soccer10k

Ok Pittsburgh, here's what you're going to do. You're going to score two touchdowns and win the game by 3 so you cover the spread for me.

Pittsburgh: "Here Cincinnati. Take this victory. We really don't want to win this game." Cincinnati: "Ok." WOW. What a catch by TJH for the second touchdown. What concentration.

Thanks for the reminder, I forgot to put Rutgers into the schedule. There are a lot of games this week that I didn't know whether to group into good or mismatches, including Missouri and Notre Dame (Purdue has looked really bad, but after last night I can't make any ND game a mismatch). I would say Minnesota-Michigan is likely to be a mismatch. Who knows though. Talentwise I'd say yes, but Minnesota's made a habit of playing them extremely tough, especially at the Metrodome. That's true. I don't think Minnesota has the talent they have had in the previous few years though. We'll see. Like you said, it is in the Metrodome.

I would post this in the Vikings-Bears thread but I would probably get shot. HAHAHAHA!!! Nice throw Grossman.

I don't think anybody is watching the Cubs right now.

Thanks for the reminder, I forgot to put Rutgers into the schedule. There are a lot of games this week that I didn't know whether to group into good or mismatches, including Missouri and Notre Dame (Purdue has looked really bad, but after last night I can't make any ND game a mismatch). I would say Minnesota-Michigan is likely to be a mismatch. Who knows though.

Carolina needs to score again, I picked them to cover.

Rutgers moved into the AP top 25 for the first time sinc 1976. ESPN.com story EDIT: And congrats to Missouri on being ranked as well.

Brunell finally threw an incomplete pass. He ended up completing 22 straight.

Mark Brunell has topped Rich Gannon's record and has completed 21 straight passes which is every pass he has attempted today against Houston.

I don't doubt that Soriano will regress next year, but I don't think that he will regress as much as some people are expecting if he comes to Wrigley that is. Barring injury, Soriano is likely a lock for 30-35 HR's, 30-35 2B and a .500 SLG. We know he won't get on base all that well career year or not. We know we are going to have to overpay to get a top player because it's a matter of simple economics, supply and demand. He's not going to be worth the money he's going to get, but there aren't many top players in the league that are.

regardless, there isn't a whole lot of reason to believe murton will be on base significantly more than soriano. What about Soriano's career .325 OBP? Or that this is the first year of his career with a .340+ OBP? and? how are you so sure murton will best .325 next year? or Soriano will regress? We were talking about probability, right? IMO the odds that Murton puts up a, say, .340 or better OBP are higher than Soriano's. that's your opinion, not probability. to make a statement that soriano will be on base less is not really based on fact. That's why I cited Soriano's career. The guy's put up a .340 OBP once(and only once during his minor league career when he was a 23 year old at AA), and the only time Murton has ever been below a .340 OBP was his 80 Daytona AB's. Even if you account for Murton's BABIP being high this year he's still supposed to be around .340+, and he's got age on his side(with regards to having room for improvement). For that matter, in his minor league career, he only put up an OBP below .370 just once (in the year you cited) and has a career MLB OBP of .368 in basically a full seasons worth of AB's.

Sign Soriano also.

Careful or you will hear from the stats junkies who will find some statistic to downplay his offense. No, you won't. What you will find is some solid evidence suggesting it'd be foolish to expect him to achieve those feats again. There's no reason to be optimistic that he's capable of repeating this years success. It's a fluke and it's out of line with his last few years. But even if he doesn't achieve those feats again, his career averages would be a huge upgrade at 2B or CF for the 2007 Cubs. One probem with that...he can't play 2b. You may as well put Barrett out there in the middle IF if you're that desparate for offensive production from 2b that you'd completely disregard defense altogether. I haven't watched him in the OF this year...he's got the arm and the speed for CF, but I dont' know whether or not he could hack it, so I won't say he'd be a bad idea there either. Also, there's no guarantee he'll come close to those kinds of numbers next year either. He hit about as bad as Neifi away from Arlington last year. No exaggeration there, his road OPS really was close to Neifi's. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't RFK a pitcher's park? Either way, Soriano has a .944 OPS at home and a .921 OPS on the road this year.

Could we, yes. Will we, probablynot. Everything I hear about A-Rod is he wants to stay in New York and the Yankees do not want to trade him. That could change if he has a horrible postseason though.

I'm sure that will pretty much be the national consensus (everyone outside of OSU fans) which is very cool. Yeah this will be the third time in four weeks they'll be at OSU's game, but really they haven't had much choice. They had to be at the Texas game and Iowa-OSU is the only matchup of ranked teams next weekend and the clear game of the week, plus Herbstreit will be there. I was surprised they were at Columbus today, but I guess the next best options were Notre Dame or Cal and Arizona State. And you know as long as Michigan doesn't fall off the map, Gameday will be in Columbus on November 18. I thought I heard they didn't plan on going to the same location twice. A quick look shows the only other ones that would make sense being Auburn/Alabama and Cal/USC. They could go to Cal/USC also. But that one depends on whether they go to USC for the Notre Dame game.

I have to say that going back and reading all of the posts - especially the posts from early in the game - was quite entertaining. From the impression I got from looking at the box score, some credit has to be given to Notre Dame for coming back. Anytime a team lets a 17 point lead get away, they choked at least little bit. Apparently Quinn went 2-8 for 6 yards in the first quarter meaning in the other 3 quarters he went 18-28 for 313 yards and 5 touchdowns. That's a solid 3 quarter performance for any quarterback. Then factoring in the rain as well as the fact that it was a road game, his performance becomes more impressive (I do realize he wasn't perfect though). What Notre Dame definitely has to do is shore up their defense. This team reeks of 2005 USC all over except with a less potent offense. And believe me, that is not a shot at Notre Dame at all rather a compliment to USC. I'm really torn on whether or not Notre Dame should be encouraged by both the result of the game and their 3-1 record right now. It's always a good sign to see a team continue to fight to the end and pull out a victory like this, especially on the road, but Michigan State likely isn't a great team this year and a team with National Title aspirations should have done better. I do think all of the media hype inflated the expectations for Notre Dame this year and that isn't helping matters. But Notre Dame is going to climb in the polls as they get into the easy part of their schedule and other teams start beating each other in conference. And for those who think the Brady Quinn Heisman campaign has been derailed, it hasn't and it will pick up in the next few weeks as he piles up stats. He will be in New York for the ceremony. And as much as I hate to say it, congrats to Notre Dame on the victory.

I'm sure that will pretty much be the national consensus (everyone outside of OSU fans) which is very cool. Yeah this will be the third time in four weeks they'll be at OSU's game, but really they haven't had much choice. They had to be at the Texas game and Iowa-OSU is the only matchup of ranked teams next weekend and the clear game of the week, plus Herbstreit will be there. I was surprised they were at Columbus today, but I guess the next best options were Notre Dame or Cal and Arizona State. And you know as long as Michigan doesn't fall off the map, Gameday will be in Columbus on November 18.

Chalk up another K for Adam Dunn.

In the Youngstown St./UC Davis game, Youngstown St. got a touchdown in which a player went untouched to the endzone and the announcer said "he went unmolested to the endzone." I kid you not.

ARam is the man.

Congrats to Missouri. Any chance they'll be ranked next week?

30 minutes til UC Davis.

Ohio State finally gets on the board with a touchdown. 7-3 OSU.

Considering the weather, I'm not too surprised. I figured it would be low scoring. We'll see if OSU makes any adjustments in the second half. Have the announcers said anything about JoePa? I've been watching the Cal-ASU game.