Richie

Hell, I thought the World Series. We literally just weren't losing.

LMAO No, it's not. We have won twice in like 11 days and every facet of our team has been dreadful. We are in a BRUTAL state right now. Dreadful.

I'm glad my spirit was crushed and my will to give a shit was cut directly in half during the Cleveland series. I'm not half as upset as I normally would be. You had to know this was coming. We're a horrible baseball team right now. For a variety of reasons. We're not even a top 8 team in the AL. Not at this moment. Not a playoff team.

I am going to pay a series of women to #MeToo Rick Renteria. Any means necessary. F**k this. I am done. Have fun for those of you who hang around. I'm going to watch this terrible Thursday night football game instead.

Lol... This decision is mind blowing.

That isn't referring to guys who were totally crushing it and then had a few terrible weeks. That's referring to guys who come up and get abused immediately.

The long term concerns over Robert are ludicrous. For 2020, have I lost hope? Kind of, yeah. However, making such damning claims towards a player's career over a bad few weeks. After being the ROY front runner? Come on... just... come on.

My heart just moved on from COVID baseball and onto COVID football. Hard to believe. One week ago I felt so opposite of this. I literally have lost a massive chunk of my excitement about the season. I mean, I'm here for it... but... eh. Looking more forward 2021 than I am the playoffs. Unless we just totally regain form THU-SUN. But I doubt it.

Lol chill the hell out. And no, not at all. Not if Madrigal played like ROY the first 1.5 months of the season before going into this funk.

This could be a very bad turning point. I've never had my opinion of a team plummet so hard in such a short time. Half of our lineup is non-existent and everything has just gone to shit.

Luis Robert is utterly hopeless right now. I mean, that's just embarrassing.

Started hammering the ball after this post. lol. Now he's slashing .257/.376/.440 (.816 OPS). That is elite as hell for a catcher. AND he's one of the best defensively. What more do the people want? It was ALWAYS stupid. People declaring him a failure over 15-20 games? What a joke.

Jesus people. He's had a few bad weeks. Relax. lol. Did he not have Post COVID Fatigue when he slashed .302/.371/.508 over the first 2.5 weeks of the season? The team has also publicly spoken about his leg injury and he's pulled up gimpy, gingerly, or favoring one leg while running a multitude of times. I'm going to go out on a MASSIVE limb here and say that is hard to play with. Moncada himself said that with returning from COVID - the problem was more so the prolonged inactivity and not having a chance to rev up for the season. Legs aren't in shape, etc. He looked pretty good earlier tonight. Had some good AB's and absolutely hammered a couple balls a little wide of the foul pole in right. It wouldn't shock me if starting tomorrow - it was his turn out of the guys to get extremely hot.

I think you're overstating the words of many, to say the least. I do not think there was a widespread SoxTalk consensus that Madrigal "sucks". That's just massive hyperbole. I like Madrigal and liked the pick. I think he can be a rock solid 2B for years to come. That being said, he's played 11 games and has 41 PA's. I don't think I have to point out that hitting .400 isn't sustainable. The fascination that so many seem to have with small sample sizes when it suits their viewpoint never ceases to amaze me. For instance, if he was hitting .200 through 41 PA's. I'm sure you wouldn't accept the notion that those who feel contrary to you were correct in their assertion. The list of bad players to hit .400 for 11 games is endless. Let's see what happens when he goes through an inevitable struggle. Let's see his first 500-600 PA's, yeah? I mean, he hasn't done much to prove his critics wrong when it comes to what he "can't do". He has yet to notch an XBH and never walks. Maybe he can literally hit at a Tony Gwynn like clip, who knows? However, if he cannot (most likely outcome), he's going to have to develop some gap-to-gap power and walk some. If your response to this is "Jeez! He's only played 11 games and he's hitting .400! What more do you want?". Then, I appreciate you understanding the point I made above about small sample sizes and it being too early. The success or failure of positional player draft pick, trade, or free agent acquisitions are decide over hundreds upon hundreds of PA's (often over a thousand). At least, when it comes to those you've invested into long-term. Which, clearly, we have with Madrigal.

