Patrick425

Col Springs, Biloxi, and Milwaukee, each in 1st place, and Carolina is in 2nd place.

I agree with this. It's not realistic to believe every top prospect in their system will pan out and be contributing starters in 3 years. I disagree with setting 2020 as the target and not deviating from that. What if somehow they remain hot for the next month and a half and are still at the top of the standings? I know this is also a bit unrealistic, but who knows...what if that happens? I know I'm in the minority on this message board when it comes to this train of thought, but I say you sacrifice some of those prospects, bolster the starting rotation and make a run. I would rather do that than hope that these unknown commodities in the farm system can put us in the same position 3 years from now. If they start to falter this year (which is likely), but come back next year and in our contending position in July 2018, then go for it then. My belief is that basically any time you are in playoff position in July, regardless of what your expectations were at the start of the season or where you are in the "rebuilding" phase, you should be looking to make trades to win now. Again, I know that's not a popular thought on this board and many will argue that you can't build a consistent contender that way. I understand that argument, but I also think there is way too much confidence put in some of the prospects when the reality is that you are lucky if 50% of those prospects hit and that there is no guarantee that you will be a consistent contender by waiting on the farm system to mature. I don't have a problem with a 3-5 year rebuilding plan if during the "rebuilding" years the team never contends, but if the team has some unexpected success in one of the rebuilding years, don't blow that opportunity.

"This is Chuck, here to remind Bill to SHUT UP!" Cracks me up every time. rewind.."reminding Bill to shut up!...rewind..."to shut up"...rewind..."Bill to shut up".

Exactly. I guess the one exception I can think of is juke boxes in bars.

Seems like we could start a whole separate thread on golf etiquette and protocol. I'm not sure that comparing this to the "Get off my lawn, back in my day" type of old man griping is really a fair comparison. This isn't something that has been around for a long time and is just starting to annoy me as I get older. This would have annoyed me when I was younger as well. I grew up just down the road from Greenfield park and that's where I learned to play golf starting around 7th grade. Played 90% of my rounds there until I was a bit older and had a car and more mobility. However, still mostly played county courses my entire life and never noticed this as a thing until about 4 or 5 years ago (and honestly I have only witnessed it 3 or 4 times, but that's 3 or 4 times too many). I get the whole live and let live thing, but I also believe in having some common courtesy towards other people while you go about your living. A reasonable person should be able to understand and not be oblivious to the fact that other paying customers on a golf course may not want to listen to their music. I think that's just common sense. Yes, some people take way too long to line up a put or take a shot. That can be annoying as well, especially when the course is crowded, but at least it's golf related activity. Playing music is not a golf related activity and is intrusive to other golfers enjoyment. It's really not something that anyone should expect to hear on a golf course.

Swing and a Drive, watched that movie last night and really enjoyed it. As I was watching I was thinking that it kind of reminded me of "That Thing You Do" and another movie that I can't think of the name now. Again, thanks for the recommendation, not a movie I would have normally clicked on when browsing. In regards to "must sees", I have a long list of them and would agree with Bikeage that "Good Fellas" would be on that list, but I would hope most people have seen that one. Although, some of my co-workers are 20-25 years younger than me and I sometimes have a hard time believing some of the movies they have not seen (Back to the Future, Ghostbusters - the original, Blues Brothers, etc). I want to ask them what is wrong with their parents. How did they never introduce you to these classics? Anyways, as far as possible "hidden gem" must sees, one that comes to mind is "The Pope of Greenwich Village". Most others I can think of are comedies like some of the early John Cusack films like "The Sure Thing" and "Better Off Dead". Now that I think of it, "Martian Child" , also with John Cusack, is not a well known film that I thought was decent. "Night Shift" with Henry Winkler and Michael Keaton (directed by Ron Howard) is another not widely known comedy I always enjoyed. I know there is more, but having trouble thinking of them now. I use the phrase "hidden gem" loosely in the films I'm mentioning, especially the comedies which would possibly come of as a bit dated and campy to a younger viewer and they are not as critically acclaimed as Sing Street. Most of these I first saw when I was much younger and they were simple, silly, and fun and I would definitely watch them again if they popped up on cable somewhere...but they hardly ever do.

