southsideirish71

Its seems that someone is purposely telling people about pulling the ball for homers here. I have been saying it all season long, AJ used to kill the sox hitting the ball to left and left center. This year he started to pull the ball only, his average dropped and his power numbers went up. Whether its Greg Walker or someone else telling them to pull the ball, these fences need to go back a few feet. Obviously its too much of a distraction. If you watch the sox hit and have big offensive games the same holds true in all of them. The pitcher of course throws away, the first few hitters start to hit the ball with power oppo. They give up a few runs then try to re-establish the inside, then our guys turn on the inside pitch and just destroy the ball. If this can be preached and is being preached we will have a consistant offense the entire year and will be hard to stop in the post season. If we get myopic and pull happy, we will be 1 and done in the playoffs. This is the time our hitters need to concentrate and work on being total hitters. Putting the ball in play the other way opens up the opportunity to pull for power later in the game. Hopefully our boys keep the good work they have been doing lately and keep this type of hitting going. Yesterday they got away from that and that is why they could only muster a few hits. BTW I will take my hat off to the hitting instructor tandem for figuring this out and working on this. They need to do this will all of our hitters. Arow last year had some sick power to right center. This year he is more pull happy.

No Lilly. Lilly will get destroyed here. He just got hit hard again.

QUOTE(Dam8610 @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 09:17 PM) Finally, a stat that no one can be negative about. Maybe we won't hear of the forthcoming gloom and doom in this game thread? The only doom and gloom happens when our team abandons what has worked and gets pull crazy. Its their only and main weakness. If they hit the ball where its pitched they will be fine. You cant square up a ball on the outside corner trying to pull it unless you are Frank Thomas and he is huge and has long arms. They should of beat the crap out of Maddux yesterday. If they hit it to right and up the middle, prior will have to come in. And when he comes in its YOU CAN PUT IT ON THE BOARD, YES!!!!!

Elevate that pitch count at all costs if he is on. The minute you get into that dump they call a bullpen we should be able to get a few runs. Jon Garland will keep it close. If it wasnt for the cuban give a few extra bases to the opposition we would of been fine today with pitching. TIME TO RALLY EAT s*** CUBBIES

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:51 PM) Exactly. I have no problem with you, other than the fact you want to pick up a bunch of players before the deadline. A bunch, well if 2 is a bunch.. I just want 2 players. One at 3rd, and a pitcher. Thats it.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:49 PM) I love Sox Fans. But even the closest of brothers have spats (I am in no way, shape or form trying to catagorize people I meet on the internet as Brothers, sorry guys, nothing personal) Trust me you are not going to offend me. But if you take a shot at me, guess what its coming back.

QUOTE(JimH @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:41 PM) We are basically on the same page, except you believe adding a hitter will be more beneficial and IMO a very good swingman pitcher is key. Alsp they need to get this backup 1B situation resolved. I know everybody says Gload but he will have had a long layoff ... I'm not sold that he'll come back and automatically be the hitter he showed last September. That's where I'd like to see an upgrade on the bench. If Randa can play some 1B I'm all for it as I've said before. I cannot see them making 2-3 trades though ... that would be disruptive to the chemistry IMO. I think it will be 2 trades. One will be for a guy who can play 3rd and 1st. I agree Gload probably wont be back. Which is kind of sad, because he is an excellent sub at 1st and has a good line drive swing. I think the swingman/pitcher is the other guy.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:36 PM) Being lucky is SO much better than being good. The whitesox are in this position because they are good. Not because of luck. To state this is more of a disrespect to the team.

QUOTE(JimH @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:30 PM) No ... SSI 71 knows I am not trying to do that. I think he beats this trade Crede and bring in Randa thing to death, especially because KW and Guillen have all but said they aren't gonna trade a starting position player unless it's a major upgrade. I don't see what posting this trade Crede and bring in Randa every single day on a message board is gonna do. It is not going to change Sox managements minds, nor is it going to change anybodys mind here. A few days ago I said I was done arguing about this stuff, and i am. Out of curiosity I looked at the overall RISP stats and posted them, that's all. I have a difference in opinion with Jim and Nitetrain on this subject. I have my views and they have theirs. Hence why these message boards are a cool thing. And Jim the reason I keep on this is I think this team is very very close to doing something big in the post season. I look at our starting rotation and think our big 3 will be hard to beat. Our offense has picked up, outside of the occasional pull a thon like today. We are just a single hitter/pitcher away IMHO of doing some damage in the playoffs. However some 10 year old posting PWNED and I think Luck is the key to the sox winning the world series is a bit myopic at best.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:27 PM) But according to a comment you made about 2 sentences earlier, Uribe can hit about .240 with line shots to the gap. Actually Uribe can hit .270-.285 if he hits pitches in the strike zone and shortens his swing a bit and doesnt go for the fence everytime. Crede has a mechanical flaw in this swing. This is according to Greg Walker.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:26 PM) CAN I GET A "OWNED"? Whats is the hitting with RISP and 2 outs. The clutch stat Jim. There is a huge difference there. Crede is .167 and Randa is .321.

