Precious Roy

What? Why? Because the bullpen is generally ass aside from Rivera. As I, and many others, argued, a late inning combo of Joba-Rivera was an invaluable commodity. We don't have that now, we now have a total crapshoot until we get Mo in the game, if we get Mo in the game, and though Girardi hasn't done it yet, there's the risk of him overusing Mo to make up for the lack of a reliable setup man like Torre did all too often. Don't get me wrong, I love Joba as a starter longterm, and so far shorterm based on how well he's acclimated himself, but the move created a ton of bullpen questions that have yet to really be answered. I'm not at all comfortable with an unsettled pen, I've seen the Yankees lose too many games, and put themselves in a position where they can't even get Rivera into the game over the last several years due to that. Having a "lights out" bridge to the closer who you can bring in in the 7th or 8th inning is apparently underrated, but I think it's an absolute necessity for a winning club.

riiiiiiight

Joba has been pretty awesome his last two starts. Granted it's been against the Padres and Pirates, but he's handled an awkward transition exceptionally well. He just needs to work on getting his pitch count down and getting some easier outs off of contact rather than trying to strike every batter out and he's going to be in ace territory sooner than expected. I was pretty strongly against the move, but in hindsight, with Wang getting hurt, it's probably worked out for the best. Still not entirely comfortable with the bullpen situation though.

I'd like to be back next year, thanks for waiting on me

That Love play, if he's one step away from the basket it's a charge call in the NBA. He's talented and has a high "basketball IQ", he should be ok on the defensive end once he learns the ins and outs of the NBA game. If he drops out of the top 6 he's going to be a steal for whoever gets him. For the Hornets and Nuggets selling off their picks, yeah, there's going to be talent there, it's just a case of the respective management looking at their rosters and free agency and looking at the players that will likely be there and deciding they don't need to be adding a first round rookie at this point. I'm sure in a couple years there'll be a guy drafted around that time or later who turns into a stud and people will question why those teams moved their picks, but whatever. Denver I understand because they are way over the cap and have a ton of guys on guaranteed contracts, and they got a future pick out of it that they can cash in on when their salary situation is more manageable. The Hornets deal I don't get so much, outright selling a pick always seems silly to me, you own a fucking NBA team, do you really need an extra million or whatever that much? And the Hornets seem like a team that, while they don't really need to add a first rounder, could find a solid dude there who could make their rotation. As good as they were this past season, they've got some holes and spots they could upgrade.

Hibbert is a guy who could help create opportunites to run from the defensive end, but he's not going to be a factor in it offensively. With Ford running the break, he's so fast in the open court, they don't necessarily need a 5 man break, not that a 5 man break is anything a team necessarily needs anyway. I think Hibbert would be a good fit for them, plus they still have Foster and Murphy which takes pressure off him to play a ton of minutes right a way. I think he's a guy who should develop and get better and better over the years.

If the trade goes through I like it for both teams. O'Neal's rep has taken a big hit the last couple years, it seems like he just kind of checked out once they started slowly dismantling that team. The knocks on him are deserved, misses too many games, drifts out to the perimeter too much for a guy who's only an average mid-range jump shooter, takes plays off etc. but putting him next to Chris Bosh could be the tonic for a resurgence. Ford is a good player, but personally I like Calderon better, and this allows them to resign him and hand him the PG spot fulltime. For Indiana they get a very good-great playmaker who, aside from his suspect outside shot, should fit into Jim O'Brien's system and mesh well with shooters like Granger and Dunleavy. The 17th pick shouldn't be slept on, there will be some legit talent still on the board at that pick. It seems like everyone is hating on Hibbert, but I think he'd be a good pick for them if he's there. DeAndre Jordan, CDR, Robin Lopez, they can get a contributer here and maybe more than that. Plus they're going to get rid of Tinsley, which is addition by subtraction at this point, as is turning the page on J.O. Ford is a major injury risk, but one worth taking for the Pacers here IMO. As far as the Heat go, I'm skeptical about Wade returning to form. He's always been injury prone due to style of play, and if he doesn't have the ability to slash and finish at the rim he becomes merely a good player, not the great player that he has been in the past. If he's a quick guy who shoots pull up jumpers and occasionally attacks the basket he's a hell of a lot more guardable than the guy who's hitting the mouth of the defense every time and the mid range jumper is his changeup shot. How Wade performs and if he stays healthy enough to play 70+ games is the difference in the Heat being a top 4-5 or on the bubble playoff team. With the pick they have they should be a middle of the pack playoff team, I just have a lot of questions about Wade at this point.