Yeah, there has been a large increase in the use of carts over the last decade or two. While it has no real direct affect on me, it annoys me a little from a societal viewpoint. It's not just the exercise, but the financial aspect of it. Depending on where you are golfing you can save between $10-$20 if you walk and in so many ways, as pointed out in posts above, it can be much more enjoyable to walk. And yes, the cart etiquette exercised by some is not good. Not only parking carts in front of greens and not closer to the next tee, but just so many other time wasters. For example, two golfers riding in the same cart hit their ball 50-60 yards apart from each other. They go to one ball, wait for the group ahead of them to clear and then hit that ball, then they go to the other ball and hit that one. How about dropping one golfer off at his/her ball and then going to the other ball? Golf carts definitely do not save time over walking when used inefficiently.

You didn't know if you said "all"? It's a message board, just have to scroll a little to see what you said. The context in which you said it and the fact you didn't put it in blue made it sound like you actually meant it. I apologize if I misunderstood. I'm well aware that golf popularity is declining and that there are course closings, but there have been a lot of new golf courses opened over the last 20 years as golf popularity spiked so it would make sense that golf courses would close when the popularity decreases. As far as others "subjected" to my preferences it really is not a two way street. I'm not doing anything that would annoy others, I'm just golfing on a golf course. I'm not adding some other activity to my golfing that would possibly annoy other golfers. Some people have no problem concentrating when they are reading or studying, so does that mean we should allow people to play music out loud in libraries? How about on airplanes? I don't know...maybe I should just change my profile picture to Judge Smails...."The man's a menace!!"

There, corrected. Not sure when this practice started, but it drives me nuts. Golf courses should outlaw it. The people who do this are the same people you can hear talking 2 fairways away..."Me, I, and me, myself, me, I, me, me, myself, and I.......". The sense of self importance that some people have is intolerable. With how much golf has fallen off in recent years, especially with young people, they're doing all they can to do things to accommodate younger people. I really don't think you can blame the courses for allowing it, they're all going to go under soon and the private membership clubs will too as all the old folks pass away. If you've ever spent time in one of those it's rare to see anyone under 40, heck even 50. That said, you can play your own music and keep it at a normal volume and it's really not a big deal. no need to have it cranked to 11. I think if anyone had suggested 20 years ago that there will be a trend on golf courses where golfers will play music in their carts, most golfers would have laughed at that suggestion and said that would never happen or be allowed to happen. When I witness trends of this nature it just reminds me of the movie "Idiocracy". I would not say that keeping it at "a normal volume is really not a big deal". If you are on a green and the 4 some ahead of you is playing music on the tee box at a "normal volume", you can still hear it. I have a hard time understanding why some people feel other people should should be subjected to listen to their taste in music when they are on a golf course (or that other people even want to listen to music at all while they are golfing). I guess I'm too self conscious to ever think that way and would never have any desire to draw that kind of attention to myself. I sometimes get the sense that people engage in this type of behavior because they know it annoys others (or maybe they are just profoundly egotistical and/or oblivious). I don't know the exact numbers and I understand that golf's popularity is declining, but sometimes I wonder if it's a bit overblown. Golf popularity was at an all time high during the Tiger Woods era. Are we comparing it to that time period? Maybe golf is just back at it's pre-Tiger popularity levels. Just a theory, could be wrong. All golf courses are not going to "go under" soon or even in our lifetime. Horse racing use to be one of the top 3 sports in terms of popularity in the U.S., but the sport did not disappear as popularity took a drastic turn downwards. Yes, some golf courses may eventually fold, but the sport that has been in existence for about 500 years is not going away any time soon. Also, country clubs memberships have always skewed towards an older age group.

Thanks for the recommendation! Looks like a movie I would enjoy. I'm definitely going to check it out.

