Wisconsin on Saturday. They're without Landry for the rest of the year, and Stiesma will be in his first game back. If they can do what ND St. did, pack the lane and force them to beat you from further away, they may have a chance.

Former 4th round pick, outfielder, turns 25 in July. Career minor league line of .278/.334/.373/.707 at age appropriate levels. 163 minor league steals at a 73% success rate. I hope he's really really good defensively, because he hasn't done a whole lot on the offensive end.

How is Williams surplus when he's the 3rd best SP with Wood hurt? Because he isn't the 3rd best pitcher with Wood hurt. And if even if we get past the personal opinion difference of his talent level, the Cubs have several other young arms that could use a MLB try-out while Wood is out. Folks about complain about the Cubs not seling high. Here is a chance to sell high while the rotation is stocked. By trading for Kearns? If you want to trade Williams or the other starters, that's fine, but Kearns isn't very good, and wouldn't help much, especially for the cost. There isn't anything I can tell you to sway you're opinion. All I can tell you is that you are underwriting Kearns prematurely and overvalueing Williams. The league and scouts don't agree with your stated values of these players. How in the world do you know what the league and scouts think of the values of some players? Because of what Williams was traded for before he was one of the better starters in the National League last year? Because of what a rumor says the Reds will get in return for Kearns?

IMO, Hughes comes off as closeminded and uninformed on the "other" side, probably the worst of the 4. Bane and the non-McCracken stat guy come off the best, and McCracken doesn't tolerate the other side much at all.

How is Williams surplus when he's the 3rd best SP with Wood hurt? Because he isn't the 3rd best pitcher with Wood hurt. And if even if we get past the personal opinion difference of his talent level, the Cubs have several other young arms that could use a MLB try-out while Wood is out. Folks about complain about the Cubs not seling high. Here is a chance to sell high while the rotation is stocked. By trading for Kearns? If you want to trade Williams or the other starters, that's fine, but Kearns isn't very good, and wouldn't help much, especially for the cost.

How is Williams surplus when he's the 3rd best SP with Wood hurt?

Walking a lot and getting a lot of XBH's with your hits > getting fewer walks and more hits but many fewer XBH's

Welcome!

.258

I dunno, maybe he is. Believe what you want I guess. Dunn doesn't get a ton of hits, but he still reaches base more than most people because of walks. He also hits for more extra bases than most, even though he doesn't get as many hits as most.

Fiver's IU posts are hilarious. I must say that I would like it if Iowa held on, for MSU's sake.

If the Reds are considering trading Kearns for a non-OF, they obviously still see a surplus there. I think that Dunn's unlikely to be traded, but he's been rumored to be on the block before, and he's been linked to the Cubs in those rumors before. On a side note, Dunn does more with his .240 than the vast majority of players do with .300.

Adam Dunn vs RHP: .273/.421/.580/1.001 Adam Dunn vs LHP: .197/.321/463/.784 Seems to be a lot of guys that have trouble against Lefties. I'd hang on to that farm system. the obvious difference being that dunn is still good against lefties. jones is worthless against lefties. Trading for Kearns would be asinine but platooning jones makes a lot of sense. I would give up a b prospect for kearns, nothing more. I would rather trade williams for westbrook than kearns. huh? Dunn career v. LHP: .234/.353/.488/.841 This past year looks like a bit of an aberration. His IsoP and IsoD are very similar, so it's apparently a function of BABIP.