MRKARNO

There is no legit comparison. They owned with RISP. We suck so far. Their pitching staff was trash. Ours is a helluva lot better. I'd take our lineup over theirs as well. The only similarity is wins and losses through the first month of the season and you could argue that we're pretty similar to teh 2001 M's as well.

QUOTE(aboz56 @ Feb 18, 2005 -> 07:27 PM) Since we all love to analyze, I figured I'd come up with a White Sox edition of Fact or Fiction again this season. If you're not familiar with the concept (as seen on Sportscenter) I am going to list a series of phrases and you, as the analyst get to respond with either Fact or Fiction. I'd also like to encourage a bit of justification for each of your answers, otherwise they'll probably be knocked down by others like a scarecrow is knocked down by a fierce wind storm. So, here we go. Fact or Fiction: A White Sox starting pitcher will win 20 games this season. Fact or Fiction: Willie Harris will be on the White Sox opening day roster. Fact or Fiction: Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez will toss more than 140 innings this season. Fact or Fiction: Shingo Takatsu will record more than 30 saves this season. Fact or Fiction: Scott Podsednik will set a career high in both batting average and OBP this season. Fact or Fiction: Frank Thomas will play in more than 120 games this season. Fact or Fiction: Carl Everett will get more than 350 at-bats this season. Fact or Fiction: A White Sox starter other than Mark Buehrle or Freddy Garcia will throw a complete game shutout this season. And finally....Fact or Fiction: The White Sox will win the American League Central in 2005. 1. Fiction. No reasoning, it's just so random that there's no way to predict the number of pitcher wins and only two AL pitchers won 20 last year so we'll go with no 2. Fact. I don't think we'll be able to work out a trade before Opening Day 3. Fiction. 120 seems to be a bit more accurate from what I've seen. 4. Fact. He's the real deal. 5. Fiction. I do think that Miller Park supressed his stats and that he'll split the difference between his road OBPs the last two years to post a .370ish OBP, but I'm not so sure about career highs, but we'll see. This is a soft "fiction" 6. Fact. He'll be back in early May and play about 125-130 games 7. Fact. Thomas's being out will help. Also I think he'll win the RF job by midseason over Dye. 8. Fact. Contreras against a really bad team.

If they cant get Odalis or Clement, there's only player I think I'd spend the money on and that's Jason Varitek and I dont see us getting him.

Uhh....Albert Belle in 1996? 5 years 55 million and the "top three" clause?

What's with the lack of love for Odalis Perez?

One (or two) of the following three: Cotts Diaz Munoz

Fair enough. I'm just saying that there is statistical evidence to suggest that it's possible. Uribe is 2 years behind Tejada was, but I dont see why it cant just be that it suddenly just "clicked" for him a little later than it did Tejada. Hype doesnt always equal results. Ask Joe Borchard about that one, but just because one of two similar players are hyped, that doesnt mean that they arent similar. I buy your arguement about Uribe being less likely to approach that level than Tejada himself, but I'm just trying to show everyone what we may have on our hands here.

I beg to differ. If you look statistically, there seems to be a very close correlation between the two: 1998 Miguel Tejada (22) 2003 Juan Uribe (23) AB 365 316 BA .233 .253 OBP .298 .257 2B 20 19 HR 11 10 SLG .384 .427 BB 28 17 K 86 60 1999 Miguel Tejada (23) 2004 Juan Uribe (24) AB 593 502 BA .251 .283 OBP .325 .327 2B 33 21 HR 21 23 SLG .427 .506 BB 57 32 K 94 96 2000 Miguel Tejada (24) 2005 Juan Uribe (25) AB 607 ????? BA .275 ????? OBP .349 ????? 2B 32 ????? HR 30 ????? SLG .479 ????? BB 66 ????? K 102 ????? Sure Uribe's strike zone issues are a little more pronounced than Tejada's but offensively they are following the same path. Tejeda just was more hyped and got a quicker start. If you dont pay attention to stats, I'm probably not going to win you over, but it doesnt hurt that they're both about 5'10" and 175 pounds and hail from the same town in the Dominican Republic (that last fact is irrelevant, but interesting anyways). The jump from where Uribe is now to where Tejada was in 2000 is not a very big one and I think Uribe can make that jump offensively. He already is very good defensively (not unlike Tejada). I think I've made a fair case for an "accurate correlation," whether you agree with it or not.

"Almost never" is probably a little bit stronger than I intended, but a 24 year old hitting 23 homers is a lot less likely to be a fluke than say a 29 year old.

He's been "overlooked" because he's asking for money that he wont even get in this market.

Yeah, but at a similar point in Tejada's career I'm sure that he had similar problems. I wish I knew where to find the 1999ish splits to demonstrate my point. Tejada is an older, more developed player so of course he'll be more advanced than Uribe. He's further along in his career than Uribe. There's no reason why Uribe can't be a similar player at a similar point in their respective careers.

Statistical Jumps at the age of 24/25 are almost never flukes. They usally indicate an upward trend and just that a player is developing and is finally making the jump to reaching their potential. This guy is currently on a similar development track to Miguel Tejada and I see no reason why he cant be as good as Tejada in the coming years.

Juan Uribe

He seemed to have no problems in his one start at the Cell in 2004 (8 IP 1 ER). Olympic stadium had been playing as a hitters' park before this year so those numbers before 2004 are not just a result of the park he was pitching in.

I'd be in on any league