Jehrico

I'm starting to think we might have been fleeced in the Aardsma deal. It's still too early to make that call, but I have yet to see anything to the contrary...

Wouldn't it be a 4.50 ERA? the ERA is cumulative of all ST appearances. 4 runsin 9 IP I'm more pessimistic than most of Miller's performances. WHIP is way to high. Today would be a 1.75 WHIP...not good. Too many guys getting on bases, eventually, you give up too many runs. He's had some luck on his side to not have an ERA closer to 6.

Really? PECOTA projects Pie to be worth 2 wins more than Jones this year. PECOTA projections are atrocious when it comes to rookies. Example please? It pegged Ryan Howard to hit almost 60 HR last year, and I thought it was crazy, but he did it. That's an exception, not the norm. I'm not going to look it up and provide any examples (seems you already did if you know it projected Howard to hit 60. If you look at all of the rookies, you'll find alot of numbers like that. Pecota expects the average rookie to perform in his first year in the majors like he would if he did another year in the minors.

Really? PECOTA projects Pie to be worth 2 wins more than Jones this year. PECOTA projections are atrocious when it comes to rookies.

so does coats make the 25 man along with cherry? if so, does what do they do with pagan? I still think it's a long shot for either Coats or Cherry to make the team. I think Cherry makes it. I think at least two pitchers have to be traded before Cherry makes it. That said, I think he makes it. I think Eyre and Miller (and possibly Novoa, if anyone wants him) will be gone by opening day. I think Cherry makes it as well. I predict Guzman wins the fifth spot so Miller is as good as gone... The Cubs don't have to trade Novoa, doesn't he still have options? They don't HAVE too, maybe I'm just being wishful that they will...

so does coats make the 25 man along with cherry? if so, does what do they do with pagan? I still think it's a long shot for either Coats or Cherry to make the team. I think Cherry makes it. I think at least two pitchers have to be traded before Cherry makes it. That said, I think he makes it. I think Eyre and Miller (and possibly Novoa, if anyone wants him) will be gone by opening day.

Teams definitely conduct try-outs. I went to an Orioles try-out my senior year of high school. I highly doubt they have a walk-on sort of thing. Willie Mays Hayes might disagree. He ruined it for everyone else. Have you seen him lately? He's huge! Gotta be a roider. Now everyone is scared to bring in walk-ons like that.

Teams definitely conduct try-outs. I went to an Orioles try-out my senior year of high school. I highly doubt they have a walk-on sort of thing. The Padres invited a Marine to camp who had just gotten back from Iraq. He's supposed to be a pitcher, but he's missing a finger or two on his throwing hand from when a flash-bang went off in his hand. I haven't heard much about how he's doing though...

Soriano single, Theriot double, Lee reached on Visquel error scoring 1, Ramirez singled, Jones singled in 1, Floyd singled in 2, Blanco got out, Izturis got an RBI out, and Z tripled in another run before Soriano got the last out of the inning. That's how you like to see a game get started! Did they chase Morris off of the hill, or is he still in the game?

Can anyone give the highlights of how we got 6?

I think a couple of relievers are going to be traded. Eyre would be at the top of the list. Gotta think Cotts and Novoa are other obvious candidates. Wuertz probably is too, though I hope not. Miller is a maybe, depends on how everyone else falls out. At the end of last season, I would have given Cherry virtually no chance of making the team out of the pen this year. Funny how some guys just fall into place. Kind of like Marshall last year.

Same here. I realize now I love Pat and Ron, but I prefer it when I'm listening to them while watching the broadcast. Pat and Ron are entertaining but Ron is a bad broadcaster. He usually sounds lost Ron is not technically proficient as a broadcaster, no. But I'd say his enthusiasm and emotion certainly saves him from being "bad." Harry "technically" was a horrible broadcaster as well. But we loved him anyways! A little personality can go a long ways...

Fixed

I'm always on 1680x1050. I could never drop any lower... I'm on 1600x1200 until I buy myself a fancy new monitor. With all the time I'm putting in and my hopeful revenue later in the year as a result, I'm hoping to buy a fancy new rig with a super high-def 30" monitor for development. Or maybe a dual 24" Who knows...maybe a dual 30" :D You gotta get off of the full screen monitors and go wide. What's the old saying...Once you go wide, you never go back? No, wait....

