Y2HH

Relax people, Thornton actually looked good, despite the outcome. And no, it wasn't bad managing. It almost worked, and if it had, you'd all be praising how awesome the managing was. Stuff it.

Or not...

S' ALL GOOD!

This is do or die for Thornton.

93 Octane taking the mound...

QUOTE (The Ginger Kid @ Apr 13, 2011 -> 03:37 PM) count me out Count me out, too.

QUOTE (whitesoxfan99 @ Apr 13, 2011 -> 10:16 AM) How can you pitch over an error when that error leads directly to a run? In that specific case, my point isn't very valid, obviously. But when you're getting lit up everyday, it doesn't matter, even in instances where you could pitch over errors or lead off doubles (for instance), he's not going to be able to do it. Thornton isn't fooling anyone, and nobody is afraid to hit against him right now. Do you have faith Thornton could pitch over errors, or even pitch over lead off doubles? Right now, the way he looks, I don't. Honestly, even if Pierre made that catch, I was hoping Ozzie would yank Thornton that night. I remember saying, oh thank god that didn't leave the park when I saw JP lining up the catch on the track...obviously before he dropped it. It's not like bad luck hits here, every batter that faced him that night hit him hard.

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Apr 13, 2011 -> 09:24 AM) He allowed one hit. Like I said, he certainly didn't look good out there but it's kind of hard to blame him for the loss when he just allowed a hit that didn't leave the park. He allowed a leadoff double, not just some minor blip of a hit. Then the error. Then a line drive that, luckily, was smashed right into Konerko's glove. Pierre messed up, but Thornton looked terrible, too. A real closer MUST be able to pitch over errors from time to time. I understand this isn't the Thornton we all know and love right now, but fact is, it's the Thornton we have at the moment. We cannot afford to have a closer out there everyone has to play perfect baseball or the game is over. Fielders WILL mess up from time to time...he has to shake that off and pitch over it if/when it happens.

QUOTE (Iwritecode @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 11:27 AM) Really? I've read the Mr. Perfect jokes on here before but is this really the case? Yes, that's really the case. Miss Elizabeth, Ravishing Rick Rude, Chris Benoit, Eddie Guerrero, Davey Boy Smith, Big Boss Man, Mike Awesome, The Earthquake, Bam Bam Bigelow. All dead. And that's just a short list.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 11:17 AM) You'll never convince me that Ozzie is a good in-game manager. He's a good players manager, but his in-game decisions are bad. Despite that, I completely understand and agree with the decision to remove Buehrle last night in favor of Thornton. It's necessary to limit MB's pitches and we needed to see if Thornton had it in him to close. Now he's proven that he cannot and he shouldn't be trusted in that scenario anymore. We just have to hope that Ozzie also realizes this. I can't convince you that Mr. Perfect is dead, when he is...so I wouldn't bother trying to convince you Ozzie is a good in game manager. You've already shown that you ignore reality.

