Patrick425

The double whammy here is that not only will they miss his production for the first 6 weeks of the season, but any possible mid-season trade value that he would have had will probably be brought down a notch or two.

I agree. Regardless of whether players are possibly not going at 100% in these games, I enjoy the concept of these games and I enjoy watching them. I hope that it grows and becomes a bigger event (in the eyes of the media and public) going forward. It's very disappointing to me that baseball is no longer an Olympic sport (although not as disappointing as there not being a men's baseball program at UW). To, me it's still the greatest game there is and I would love to see it's popularity grow beyond countries in North America, South America, and Asia. I understand what you are saying and I think Monty's reply was pretty accurate. It's kind of like when you turn on the Little League World Series and you see "Saudi Arabia" as one of the teams and think "wow, I gotta see this. I didn't know they even knew what baseball was there". Then you realize it's just a bunch of ex-pat's kids that really still play baseball in the USA.

What happened to this rule that McCalvey mentioned in his blog? The rules dictate that teams cannot lose more than eight members of their 40-man roster to the WBC, and the Brewers’ expectation is that they will either come close to or reach that limit. The Brewers have 14 players from their organization playing in this thing. 11 are on the 40 man roster. The start of the season is not delayed by this. Spring training games are starting early.

Not sure if this is old news, but apparently the Brewers are adding a Miller Light Party Deck next to the Dew Deck: http://www.biztimes.com/article/20130117/BREAKINGNEWS/130119817/-1/enews_breaking?utm_source=Listrak&utm_medium=Email&utm_term=http%3a%2f%2fwww.biztimes.com%2farticle%2f20130117%2fBREAKINGNEWS%2f130119817%2f-1%2fenews_breaking&utm_campaign=Breaking+news%3a+Brewers+to+add+Miller+Lite+Party+Deck+to+Miller+Park

Why do I keep thinking of Kip Dynamite? "Napolean, don't be jealous that I've been chatting online with babes all day" Well...at least Kip got to actually meet (and marry!) his online babe.

Not sure I understand. With the economy and current unemployment levels, yes, the employers call the shots and can be very particular about what they are looking for.

Why not? It would seem to make perfect sense to me. You make up for losing a first rounder (and save some money - to help offset the $28M you just spent) by trading for a prospect or two. They probably view Soriano as more experienced and reliable than Storen and they may believe that they can get a better prospect (one that may be closer to MLB ready) by trading Storen (or Clippard) than what they would net with the 1st round pick they are giving up.

I'll second FVBrewersFan's 1st comment in regards to a 529 plan. Take full advantage of the $3,000 WI tax benefit if you can. My son is a Freshmen in HS and we started saving when he was 1 (or 2?). Even though there have been a few tough years in the market he is still in very good shape in regards to college finances. I would also recommend signing up for a Upromise account (upromise.com). That program gives you cash back towards your child's education for money you spend on different items including gas. You can also get grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc to link to your child's upromise account and accumulate funds from purchases that they make. However, sorry FVBrewerFan, I can't agree with your 2nd comment. It seems that parents mainly do this for sports purposes and to me that's not a good enough reason. A year and a half behind most other kids is a bit of an overstatement. My son was born in April. He's younger than many others that were born in maybe Sept, Oct, or Nov, but only by about 6 months. If your son is a year and a half behind most others then it's because you entered into school a year sooner than what the standard entry age was. I also think this possibly a regional trend in some areas. I hear it's very common the Green Bay area, but I don't see it hardly where we live in Waukesha.

If I'm Drew Storen, I'm not thrilled about this. Storen had 43 saves in 2011. He get's injured in 2012 and they move him to a set up type role. Seems like they have to move one of those guys. Any one of them (especially Storen, Clippard, or Soriano) could be closers for another team. Are they planning on having 3 setup guys?

I voted for Ron's (from MD).

