Hobby Insider's Version of Around The Horn

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Clemens9

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In an attempt to generate some general hobby/sports discussion I will be running a Hobby Insider version of ESPN's Around The Horn. I will post a topic and everyone will respond with their opinion and facts etc. I will award points for a good point/fact/argument and a negative point for a bad point/fact/argument. After each round of a topic, I will eliminate the person with the lowest points.

Everyone who responds to the first topic will be entered into the game, with no limit on the max number of members who can participate. You may only post once a round. The first round will last 48 hours and all rounds following will last 24 hours. Noone will be eliminated after the first round, I will start eliminating in the second round by eliminating 1 member per round. If there is a tie for lowest number of points, all tied members will be eliminated (unless all members remaining are tied).

I will run the entire game in this thread, with the next post being the first topic. If you have any questions please ask and I will do my best to answer.
 
Since we all focus on different sports, I will include 4 options, 1 for each sport. Please choose 1 of the questions to answer.

Baseball- Buy or Sell, the Blue Jays decision to give BJ Ryan a $47 million contract.

Football- Buy or Sell, The Lions decision to fire Coach Mariucci.

Basketball- Who is the best team in the NBA?

Hockey- If you could have any goalie in the league on your team, who would it be?

It is 4:30 PM EST right now. You have until 4:30 PM EST on Wednesday to answer.
 
Dallas Mavericks- I know I'm a huge Dirk and Mavs fan, but believe it or not, I am not being biased. Within the last 3 games 6 players in Dirk, Howard, Terry, Harris, Howard, and Daniels have had double figures in points, and almost had a game with 6 of them being in double double's! Not to mention the broke the Pistons winning streak! And now are 6-0 right now. And they have had great opponents in the Pistons 8-0 before Mavs killed them, Pheonix, which took 2 OT's but what a game, and the defending NBA Champs in the SPURS, so for a team that has beaten the NBA Champs, the SUNS, and broke a winning streak of 8-0 in the Pistons, they get my vote for the best team in the NBA right now
 
Gonna Buy on Mooch being Canned. Come on...They have Harrington, KJ, Rogers, Drummond, Mike Williams. They have all the talent, no spotlight hogs, they play solid defense most of the time...but they have NO DIRECTION. You call a running play on 3rd and 11. Mooch likes to veto the O-Coordinators decisions all the time and ends up screwing things up.
I'd drop him like a bad habit.
 
Football- Buy or Sell, The Lions decision to fire Coach Mariucci.


I am selling. The Lions have no offensive line. Harrington is having a sub par year. They bench Harrington to put in Garcia. I fire Millon and work on getting an offensive line which in turns gives Harrington more time and be more productive. He has great wide receivers and a running back that could put up numbers if he had a line. All they need to due is pick up a few linemen and work on the defensive alittle and they should be a playoff team.
 
I disagree with the Mavs pick! The best team in the NBA right now is the Detroit Pistons. They are deep at every position and Rip and Chauncey look better thanever. They still have their trademark defense and have added a fastbreak element to their game. They still know how to close games out better than any other team and have some of the most clutch shooters in the L in Rip/Big Shot Billups and Sheed. Detroit Pistons know how to win when it counts.
 
Buy or Sell, The Lions decision to fire Coach Mariucci.

Sell

Mariucci is not the cause of the problem as the Lions have far more larger problems than their head coach. You take a look at their offensive production and they aren't getting much out of their wide reciever core. While Roy Williams is quickly escalating into becoming one of the better recievers in the league, you have Charles Rogers who isn't even playing 100%, (is dropping balls), and you have Mike Williams who's been dropping balls as well and you just expect more out of him. On top of that, Kevin Jones has been a bust this season, is hurt, and they have a very weak offensive line, while playing with their 2nd and 3rd string backs who can't produce any numbers with their weak offensive line. While Mariucci seems like he may be the problem, their are far larger problems for this Lions organization.
 
Sell

The Bluejays giving BJ Ryan 47 million over 5 years

He himself when asked is he worth it, Ryan said I dont know I sure want to hold up my end of the bargain, we'll see on the field.

He received the highest contract ever for a reliever. Has he earned it--NO!!
Ryan has 42 career saves with 36 of them coming last year. Ryan converted 36 of 41 save chances for Baltimore last season, going 1-4 with a 2.43 ERA. Decent numbers but worthy of the richest contract in history? I say No and finally lets not forget he is 30 years old and with some ratings systems he ranked the 12th best reliever last year behind the likes of Wickman, Nathan and Hudson Street.