QUOTE (JohnCangelosi @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 11:04 AM) Guys, I will go back to ONE OBVIOUS case that just proves the ineptness of Ozzie and his decision making. Remember when we blew a 5-1 lead against the Cubs at Wrigley with Liney on the hill? D Lee hit a 3 run shot off him to make it 5-4 with 2 outs in the 8th I believe it was. I think 99% of us would have pulled Liney at that point. Not Ozzie. And the next batter hit a home run, tied, the game, and we eventually lost. I remember screaming at the TV during that game before the game tying homer at Ozzie to get Liney out of there. He should have been fired for that decision, really. It was such an easy call, but he can't get it right. As Fathom pointed out in that game, you bring in MT in the 8th and Bobby in the 9th and if they get 4 runs tip their cap to them. It's our arch rival and Guillen is clueless. Put simply, Ozzie routinely makes the wrong decision in when to leave in a pitcher and when to pull him. And I am NOT talking about after the fact. I am talking before it happens, we are screaming about it, and sure enough, his decisions cost us games. Last night was pathetic. Anyone else but MT in that situation. Really, he has not been himself in the closer slot. Are we blind or are we just going to ignore this and keep losing games over this? When we're chasing the Twins by 2 games in August you may remember these s***ty decisions. People just don't want to admit it here. You guys were hard on Bobby when he closed 41 out of 45 games. HA! Try 0 for 3 for Matt. Bottom line is the Twins never lose a game like we did last night all year long, most likely, and if you guys want to excuse Ozzie be my guest but as for me, I am going to call a spade a spade. The decision making on pulling pitchers/not pulling pitchers is easy in hindsight, meaning, it's easy for you as a fan to judge it after the fact. If Ozzie had pulled Linebrink in that game, when all he needed was 1 more out, and his replacement lost the game anyway, everyone here would be crowing about how the odds of Linebrink giving up another run after the 3 run homer were almost zero, and he should have just been left in at that point. Again, in hindsight, you judge him about his decisions based on whether they work or not. For every situation you bring up where a decision Ozzie made was bad, one can be brought up where it was good...if not more. Example, putting Crain in the other day in what turned into a brilliant inning that had people on Soxtalk screaming, "Welcome ot the South Side, Crain!"...just days after Crain totally sucked it up. If Crain had screwed the pooch that inning, you'd be here saying how stupid Ozzie was putting Crain in that situation a day after he failed miserably.

QUOTE (bucket-of-suck @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 10:32 AM) Cahill is a stud. If the Sox hated facing Masterson, wait until they pile up the ground outs tonight against a real sinkerballer. Better change the approach or this is gonna be a quick game in the A's favor. Adam Dunn > Sinkerballers.

QUOTE (qwerty @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 10:48 AM) Sure, he has. Now how good he would be is a different story. In his career his time in left has been limited in comparison to right field. With the sox he has been out there for one inning... and just so happened to make an error. Not to mention Teahen has a dropped ball in LF this year, too...if I'm not mistaken. That makes him half as bad as JP, only with 1/20th the number of innings logged in left.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 10:35 AM) Expect for the Bears fanbase & coach Ditka. He's smarter than everyone else combined. Great White Sharks are smarter than the typical Bears fan, for that matter, so were T-Rex's and all other varieties of Dinosaur. Present company (Soxtalk.com Bears fans) excepted.

QUOTE (103 mph screwball @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 09:51 AM) Some tactics seem like such an obviously bad idea. 2nd inning against Braden, Konerko walks on 6 pitches and then TCQ works a full count. Great! Even if we don't score, let's tire out Braden since apparently he has a supernatural changeup. Why the heck do you send Konerko for a certain caught stealing? The only thing I can think of is to hopefully get him to third on a Quentin single. It certainly wouldn't stop a double play and would be more likely to cause one on a line out. Konerko is a dead duck and he shouldn't have bothered sliding since it was not even close. Braden can go back to the windup and faces the minimum that inning. Come on Ozzie! Sometimes the gamble is not worth it. I can deal with Pierre and Rios running into an occasional out, but I'm sick of giving away base runners. Ozzie doesn't think I know the game well enough to have an opinion, but I thought it would be funny to talk about Ozzie as such a bad tactical manager. Crap like that bothers me more than Pierre missing a fly ball. Hopefully the Sox can bounce back the way have earlier this year after tough losses. My apologies to Ozzie if Konerko was stealing on his own or forgot how many outs there were after leading off the inning. I highly doubt Ozzie gave Konerko an explicit steal sign, if anything that was a hit and run, or Konerko misread something, I don't believe Ozzie would EVER send Konerko on a straight up steal...ever.

