Molto

Even if Beckham is the real deal and ready to play now, and I don't doubt it from the way he looked during spring training, it's too too risky to bring him up now. Make sure that once he comes up, he's up for good. Let him go through some ups and downs at the minor league level before he experiences it on the big stage. With regards to Poreda ... I wouldn't mind him starting, but that's just because I'd rather him struggle now and show he's not a major league starter than next season when there are certain expectations that he'll never live up to.

No reason why Anderson shouldn't be playing. As confident as I am that he'll never be a productive enough hitter to be a starter, he's sadly the best option right now, considering the season is in jeopardy and this team is past due for an overhaul.

QUOTE (BearSox @ May 19, 2009 -> 01:24 PM) Rudy Jaramillo never made the majors... Neither has Don Cooper, I believe, and his job should be safe for some time.

Being a coach and instructor for the past 8 years, and having very little natural baseball skills prior, it infuriates me when people assume that playing baseball (or any sports) well makes you qualified to teach it. Having coached with good ballplayers and seeing professional ballplayers instruct, a good chunk of the time I find they really aren't qualified to teach. Someone who does something well may not know how he's doing it and in many instances can't relate to the person who can't, and then, fix them. That person may have also spent more time on the field playing than off the field watching, which is extremely important in being an effective coach. I don't care for Walker ... it's hard to know exactly what he's telling the hitters, but his approach appears to be geared towards turning on pitches. It could it also just be the players' fault. Nonetheless, the coach is usually the first to fall, and then if things don't change, it's obviously the players. So why Walker still has his job is baffling. As for Harold and his inability to communicate. Are you guys in the dugout and clubhouse? And even if he's soft-spoken, it doesn't mean he can't communicate.

You are one year closer to death.

August 8th is the OFFICAL DATE, for the WSI/Soxtalk softball game, part III. Southsider2k5 Northsidesox72 Chisoxfn shipps kapkomet The Beast Molto

Right across the street.

26th is a pretty busy street and just a few blocks west and east of Halsted and Canal, two streets (with bus routes) that take you right into the south loop/downtown area. Area is fine.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 2, 2009 -> 09:36 AM) If she has a kid, the biggest thing to consider might be schools. In general, the Chicago Public Schools are not great, though there are some that are good. Yeah. I think the main public schools would be Healy and Mark Sheridan, which are literally two blocks from each other (Wallace St, 28th-30th). Other that that it's mostly catholic schools. If she works downtown or takes public transportation a lot, somewhere close to the Red Line/the Cell (30th-34th & Wells, Princesten, Shields, even Normal) or Orange Line would work too, although I would say the area by the Red Line is better than the Orange Line.

Police station isn't there anymore. On 31st and Halsted now, but that area should still be calm. I think the area between 35th and 38th on Lowe, Union, Emerald is calm. Most of Bridgeport is good to live in. There are some s***ty blocks, but I think you can just drive down a block once and know.

Have 'em do a vasectomy while they are down there. It'll do society, and the environment, a world of good to a know a little Gage isn't running around followed by a steady and lethal stream of gas. We can all breath easier.

QUOTE (bmags @ Oct 12, 2008 -> 02:08 PM) any episode where there is a solo storyline for D sucks. Very true, but I'd say that for the most part that would be the case for any of them individually. The best is when they are working together, or at least when they are paired off in twos, like the billboard episode. This past week's episode was really really bad for any show, let alone this show. If I never watched before I would never watch another episode. The hour-long episode the week prior was OK and the season premiere was solid. The rest have been awesome.

got two. bleachers. it's all luck.

QUOTE (spiffalicious @ Sep 5, 2008 -> 12:52 PM) The score said that this didn't happen from a HBP, but that Carlos did it to himself when he struck out and slammed the bat. Does anyone know when that could have happened? I wasn't able to watch the games over the weekend to remember if he did it then. If that is the reason, hopefully he can learn from it and be a little less intense next year. It'd be pretty damn hard for him to injure his right wrist with a HBP.

I've never ever ever liked MacDougal. Awesome stuff, but never liked his delivery, which has led to injury problems, and his obvious control issues ... but yesterday was a different pitcher. The path of his delivery seemed identical, which is still annoying, but it was MUCH more controlled and fluid. With his stuff, that's what he needs to do. Stay relaxed, go to the plate and let talent do the rest. It was very nice to see him yesterday, granted it was only for three batters. Still, throwing with your team down a few runs and pitching in a tight game or with a lead are two different scenarios. Not sure if MacDougal is capable of handling those situations consistently. Yesterday was encouraging, especially considering how he's been the butt of a lot of people's jokes.

QUOTE (YASNY @ Aug 28, 2008 -> 09:07 AM) I got an out of left field email from Molto .... I think, telling me about Soxtalk. How the hell he found me and knew I was a Sox fan, I guess I'll never know. But I'm glad it happened. I gotten a lot of enjoyment from this place over the years. I used to post on the ESPN board under rio255 and on WSI as well ... maybe I remember you from one of those places. Not sure how I would get your email though and I wasn't really one to email, as I was a horrible promoter/marketer. Glad it worked out though.