I'm in a league that we started way back in 1984. For the last 15 (20?) years or so we have used CBS. However, we use the pay version (commissioner). It's about $150, but we have 11 people, so when you divide that fee out among everyone, it really does not come to that much. I can't speak too much for the other sites or options, but we have never really had any complaints with CBS. I will make this comment regarding 10 people and doing NL only. We have 11 people and do NL only. We have 23 players on each team. We end up getting down to some fairly "peripheral" type players (i.e. platoon players, middle relievers, etc). So, if you have several people in the league that are not exactly "hardcore" baseball fans as you stated, then you may want to consider expanding your team selection, especially now that the NL only has 15 teams. I'm not sure about the free version on CBS, but the commissioner fantasy baseball product allows you to choose leagues (NL or AL) or choose individual teams. For example, since we are a keeper league, we are slowly fazing out Houston. So, this year we are using NL + Houston.

Not sure if anyone else watched the Golden Globes tonight, but what was the deal with Tommy Lee Jones?

8-10 nominations? Really? Isn't it usually something like 5? I didn't know they could have as many as 10.

I used a gun to clock the speed (these were not "public" batting cages). So, it was the actual speed. It was humming pretty good...had to at be at least in the 80's. The person that owns the facility told me today in an email that the machine can actually get up to the equivilent 60ft 6" speed of 93mph when fully cranked.

This is more of a question than a random thought. However, my son was in a batting cage yesterday. The machine was 45 feet away and the pitch speed was 64. By my calculations that equates to 85 mph at 60ft. Does that sound correct?

I went in and voted this morning. I thought I had voted multiple times but them realized I may not have voted at all (I kept hitting "select new player" and then "vote"). Do you have to have a twitter and/or facebook account to vote?

In case anyone is looking to purchase a treadmill as part of a New Year's resolution, I wanted to revive this thread and give some advice in regards to Nordictrac treadmills (or any exercise equipment that uses Ifit.com for programming workouts). As I mentioned in my last post in February, we purchased a Nordictrac treadmill with 2 years of Ifit. If you are unfamiliar with Ifit.com, the concept is great. It's basically supposed to work as a website or app that you can use to design workouts or use some of the pre-programmed workouts they have on their site. Then you basically put these programs on your "workout schedule" and these workouts then get downloaded to your equipment (after you log in on your equipment). Ifit came out with a new web site in November. The old website was ok, but could have used some improvements. When I saw that they came out with a new website, I was excited and hopeful. However, I and many other Ifit users, are longing for the days of the old web site. I won't go into all the issues with the new web site, but it's counter-intuitive and not user friendly at all. From reading other user comments on the Ifit support page and the Ifit facebook page, it sounds like many people can't even get the workouts from the new website to download on their equipment at all! At least I don't have that problem. The treadmill itself has worked great. Other than a calibration I had to make after it was set up, we have had no problems with it. However, one of the main reasons people fork over the extra cash to get a Nordictrack or other Ifit capable machine is because of the extra added features that Ifit promises. It is nice to get on the machine basically push a button and know that it's going to take you on a run through Central Park or around your neighborhood, or that its going follow a program that you already entered and automatically increase speeds and incline and decline as you have directed it to do. Not being able to have those features greatly reduces the values of the machine. So..if you are thinking of purchasing an Ifit capable machine, I would hold off for now until they hopefully get the issues related to their new web site fixed.

Not sure how anyone can say baseball is a boring game: http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/8772294/strange-true-feats-2012-mlb-season

I remember when 920 was WOKY and was a top 40 station in the 70's. I use to listen to it all the time as a kid. Geez....I'm such an old man.

I like both of the new ones. I don't like that random gold stripe on the old ones.

[sarcasm]Well...it makes sense that they cancelled school then.[/sarcasm]

Currently raining in Waukesha. Had about an inch or two of heavy, sloppy snow last night. Forecast is calling for up to 6 inches in Waukesha....and they cancelled schools?!? Really?? Edit: Also, I'm not a meteorologist, but I'm looking at the radar on weatherunderground and I'm not seeing how Waukesha will get anywhere close to 6 inches.

For some reason, each time I see this thread I instantly think of Uncle Rico.."You must as well do something while you're doing nothing"