vilehoopster

God damn Blake Rutherford. So glad we wasted all those vets when we traded for him. I hated that deal then and hate it even more as Rutherford pisses away a chance to beat the Cubs. He's been a great addition to the Sox Single A and Double A teams. What a f-kin waste. Would make me happy if they released him tonight.

I agree with this guy. I think the Sox feel that Rodon has more upside and can really be something. But, I disagree with that idea. I never remember Rodon ever being good; at his best, he was slightly above average. Sometimes he'd pitch a game and come out after 5 and 2/3 innings with a guy on 2nd and Jason B. would be saying something like, "Now that's the Carlos Rodon we've been waiting for, really showing his potential." He say something like that, and I'd think, "Really, a No. 3 pick with a great game? Really, giving up 2 runs (maybe 3) in less than six innings?? At his best, he's just above average. On the other hand, I can remember lots of outstanding games and stretches of games from Lopez. I admit, they're becoming distant memories, but I know he can really throw a great shut or a one-run game. I went to a game against the Angels when he came out in the 7th or so, and he lost 1 to 0. I just really feel that he has way more upside than Rodon. I wouldn't bet the house (or even five dollars) on it, but I wouldn't be shocked if he was the Sox three-pitcher this year. I've seen and can remember great games from Lopez, though rather briefly and long ago.

That strike on Eaton is the Ump knows the game is over and he wants to get going as soon as possible. He's thinking, "Why waste anymore time on this batter? Let's move it along."

From what I understand, Reylo really preplexed 'em with his slow ball: Two innings, six batters and six outs, no base runners.

Did he look any better than Lopez? I don’t see how.

Okay, I'll deal with the second question on this thread first: When the Sox signed Yoelqui and Marco Paddy bragged him up as MLB ready, I made the prediction/ hope that he'd be our starting right fielder in 2022. I am going to stick with that. Now the question of Yoenis is very interesting. On one hand, I can't think of a place or clubhouse where he'd have a better chance of success, with his step-brother in the organization and all the fellow Cubans to welcome him. And he has serious potential; he could be a real powerful bat in the order, could be . . . He could be a 30 or more home run guy in the order. But . . . with his age and leg/feet problems (can't remember which one it is), can you realistically think he can play in the outfield? I don't know about this? So really, if you're signing him, you're signing a right handed DH. If you do that, and it works out, you're sending Vaughn down to the minors this year. Which for many reasons may or may not be good. I would say look at him, especially to see if he can still run, at least some, and be able to play outfield. If he can play some outfield, I would give him a performance loaded minor league offer and see how it goes. If he can't play in the outfield, at least some, I say go with Vaughn at DH. But still staying with my prediction, Yoelqui in RF in 2022.

Wait!!!!! How is this possible?? How could the White Sox possibly have this much talent? Having more than any team in the American League? How can this be? If you read most of the comments on this forum . . . . Our owner is a total cheap ass who won't pay for talent. Our GM has no idea what he's doing. No other organization would ever want our GM. He screws up every trade, every one. He can't convince the owner to sign the necessary washed - up pitchers we need for depth. He has no idea how to assess and draft talent. We have no idea how to develop our talent. So there must me some kind of mistake. I know there must be a mistake because pretty much every other post on this forum tells me how worthless our management is.

So, 42 huh? What question does that answer? Is that the least number of left-handed starters any team has ever seen in a season? Or is 42 the answer to the question of Life, the Universe, and Everything? Or is it both?

I can't believe that too many left handed starters are going to want to face the White Sox this year. Also, I have to believe that a lot of managers are going to try to avoid starting a lefty against the Sox. Seriously, if you're an average left hander, even above or below average, are you going to want to go out and pitch against the Sox? I have to believe no. Now, I know every professional athlete has pride and confidence, but there has to be a point where any athlete (in this case a lefty pitcher) thinks about the odds and how the odds are not in his favor, and what would be best for his stats and his success. As the Sox are approaching on the schedule, I believe that managers will manipulate starting pitching rotations whenever reasonable and without throwing guys off pitching cycles to avoid putting a lefty out against the Sox this year. I mean 14 for 14 last year says a lot. Here's a question. Is it kept track of; is there a stat for how many left-handed starters a team faces in a year? If so, I have to believe the White Sox might set a record for fewest number of starting left handers faced in a year.

