ZoomSlowik

Pretty good list. The only thing I'd add is that the way he's pitched thus far, Mussina is a decent candidate to start. We all know that Jose or Mark will get it with Ozzie making the lineup though.

Is death an option. Seriously, for 3 games, go Cubs! In the long run, there isn't really any difference between 68 and 71 wins, they'll still suck.

If I wanted him at $14 mil a year, imagine how happy I was when we got him for more like $8 mil. In retrospect though, I was a little nuts. $12 mil a year with his status would have been a pretty hefty price to pay. Yeah, the potential reward was huge, as we're seeing now. But if his injury problems had persisted, $12 mil is quite an albatross. Luckily things have worked beautifully so far, and his salary isn't that big a financial burden.

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Jun 12, 2006 -> 01:13 PM) We had 2 shots on goal for the game. We gave up a long range goal. But on the good news. After this dismal effort Bruce is going to go away, and maybe we can hire someone outside of the US that can teach an attacking creative brand of football. We seriously need to work on our finishing. It has never been that good. If you watch world class teams, when they strike on the ball it travels near the net. When we strike on the ball, its a field goal or way way wide right or left. Too bad we missed out on Jurgen Klinsman. He would of been great. I definitely agree with you on the striking front. Our guys seem to be able to create some decent chances, but not finish them. We don't put the ball in the net as well as some of these other teams with elite offensive players. When Johnson is on, he's pretty dangerous, but he generally seems to be about it. Guys like Donovan, Beasly, and Adu (for the future) have to seriously work on their shooting ability. If those guys can't consistently be goal scoring threats (or if another striker doesn't emerge), we're always going to have problems against the real teams.

QUOTE(lukeman89 @ Jun 12, 2006 -> 08:41 AM) G GS W L SV CG SHO IP H R ER HR BB K ERA WHIP BAA Pre All Star 384 247 116 75 13 20 5 1711.2 1799 890 810 172 613 1020 4.26 1.41 .271 Post All-Star 316 166 82 59 15 16 4 1233.2 1265 632 562 124 424 777 4.10 1.37 .265 ??????? Try the numbers from the last three years, which are a little more relevant... pre-all star- 3.87 ERA, 1.34 WHIP, .273 BAA post-all star- 4.80 ERA, 1.50 WHIP, .301 BAA

They definitely still have a legit shot to win it all, although I'd feel a lot better if they added a decent righty in the bullpen. I'm not all that worried about anything else. Virtually every team out there has other issues that are more significant than ours. Detroit has a young pitching staff (outside of Rogers) that is unpredictable. They have talent, but you don't know what you're going to get from them in a high pressure situation. They also lack a proven, domiant closer, and their lineup loses a lot if one of their injury prone veterans goes down. Boston's starting pitching is still an issue. Schilling is back, but Wakefield is mediocre, Beckett is injury prone and inconsistent, and Matt Clement has been brutal. New York has Serious injury issues. Matsui and Sheffield might not be back to form this year. The starting pitching is also a serious issue for them. Mussina has been good, but Johnson is still way off, and the rest of their rotation is a joke. Cleveland's starting rotation is a mess outside of Sabathia. The bullpen also has struggled, and their defense is pretty weak. We're easily in the best shape of any of those teams, outside of being virtually even with Detroit. Those are the major threats that everyone seems to be worried about.

A few good ones (especially guys like Jack Youngblood and Jack Tatum). I can't believe no one has mentioned Walter Payton yet. He was extremely tough on the field, taking and dishing out some poundings, and amazingly only missing one game in his career. He also worked very hard in the offseason. He was a nice guy, but you don't get too much tougher than him on the field.

