Big Blue Huddle

Quote from: kartanoman on October 21, 2024, 04:04:56 PMI wish I were a fan of Women's Basketball, but congrats to them, just the same.

If I were still a kid, I'd be going crazy that we'd be having another Yankees-Dodgers World Series. But all the strikes, lost seasons and greed killed my love for the game and that love isn't there anymore. I still yearn for my "Bronx is Burning" Yankees!

At least the Rangers are off to a good start as they play in Montreal tonight. Always a tough battle between these two, and a marathon ahead of them which I hope will lead them to the finals this season.

Peace!

I've given up following baseball when the Mets traded Strawberry, I think to the LA Dodgers. It's been awhile, but go Yankees anyway...

I've pretty much gave up following New York football teams as well for years. They have been awful for number of years. Although admittedly, I like to see the Jets falling flat on their faces with all of the had been big stars joining them. Yes, I know, it is not nice, but it is what it is...

BTW... The Rangers are off today, they will play Montreal tomorrow....

Quote from: DaveBrown74 on October 09, 2024, 06:11:27 AMThere's risk involved in what he's doing and he knows it. I like that myself. It's more than just pure greed. There's a balls factor to it that I like.

There's no question that there some risks for Igor. Albeit that risk is somewhat softened, when this season's salary of $5.6M is taken into account. 

I don't know, if it make sense to keep an overpaid Shesty. Surrounding him with players who are no better than the Rangers already have and expect them to win the cup is in sane. During the last three season, Shesty had been with the team. The core of the Rangers players were not been able getting to the SCF, much less winning it, with two different coaching staff. This is the fourth year in a row, where they have a chance to get over the hump and still have Shesty for the upcoming season.

I believe Drury did the best he could. Let it play out this upcoming season and readdress the goalie issue, no matter which way the season turns out. If they don't win the cup, it's time for some change and Drury will be frugal, he'll need some cap left for changes. For around $4-6 M/AAV, he could get a goalie, certainly not at Shesty's level, but that would be serviceable, if changes are coming. Even if they win, the same goalie for less should be just fine for couple of years.

Again, I like Shesty, I really do, but he put himself front of the team. It's understandable that he tries to cash in with his records. That's fine and I wish him luck to get it somewhere else...

PS: Shesty borne in 1995, I would not put him into the mid-twenties age group. In couple month he'll be in the early-thirties group and 38 years old in the eighth year of the rejected contract.   

I don't disagree... It certainly had been a great season, but the goal had been getting to the SCF. They failed to achieve in three consecutive years. They had proven in three seasons with two different coaches, that they are not capable to reach the SCF. We can blame the coaches, but in my view this is on the players. Certainly, running it back does not look like that the same players will get over the hump this season. I'd be surprised, if they do, but probably will have another great season.That's not enough in my view and basically admitting, that this team reached the plateau and not capable to to do more.
 
@Messiah717 Agree, ride him hard this year and let him go. I like Igor, I really do, but rejecting the $88M/11M/AAV puts him in different light for me. Thanks for the memories Igor....

Certainly, Bread deserved to be called out for his performance during the playoffs, but he wasn't alone. From Mika, Kreider, Fox, Laffy, etc., they had also disappeared in playoff games. Maybe not as much as Bread, but more than one guy disappearing at the same time had been the main issue for years for various lines. Trochek and others had been pretty much consistent, but during the playoff that's not good enough. This is the biggest problem that Levi didn't fix yet, they were great during the season.

Levi is trying and brought in Rempe for some toughness, that worked at times. Maybe Rempe will be more effective on the ice, aside from scaring players with his size. Aside from Rampe, I hope Levi does something else to fix this... LFGR!!!


 

The aren't many changes for this team; pretty much the same players and coaches. Lavi could not get them over the hump in the ECF, pretty much the same as in Gallant's first year with the Rangers. Gallant's second year result, one and done in the playoff, looms over Lavi. This is not a prediction, just an indication that he has a tough task ahead to move them over the hump. It's not going to be easy as the core players had been around for a relatively long time. I am hoping that Lavi still have some tricks up in his sleeves, but we'll see.

Some of the injuries during the preseason will impact the start of the season. Vesey out for couple of weeks, while others are day-to-day.

Othman and Korczak are back to Hartford, while others are on waiver. They really didn't show much during the training camp and preseason games. In my view, this was the right decision by the coaching staff.

I am optimistic about the upcoming season. It may start out slow, but as they say; it's not how you start, it's how you finish....