Glad that someone started this topic, very interesting. So here's my two-cents worth. First of all, Anderson pretty much has to lead off and Abreu has to bat 3rd. Both of them like being where they have been and both are huge leaders (probably the two biggest leaders) on the team. TLR all but has to bat them there. If he doesn't, I strongly believe it would be a big first step to losing the clubhouse. Plus they're both great there. I think Anderson is pretty much an ideal lead off man. He gets on base; charges the lineup with excitement and disrupts the other team; you want him getting as many bats as possible. Abreu is great batting 3rd. He is officially a great RBI guy; no longer in dispute. So here's my line up for next year. 1- Anderson 2 - Madrigal - high batting average - good bat control for hit and run or can take pitches for Tim to steal and still not strike out - will get on base that can be knocked in 3 - Abreu 4 - Moncada - I don't think he will start here, but I believe he will be so overpowering that he has to be moved here, smashing doubles and homers. I also, think he will be top- three in MVP voting this fall 5. Eloy - It's gotta be him 6. Robert - he won't start here, but will soon move ahead of Grandal to bat 6th -- look at the murderers row of Abreu, Moncada, Eloy, and Robert (who will explode in his 2nd year) 7. Grandal 8. DH -- Vaugh -- He will give us about .275 average and between 15 & 20 homers 9. Eaton/ Engel That's my prediction, and I'm sticking to it. Wow, is this gonna be a fun lineup to watch. Can't wait.

I just have a general set of questions about some possible and probable incoming players with Cuban backgrounds. 1.) First of all, has Norge Vera signed with the White Sox yet? According to posts on this forum, he was supposed to sign last week. Where is that situation at? 2.) There were some comments on here that Yoenis Cespedes has changed his agent/ management team at that he was now with the same agent team as several other White Sox players from Cuba. The belief or implication was that he would soon be a White Sox player. Has anything happened with this? 3.) And my last question is a tough one, sort of opinion based. When the Sox got Yoelqui Cespedes, he was, according to MLB.com, the No. 1 international player available in the draft. Marco Paddy bragged him up as major-league ready right now. I saw this and thought: There's our starting right fielder next year, in 2022. Yet, when I look at other ratings of international players, he is rated far down the list of best players, in some cases not even top-ten. What is going on here? Is it the usual difference of opinions between scouting services? Also, how reliable is Marco Paddy? I understand that he found and talked the Sox into Luis Robert. Did he discover Abreu? What is Paddy's track record with finding players? Thanks for any comments or insights.

Is the Percota total of season wins usually the same as the Vegas lines or the online betting places lines?? Because if it is, I'm gonna break my rule and do some betting that the Sox win over 83 games and the Cardinals win over 80.

Of course 4 at 25% doesn’t mean a guaranteed 100%, but if you do a 25% chance and do it twice, you have a 50% chance of success. So there is something to my logic.

So, I have a 21.7% chance of being correct. I'll take that.

I feel the exact opposite. I feel okay about our DH situation, but feel confident that, no matter who it is, we'll be much less bad than last year with EE. My optimism is with the back end of our starting rotation. All four guys there have pretty big upsides. I would say that Cease and Kopech have huge upsides (TOR stuff), and Rodan and Lopez have very good upsides (Let's say solid 3- starter upside). Now, I admit that these percentages are totally off my head, but I think there's some validity there somewhere, and I think I might be being a little conservative in my expectation here, but here goes: I think Cease has a 30% chance of approaching his huge upside in 2021. With Kopech, for the 2nd half of the season when he comes up, I would say he has a 25% chance of approaching his huge upside. I would say with Rodon, due to fear of injuries, he has a 20% chance of being a good 3-level pitcher for our World Series contender. With Lopez, I'll say a 10% chance of becoming a solid 3rd starter on a contending team. Now, add all those up: (and to a simplistic degree odds do work like this), with four options with strong upsides and the odds come to 85% likely that the Sox have, at least, one good pitcher from that group of four. I think there's a chance that the Sox are very strong with their 4th starter, strong to the point where if Keuchel takes a little step back from last year, the Sox will still be very strong in, at least, their 1st four starters. To be honest (and I am an optimistic fan), I think I devalued the odds for Cease, Rodon, and Lopez, but I think I overrated Kopech a little. But that is my weird logic about why I feel good about the back end of our starting rotation.