Are we still doing this? I don't even want to do a write up, my team is just awesome

Just wanted to argue this point as well. I don't like this idea either. If I pick up someone that got dropped their "contract" should be finished. Of course the cost is kept through trades and if you want to argue against someone dropping their own player and picking him back up still costing the draft slot I won't argue that (as I did with Ervin Santana, though it was not for that reason). But if a player is made a free agent, that should be exactly what they are "free" with no later cost. Agreed. To prevent circumvention, If someone picks one of their drafted players back up the player should retain his draft value, but if another team picks the player up it should be a clean slate. I don't see anything wrong with the keepers as set up now. The whole goal in a keeper league is to build a dynasty over time, there's no need to handicap things to make an "even playing field" between established owners and new owners. And really, if you do a good job managing your team there's no reason you can't be a contender in your first couple years. I'm in my second year in this league, my team sucked last year, but so far this year I'm in the top 5, and that's almost entirely through drafting.

Hypothetical question, if you pick up a player from free agency who was initially drafted by another team and then dropped, if you make that player a keeper does he cost you a round 20 (or equivalent) pick, or do you inherit his drafted position. It seems like the draft value should be wiped clean once a player is dropped and clears waivers, but I could see how it might go either way

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Doesn't Scottie Pippen want to get into coaching?

Anyone making a big deal over this Pierce thing just comes off to me like they never actually played sports at anything beyond a pee wee level and/or never had a sports related injury. He was acting? Come the fuck on. Plus there's just the simple common sense of the trainer not letting him immediately put weight on it after Pierce has told him, "I felt a pop, and it really fucking hurts." Once they get him back in the locker room on a table and the trainers can actually examine the injury and determine that there's no major structural damage, that's when they give the ok for him to try and go with it. That's just standard procedure in a professional sport. I worry about Pierce for the rest of the series though, a sprained knee won't go away in a couple days, especially if every other day he's playing basketball on it. He says he'll play Sunday, but I bet he's going to be very limited and in a lot of pain after a couple minutes up and down the court. Also, he's apparently refusing to take an MRI till after the series, so while the trainers will have an idea of the injury, they won't know for sure if there's any small tears in any of the ligaments. Just as an aside because it relates to this, I've experienced a severely sprained knee in combination with a partial (around a 1/4 of an inch) tear of the MCL (the ligament on the front of your leg that connects the knee cap to the tibia), during a basketball practice. When it happened I was down on the ground for at least 2-3 minutes and even the slightest movement of my leg was just total, mind-searing pain. After the initial pain subsided I was helped to my feet, stood on it, stretched it out, kind of tested it with weight and walking for a bit, and after about 5 minutes of that I re-entered the practice. The next day when I woke up my knee was swollen to shit, I could barely even move the thing, just getting out of bed hurt, and I decided I had to go see a doctor. It took a good week and a half to two weeks for me to be even close to doing anything more than just walking, and the partial MCL tear bothered me off and on for about a year. I only share this as an example of how there are different stages of an injury, how you can go from initially being in a ton of pain, to feeling ok almost immediately afterwards, to being in much worse shape once activity stops and swelling sets in. Like Ripper has been saying, every injury is different and everyone reacts differently. I have no doubt that Pierce was in a lot of pain when it happened, and I don't doubt that it will be bothering him for the rest of the series. Also, Pierce got stabbed 11 times, had a pierced lung, and was back on the court in less than a month. Nobody should question that man's toughness.