QUOTE (qwerty @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 09:36 AM) I am in no way disagreeing with what ozzie did after buehrle was pulled. If you agree giving people a shot to get some confidence is one thing... then i can't see how you feel it was the right decision to put him in there in a 1-0 game. Winning a game 1-0 is a accomplishment in itself. Generally it happens a handful of times at best... and that is including losing 1-0 also. Psychologically speaking, a 1-0 game seems more intense, more pressure, than lets say a 4-3 game. I may be wrong, but i personally feel different in the first scenario rather than the second... and i know i am not the only one is that regard. Seems to me like a pitcher would feel the same way... but once more i may be entirely wrong, but i don't think i am. Describe these trash innings? You mean when he gives 4-5-6+ runs? Everyone has these ''trash'' innings. So he has a s*** game, one or two great starts nullifies the bad... and that goes for mostly everyone. In the ten years of him starting his era has been above 4 only three times... only twice if you throw out (which you clearly can't) that 2006 aberration year. 2006 was the only year of a 4.5+ era... and as i said... it was nothing more than an abberation. In 2003 buehrle posted a 4.14 era... but his WAR was still a damn fine 4.4 wins. Last year he was at 4.28 and a WAR of 3.3 The three years prior to last year he put up 3.63, 3.79, and 3.84 era. Where does this 4.5+ era come from? In halladay's second year of starting he had a 10.64 era in 67.2 innings... which is a record for that amount of innings pitched. This is a two time cy young winner... and he just may be the best pitcher in all of baseball. One inning was not gonna be the deciding factor if that he has a good season or not ...in any shape or form... and i will stand by that. Buehrle is 32... it's not like we are talking about jamie moyer here... and even he had 2 complete games last year (buehrle had three). Essentially what i am saying is the sox are talking out of their ass... and buehrle will in no way be limited. He will get his 200+ barring injury as i have already stated. I don't see how that is limiting him one bit, but maybe that is just me. During ozzie guillen's tenure he has heavily relied on his starters... which is why the bullpen has literally been the least used during his tenure here. A fair assessment...however Buehrle himself said he didn't mind getting pulled last night, and has complained of shoulder soreness/dead arm due to workload on a few occasions now. As for his ERA, it's been on the rise, and I'm ignoring 2006, it's obviously he was gassed...again, pointing to why Ozzie is doing what he's doing, to avoid a repeat of that situation. I didn't check statistics, etc...but I remember Buehrle giving up a huge number of hits per inning last year while his fastball becomes less and less effective year after year (at only 32 years of age). Now that Ozzie decides to actually be more careful with MB instead of just talking about it, limiting his innings/pitch count, we want to jump on him for being a terrible manager because of 1 game, that despite pulling MB, we STILL should have won? Also, I don't think it's the inning count that Ozzie is worried about, it's the pitch count. If Buehrle could pitch all 9 innings at 90-95 pitches, I'm sure Ozzie would leave him out there every game and compile 240+ innings. I think they're more concerned with how many pitches it takes him to compile that 200+ innings you keep mentioning.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 09:21 AM) In all seriousness, you can't tell me that 29 other teams in MLB don't know what the fans here supposedly know about Ozzie as a manager. The Florida Marlins wouldn't have been chasing that hard after a guy under contract if he was that big of an idiot tactician. My point exactly. When Ozzie makes a tactical decision and the player in question botches the opportunity, such as a failed bunt, a failed hit and run, etc., he's blamed as a terrible baseball tactician. And this is precisely what happens. When he puts in a pitcher and trusts that pitcher to be able to get an out, and they fail, again, Ozzie is blamed for making terrible decisions. His decisions wouldn't look so bad if our team could get down a simple bunt instead of stabbing at the ball and popping into a triple play. Don't get me wrong, I sometimes question his decisions, too...that's what we as fans tend to do. But if he was truly as terrible as some here at Soxtalk say, he wouldn't be a major league manager, let alone a manager other teams would love to have (and will hire if/when he leaves the Sox).