Yes-time change tomorrow, and Arizona doesn't change times-so that's why the normal starting time for the games suddenly moved from 2:05 CT to 3:05 CT. Idiots!! (Apologies to our one poster in Tucson.) Well, I lived with it most of my life in Indiana as well, but thankfully last year we gave up one element of our backwards ways :D Way off topic, but... This reminds me of my favorite story out of the Darwin Awards. Some palestinian terrorists were planning on blowing up an Isreali market some time in the 90s with a car bomb. This bomb was set on a timer, so it wasn't a suicide bomb, just drive the vehicle up and park it in a crowded area, and walk away. They made one slight miscalculation. The terrorists refused to acknowledge "Zionist" time (daylight savings time), while the bomb makers did. Turned out to be a suicide mission after all. The only casualty would have been the would-be delivery man, whose refusal to recognize "Zionist time" got himself blown up into little pieces. :D The moral of the story? Don't mess with Daylight savings time. You Arizonians are playing with fire :wink:

I don't think most of us are worried about his defense (ie-covering the field, catching the ball, getting good reads, etc.) per se...more what he's going to do with the ball once he decides to throw it. I hope his "playing hurt" problem last year is something he can get over since the guy really has a decent arm. Sounds like CF last year...

I'm not giving up on him, but I don't want him taking up a spot in the rotation if he can't consistantly hit 90 by the time ST is over. Put him on the DL so he can get more work in at Iowa until he gets back up to that.

I read that Maddux told Marquis (being pretty close friends from what I understand) to pay close attention to what Rothschild has to say, and that he has much respect for Rothschild as well. Again, I really don't pin the blame of the pitching staff woes of the past few years on Larry. I blame Dusty for his perceived overrulings of Larry's opinions/decisions. Running guys out there consistently for 100+ pitches wasn't Larry's idea. That's the manager. That's why I'm reserving judgement :wink: One thing that puzzles me a little though...if Dusty really did override him as much as we all think, I'm surprised he opted to stay here and work with Dusty again instead of going to Detroit. Makes you wonder if Hendry spoke to him and Rothschild knew way before anyone else that Dusty's time was about to come to an end. If I were Rothschild, there's no way I would have come back to be an assistant under him again. It wasn't exactly a stunning surprise to anyone that Dusty was canned. Pretty much every sportswriter and commentator had him written off by midseason last year. There are a lot of reasons Larry could have stuck it out. Maybe he likes the city or he has family in the area. Maybe he's out to prove that the pitching problems were Dusty's and not his and salvage his reputation. I'm with you in reserving my judgment. We'll see how the pitching staff improves this season and what changes there are in the way the staff is used. Then we can better separate Dusty from Larry. Larry Rothschild is from the Chicago area. He still has family here although I believe he now lives in FL during the offseason. Good info, I didn't know he was from the area. That gives a little more perspective into his decision. That, and who would want to spend half the year in Detroit? It's not as bad as St Louis, but it's not far behind on the suck scale.

He also could have been trying to criticize some of his teammates. Maybe he thinks some of the other guys from last year were too comfortable under Dusty, took it for granted, and got complacent. With Lou, they know they have to keep their butt in gear, or they'll find his shoe up it. Or maybe he was trying to criticize both Dusty and some of the other Cubs.

I read that Maddux told Marquis (being pretty close friends from what I understand) to pay close attention to what Rothschild has to say, and that he has much respect for Rothschild as well. Again, I really don't pin the blame of the pitching staff woes of the past few years on Larry. I blame Dusty for his perceived overrulings of Larry's opinions/decisions. Running guys out there consistently for 100+ pitches wasn't Larry's idea. That's the manager. That's why I'm reserving judgement :wink: One thing that puzzles me a little though...if Dusty really did override him as much as we all think, I'm surprised he opted to stay here and work with Dusty again instead of going to Detroit. Makes you wonder if Hendry spoke to him and Rothschild knew way before anyone else that Dusty's time was about to come to an end. If I were Rothschild, there's no way I would have come back to be an assistant under him again.

I think Kinkade is the only guy in the lineup that is at risk of getting cut in the first wave. I'd be surprised if anyone else was. There's a couple of guys who probably won't make it, but should at least last until the later waves of cuts.

I'm still reserving judgement on Rothschild until we see how the staff holds up this year. Other than that, I'm pleased with everything that I've seen thus far.

That's code for I thought this needed revisiting. Jacobson's whole quote was: I see no reason to call him a douchebag, unless you're just too narrow minded to see why this isn't' a good thing for everybody. Either that, or you somehow feel that being in the directtv circle somehow makes you more 'elite' than non-directtv subscribers, and you just don't care about them. Anyways, as far as Jacobsen goes, I'm sure he has other motives, but he's looking out more for the general fan base in this case than either DirecTV or MLB. This is anti-competitive. Competition is always good in any market. There won't be any competition for directtv for EI, which is incredibly bad for consumers. You may not notice it too much for the first year or two, but I guarantee everyone will by the end of the deal.

