Ms to RAISE Payroll?

Larry Stone

Here’s some encouraging news: The team’s ownership is said to be willing to take its 2007 payroll into the $95 million range — or possibly even higher, as long as the first number remains a nine.

Considering that Dave Cameron’s offseason plan was working under the assumption of a sub 90M payroll, this is a big boost. The 7-12M of space that Dave quoted would now be 17-22M and since I feel that Dave was overly generous on some aspects, I would say it’s probably another 3-4M on top of that.

So, go hog wild with some rosteurbation.

P.S.

Just going to show you how worthless it is, the 2006 Red Sox eclipsed the record setting 2003 Mariners as the team with the highest fielding percentage in baseball history.

V For Vendetta is a Fantastic Movie

I saw it when it originally came out, but just got the Netflix in, and man, did I forget how much I enjoyed this movie. The cast really performed well with almost no letdowns across the board. I don’t have much to say about it other than to go see it, again if you already have.

Biggest Pro: Never taking off V’s mask.

Biggest Con: The movie could have used some more oppressive government scenes. I think the points still came across (and continue to be ever more relevant in today’s world), but if you have a few more 1984 moments in there, it really would have hammered home the message to everyone. They dropped the ball there.

By the way, how come nobody has done a 1984 remake? It’s been 50 years, the first one sucked, and the book is incredibly relevant now. Maybe I’m just a sucker for good sci-fi (okay, I am), but who wouldn’t want to see that movie? Plus, with the short length of the novel, it’s a perfect candidate for adaption to film.

Also, there’s a Foundation movie in development. But I have no idea if it’s related to the Asimov series. If anyone does, drop me a line.

Would I Be Better Off Without M$ In My Life?

I don’t know.

It’s fairly common within the computer science world to bash Microsoft, and while I’m far from a MS apologist or defender, I’ve always ridden the fence on the issue. I’m not a huge fan of linux and until the dual proc mac pro, Macintosh’s proprietary-ness always prevented me from giving it anything more than my disdain. I use a lot, I mean, a lot, of third party programs and have just always felt that Windows provided an ideal platform for that. Furthermore, if you have any sort of computer intelligence, it’s not terribly difficult to avoid viruses and crashes.

That being said, I am sick of XP. It corrupted for the second time now for me, and while this might not have been windows fault this time (The install that corrupted wasn’t properly made), the re-install process is a joke. Here’s the issue:

All that happened to my PC was that Windows corrupted. All the files on the hard disk are still there, everything’s fine but I can’t boot into windows. Which also means that I can’t get in to get my files out. Otherwise I would just do that then wipe the whole disk and re-install and I’d be fine. So, this afforded me the flimsy pretense needed to splurge on another new harddrive. This time, a 250GB SATA from Western Digital. This is my first SATA HDD. Those of you with extensive XP experience can probably already guess where this is going.

Yes, being old (XP is actually quite old), XP doesn’t recognize SATA initially. Which means, it wont find my new hard drive, and wont let me install windows onto it. How to remedy the situation? Well, you simply need to load a SATA driver into XP. No problem right? Well, it wouldn’t be four years ago. Here’s the catch: XP ONLY recognizes drivers coming from the A: drive. I do not have an A: drive, having never added a floppy disk drive to my PC upon it’s last rebuild. This means that I cannot load the drivers in, which means XP wont recognize my drive, which means I continue to have a dead PC sitting next to my wonderfully, never malfunctioning laptop (seriously, if you buy laptop, buy IBM or Mac).

So, I’m waiting on a kind co-worker to arrive with a floppy drive that he no longer uses (because, really, who DOES use one?) and then hopefully I can go about resurrecting my precious PC.

Anyways, it just got me thinking about whether or not I need Microsoft in my life since almost every other OS wouldn’t have had a SATA issue. Visual Studio is the only piece of software that I use from Microsoft. It is great though. I just don’t know.

Out of the office

Moving back to Philadelphia over past week and into next week. Back to regular posts afterwards.

Gameday, 60% of the time, it works all the time

This was one of the other 40%.

Snelling actually walked. Pitch 6 was, indeed, a ball.