While the Bluejays were 16-31 in one-run games last season, Ryan is an upgrade over Miguel Batista 31 Saves 4.10 and will help those stats but not at that price. The Bluejays have too many holes and an offense that struggled to score Runs, they will need to spend there money wisely to overtake either the Yankees or the Redsox.

You have to sell BJ Ryan
 
I totally agree but let me just say this as a Tigers fan I have run into this some of the teams have to over pay to get the players to come to their city....I totally agree when I heard the deal yesterday my mouth hit the floor. Ryan had decent numbers last year but not anywhere close to the contract he signed....I would be jumping up and down with that contract considering basically he has done very little in his major league career. I guess time will tell if this one works out for the Jays...jason
 
I can be disqualified since my A.D.D. kicked in again I didnt read the whole post...was just responding to dherm lol...
I will resend but I kill myself from second round. I see what I am suppose to do now lol...

1. Sell B.J. Ryan way over paid for a basically unproven player at age 30. One season does not qualify a contract of that maginatude. The poor Blue Jays are more then one player away and to sink this much money into one guy could strap the team from going out and getting other pieces of the puzzle. I can see possible giving that much money to a top notch closer such as Mariano Rivera who been saving games for a long period of time. It is possible that B.J. is coming into his own as some pitchers take time to develope but at age 30 and with very little track record to support his cause for a huge contract I got to say the Blue Jays are taking a huge risk on this one.
 
Round 1 Breakdown of Points
Points earned is followed by the quote that earned you those points, followed by my comments. I was pretty leniant this round. Next round you can expect to see some negative points handed out. I will post the standings as well as the next topics in the next posts.

Eric Draven
+2 "And they have had great opponents in the Pistons 8-0 before Mavs killed them, Pheonix, which took 2 OT's but what a game, and the defending NBA Champs in the SPURS," Tough schedule is a good point. I don't agree with you, but you did make a good case for the Mavs.

HOFautocolectr
+1 "You call a running play on 3rd and 11." True. Mariucci isn't the greatest playcaller, but he is not the reason for the Lions problems.

jchurlbert
+1 "The Lions have no offensive line." Agreed
+2 "I fire Millon" I also think he is the problem.

Duke Snider Fan
+1 "They still have their trademark defense and have added a fastbreak element to their game." Agreed.
+1 "They still know how to close games out better than any other team and have some of the most clutch shooters" This is definitely one of the biggest reasons they are as good as they are.

bdavis1hornets
+2 "you have Charles Rogers who isn't even playing 100%, (is dropping balls), and you have Mike Williams who's been dropping balls as well and you just expect more out of him. On top of that, Kevin Jones has been a bust this season, is hurt" RB and WR production has been a problem.
+1 "they have a very weak offensive line" Agreed.

dherm360
+1 "He himself when asked is he worth it, Ryan said I dont know I sure want to hold up my end of the bargain, we'll see on the field." He must be feeling like one lucky guy.
+2 "Ryan has 42 career saves" And he gets a $47 mil contract???
+1 "he is 30 years old" Another reason...

hockeytown- No need to be DQ'ed. I will just disregard your first post.
+1 "One season does not qualify a contract of that maginatude." Yep
+1 "could strap the team from going out and getting other pieces of the puzzle" Another reason...
 
Current Standings
Through Round 1
Dherm 4
jchurlbert 3
bdavis1hornets 3
Eric Draven 2
Duke Snider Fan 2
hockeytown 2
Hofautocolectr 1

Round 2 Topics
You have until 5 PM EST tomorrow to get your posts in.

Baseball- How do you think the White Sox will do next year?

Basketball- Who is currently the best center in the NBA?

Football- If you are Dungy and have clinched home field advantage throughout the playoffs, would you bench your players in week's 16 and 17?
 
Basketball: Who is the best center in the league?

The best center in the NBA without a doubt right now has to be Alonzo Mourning! He is doing a awesome job filling in for Shaq diesel right now, and I'm sure Van Gundy will wonder what he will have to do when Shaq comes back, because he's doing such a great job at Center right now. Even though he isn't getting almost 20 points a game like Tim Duncan or Rasheed Wallace, he is doing what Centers are paid to do, and that is getting BOARDS and BLOCKING shots and dishing in a couple extra points in the game. He is getting 8.1 rebounds per game, which is above the league average for centers, he is getting in 11 points a game, which is great for Zo, and then is the LEADER in BLOCKS in the nba averaging 4.1 a GAME! What a beast he is, without the best center in th league right now! Not to shabby for a guy who was thought to be out of his prime, huh?
 