That's code for From your article: DirecTV uses statistics that only 5,000 of the 500,000 subscriptions would not have access to DirecTV. That's all well and good. Did they factor in the number of people prohibited by lease agreements , neighborhood associations, or simply access to the proper direction in the sky from installing a dish and/or utilizing it? Just for the sake of argument let's assume that 45,000 of those households fall into at least 1 of those 3 categories. According to their published statements DirecTV claimed to have 230,000 of the 500,000 subscribers already. At $100mil/year assuming they get ALL of the previous subscribers, that comes down to $222 per household in fees and advertising revenue, just to break even. Not factoring in their costs in installing systems in each home who switches, their custom programming on the extra innings package, etc. And they are convinced that by their exclusivity and content they're going to get more subscribers than when the package was available from all 3 sources. That's sheer arrogance. Yes they'll likely convert more of their own previously existing subscribers into the package, but they're not likely to see a huge boom of new subscribers switching from alternate sources. In today's day and age of package deals, not many people have the money, let alone the desire to disrupt the package pricing to switch their TV to something else and pay full price for what's left behind. DirecTV isn't the bad guy here. Sure, they'll take advantage of their monopoly and jack up their rates, as well as ridiculous surcharges for HD content. But that is capitalism. MLB, is looking out for it's interests, namely profits. And that to, isn't against the law. Saying a big old screw you to those who can't/don't want their service, that's no different than any other business. I don't fault them for what they're doing. Just think it's gonna backfire pretty good for baseball and directv in the long run. I hope Congress revokes MLBs anti-trust exemption as a result of this. I think they solved that problem by giving cable and Dish the right to match the offer...If they decide not to pay then it is their choice not to... I think that was just some legal language aimed to get around the issue. Pretty sleazy if you ask me. I can't recall the legal term for it, but I don't think the fact that they added that clause would hold any weight in court or in front of congress. The intent is very clear, and that will override the writing if it does go before Congress and the SEC. They obviously do not expect anyone to match the offer. Even the larger companies like Cox, Comcast, or Adelphia couldn't afford to match that. Of course, DirecTV likely loses a ton of money as well if one of the majors were willing to committ suicide, since they wouldn't get the additional subscribers they were expecting to cover the cost. I wonder what exactly a broadcast company gets rights to for $100 million. If it's pretty much unfettered rights to rebroadcast and distribute live MLB footage as they wish, what would stop one cable company from selling a feed to the other cable outlets to help diffuse the cost? They could all chip in. If Comcast, for example, buys it, they should have the rights to sell the package through all of their affiliates. If they owned 1% of Adelphia, or something like that, would all Adelphia cities be fair game? This of course could also raise some eyebrows as well. If DirecTV can get away with their shady deal with MLB, I don't see why one of the major cable outlets couldn't get away with a shady deal either.

That's code for From your article: DirecTV uses statistics that only 5,000 of the 500,000 subscriptions would not have access to DirecTV. That's all well and good. Did they factor in the number of people prohibited by lease agreements , neighborhood associations, or simply access to the proper direction in the sky from installing a dish and/or utilizing it? Just for the sake of argument let's assume that 45,000 of those households fall into at least 1 of those 3 categories. According to their published statements DirecTV claimed to have 230,000 of the 500,000 subscribers already. At $100mil/year assuming they get ALL of the previous subscribers, that comes down to $222 per household in fees and advertising revenue, just to break even. Not factoring in their costs in installing systems in each home who switches, their custom programming on the extra innings package, etc. And they are convinced that by their exclusivity and content they're going to get more subscribers than when the package was available from all 3 sources. That's sheer arrogance. Yes they'll likely convert more of their own previously existing subscribers into the package, but they're not likely to see a huge boom of new subscribers switching from alternate sources. In today's day and age of package deals, not many people have the money, let alone the desire to disrupt the package pricing to switch their TV to something else and pay full price for what's left behind. DirecTV isn't the bad guy here. Sure, they'll take advantage of their monopoly and jack up their rates, as well as ridiculous surcharges for HD content. But that is capitalism. MLB, is looking out for it's interests, namely profits. And that to, isn't against the law. Saying a big old screw you to those who can't/don't want their service, that's no different than any other business. I don't fault them for what they're doing. Just think it's gonna backfire pretty good for baseball and directv in the long run. I hope Congress revokes MLBs anti-trust exemption as a result of this.