Quote from: Jolly Blue Giant on September 11, 2022, 10:27:53 AMHmmm...and we thought Big Brother was going to come from a swamp inside the DC beltway 

Well, the swap certainly has its integral role in this. Big Brother is the enabler for surveillance capitalism on one hand, pretty much refuses to create regulations to protect our privacy. Whatever they have created has so much hole it , that you could drive through an 18-wheeler. On the other hand, the government is also a user of the surveillance, most of the times for free. If you'd say that it is not really free, since they had sold out our privacy, I wouldn't argue much with you...

Quote from: Ed Vette on September 11, 2022, 09:07:40 AMIf Siri is disabled, then I assume that Apple Car Play for navigation won't work for voice commands. Correct?

It is correct, albeit sometimes the car play doesn't even work with Siri enabled... 

Quote from: DaveBrown74 on September 11, 2022, 09:17:54 AMI'll be perfectly honest - I have certainly read/heard stories about this sort of thing but for some naive reason I never fully believed or really worried about them. This thread has really woken me up to all of this.

I recommend you this book for further reading:

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism

This quote is pretty much an accurate description of the current status for our the digital world:

"Surveillance capitalism transfers the digital infrastructure from what we have to a thing that has us"

Off or online doesn't matter anymore, they really got us...

Quote from: MightyGiants on September 10, 2022, 01:59:11 PMMore specifically, my Facebook app.  I am very familiar with cookies, and how after I research tires for my car, there will be ads for tires on various websites I visit.

On the other hand, this was a bit more unsettling.  I wasn't researching home blood pressure cuffs, but I was talking to someone who was researching them.  A little while later, I go on to Facebook to acknowledge B-day wishes, and the first ad just happens to be "top 5 blood pressure monitors".  I am having a hard time accepting that was just an amazing coincidence

Rich, Facebook spying on you is a given, among other social network apps. For that matter any other apps are doing the same, that's their main source of income. Yes, I just beat up on apps for smartphone, but should do the same to the Android and iOS based smartphone as well. Google pays $8-10B/year to Apple to be the default search engine for Siri. Maybe Apple isn't spying on you, doubtful, but certainly allows Google to do just that for the yearly fee.

One way for cutting them off is only have apps installed that you actually need. In my case, that's 3-4 apps aside from the standard iOS apps that are left on my iPhone. The other way is to use NextDNS and block certain sites; I block google.com (shuts off Siri in addition to being disabled in iOS) among others and even some Apple domains, especially the one with telemetry reporting.

You could also disable WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS, if you don't use them. These are the services that define your exact location, valuable for advertisers. If the apps work without cell connections, disable their access to cell service. For example,I use the "MapmyRide" app, when going out biking. the app can have access to GPS, but not to cell and/or WiFi connections. It works just fine, records my route, speed, time etc., but no connection to the internet and as such, no uploading my data.

I am the first one to admit, that despite all of my trying to limit collecting my data, it's an uphill battle that I am loosing. When tracking is an integral part of the operating systems, the only thing one can do is not using any of them. That's really not an option in year 2022, is it?

If you want to see the domains that your iPhone has contacted to, go to:

"Settings\Privacy\App Privacy Report"

Tap on "Show All" under "MOST CONTACTED DOMAINS" to view the domains your iPhone had connected to. The chances are that you didn't initiate connection to roughly 30-40% of these domains, but your iPhone/apps did anyway...

I had three Covid shots and pretty much will stop there. I've seen people in really bad shape after getting the second booster, including my neighbor. They go from doctor-to-doctor, but they don't find anything to fix them. There's no reason for me for getting the 2nd and possibly subsequent bosters. I still wear mask, wash my hands, avoid large gathering, etc., for protection. I find it ironic that back in the days, when Covid infection rates were ~5%, CDC required us to wear mask. Nowadays, when the infection rate is ~10%, the CDC says, nah, you ok...

I haven't had Covid infection as of yet, but the long Covid looks scary. The CDC data shows, that 1-in-13 adults have long Covid. That's lot of people already suffering from it and this number will increase as the infection continuous to spread. And spread it will, since the Covid shot will not prevent getting infected, mildly infected is still an infection...

Kids are smart... 

Little by having a discussion with her mommy in the morning...

Boy: Mom, why were you bouncing last night on daddy naked?
Mom: Son, your daddy has a big belly and tried pushing it back...

Sounds reasonable explanation, but not for the little boy...

Boy: It's no use mom, our neighbors wife keeps blowing it up during the day....

Look folks, you don't fire anyone who's just won the SB; got that?

Denver Broncos -
Carolina Panthers -
Cincinnati Bengals -

Tampa Bay Buccaneers- 24
Washington Redskins- 9
Chicago Bears- 10.5