CheezWizHed

Spain and Italy are the exceptions in the EU because they were hit early, before anyone really reacted to do anything about it. But France, Belgium and the UK are interesting because they did react, yet fared no better than Sweden. Either way, if your focus is too small, you will miss patterns. That is why I didn't limit my data to just their neighbors. Plus, in this case, I don't see anything effected due to geographic location (I could be wrong). Climate doesn't seem to have an effect either as people hoped. Seems like number of travelers and general population movement seems to be more important than geography. Not sure how Sweden compares to Norway, Finland or Denmark in terms of travelers, but there are enough unknowns in the equation to look at the larger picture.

"Here" being Alaska (from AKCheesehead)?

I wasn't spinning the Sweden numbers. I simply put them out there with several other EU countries for comparison. Only comparing them to other Scandinavian countries is spin. Its a complicated problem and I'm not saying Sweden did it right. I knew Sweden's death totals were poor, but I was surprised to see them in line with the UK, France and better than Belguim.

I didn't try to duplicate the rates, but you need absolute numbers with the rates. If I had 10 cases yesterday and 20 today, its 100% increase. If I had 100 cases yesterday and 110 today, it is 10% increase. Yet, I would rather have 20 cases/day... But I did start poking into the death/million population and found some surprising info (source is John Hopkins + spreadsheet math): - In the "very good" category, Norway (47.1), Denmark(106.1), Germany(110.4) and Switzerland (231.2) have very low rates. - In the middle are: France (450.5), Sweden(561.8) and UK(624.1) - The worst are Spain(939.6), Belgium(859.5), and Italy (703.0) Those are the only EU countries I looked at and wasn't cherry-picking countries, except Sweden (based on the different approach). Obviously, Italy and Spain had a pretty hard go of it early in the COVID crisis. But overall, Sweden really isn't an outlier here. Looking at infections/million population, Sweden(8000) is just behind Spain (9983) and ahead of Belgium (6135) where the rest range from 1720-4965. This just tells me that their death rate really wasn't out of line with other EU nations. Maybe it could've been better...maybe not (unfortunately, you can't "test" a historical decision like this).

Al Gore invented it, so he gets to say if it stays or not! The USG is not even 25% of Iridium business today Interesting, I hadn't realized it has started to grow again. I left Motorola in 2004, so I've been out of that industry for a while...

Don't lump us all in that. My driver ed teacher taught us all of those (passing lane, vehicle on the shoulder). And that was 30 years ago before we needed the laws to dictate common courtesy. Just because you had a bad teacher...

No, I wasn't suggesting Iridium do anything with data plans. My point was that it became too expensive with cheaper terrestrial options. The only reason it still exists is the USG funds it for the convenience and privacy. But the parallels are there between that tipping point in the early 2000s and high speed internet options today. It looked like satellite was the best and easiest option (plus available everywhere), but terrestrial solutions came that were cheaper and people didn't want to pay for the convenience. If I'm a user in the middle of Alaska... The problem is the uber-remote are always going to be at the mercy of what is available. No company is going to fund a solution for the 0.1% as that won't fund the business. Maybe if the 5% (pick your preferred number, I didn't do a business analysis for this post. ) will select the satellite, then Grizzly Adams in remotest Alaska can use it too. The shorter wavelength allows for faster transmission of data, but it also means a shorter range. From what I understand, 4G has a range of about 10 miles; 5G has a range of about 1000 feet. Unless they can make towers cheaply, or turn people's phones into mini-towers, 5G is really only going to be practical in bigger cities. Good point. But that is today's tech and/or solutions also. No one thought satellites would reach starlink speed either. What if people put up 5G towers at various places where the high speed fiber resides rather than running that fiber to each house. For example, a friend of mine has fiber running down the road past his house. Rather than the $20k bill of running it up to his house, what if they put in a tower and picked up him and his neighbors? Perhaps the business case isn't there today, but you need to look forward where costs continue to drop due to volume and improvements.

They way the Bucks were giving up 3s, I'd have done the same thing.

That’s what I’m thinking. They have a taxi squad for a reason. Just make if next man up and play ball. You still have to deal with the exposure of the rest of the 30-man team. That is why I suggested playing with the other 30.

Maybe you take the other 30 guys on the 60-man and go play the series the "A squad" couldn't play? Yes, only 10 of those players are on the 40-man, but rules are made to be broken...