This is where talent evaluation and scouting comes into play beyond just a debut professional baseball stat line. This line really doesn't have anything to do with my post, though. I never ignored his ability. I must have done an absolutely horrid job of explaining my viewpoint if all you got from my reply was "Hey, here's his OPS in A ball. Kid stands next to no chance right now!". I apologize. What we’ll likely see is him taking quality at bats from day 1... making solid contact, showing spurts of his potential, along with some Mazara like periods of struggle. I would probably agree with this assessment. My point of contention is with the posts alluding to "Stop everything! Bring him up! Hit him 3rd! Play him at a position he's never played! He's the answer to everything!". That’s worst case. No... no, no, no. Lol. Come on, we've all been watching this game for a while on this forum. Talented prospects with a lot more time to develop than Vaughn has had come up and totally lay an egg ALL OF THE TIME. That includes guys who eventually figure it out, too. I would say your description is "most probable outcome" within the range of potential outcomes. Not the "worst case scenario". It’s not going to be as gloomy as you make it out should he be here in 2020... but it’s not likely to be roses all the time as well. I am sorry, but with respect, I am very confused. I feel like we're not that far apart - yet you keep attempting to paint my post as doom and gloom for Vaughn if he came up. I explicitly and clearly said "I would like to see him come up and get a shot". Why would I say that if I didn't think he had a chance to help out?

And never posted an OPS over .798 in A ball. I get that he's the "other option" which automatically gets him love. Sort of like the "backup quarterback fallacy" in football. I also get that he's a young, talented player we have big hopes for. But I am very puzzled by the nature of some of these posts. - Not only is he ready to come up and face big league pitching. - Not only is he ready to be successful in a big league role. - NOT ONLY... is he ready to play EVERY DAY. - NOT ONLY... is he the answer to the biggest problem in our lineup, at a position he has NEVER played. - He is ALSO ready to be our #3 hitter and a central piece of our lineup as we contend for an AL Central title! Wow! How convenient is that!? I mean, what a coincidence that this guy whose been down at the training site, just HAPPENS to be the answer to all of our problems? Every. Single. Solitary. ONE. Gee... if I didn't know any better - I would say that SoxTalk is getting a bit ahead of themselves. But nah... we'd never do that I want Vaughn up here and getting a chance as well. But let's turn the volume down... just a tad, eh?

I don't believe that was his point. I think it was more taking issue with the strong implication that "This is what this is. Post COVID fatigue syndrome. Ain't it a shame?". I mean, it's a bit of an absurd comment. Based on literally zero information or knowledge of what Moncada is dealing with. It's being assumed by some here for no reason. In fact, Moncada's issue has been described as a leg injury. Yet, this "Post Covid Fatigue" narrative is being pushed despite DIRECT reports from the team.

This was an avoidable and very sh*tty loss. Especially seeing as it probably means the series. I give Lopez very little chance of not being pulverized tomorrow. I love what this team is doing, overall. I love where it's headed in the big picture. However, until we start start beating CLE/MIN in these series? I can't get my hopes up to win the division and I really can't begin to start thinking about a deep run in the post-season.

Yeah, I know it feels "special" when you wait for a long time and finally reach daylight with a team. Begin to win after a long drought. The energy and optimism is palpable. But really... it ain't supernatural. Two years ago today we had Matt Davidson and Daniel Palka hitting in the middle of our lineup. When you think about that relative to what we have now? Yeah, we're going to come up with runs in some spots where we didn't used to. lol That being said - I didn't have a great feeling about tonight. Falling down 4-0 on 3 2nd inning errors didn't help. I was skeptical that we would pull it out all the way up until the 9th. Impressive.

I can't believe someone else caught that. His voice, his cadence, his "sheesh, well alright" sort of vibe, etc. All I heard was "Jay Cutler". lol

If we traded Luis Robert - I would probably wind-up in jail that night. Just sayin...

We lost.... See ya tomorrow. This game sucked.

God, this ump is horrific

We need a run out of this. Come on...

Don't K... please