Oh my God! How many more threads are gonna be started bitching about the organization/ owner being cheap, about how we should have done this or done that or added this for that much money. I like Rick Hahn's Hoosiers quote, "Our team is on the floor." And it's a damn good team, a damn good one. It is exactly what we fan wanted; it's a World Series contender, a strong World Series contender. For all the bitching on this forum, that is all a fan can ever ask for. In this post and so many complaining others the "there's no guarantee" or "what if so and so gets injured, there's not quality backup". People are upset that, with this present line up (this team "on the floor") that for the White Sox to win the World Series, things really have to go right; they need to stay injury free. That complain is made over and over and over. Well . . . No Duh!! Every team ever is like that. If they don't have luck and stay injury free, they're not going to win the World Series. There's never a guarantee, never. Nobody in MLB has spent more money or had better personal or farms systems than the Dodgers and Yankees since the 2000s. Yet before this year, the Dodgers hadn't won a World Series before 1988 (That makes our 2005 win seem recent). The Yankees haven't won a World Series since 2009. No amount of money spent can guarantee a World Series and protect a team from injuries derailing a promising season. I got news for you guys: if Mookie Betts goes down either to injury or a bad slump and one of their top pitchers gets hurt for a long time, that $40 million on Bauer ain't gonna matter. Same thing with the Yankees or Padres, if they lose two important players, they're not making the World Series. So it's equally true for the White Sox. If one of our big pitchers go down and we lose one of our big bats, I got news for you, a back up LH bat and better back up catcher isn't going to matter. It ALWAYS comes down to a lot of luck and staying injury free, always. I'm excited to see what Vaugh can do. And I've said this before: I absolutely did not want Nelson Cruz, that steroid cheater. I don't want to cheer for a Cruz; I want a team I can be proud of. For all our complaining, I want to see what Collins can do, or to see a huge jump in performance from Cease. If we worked in the same office and could have a solid, hand-shake bet, I would bet that Cease has a better year than Musgrove or Taillon or whatever oft-injured pitcher somebody on here mentioned that the Sox have to have to "guarantee" success. To justify their complains, people on here are making statement and taking off with them like they're absolute facts. Come on, really? Are the Sox really not going to make the World Series because Joc Pederson is soooo much better than Eaton. Yet people are having shit fits on this board because we didn't sign Pederson. Or someone bitching about this back up infielder is so necessary when the Sox have Leury Garcia. Really? Are any of the many names listed on here THAT MUCH better than Leury? Ridiculous. For all of the complaining on this board, in my opinion, the rebuilt has been a total success, and we have to give Hahn and management credit for it. This White Sox team is what we wanted: It is a strong World Series contender and will be for, at least, four or five years. There are no guarantees (again, ask the Yankees and Dodgers fans). All fans can realistically ask for is the ownership and management to give them a a strong team, a team that is a serious World Series contender. And we have that, so if only for a minute or a thread or two, just stop bitchin'!

Merkin, the White Sox reporter said this in answering a fan question: The White Sox aren’t done, but, barring a trade, I’m not sure if there will be any more big-name additions. Now I have noticed that Merkin is pretty much the voice of the Sox front office; that's the way he's appeared to me in the years I've been following his stuff on MLB.com. He's pretty much saying no big signings are going to happen. Whatever might happen will be in a trade. So, I think we can put any talk of signing Bauer or even Cruz to sleep, because it looks like it ain't gonna happen. The trade point scares me. I hope we don't give up too much.

Edwin Jackson has an interesting article on MLB.com right now where he talks about all the cities he played in and which ones he like best for this reason or that reason. He listed Chicago as the best city for kids and for pizza. Anyway, he listed St. Louis as friendliest city and as having the best fans. It's pretty funny that he mentioned only one person he ever heard booed there. Can you guess? It's a former White Sox? Here's the quote: "The only place that I've never heard a person get booed, except for A.J. Pierzynski, is St. Louis," Jackson says. "They kinda cheer for everybody, and that's something you don't see anywhere." Here's the link, a good read, if it works. https://www.mlb.com/news/edwin-jackson-talks-favorite-baseball-cities

I really hope that there's a minor league season. Being down here in Indiana, I really look forward to Charlotte playing in Indy every year. It's great: cheap seats right down by the field, up close in a great park with easy in and out before and after game. Don't my seeing Charlotte from me two years in a row!