Catching Up On Some Minor Leaguers

Just a follow up on some players I am keeping tabs on.

Brandon Morrow: 10IP, 10K, 8BB, 0 HR (rookie league)
Tim Lincecum: 16.1 IP, 28K, 5BB, 2HR (split btw A and A+)
Andrew Miller: no stats yet
Clayton Kershaw: 36IP, 52K, 5BB, 0HR (rookie league)
Marcos Carvajal: 65.1IP, 58K, 33BB, 7HR (AA)
Asdrubal Cabrera: 141AB, .255/.278/.319 (for AAA Buffalo)

How Barry Zito Will Destroy Your Payroll Flexibility Starting in 2007

Barry Zito, FIPs, 2004-6: 4.57, 4.37, 5.00
Barry Zito, xFIPs, 2004-6: 5.04, 4.61, 5.33
Barry Zito, K/BB, 2004-6: 2.01, 1.92, 1.57

For Reference

Washburn, FIPs, 2004-6: 4.60, 4.37, 4.65
Washburn, xFIPs, 2004-6: 5.06, 5.01, 5.33
Washburn, K/BB, 2004-6: 2.15, 1.84, 1.81

They both generate GBs at about the same 35-40% rate.

Barry Zito is Jarrod Washburn (maybe even worse) and he will cost 150% times as much as Washburn.

J Schmidt, FIPs, 2004-6: 2.78, 3.77, 3.48
J Schmidt, xFIPs, 2004-6: 3.35, 4.40, 4.43
J Schmidt, K/BB, 2004-6: 3.26, 1.94, 2.41

Jason Schmidt is, by far, the better pitcher. Whoever signs Zito is likely to be seriously regretting the move by about August 2007.

If Only There Was an Easy Way to Transport Food Around the World

According to the BBC, there are now more people in the world who are overweight than than people who are going hungry.

The number of overweight people in the world has topped 1 billion and is growing rapidly, while the number of undernourished people in the world is at 800 million.

If there is good news to take out of this, it is that while the number of obese people is spiking at an exponential growth rate, the number of people who are undernourished is slowly declining. So not only do we need to find better ways of distributing the food that we do grow, we’re still growing too much of it. Or, alternatively, we don’t have enough people. So farmers out there, find something else to do with your food (biodiesel anyone?) and/or rest of world, start having more sex.

The Princeton Review Doesn’t Get It

The following is taken from the Princeton Review’s Dispelling the GMAT Myths article.

MYTH: All of the questions on the GMAT count equally towards your score.

FACT: Questions at the beginning of each section have a greater impact on your score than do questions that come later in the section. Think of it like your college GPA: your grades from freshman courses could cause big changes, but by the time you were a senior, individual grades didn’t have much of an impact.

Apparently, the Princeton Review doesn’t understand that the individual grades from senior year classes do have exactly the same impact on your GPA as an individual grade from your freshman year. The Princeton Review is essentially making the “games count more in August and September” argument, which is, well, flat wrong. Good job guys.

Newcastle Brown Ale

***IMPORTANT NOTE***: This review concerns Newcastle on tap only. I have heard that Newcastle bottled is quite a different, and inferior, experience.

Appearance: Pours like you would expect from a stout, dark brown/blackish color, thick dark head.

Smell: 7 – There’s just a hint of the dark, nutty, taste that lies beneath in the smell. This is quite the reverse of the Harpoon Raspberry UFO which possessed a strong scent, but little punch in the way of taste.

Taste: 9 – Just a wonderful, filling taste. Harder to describe in terms of flavors because it is a complex mix of nuts, coffee, caramel, and toffee.

Mouthfeel: 9 – A terrific balance between too lite and too thick.

Finish: 9 – Clean, smooth, almost a blueprint for how a beer should feel at the end.

Aftertaste: 8 – Pleasent and understated. Doesn’t grow with repeated tastings, instead, it maintains a comfortable reminder of the wonderful taste without being just a continuation of the first impression.

Drinkability: 8.5 – I could drink tons of these. Only the neccessity of getting Newcastle on tap, and therefore the increased cost, keeps this from being a really high rating.