QUOTE (qwerty @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 08:55 AM) So basically your argument is the reason that thornton got pulled to boost his ''confidence''? This is what happened... i can't argue that... but i in no way believe it was the right thing to do. As others have stated, and i just figured it was a given, if he needed this ''confidence'' boost... it could have been done in a slightly less pressure situation. I personally think this confidence argument is a weak one, at best. I see it as nothing more than just another cover up for a boneheaded decision by ozzie guillen. Buehrle being overused? That is baloney. Buehrle is getting his 200 inning+ innings regardless of what ozzie guillen says. Ten consecutive years of 200+ innings ... sure he is not in the 220+ range like he was for his first full five years of starting. What really makes you think that is changing anytime soon? Because ozzie said it? That is a joke right there. We could write a book about all the things that guilen and the organization say... but never actually come close to happening. Buehrle could have easily handled that one additional inning... and on top of everything he was absolutely rolling. The first two lines seemed a bit insulting, you very well may not have intended such, but if you did... you can keep playing that game with thebighurt rather than me. Thornton got pulled after he gave up a lead off double and Pierre errored, got lucky with that would be base hit line drive hit right at Konerko. At that point Oz knew Thornton was defeated and yanked him...it was over. Giving people a shot to get some confidence is one thing, but understanding when to say when is something else entirely. And at that point last night, it was time to put in Crain. Yes, Buehrle being overused. No, it's not baloney. Buehrle may get 200+ innings, but when an increasing number of those innings are trash (which they have been), it's useless. Eating up innings is fine when you post a 3.5 ERA, eating up innings when you're giving up 4.5+ per game is not unless you are a number 5 starter. Buehrle is not considered a #5, nor is he being paid like a #5. And no, my first two lines weren't the least bit of an insult, but more or less reality. It's what's been said, and the reason why it's been said. Now, again, whether you like it or not (or me for that matter) doesn't matter. The Sox organization made the decision...so it's happening whether we want it too or not.

QUOTE (JohnCangelosi @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 08:39 AM) I'm sorry if this has been covered in another thread but I haven't seen it on the website or postgame coverage, but why did Ozzie pull MB last night? Did MB ask to be taken out or was this yet another bone headed decision by arguably the worst tactical manager in baseball? Usually Oz will leave our starters in a bit too long, so I am HOPING that MB asked to be taken out. But with the way he was dealing last night, how could you ever pull him out at that point unless he asked for it? Decision was made in the off season that MB would be under lower pitch counts than in years past, even if he's coasting after 95+ pitches/8 innings. As the innings continue to pile on over the years, Buehrle's running out of gas earlier and earlier in the season...and if this team is going to contend in the playoffs, or even get into the playoffs, we need Buehrle to have some gas left during the stretch run. Call me crazy, but despite Buehrle coasting, a closer should be able to close out a 1-0 game against one of the worst offenses in the game. If we can't trust Thornton now, we can't trust him later while he "works out his problems" and games become increasingly important. Which also leads me to this: Everyone here just assumes he will work out his problems based on previous seasons. However, this isn't previous seasons...it's 2011. We may have to consider that Thornton won't come out of this, especially when placed in closer situations game after game. Also, it's funny to listen to Sox fans talk about how Ozzie is such a bad tactical manager. I've heard, on repeated occasions, from other teams fans and announcers and radio personalities that they'd LOVE to have Ozzie as their teams manager. While I understand many here at Soxtalk would love to see him fired, the fact is he'd have another managerial job with another major league team tomorrow.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 07:32 AM) If the link goes to the right spot, here's the Pitch F/X data for Thornton last night. Average fastball was 95.6, hit 96.7 at his top. Wasn't 98 his usual last year, though? While 1-2mph doesn't sound like a lot, at that speed, it's a world of difference.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 07:28 AM) Trouble is, his fastball looks slow and is still clocking 96. On the Billy Koch gun?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 12, 2011 -> 07:17 AM) Hell, add in the fact that Matt Thornton genuinely needs to work his way through whatever's going on with him, and pulling M-56 was clearly the right call. I'm not sure people realize this, but an obviously reeling Thornton needed that game, Ozzie put him in a normal save situation against the 29th worst offense in baseball (out of 30), which should have translated to an easy save, and confidence booster.