The other day in a Pick N' Save parking lot I saw a bumper sticker on a car that said "F" you and your stick figure family and it had an image of a male and female stick figure engaging in "activity". Seriously? You're that annoyed by someone else's innocent pride in their family that you are going to counter it with completely vulger and inappropriate graphic and display it to the whole world on the back of your car. What is happening to society?

There, corrected. Not sure when this practice started, but it drives me nuts. Golf courses should outlaw it. The people who do this are the same people you can hear talking 2 fairways away..."Me, I, and me, myself, me, I, me, me, myself, and I.......". The sense of self importance that some people have is intolerable.

Seriously? Trying to steal third with a 5-1 lead and the opposing pitcher struggling in the 2nd inning? Why?

I'm old enough to remember those guys....but unfortunately, I'm not insightful enough to recall their pitching style. Funny, when I think of those guys I tend to think of their baseball cards.

Kevin Mench always reminded me of this guy (Michael Berryman): http://e.snmc.io/lk/f/a/41354723eb3599a706ea3c78c3c08afe/1183170.jpg

Shaw has gotta stop there and get in a pickle or at least make Molina have to come tag him up the line so that you at least stay out of the double play.

Oh, man, I hear you. I've had to shorten or roll up petite garments for myself - that's how short my arms are. I suppose manufacturers conclude that it's easier for shorter-armed people to roll up than for longer-armed people to...shorten their arms? Yeah...I don't know, maybe that's ok for women, but at least in my opinion, not really a good look for a guy (rolling up sleeves). I'm thinking about a shirt kinda like below. Maybe you can push the sleeves up, but then you are just stretching out the fabric and eventually it looses it's elasticity.

All I can think of in regards to the last few comments is Frank Costanza..."I wouldn't be caught dead in banlon!" I get it though. As a guy in my 50's who is about 15 pounds overweight, some of the newer fabrics are, a bit too "revealing". My 2 issues in regards to recent trends in clothing are sleeves being too long or too short. In my opinion, the sleeves on short sleeve shirts (golf shirts, tee shirts, etc) are being made too short. they end less than half way down the upper arm and are way too tight in the arm pit area. Even if I was "ripped" I want some looseness and breathing room in that area. In regards to long sleeve shirts, I don't have long arms and every long sleeve shirt (not talking about dress shirts - I'm referring to sweatshirts, pullover type shirts, long sleeve polo shirts, etc) seems to be made with the assumption that everyone is at least 6 feet tall and has longer arms. I use to not have too big of an issue with this until the trend of non-elastic fabric around the wrist became a thing. Most of these shirts have sleeves that end around the top knuckle on my hands. Why did they stop putting elastic in the wrists? Not everyone has the same length arm!

Before the internet, I use to rely on ESPN a lot for information on how my fantasy baseball players did. I watched "Baseball tonight" religiously. I also enjoyed watching the Tuesday night (and/or Thursday night?) baseball double headers when my first job out of college had me on the road a lot. Disappointing that they are moving farther away from baseball. Speaking of fantasy baseball and what's bugging me. I have Bumgarner on my team, he goes down. I then trade for Syndergaard, now he is having arm issues. I told the other guys in the league if they want to help the Brewers chances this year, offer me some Cubs and Cards pitchers in trades.

I really don't see any "shift" at all from batter to pitcher. I think stats are just more normalized now. 50 HRs should be the exception, not the norm. When George Foster hit 52 HRs in 1977, that was huge. Hank Aaron and Reggie Jackson never hit more than 47 HRs in a season. Willie Mays only hit more than 50 twice (51 and 52). For each of the last two seasons the top HR hitter hit 47 HRs. To me that's normal. Not 66, 70, 73. I'm not saying that no one could ever legitimately hit 65-75 HRs, but when it happens several years in row from multiple players, something is wrong. Now, PEDs or not, whenever anyone like Thames comes out of nowhere and starts putting up big numbers or if anyone were to approach 60+ HRs there is always going to be raised eyebrows and suspicion. I know some people could care less about that, but the numbers of the game are one of the reasons I fell in love with it as a kid. Now the HR records are basically meaningless.