OVERALL: 8.63/10

Sam Adams Cream Stout

Appearance: Pours like you would expect from a stout, dark brown/blackish color, thick dark head.

Smell: 8.5 – Nice fragrance of chocolate with some caramel and malt undertones. Very refreshing.

Taste: 8.5 – The chocolate really hits home here as it takes no time to announce its presence in the beer. Right off the bat, I am reminded of the more heartier chocolate stouts like Young’s.

Mouthfeel: 7 – A comfortable filling feel. Not thick, but possesses enough substance to know that you are drinking a beer.

Finish: 7.5 – The chocolate takes a back seat here as the caramel and malty flavors really heighten and provide a nice finish on their own, but especially so when coupled with the chocolate first impression. A lesson in well-roundedness that many other beers should be paying attention to.

Aftertaste: 6.5 – Very little aftertaste to begin with, though over the course of a bottle, I began to notice the finish hanging around longer and longer. Lost a few points for that as the finish grows wearisome when it’s present well after the swallow.

Drinkability: 7.5 – By no means is it as filling as a stout makes you think, and it certainly gets good marks here, but the mounting aftertaste do hold back the beer somewhat from elevating past a merely good overall rating. Could easily have 3 or 4 of these in a night, and with the price of being a Sam Adams, that is certainly affordable, it just does not quite possess enough character to pass the great threshold.

OVERALL: 7.70/10

Harpoon Raspberry UFO

Appearance: Pours with a soda-like fizzy white head and lots of carbonation. Has a peach hue to its body.

Smell: 7 – Deep raspberry smell. Not as strong as a Lindemans Lambic, but it is quite noticeable berry tinged.

Taste: 5 – Weaker than expected given the strong smell. It has very little kick to it and reminds me much more of a generic American macrobrew than anything specifically flavored. There’s nothing really wrong with it, though there is a distinct sourness at the back of the mouth. Underwhelming would be the best way to describe it

Mouthfeel: 5 – Very light. Again, reminds me of somewhat flat soda or any American piss beer.

Finish: 4 – That bitter/sourness at the back of the mouth is the most distinct appearance of this beer, and that’s not exactly a good thing.

Aftertaste: 5 – A really small hint of raspberries comes up on the aftertaste, but you would only notice it if you were looking for it. Pretty much zero aftertaste.

Drinkability: 4 – I could guzzle these without really noticing it, but, at $1.25/bottle, why would I when I can get much cheaper beers that taste pretty much the exact same? Overall, I’m disappointed. Harpoon is one of my favorite breweries, but this offering just does not bring much to the table. If you really want a good raspberry taste, splurge $10-12 and go buy a 750ml bottle of Lindemans Framboise

OVERALL: 4.75/10

Andrew Miller Signs With Tigers

Link Here

“The Tigers have agreed to terms with their first-round draft pick, Andrew Miller, on a four-year, major-league contract.

The deal will place Miller on the team’s 40-man roster, leaving him eligible to join the team as a September call-up.

The Tigers did not announce terms; however, one source with knowledge of the negotiations said it included a $3.55 million signing bonus with a guaranteed value near $5.5 million. Incentives could bring the total value above $7 million.”

That’s less than expected and a quicker sign than expected. Quite a coup for the Tigers.

Can’t Screen Capture From Popup Videos?

Try this:

Right click on the popup video player and select options,

go to the performance tab, click on advanced,

Find the “video acceleration” header and uncheck the “use overlays” box

That should solve your problem.

Mark Lowe Touches 102

Mark Lowe hit 102 mph on the stadium gun yesterday in Baltimore. Comcast’s gun had him at 101. Either way, say hello to the Mariners second version of Papelbon (Putz being the first), who is also better than that papsmear** they have is beantown. Mark Lowe, please join the rotation soon and make my dreams come true.

Ramon Hernanez, meet Mark Lowe’s fastball. Mark Lowe’s fastball, meet Rene Rivera’s glove, a place you will reside most often because it sure as hell isn’t getting hit.

**FIP/xFIP:

Papelbon: 2.13/3.34

Putz: 1.61/2.28 (2nd best FIP in MLB behind Joe Nathan [1.29])

Lowe: 1.76/2.74 (3rd best FIP in MLB)