QUOTE(JackTalkThai @ Jun 9, 2006 -> 09:45 AM) Just asking, what do you see as Chicago's rotation, three bullpen arms and closer three years or so down the road? With the assumption that all of the arms come from within the organization. I know the Sox have a few pretty impressive arms down in the minors. For the Tigers my staff is looking like: 1. Justin Verlander 2. Jeremy Bonderman 3. Joel Zumaya 4. Maroth or Robertson 5. Andrew Miller Bullpen 1- Fernando Rodney Bullpen 2- Humberto Sanchez Bullpen 3- Wilfredo Ledezma Closer- Kevin Whelan (possibly Zumaya if he gets pigeon-holed as a closer) It's hard to say exactly because you never know with Williams. Also, we've already got 6 starters on the team, and our guys aren't as young as Detroits' guys. This would probably be my best guess though: 1) Buehrle 2) Vazquez 3) Garland 4) McCarthy 5) Broadway/Lumsden/Tracey/Liotta?McCoullough closer- Jenks setup- Cotts setup- ? By the end of the 2009 season, my vote is that Contreras is just about out of gas, and he either retires or gets dealt because he is no longer effective (kind of like El Duque). I know that he's our best starter right now, but he's also our oldest by far. I get the feeling that Garcia gets dealt this off-season. If that happens, it's possible that whomever we would acquire factors into this somewhere, but I'm leaving him off since I'm not Nostradamus. I see us keeping Vazquez because Williams has wanted him for some time, and he's got the best stuff on our staff (well, actually about even with Jose I think). Garland could conceivably be the odd man out, but I think Freddy will be a little easier to deal and bring more in return because of performance and contract situation. I'm also kind of making the assumption that one of our prospects steps up and forces his way into the rotation, assuming of course that Kenny hasn't dealt them all by then. I can't really predict the other setup spot because we don't really have a young righty flame thrower. Maybe it's Long, but I think we probably end up signing someone to fill in there. Again, not going to predict exactly who that is. QUOTE(mrzo2733 @ Jun 9, 2006 -> 11:05 AM) Cleveland scares me more of the two. I kind of liken the Tigers to a much better KC froma few years ago. They are coming back down to earth. I still see Cleveland making a big run like last year before it's over. This Tigers' team is A LOT better than that Royals team. KC had no pitching whatsoever, and their lineup wasn't very good either in the long run. That team was an incredible fluke. This Detroit team won't fall off as much as they did.

QUOTE(DBAH0 @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 10:35 PM) You guys are very lucky with the time zone. Unfortunately for me, most of the games are on at about 2a.m Us Americans had to deal with that in 2002. It was annoying and tiring, but worth it, especially the Portugal and Mexico games.

QUOTE(Misplaced_Sox @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 05:53 PM) Ill play You got to fill out an application in This forum.

QUOTE(BigSqwert @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 03:05 PM) They had better pitching than Cleveland does this year. Come on, Bob Wickman? I really don't think so. Boston's rotation was brutal and their pen was worse. Their top 4 was Wells-Clement-Arroyo-Wakefield, and Miller and an ailing Schilling filled in the 5 spot. Their ERA at the end of the season was 4.74. The Yankees were throwing every pitcher with a pulse out there. Some of them performed okay, but it's pretty clear that they weren't very good judging by the playoff results and the performance of most of those guys thus far this year. Cleveland's pitching has been bad, but I doubt that it ends up with numbers quite that ugly. At least they have some talent in their rotation, which is more than you can say for Boston and New York last year outside of an aging Big Unit. Even assuming they were better a bit better, they're still not exactly stellar rotations. Plus if you haven't noticed, Wickman has pitched pretty well the last two years.