Football- If you are Dungy and have clinched home field advantage throughout the playoffs, would you bench your players in week's 16 and 17?

No not bench them totally. I would let them play a quarter or so to stay in tuned. If be bench them and not play them at all they could lose their rythem all together and lose in the playoffs. The undefeated streak is really not that big of a picture. Save your players and play them alittle and go to the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl is the big picture. So they go undefeated in the regular season and lose the first playoff game then it doesn't mean anything. Or what if you play Peyton the whole game in the last game and he gets hurt then what. I say let them play a quarter then bench them. No need to risk hurting your starting players to do undefeated when the Super Bowl is what you really want to win.
 
If you are Dungy and have clinched home field advantage throughout the playoffs, would you bench your players in week's 16 and 17?

If I'm Tony Dungy sitting at 14-0 and have clinched home field advantage, I'm not playing my starters for my final 2 games. As much as we'd all like to see Peyton Manning and the Colts cruise to an undefeated season, there are more important goals for this organization. Of course they want to make history and be the 2nd team in NFL history since the merger to go undefeated in a regular season, but let's get down to the facts, winning the Super Bowl is on the top of their list. I would not even play Manning and the crew for a quarter, just start Manning so he keeps his consecutive streak going, have him play a series, then sit him. Let's say they play for a quarter and Edge or Manning gets injured and is out for the playoffs. What kind of risk does Dungy want to take? You never know with the NFL, and they need to play it safe and worry about getting a super bowl ring rather than going 16-0. Sure, maybe you go 16-0, but you lose your best player. Which is more important? And some may argue, "oh they won't have rhythm and they will be cold going into the playoffs" But c'mon now. This is the Indianapolis Colts we are talking about, not the Denver Broncos, not the Bengals, not like any other team in the league.
 
I'll extend the deadline for this round until 4 PM EST tomorrow, so hopefully we can get all members who responded in the first round, to respond again.
 
How do you think the White Sox will do next year

The Whitesox will repeat as AL Central champs holding off the young and upcoming Indians once again. The question is can Jim Thome {signed for the next 3 years with 46 million owed, but the Phillies kicking in 22 mill of it} provide the protection in the lineup for resigned Paul Konerko and return to his past form of hitting 40-50 homeruns.
Konerko turned down 5 years and 65 million and returned for less money because in his words they have something special here.
GM Kenny Williams only goal this winter was to "keeping his world championship team intact" and make sure the Sox were not a one year wonder.
Trading Rowand was a difficult decision for Kenny Williams but he states that they have Brian Anderson who is an up and coming outfielder, and there are also rumors that they are closing in on Juan Pierre from the Marlins.
Sadly Frank Thomas who was a mainstay for the Sox for years was not a major factor in last years World Series team and bought out his contract for 3.5 million saving the team million 5 million plus to help pay for salary arbitration eligible players Garland, Crede and Pyrzinski.
One advantage the Sox do have is having a players manager like Ozzie Guillen, he will stand behind his players through thick and thin, thats a manager everyone wants to go out and win for.
With that said they should squeak out the Central once again, and 100 wins is not out of the question but can they get by the aging Yankees and there seemingless unlimited budget, the Red Sox who added another starting pitcher or the Angels who are currently in the Manny Hunt--I say no and the Sox lose in the American League Playoffs. The winter meetings which start in Two days will reveal much more to this story and will shed light on which teams improve even further.
 
Clemens9 said:
I'll extend the deadline for this round until 4 PM EST tomorrow, so hopefully we can get all members who responded in the first round, to respond again.
Click to expand...
sweet thanks clemens9...no way I was going to be able to get my answer in before 5 tonight....jason

will have it posted sometime tonight :D
 
Round 2 Breakdown of Points:

Eric Draven
+2 "he is doing what Centers are paid to do, and that is getting BOARDS and BLOCKING shots"
-1 "he is getting in 11 points a game, which is great for Zo" It may be good for Zo, but it isn't good enough to be the best center in the game.

jchulbert
+1 "The Super Bowl is the big picture."
+1 "No need to risk hurting your starting players"

bdavis1hornets
+1 "winning the Super Bowl is on the top of their list."
-1 "just start Manning so he keeps his consecutive streak going, have him play a series, then sit him." Individual records should not affect Dungy's decision.
+1 "Edge or Manning gets injured and is out for the playoffs."

dherm360
+1 "having a players manager like Ozzie Guillen"
+1 "but can they get by the aging Yankees and there seemingless unlimited budget, the Red Sox who added another starting pitcher or the Angels who are currently in the Manny Hunt--I say no"
 

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