My team doesn't really need anything, so we'll go with a little instant offense off the bench World B. Free 20 pts in 30 mpg over a 13 year career, 22+ in 8 consecutive seasons. Was second in the league in scoring to George Gervin in back to back seasons (78-79, 79-80). Great penetrator, regularly among league leaders in free throw attempts. 45-46 percent FG shooter on his career.

I think this guy might be the last member of the NBA's 50 Greatest team. He was the 1957 rookie of the year, a 6 time all-star, 4 time all-NBA second team, and an 8 time NBA champion. But I'm not picking him as a player, I'm picking him as my coach... Tom "Tommy" Heinsohn! A protege of Red Auerbach, he coached the Celtics from 1970-1978, through what was initially considered a rebuilding period with the end of the Auerbach/Russell dynasty, winning two NBA titles in the process. He won a coach of the year award in 72-73, and amassed a record of 427-263 (.619), the 11th best regular season win percentage amongst coaches with at least 200 games on their resume. His teams had a .588 win percentage in the playoffs. Like Red he emphasized unselfish team basketball, defense and hustle, making him a perfect fit for my players.

The Yankees lost the game tonight in the 8th inning. Joba's inning. *sigh*

It was widely reported that Kaman discovered in the past off-season that he had been misdiagnosed with ADHD. Kaman and Mike Dunleavy both credited his improvement on the court to finally receiving the proper treatment, as he'd been plagued by lapses of concentration and short-term memory problems beforehand. He might not put up the same numbers with Brand playing, but as long as he's got his issues sorted out I don't see his improvement being an aberration. And no, the Clippers would not leap at the chance to trade a 7 ft shotblocking, rebounding, low post scoring true center for an undersized power forward who's yet to prove himself as any more than a role player off the bench. What in the world makes you think that? Why would any team make that trade, much less a team that already has a great power forward?

I'm betting on Rey Mysterio to RAW and Punk to Smackdown, beyond that I have no idea.

I haven't watched RAW in several weeks, have they done anything with Cade and Murdoch since Cade turned on him? I'd like to see a match between the two.

Seriously? Because Chris Kamen was pretty fucking awesome last year, just shy of 16 points, 13 rebounds and 3 blocks a night. Those are monster numbers, and I think every single GM in the NBA would take Kamen over Maxiell, or McDyess, and taking age into consideration over Rasheed too.

Czech instant messaged me his pick He would have taken Bob Hansen but there weren't any good Google images

Pending whatever changes the draft might bring to RAW, If they want a fresh program for HHH that has potential to draw over the summer they should turn Jericho heel and put him over HBK to build into a title program with Hunter. And maybe not make him look like a total jerkoff goober like they did the last time they worked together. The only "problem" with that is that they'd get some split crowd reactions because Jericho has such a loyal fanbase and HHH isn't exactly everyone's cup of tea, but that really isn't a problem unless they make it one by booking against it.

Yeah, but there's no way you can blame Orton for that. He was really just hitting his stride as champion when they took the belt off him. The program with Hardy, working with Cena and HHH, the win at Wrestlemania, the "Age of Orton" stuff, he was getting super over, they finally discovered the perfect formula with him and then they just killed it. The ratings didn't start dropping because Orton was the challenger, they started dropping because HHH has the belt, he's insanely boring when he has the belt, and they make Orton and everyone else into total jobbers against him.

What? Orton is and has been for a long time one of the best performers on RAW. If I had to choose between Orton and HHH being off TV it wouldn't even be a choice. Though, if HHH broke a collarbone while holding the belt they'd probably just keep it on him and go a couple months with a champion who can't wrestle rather than write him out of the picture. Also, I doubt they'll take Orton off TV completely. Return of the RNN???

MDM? Million Dollar Man Oh. Duh I thought the "2nd Generation" (and Ted Jr. is actually 3rd gen) stable was going to be a showcase for Ted Jr, Cody Rhodes and Harry Smith, I didn't know that Ted Sr. was actually going to be involved. I like the idea of putting Orton and Batista back together, they don't necessarily even need to form a stable, just do it like the Two Man Power Trip or Rated RKO. Even if Orton is hurt and out for a couple months it would still work.