Shelby turns 30 this year. I wonder how a year off will effect his arm? Obviously touch/control seems to struggle, but maybe the rest will help? He is also at the age where it becomes tough to play at this level anyway.

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/07/why-arent-we-talking-more-about-airborne-transmission/614737/ The super-spreader–event triad seems to rely on three V’s: venue, ventilation, and vocalization. Most super-spreader events occur at an indoor venue, especially a poorly ventilated one (meaning air is not being exchanged, diluted, or filtered), where lots of people are talking, chanting, or singing. Some examples of where super-spreader events have taken place are restaurants, bars, clubs, choir practices, weddings, funerals, cruise ships, nursing homes, prisons, and meatpacking plants. If they just stop the group-sings at those meat packing plants, everything would be good!

I'm curious if 5G wireless data will once again make satellite obsolete. I worked for Motorola when they launched iridium for the world sat-phone network. But that died so quickly as terrestrial towers were cheaper and easier to maintain (NOTE: I believe Iridium is still active, but only for the US Government use). Yes, there are still holes in coverage, but competition like this seems like a case where terrestrial towers might (once again) overtake satellites.

We need to be careful blaming people that get sick too. Masks and social distancing are only capable of limiting exposure and not preventing it. People do get sick when "doing it right" too. Yes, some people do take unnecessary risks, but I'm seeing an increase of COVID-shaming (social media in general). It is a form of bullying.

[sarcasm]St. Louis didn't social distance and our server got a COVID virus. But they can't say that because of HIPPA rules....[/sarcasm] (And yes, that was me that said nearly the same thing on the Facebook page. )

Agreed. We had it on last night and as we approached the end of the first half, I kept thinking it should be the end of the 3rd quarter...

Just finishing my masters degree from Penn State in 2 weeks... all online. You do online tests differently. Essay tests don't really matter if they are open book. Timed tests make it hard to look up much and finish on time. Or if you need to, you can proxy a test (i.e. have someone watch). Tools and online expectations are really becoming the norm in the work world. Zoom can do break-out rooms for small discussions, online ways to "raise your hand", it really wouldn't be much different. If you want to be distracted in a class, it really doesn't matter if you online or offline. Yes, offline might take more discipline, but that might not be a bad thing.

Suppan's pillow problems still rank up there for me... But I did wonder if Braun had seconds on the salad to cause the problem.

I'm sure most college football players would opt for an online experience with their tutors and not attend classes in person.

[sarcasm]So the WS banner is going to come down to the last team playing?[/sarcasm]

I think there will be trades of convenience swapping AAAA players to patch holes in the rosters with 1 for 1 player swaps. I doubt there will be the multiple prospects for one type trades given the 60 man restrictions. The more I think of the 60 man roster, the less I understand why it was necessary? The 40-man roster dictates who can play MLB ball, why not leave it at that and the rest of the MiLB squad in development (per the club's discretion). Then trades could be done as normal.

with the marlins claiming mike morin, the cpp remains at 55 players, with the same two aforementioned players on the covid-19 il. Hard not to feel bad for Morin. That's like a one-way trip to purgatory right now. And that would be true even if it weren't for the COVID-19 problems in the Marlin's clubhouse.

Thankfully, I don't have to wear a mask all day, but when I'm in the office, old habits are hard to break. My masks moves when I talk and wants to come off my nose, so I grab it to move it up. I've learned to grab the bottom now and push it up, but most the time I'm not thinking about it. Realize we are looking at people under a microscope that I'm glad isn't focused on me. Yes, they need to do better, but give 'em a break too. These are a lot of adjustments of lifelong habits guys have made (i.e. spitting, high fives, etc..).

In late developing countries where the landline infrastructure was poor, they skipped adding hardwired phone lines and everything was built around cellular. So for some countries in eastern Europe and Africa, their cellular was much better and cheaper than the US for many years. My guess is that for most of the rural parts of the US, the government will work with cellular providers to make sure there is "ok" coverage in the rural areas to provide the minimum internet access levels. I remember when the first cell tower was put up in my tiny unincorporated town in NW Wisconsin when they just started getting phone coverage in the boonies. Or when cities had high speed internet, but outside was dial-up only. The coverage will come, but it will always lag the populated areas in speed and/or features.

Is this among MLB starters or all pitchers?