I was actually thinking on Monday what if Broadway started tonight, pushing Danks (and all the starters for that matter) back a couple days. Obviously you want to limit the starts of Richard and Broadway, but what good is winning a game today if you put yourself in worst shape later. Danks could very well wear down big time come September, and not just where he'll struggle in the seventh, but struggle in the fourth. Broadway/Richard getting an extra start in August is better than having to use them in September for a tired Danks.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Aug 27, 2008 -> 09:58 PM) I think I should split all the prior year bills with mods/admins. Nevermind. I don't like that idea.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Aug 27, 2008 -> 09:54 PM) You aught to up his rent now that he's making the big bucks. You pay? I've been an Admin for years and haven't gotten a dime, and he's a lowly moderator and gets money? The guy just learned how to break paragraphs.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Aug 27, 2008 -> 09:50 PM) It was Soxfantatic.com or something like that. The site was ran by Spataro who is now a poster here (people may remember him as the person who made the posts that led to this site being published in Sports Illustrated). I will always remember the day where we got the call that they were going to file a suit against us to close SoxNet. Pretty miserable ass day. Although I think we both learned a valuable lesson about business on that day. It was one of the worst feeling moments of my life. The time and sweat we put into it all only to have some jagoffs take it away, but it was a valuable lessoned learned indeed. Contracts are a b****.

QUOTE (shipps @ Aug 27, 2008 -> 08:03 PM) Actually I gave Mario the idea.I just didnt have a computer at the time to make a move on it and original idea was to write letters to fellow Soxfans .He also sold my bill-less baseball cap idea to Jason Gage that I look forward to being screwed on also.. I remember you making fun of the time I spent I working on it ... and now you're a freaking moderator.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Aug 27, 2008 -> 05:39 PM) SoxNet.net was initially founded in 2000/2001. The site was a news site which was founded by Mario Scalise (Molto) and Jason Gage (myself). Molto was the actual founder though and I somehow stumbled upon to his post that he was going to start a White Sox website which he made on WSI (where I would read on occassion). SoxNet had a message board which I was in charge of (Mario was in charge of the news portion) and that board was part of a sports-network which had made up with numerous sites which had been affiliated with Rivals (sportsinfinity network). For about a full season we used that network as our forums and than after the network continued to have server issues we felt it was necessary to make the next step and establish Soxtalk.com (the baseball fans forums had a core group of about 20 posters and would get about 100 posts a day, which we thought was insanely busy). Soxtalk was my first venture into the server end side of things (from installing/building the forum to using PHP to make some customizations). Early in the Soxtalk days, WSI ran into an issue where they banned numerous members. We marketed and reached out to these members (which included being the official sponsor of SoxNRoll Radio) and eventually established a nice core-set of posters. Shortly after we gained a chunk of posters from WSI, we than lucked out into ESPN's forums being poorly moderated (we would consistently market our site by posting the articles on various forums, including ESPN/MLB) and picked up the likes of SS2k and slowly must have obtained about 90% of the consistent White Sox posters on such forums. At that point Soxtalk had established itself. It would consistently get 1000 posts a day and was filled with action. We've grown many many more times since but the one thing thats never changed is our dedication to the members of this site and the Chicago White Sox. In the middle of all this there was a time where this site was integrated with the "Insiders" network. This was something we thought was going to be a brilliant move which would give us the ability to provide the members with better content (giving us full blown credentials and access to getty images). However, there were differences of opinion between us and the people at the Insiders and legal actions had been threatened. There was a couple week span where we actually and we thought we might lose the site, however, we lucked out (although we were forced to close SoxNet.net at this time). FutureSox & Soxtalk managed to survive and now we've continued to work on growing the network. That's pretty much it. The board was originally under SoxNet.net, but thought it was better to have a seperate name for the board to make it easier on the users and to give it a seperate identity. Good thing that happened, because SoxTalk.com would have went under with SoxNet. It was devastating having to give up SoxNet, but very glad SoxTalk was kept and it is what it is today. The early going was pretty rough, but as you said, we ran into some luck with the demise of the ESPN board (I was a regular there), WSI banning-ways, and there was actually another White Sox site/board that had to close and brought some posters to SoxTalk.com, although I can't remember the name off-hand.

He's been a disapointment to watch defensively, from his jumps to his hesitations to his arm ... he's not a gold glover. Offensively, minus the opening weeks, he's been a consistent hitter, game to game, at bat to at bat. His numbers don't jump out, but he's consistently brought something to the table on offense. As a leadoff hitter, I think that's more important than anything. As for character ... any player who would rather his teammate get an error before himself isn't someone you'd want on your team, but once again, the way he's played offensively out of the leadoff spot shows he wants to win ... he just wants to secure his gold glove perception.

It was an odd call, but not necessarily the wrong one. The fielder makes the throw to second and has to get out of the way, even if he's going to cover two. AJ definitely stuck his elbow out, but the fielder does have to get out of the way. If Pierzynski would have turned around to his left, he would have ran right into him. Odd call, but not sure it's one you can argue.

Very well written piece, Pratt. You're a talented writer, and I've read the work of many sportswriters. Reading the story, I realized that I wasn't even mentioned. I thought I did pretty decent ... I at least fell on my ass more than anyone else (I "purposely" fell after swinging just to get mentioned in this story!). Softball was a good time though, and I seriously hope more people make the effort and come out next year. Hopefully the weather will be better.