example1

This isn't possible. Seabeachfred was sure that Wakefield was going to come back to camp.

He's from Mississippi. He wants to play in St. Louis or Dallas. The cynical side of me says that he wants to be close to home so he can go there when he's injured and not feel the need to stay close to the team. Getting injured in Boston wouldn't lend itself well to going home. Totally cynical.

A thorough physical before the signing. I suspect (and have read reports that) his injury concerns are really sizeable and that's why few teams are interested in him. Does it matter to you at all that he seemingly doesn't want to play in Boston? Is Boston the place you want someone to come who might only be half-there?

Oswalt doesn't seem to want to play in Boston. No other teams seem that interested in signing him. Something doesn't smell right about this situation. The Sox are right to wait him out. Or not sign him at all. I can't be the only one thinking this, can I?

The point isn't to get to the most posts, it's to make relevant points with reasoning behind them. 30,000 posts. What percentage of them of you think were actually necessary?

That post has actual research behind it. That means it wasn't from you. Your posts are often right, but you rarely put numbers in your posts. I would have been pretty surprised if that post had turned out to be yours.

Good call. That seems to be mostly what he brings to the table. He will undoubtedly be disappointed if they win next year.

The same is true of the US economy, yet nobody disagrees with the stratification of lower, middle and upper class. It's just more useful that way. When 90+% fits into one category, it is often useful to pick another way of stratifying... I just don't care though. I agree with this. I'm done with the Nats. I'm on for rooting for Felix Doubront to win the Cy Young.

They were never backed up in a way that you found convincing enough to stop your friendly embrace of iOrtiz. You have been leaping to the defense of him and a few others here so often that I keep expecting to see Clint Eastwood wearing a mask in your avitar. You are the king of talksox and a caped crusader leaping to the defense of others in the interest of arguing. You don't believe the Nats are a small market team. You arbitrarily decide there is no substantive difference between clubs in the middle and bottom of the spectrum, even though I'm reasonably confident a world-class businessman like you knows the importance of granular analysis over simplistic analysis. Of course, no message-board superhero would let the reasonablity of his non-caped self get in the way of a good rescue. Do you have a special insignia that pops up on your smartphone when someone needs your help defending themselves from their own misguided views? Do you discretely leave the dinner table with your smartphone when someone needs you to arbitrarily claim that no evidence has been presented? I can't wait until a700 comes back and the populist super-a700 disappears.

And a700hitter declares himself the pillar of clarity... A nonsensical farse of an ending to a nonsensical farse of a thread, capstoned by a self-declared king. If I were a mod I would close this thread, not because it has violated any ethics or forum rules, not because it has been scathing to any one person. No, I would close it because this thread is an embarassment to the board in all facets.

If the Yankees were going to sign Ortiz would that have been okay with you? I'm not challenging you, just asking genuinely what you think. I'm asking particlarly with the alternatives for 2012 in mind. What would they have done with that money that would mitigate the (assumed, in this scenario) signing of Ortiz by the Yankees? Also, as far as guaging interest for the Yankees-Ortiz connection, I think there was only a 2-3 week period where Ortiz was available before arb decisions were made. Hard to know who had what interest at that time. This scenario assumes the Sox turn down arb on Ortiz and he plays the market the way Oswalt did with an asking price around 12-14m for one season someplace other than Boston. In 99% of cases I agree with you Jung. It isn't worth getting into these money battles with NY. At the same time, that generally assumes that there are alternatives that can be suitable to replace the missing piece. I'm not convinced there were this offseason. CJ Wilson at 4-6 years would be going in a totally different direction. Fielder wasn't going to be an option for this club. Edwin Jackson isn't a suitable replacement... I just don't see it this year.

I'm not even saying that the rancor and predictable firestorm on this board would be the main reason to stick him around. I think the firestorm would have been valid because it would have been right. It would be hugely problematic for this club if Ortiz were in NY. That might not be the case in 2013, but in 2012 when there were not ideal replacements available (in the form of great SP) it would have been. If Ortiz comes in and puts up a .900+ OPS and 25-30 HR he will likely have been worth the contract, regardless of the limitations it puts on the club financially, given the possible alternative.

I don't know if anyone else has gone back into the stats to look at player values recently. There hasn't been much talk about that kind of stuff here. I've been on fangraphs and B-R a few times. It's remarkable when you look back to see how good Crawford was for most of the 2000s at such a young age. He's a guy who was on pace for a HOF career prior to 2011. People will very quickly forget his 2011 season if he comes back to the form he was prior to that. He was a dangerous player in every area of the game. A productive Crawford would be a HUGE boost to the 2012 club.

We are all prepared to go in circles when you are at the center of a discussion. You said they were a small market team. You have been shown to have been wrong. We are accused of being confused. You are shown to not understand international revenue sharing, yet you continue to hold onto your arguments. Just admit it, you were wrong initially. It won't be that embarassing because nobody actually cares about this argument. The longer it goes on the more embarassing it is. The clock is ticking. .

I saw how the conversation started. You said "small market" they said "you're not just wrong about small market, but DC could arguibly be classified as a big market team". I suspect since you started fighting "on that side of the moon" that you gave up the "small market" argument? If so, you should just say so when I am talking about small markets instead of lecturing about international markets, etc., It's wasted space.

This belongs in the steaming pile of s*** section. Do we still have one of those. Early front-runner for worst thread of the year.

We may share a certain bitterness, a700. At least I haven't blessed the world with my bitterness over 30,000 times. I have no idea how you have been able to hit "submit reply" that many times.

Make of it what you will...

I read the Wikipedia quote. You said it was from wikipedia. I understood that. Then I typed in my own search and found the other article. If you understand this so clearly then find a freaking list that says where the Nats' media market coverage ranks among all teams. That would put an end to this discussion quickly, IF we are actually disussing the same thing. I've said now a dozen times that my sole argument is that the DC is NOT a small market. You called it a small market. I quoted you in my previous post. I've said over and over what my point is. You may be trying to make a point that combines size of the population with the number of people watching and their international reach. If that's your measure then produce the damn measure, including all other teams in MLB. Perhaps the Nationals are at the bottom of the list, in which case you will be right that, by your measure, they are a small market team. Otherwise, just stop restating the argument in increasingly convoluted and non-data-based ways. Wikipedia isn't a reliable post.

Read your own quote above. You said this whole thing started because you said a "small market team like the Nats...". I stated numerous times they aren't a small market team. For the 12th time: not being a "big market" team doesn't make you small. In all seriousness, perhaps this is a language thing. In the US we have gradations between "not big" and "small". I stated that before. When something isn't the biggest it doesn't mean it is small. The DC Media market isn't small. Neither is Dallas.