This is wrong. First, insider trading is notoriously undefined by the law, and courts struggle to map its precise boundaries, so there is no “literal” definition of it. See the recent denial of cert in Newman, for instance. Second, the employees weren’t using nonpublic information about their companies to “trade” on…

Totally beside the point (which is a righteous one!), but the documents weren’t FOIA’d, as they weren’t controlled by the federal government. They were obtained through Missouri’s Sunshine Law. Christ, I’m a prick.

A high school teacher of mine told us on the first day of European History that in each subsequent class he would tell one lie during the lecture. We’d guess the lie and scribble it on index cards that he collected at the end of each class. Sometimes they were absurd and easy to spot and sometimes they were subtle and…

Sure, their lineup was already good, and pitching was weak. But both have improved quite significantly. I’m not persuaded that either improvement is sustainable at this level, or that their needs to be balance between pitching and hitting to win the Series. But I hear ya.

The entire article is about changes over a two-week period—why is their pitching improvement any less a result of normal variation + better players than their hitting?

They have similar raw stats, but Rodman in his first 4 seasons was better than Thompson in a more limited role—higher PER, higher win shares, higher VORP.

Fair enough—but I guess I’d say there are 2-3 position players who currently have clearer cases.

Whoa whoa whoa—I’m all for Beltre making the Hall, but I don’t think he has the clearest case of any active player. He’s definitely behind A-Rod and (if you prefer a less controversial candidate) Pujols.

**NOT LEGAL ADVICE** Life insurance is a must once you’re a parent (provided you can afford it, but really you should do everything you can to afford it). But naming the guardian as the secondary beneficiary does nothing, because the policy typically pays out to secondary beneficiaries only if the primary beneficiary…

17.1 WAR in 13 seasons for Cecil, you imbecile.

I guess it depends on what “historically unprecedented” means. He has low per game stat totals for an MVP, but he also averaged the fewest minutes/game of any MVP in NBA history, which is more interesting to me than failing to meet arbitrary stat benchmarks. Plus, he did break the record (his own) for most 3 pointers…

I dunno, Prince seems pretty clearly superior. Prince: 23.5 WAR in 11 seasons; Cecil: 17.1 WAR in 11 seasons. Their best seasons are pretty similar (Prince: 6.3/2009; Cecil: 6.5/1990), but Prince has more better seasons.

Ken Griffey, Jr., Kobe Bryant, Peyton Manning, Prince Fielder, Cal Ripken, Jr....

Endorsement deals typically require a certain number of appearances on behalf of the sponsor. So Messi might not need the appearance fee from the Japanese gameshow, but I bet he likes the $20m+/year he gets from Adidas, etc.

Fair enough. Though those three are all one year older than last season.

Not clear what Luol Deng's views on last year's team, which notably lacked (among others) LeBron James, Kevin Love, and Coach Blatt has to do with this year's team.

I mean, not to be a noodge or nothing, but Blatt isn't officially on notice so much as anonymously reported to be on notice?

I didn't realize that Love scored the sort of points that don't translate to wins. Is he shooting on the other team's basket or something? Or maybe one of those baskets that periodically drops from the ceiling like back in the MTV Rock B'Ball Jams, except instead of being worth 10 points, this one is worth negative 4?

I've never understood the criticism that someone only compiled stats on a bad team. That's still really hard to do, and Love managed to do it, right? Plus, yeah, sure, he shot 46% from the field—but that includes both 2-pt FG% and 3-pt FG%. His True Shooting Percent last year was 59%, which is comparable to Dirk…

I don't know all that much about soccer, for starters, and perhaps your observations are totally on the mark, so far as they go. But in some ways this reminds me of the criticism I seem to recall being leveled at LeBron some time back: if only this player, who is probably the best in the world—arguably the best of all…