QUOTE(BobDylan @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 02:28 PM) Offense doesn't win championships, every Sox fan on this board should know this. If Detroit's pitching staff keeps at a clip of 3.67, they're in it for the long haul. Everyone notices Cleveland's big bats, but it's like nobody has seen that 5.00 team ERA up from last year's 3.61. Like Cleveland last year, Detroit is pitching at the top of the league. As far as I've seen, Cleveland sucks and at best they'll be like the White Sox teams of past years...all offense, no bite. Offense definitely helps you in the regular season though and can counter-act poor pitching. Just look at the Yankees and Red Sox last year. We're not arguing playoffs, so it could be a concern. I don't see Cleveland winning more than about 88 though unless their offense gets red-hot or their pitching gets better, which means they aren't really a threat to us.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 01:41 PM) I agree that they probably won't threaten much this year. But in the long run (say, in 2 years) they are as frightening as anyone, as 2/5 of their rotation could be flat-out unreal, and they have some of the pieces for the order. Dominant pitching is the hardest thing to find, and it appears they may have that. All imo, of course. They've got a few pieces, but they'll need more. Right now, Santana, Liriano, Nathan, Mauer, and Hunter are fairly solid. Even if you assume they'll all be around and performing in two years, they still need at least one more starter and one more solid hitter, preferrably more. MAYBE Baker, Cuddyer, Morneau, and Kubel fill that, but that requires a lot of things going right. However, Hunter appears to be on his way out, and Santana will be nearing the end of his contract by then. They might not be able to keep him. Unless they pull a few more gems out of their farm system, I don't see them being a real threat to us in the next few years. We've got a lot more financial resources than them right now, and unless Pohland sells the team that probably won't change. I'm personally more worried about Detroit and Cleveland in the long run. They're not quite so financially challenged, and they have more pieces in place already.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 12:52 PM) Huh? Mauer's slugging .526 this year. It's not all about hr. About Morneau, yeah, I agree. He's been a huge disappointment for them. On his potential, that's jmho, based on seeing him play and his minor league stats. If they could just figure out that Cuddyer's a decent player, that would give them 3 pieces, plus the pitching. I watched the Sox last year win the WS with great pitching and a mediocre offense. I see no reason why the Twins could not eventually do the same. The Sox had much better pitching depth though, and the Twin's offense isn't mediocre right now, it's in the bottom 3 in the AL. They don't have anyone that is even close to as big a threat as Konerko last year, and a lot of their guys aren't really threats at all. They lack 3 and 4 type hitters, and only Mauer and Morneau really have the ability to step into those roles. Mauer can hit, but he still needs some power. Your 3 hitter can't finish with less than 15 homers if you want to succeed. He's really more of a 2 or 5 hitter right now. They need at least two other hitters to step up, and it'd help a lot of one of them was Morneau. Their average and OBP are a little better than ours was last year, but they also are on pace to hit only 134 homers compared to our 200. That won't cut it unless you're hitting around .280 or you've got 3 or 4 Cy Young candidates.

One thing to consider is that Ozzie might not have the flexibility to include all of our guys that he would want. There has to be a representative from each team, and with 7 Yankees/Red Sox projected to start right now, that won't be easy.

QUOTE(BigSqwert @ Jun 8, 2006 -> 10:15 AM) I don't think they have what it takes to have a sustained good month. Bad pitching and bad defense can only be covered up by good offense for a short amount of time. People said the same thing about Boston and New York last year. Yeah, they lost in the playoffs, but they still got there. As long as we keep our s*** together, I don't think either team is going to beat us this year. Cleveland is short at least one dependable arm, and I can't see Detroit's guys pitching this well all year. In the long run, Detroit is starting to look like a threat with all these arms. If the guys they already have can get more consistent and Miller breaks into the rotation in 2 or 3 years, that's an impressive collection of stuff. The Twins look like they could be dangerous too with Santana and Liriano, but they don't have the finances to fill in a lot of other holes, and they farm system isn't as deep as it was a few years ago.

Guys, we need at least 10 other people before I worry about priority right now. I just put that in so people know why I'm dropping/moving them if such a situation should arise.

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Mid-Season League Sign-ups!!! If I get enough interest, I'll put together a mid-season league. The deadline for sign-ups is June 18th, so do it fast if you're interested. For now, priority will go to players not already in a league, though if I get enough interest I'll make another one that is a veteran league. As an additional point, any new players that join a mid-season league will get priority for openings next season, especially if you prove your worth as an active and competent player. League info will be posted once the roster fills up.

Not a chance. Soriano has been a fantasy stud so far this year. If you're going to deal him, you better be getting someone with top-25 talent at least.

You can definitely make a case for either Thome or Dye. Thome is a little more dangerous as a hitter this year, but Dye does also play the field.

I used to listen to sports radio a lot more than I do now. Pretty much the only guys I can still stand are Mac, Jurko and Harry and Boers and Bernstein.

QUOTE(DBAH0 @ Jun 7, 2006 -> 05:11 AM) If I was going to pick a team to suprise it would be Ukraine. In a pretty easy group, and they have a great striker in Andrei Shevchenko (just signed for Chelsea). Yikes, didn't know about that signing. Chelsea is getting pretty ridiculous roster-wise after adding him and Ballack. Hurts my adopted club team too.

QUOTE(ChWRoCk2 @ Jun 6, 2006 -> 11:06 PM) I kind of think Hawaii should go but thats just me, but hell ill take the easy wins :lol Agree whole-heartedly. He's kind of in-and-out in terms of activity and hasn't done a whole lot with his team.

Dodgers are also a fairly solid team. Their record sucks, but they have some good young talent. Come on people!