Agree completely! I have to admit - I chuckled when I saw this comment agreeing with punishing steroid cheaters coming from a poster with a Bud Selig avatar. He's as culpable for the "steroid era" as anyone. I chuckled as well when I saw your comment, since without Selig, your post, this thread, and this website would not exist.

[sarcasm]Awesome news for my fantasy team!![/sarcasm] C'mon man!!

Agree completely!

Oh...I almost forgot the [sarcasm]best[/sarcasm] part of our experience in our recent car purchase. I'm a CPA and work in the financial industry so I'm the type of person that does number crunching ahead of time when it comes to financing and what monthly payments should end up being based on amount, length, and interest on a loan. The car we purchased was a certified used car and so we got the new car financing rate of 1.9%. After we agreed on a price the salesman wanted to know how much I wanted to put down and I asked him to run a few scenarios for me with different amounts and lengths of loans. So, he disappears for about 10 minutes and comes back with a grid with different scenarios and monthly payments based on amount down and length of loan. I start studying it and it immediately looks a bit off. The five year payment for the amount I was considering seemed to be off (higher) by about $40 or $50 a month. I tell him this doesn't look right and I pull out my phone and google a loan calculator. I plug in the numbers, and sure enough I'm correct. He repeats the numbers...$X amount for 5 years at 1.9%. I say "Yes, those are the right numbers, but that's the wrong calculation, I think you are using the wrong percentage." He goes back to talk to the finance person. He comes back.."Oh, for whatever reason the computer defaulted to 9.9% and the finance guy didn't catch it"...hmm..I really hope it was a mistake, but I have serious doubts. Keep in mind this was a slip of paper where he was going to check the option I wanted and then have me sign it. Now, I probably would have caught it when going through the final financial paperwork, but maybe not and I'm sure a lot of people would not catch it.

Car dealer's and the whole car buying experience. I apologize to those of you who may work in this industry. My wife and I purchased a used Camry last week. We were trading in my son's car that was basically worthless ($450 trade-in value per KBB and was due for an emissions test that it would not pass without $300+ of work). Looked at internet prices of dealers including one that was having a "push, pull, drag sale" - $3,100 guaranteed on the trade in plus match $1,000 of a down payment. Ok, I knew there had to be a catch and that the internet price was probably not going to be valid and that they would probably jack up the prices by $2K or $3K. Even at $3K, it seemed like decent deal. We went to the dealership and sure enough, internet prices were not valid for the push, pull, drag sale. The car that we were eyeing was marked up $6,000 from the internet price! So, even with the $3,100 trade in and the $1,000 match, the price was $2,000 more....not to mention that the trade-in was not completely worthless (ended up selling it to our mechanic for $750). When I mentioned this to the sale man, he said he could knock $1000 off the price. Ok...soooo...it's still $1,000 more than it was before the "sale". Why would I do this? The sale tags hanging on the cars were laughable as well...Example: "Car price $14,000, less $3,100 trade in, less down payment $1,000, less down payment match $1,000 = Final price of $8,900." What? Umm...$1,000 of those "deductions" are coming out of the buyer's pocket (also, again, not to mention that most trade-ins are not completely worthless). So, needless to say, we walked away. We purchased somewhere else, but all those dealers are the same. There is very little honesty. Also, the whole pressure sales pitch at the end of the process to try to get you to add the extended warranty or gap insurance protection, etc...is a horrible way to treat a paying customer that has already agreed to buy a car from you. Offering it is one thing but the whole high pressure pitch is maddening. About 5 years ago when we were going through this process I interrupted the person and told them that we have zero interest so can we please skip it. They continued with the pitch and I asked again if we could just skip the part where we sign that we have declined it...at that point she had a fit and yelled "just let me do my job!" It was quite a scene. I know, I could buy a used car through a private party and probably get a better deal, but there are a lot of downsides to that as well.