champaignchris
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Everything posted by champaignchris
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A contemporary story: https://syndication.bleacherreport.com/amp/2584179-patrick-kane-under-investigation-for-rape-latest-details-comments-reaction.amp.html The key quotes: “"The totality of the credible evidence—the proof—does not sufficiently substantiate the complainant’s allegation that she was raped by Patrick Kane and this so-called 'case' is rife with reasonable doubt," Erie County District Attorney Frank A. Sedita III said in a statement.” And “DNA testing later called into question the veracity of the woman's claims. In addition, an allegation of tampering led to her initial attorney dropping her as a client.”
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I know almost nothing about how that site puts together their metrics, but I'd put Keith right up there with him, especially if you discount just like, the cumulative stats Kane has put up after Keith left. They base it on their “Goal Shares” metric. They have Keith at #6 behind Hull and Hall, which puts him one spot ahead of Wilson as the best D-man in ‘Hawks history. I don’t know how they calculate goal shares, but at least in the case of ranking the all-time Hawks, it doesn’t result in an absurd outcome.
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3rd best Blackhawk ever (behind only Esposito and Mikita) if you trust Hockey Reference’s rankings. Easily the best Blackhawk of the last 30 years, without any real competition. 40 if you think he was better than Doug Wilson and Denis Savard (which I do).
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How the hell did that happen in the 80s?? The early to mid 80s were an offensive feast in the NBA. That Nuggets team averaged 123 a game and I remember going to a Bulls game when Jordan was out with his broken ankle and there was some sort of giveaway if they got to 120 pts. It was the Bad Boy Pistons starting about 83-84 when Daley took over that brought in the era of low-scoring late-80s/90s basketball. The League per game scoring average had stayed pretty set at 110 a game until 87 when the Pistons made their first Conference Championship game and then plunged to bottom out 91 a game by 1999.
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The inconsistency is infuriating. See my comment above about freshman guards. It’s been the inconsistency with the upperclassmen that’s been so maddening. The freshmen you expect, but you just don’t know what you’re going to get from game to game from Hawkins, Shannon and Mayer. Those are supposed to be three future NBA guys, but they just disappear from time to time, or worse go through stretches of a complete loss of basketball I.Q.
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This Illinois team is going to put Brad Underwood into the loony bin. (Us fans were already nuts.)
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What does Bote need to do to make the team?
champaignchris replied to Bull's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Wisdom’s low WAR last year was largely due to his defense that graded very poorly and swung pretty wildly away from his previous relatively decent grades, as defensive metrics sometimes do. I think he’s a better defensive player than what the metrics showed last year, and is probably closer to a 2 to 2.5 WAR player. -
I don’t know how this Illinois-Indiana game is going to turn out, but if Illinois game out with this intensity every game, they’d be ranked in the top 5 and looking at a 1 or 2 seed in the Tourney.
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Kind of looks like a left-handed hitting Wisdom. Not awful for your 25th or 26th guy on the roster.
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Now, there’s a point we can agree on. Sign Machado and Urias, extend Hoerner and call it an off-season.
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Meh. They have close to $90 million in payroll coming off the books next year assuming Stroman opts out. If they go over this year, they’ll easily be able to reset next year while still adding a few good free agents and/or extending some youngsters. Not saying Britton is the guy you go over for, but I’m not worried about it one way or the other. It won’t affect the team over the long haul.
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Both Big 10 games I watched this weekend - Illinois/Rutgers, NW/Purdue - featured the refs swallowing the whistle and allowing hand-to-hand combat. There seemed to be contact on every single shot attempt. Illinois/Rutgers stayed aesthetically pleasing, but that second half of NW/Purdue was as hard to watch as a rock fight. One of the speculated reasons for the Big 10 not living up to expectations in the Tournament has been that the rest of college basketball does not officiate games the way the Big 10 does. Every year the Big 10 says it’s going to clean the game up, and every year by the end of the season, it’s right back to caveman basketball.
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I think some people undervalue Lebron’s accomplishments for the same reason Wilt Chamberlain’s accomplishments got undervalued; he’s such a physical specimen that people just assume that he’s going to get his numbers no matter what. And LeBron is a complete physical/athletic freak. He’s Oscar Robertson’s game in Karl Malone’s body. And he keeps himself in immaculate condition, both mind and body. I’m not going into the Jordan-Lebron debate, but one thing Lebron has over Jordan is that he kept himself mentally able to play for two decades. Jordan walked away from the game physically healthy but burnt out, not once but twice. People sometimes criticize Lebron’s lack of intensity, but I have a hard time believing he makes it 20 years if he had kept himself in a state of competitive rage the way Jordan did.