Am I the only guy that doesn't want Cruz because of this cheating with PEDs. I have said this before: you have to be naive to not think that Cruz is on on PEDs. I know he has never actually been caught, failed drug test caught, and only caught by connection to that whatever lab, but still, it's unreasonable to think he's not on them. The way he has gotten better in his upper 30s, his connection to PEDs in the past. Lance Armstrong when years and years winning Tour de France races, while not getting caught when everyone know he was on PEDs. So don't use his never failing drug tests as an example of his innocence. Plus many, many people on this forum have complained about his PED use in his years with the Twins. But now that he's available, we want his PED cheating ass with the Sox? That just seems so hypocritical to me, "He pisses me off that he cheating for Minny, but wait; now I want him to come cheat for the Sox". I don't want to cheer for a cheater; I don't. If that means the Sox win a few less game, so be it. But I think the Sox can be (and are right now) a World Series contender without the putting the odor of PED cheating on any success the Sox have in the upcoming years. Again, I don't want to cheer for a cheater.

OKay, that is good. Pretty funny.

Of course, he should have won MVP. He had the best statistical season and he was extremely valuable to his team in terms of leadership and creating a winning club house culture. He was the Most Valuable Player, in the entire league, to his team's success this year. I don't know how you could reasonably debate otherwise. War, bwar, FUwar are, to me, stats that seem to be the ultimate example of "not seeing the forest for the trees". I talked about my distrust of war on here repeatedly. All you need to know about the value of war, whichever war it was that year, is the example of two or three years ago, when Abreu had a year-end war barely above Yolmer Sanchez. They (and there were MANY on this Board) used this war to say how the White Sox should unload Abreu to the Red Sox for whatever they can get. They quoted war (again many, many posters and posts on this board) that the Sox should offer Jose one year, at most and not for even 10 million, to return to the Sox. If he won't take it, let him walk. That people are still using war to discredit or demean Abreu is shown in the quote I started with above. Even before this past MVP season this year, Abreu led the AL in RBIs and people were talking about his low war. It kills me. When a guy leads the league in RBIs and you're using war to show that the guy is not that good; well, that says less about the caliber of the player and more about how weak war is as a stat. Come on, people. You know who you are/were. Another knock I have with war is how ridiculously low Colome's war was. I had a long post on that one. People quote his war and imply he was barely above average, but he saved (not sure of this number, don't feel like looking it up) something like 42 of 46 games in the last two years. How can a closer have such a great save percentage, but barely be above average in war for relievers. it makes no sense to me. To me, war is the ultimate "can't see the forest for the trees" stat. And how it is/ was used to assess Abreu is my example of that.

Yeah, stay away Ass Faces !!! Can you imagine an outfield of Colas, Robert, and Cespedes in two or three years. That is so beautiful to think about.

I agree; the trade of Lopez for seems like a natural for both clubs. Pretty much, both organizations and fan bases have soured on the two players. I have to believe both sides see the loss of their player as very, very minor. Yet both have big upsides that could really plug a hole that the other teams needs. Lopez has something that if you could find it and tap into it, would give you a very solid starting pitcher. Boston needs pitching, and again, Boston has soured on B. There is nowhere for Lopez to be of value to the Sox. The bullpen is loaded. People who think maybe Lopez in the bullpen, do you really want to see him jogging out to take the ball with a guy on 1st and the Sox holding a one or two run lead in the 6th or 7th inning? Do you want that? I sure don't. On the other hand, Benintendi could plug several different holes for the Sox: An insurance if Eaton gets hurt, we still would have a left hand bat to put in right field. Another left-handed bat to DH or play in left field if Eloy is sitting or hurt. Again, he has a really big upside that it seems worth the Sox time to try to find. Could the Sox make this happen if they threw in a minor minor leaguer, the equivalent of a Weems? Too me, the Sox lose nothing in moving Lopez. He's like a college junior part-time starting power forward, and the coach has brought in two freshmen forwards who are clearly better than the returning player. Like this junior forward, Lopez doesn't have a spot anymore. The Sox have recruited over Lopez's talent level. So why not move him.

I’d rather have Q.