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I’m not saying the Cubs should have signed Dex to the contract he got with the Cardinals. However, a major part of why the Cubs were never able to repeat is that they were never able to replace Dex in either the field or at the top of the batting order.
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The only real platoon opportunity I see is at catcher. Gomes mashes lefties. Barnhart hits righties better than Gomes does, but it’s not as pronounced. I’ll be curious if they play the catcher based on who’s pitching for the Cubs or who’s pitching for the opponent. If/when Mervis comes up, there will be some platoon opportunities at 1B/DH. Looking at handedness, Madrigal would be far more useful if he were a left handed hitter. His only place on this team right now seems to be insurance against Hoerner or Swanson getting hurt.
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Rolen is a top 10 offensive third baseman and top 5 defensive third baseman. Are there eligible guys who deserve to be in before him? Sure. But 40? Maybe a half dozen if you exclude steroid scandal guys. I count 15 guys with 60+ WAR that aren't in who aren't eligible yet, either banned, steroids guys, from the 1800s. Lou Whitaker, Bobby Grich, Dwight Evans, and Luis Tiant are probably the biggest misses on that list. Whittaker’s absence from the Hall at this point is inexplicable. Except that a majority of the guys in that 60+ WAR range that aren’t in the Hall (and aren’t steroid guys) all played in that same 70-80s time frame. Grich, Evans and Tiant all fill the same bill. As do Reuschel, Nettles, Buddy Bell, Willie Randolph, Reggie Smith, Tommy John, Bando, and Keith Hernandez. Throw in Thurman Munson who played the same position and had a higher WAR than Campanella while dying three years younger than Campanella was when he had his career ending accident. (To be fair, Campanella didn’t make his MLB debut until age 26 due to segregation, while Munson debuted at age 22.)
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Rolen is a top 10 offensive third baseman and top 5 defensive third baseman. Are there eligible guys who deserve to be in before him? Sure. But 40? Maybe a half dozen if you exclude steroid scandal guys.
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Yeah, I'm going to guess this will be similar. I kind of feel bad for the rest of the QBs in the AFC, because the conference is loaded with young talent. Herbert- does he repeat Philip Rivers and be good, but always on the outside looking in? Jackson- if he stays, he's on one of the best run, well coached organizations in the sport Tua- he's shown what he can do when healthy and has weapons Pickett- may never be great, but his coach has never had a losing season, so he will get his shots Lawrence- a better prospect than all of them, now has good coaching, but tough place to win And that doesn't include young guys like Watson (who has a passing title last time he played a full season) or the 1-2 picks in the draft that will potentially be QBs in Indianapolis and Houston or potentially the Jets if they can somehow make something out of Zach Wilson. On the NFC side of thing, there’s an avenue there for Fields to be one of the top 2 QBs in the conference as early as next year and for the foreseeable future if he can take another step up in development and the Bears can get him some help.
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The NFC Super Bowl team will either have the youngest (Purdy) starting QB in Super Bowl history or the 6th youngest (Hurts).
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Assuming Mahomes goes next week, the starting quarterbacks’ ages in the conference championship games will be 27, 26, 24 and 23. Without looking it up, I’m assuming that’s the youngest combined age in a long, long time, if not ever.
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What do you expect from Dansby Swanson in 2023?
champaignchris replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Put another way, he's about 2016 Addison Russell. Maybe not quite the defender, but with a little more pop. 2016 Addison Russell was a very good player. He was also about the 7th best player on that team, pitchers included. Swanson is likely one of the top 3 players on this year's team, again pitchers included, and therein lies the problem. Russell and Swanson were born 18 days apart. We can almost envision Swanson's contract as the extension Russell would have been signed to had he not disintegrated as both a baseball player and a human being. -
What do you expect from Dansby Swanson in 2023?
champaignchris replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
.260/.360/.420 slash, High 20s HRs/year, lots of Ks, good to great defense. He's not a difference maker, but he raises the win total floor. Maybe a little higher SLG and little lower OBP, but yeah, basically this. -
Chicago Bears Offseason Thread (the tank must payoff)
champaignchris replied to jersey cubs fan's topic in Other Sports
I’m 5’10”. I remember walking around Illinois’ campus when I was a student in the 90s and being amused that I was taller than a couple Illini basketball players who’d been listed at 6’2”. -
And the guy who was point guard for the first half of the season no longer being on the team seems to have helped the offense, too. I have no idea what the full story is, but the whispers of a toxic locker room have all gone quiet.
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I think the expansion to 12 teams in the playoffs will help - more schools can credibly claim to have a shot. I think NIL keeping more kids in school longer will also help - fuller rosters will trickle some of that talent down to more programs. We won’t see actual parity. But instead of maybe 2 or 3 schools with a legit title shot every year, we might get 5 or 6.