QUOTE(BigSqwert @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:23 PM) Although I'm not as concerned with the hitting I wouldn't be mad if we got a new 3rd baseman. At least Uribe is more than a 1 tool guy. If he ever gets on base he can steal a base. He also is a much better bunter than Crede...but that's not saying much. We definitely need to tweak the pitching. Stud reliever or another proven starter. The Cubans are a liability. Uribe plays good defense and can play 2nd, SS and 3rd. He has a terrible hitting style yet when he makes contact he hits a lot of line drives to the gap. If he could cut down on his swinging at pitches over his head he would be fine. Last year he didnt pull so much and had a better idea of the strikezone. This year he is going for the fences more and doesnt have any control of the strikezone. If he was hitting at all, Crede wouldnt be that much of an issue. However we cannot have 2 guys hitting at the end that cant hit above 240.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:20 PM) See, we are a lucky team, and I am confident in our ability to produce luck. That situation wont arise. Call me nuts. I dont care. Your basis for your arguement is "LUCK" and the ability to produce "Luck". Well that explains everything. Dont forget your lucky rabbits foot for tomorrows game.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:17 PM) How about commen f***ing sense? You take the good with the bad. Paulies slow, are you calling for his head? No. Uribe and Crede play AWESOME "D", do you want them gone? Yes. We got our run scorers at the top of the order. We have our D in the bottom, It's called balance, just trading and trading isnt going to win you anything. You call it Wishy-Washy, I call it sensical. Well how about defense and hitting. You know some hitters can actually do both. Check out randa defensive stats, or hey watch a game or too and you will see he is a solid defender and we wont lose much at the corner. Most teams dont have too many 240 hitters in their lineup yet you want 2. Good. We can have a few runners on and watch Uribe tomahawk at one over his head, then crede pop out to the 2nd baseman. 2 outs, rally over.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:11 PM) Are you satisfied with ANYTHING? There is no perfect team. You seem to think only a perfect team can win the WS. How about this stick your head in the sand and proclaim we are the best team. And then when we face good to great pitching in the playoffs then complain when Crede is up and Schilling tosses him a slider on the outside corner with men on and he steps in the bucket and K's.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:08 PM) Wow. I read this again. And this is EXACTLY what I'm talking about. Congrats on becoming the official poster boy for disrespectful and spoiled rotten Sox fan! Thanks for backing your facts up with conjecture and bulls*** noob. I state facts and you state wishy washy bulls***. Teams improve themselves with some moves. It will happen. Just because you have this cutesy little idea of how the shower will not be the same if Crede isnt in there with them, hey thats life. He cant hit, 1400 ABS tell us this. He has regressed. And after watching KW get Alomar and Everett a few times over the years should tell you that he will make a move or two.

QUOTE(DukeNukeEm @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 08:06 PM) We have both Everett and Thomas who can pitch hit. Uribe can play 3rd too. Uribe has been eratic at the plate also. He cant control himself and swings for everything including things over his head. Putting him at third solves nothing. We need another bat in the lineup that is a control bat, someone that hits to right field, someone that can bunt, someone who can hit to right side to move a runner over. Also someone who can play good defense. Aka Joe Randa

I would ditch Crede in a second. He cant hit when it counts. The occasional home run when up by 8 is nice and all, but it doesnt pay for the times when he has men on and cant drive them in when the game is on the line. This lets sit on our laurels because we have a great record. Well guess what when the playoffs start the only thing a great record gets you is home advantage. Wild Card teams beat Divisional Champs all the time. Crede is batting under .200 in RISP with 2 outs. Joe Randa is batting .333 in the same respects. That is the clutch stat. When the playoffs begin we start facing the best of the best from the other team. We are not facing some 8 ERA scrub anymore, we are facing Schilling, Santana, Johnson types. And guess what, it can be the difference between one good ab from someone in your lineup. As much as his defense has been spectacular we cant have a situation where we have a few auto outs at the end of lineup. And for your everyone loves Crede and the organization is behind him. I would suspect that they are completely frustrated with him and his reluctance to change his hitting. They were upset with him last year and hoped that he would finally break out. Walker was quoted on the radio as saying, well he plays good defense but we expect nothing but a .240 average. We hoped he made progress but he has reverted to last year after a good start. We need another starter. We cant have either Cuban pitching in the playoffs. I know everyone will say "El Duque" has playoff experience. Well he is barely hitting 85 on the gun and his WHIP is rediculus. He has a good record based on a lot of getting out of jams where a line drive was caught that could of broken the game out for the other team.

Another cuban has broken the 4 ERA level. These guys have got to throw strikes, they need to stop giving every team extra chances.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 05:00 PM) Or the fact that our number 3 hole had a terrible game today, unable to get the runner home in a few potentially big situations? Its nice that he is working on a new swing right now. Getting lift and getting around the ball. Nice job.

Anyone throws below 90 and our guys s*** themselves to pull the ball. The only way to beat Maddux who lives on the outside corner is to hit oppo. We do this yesterday however the minute our team goes down a few runs everyone is up there swinging and trying to pull the f***ing ball. Hopefully they get a better approach to the plate tomorrow.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 25, 2005 -> 04:46 PM) Exactly, Contreras basically handed the Cubs those runs in the first inning. This game was a perfect example of why Maddux has 300 wins....and Contreras has been a bust overall in the majors. One person will NEVER lost a game because they "beat" themself, while the other puts himself in a tough situation far too often on the mound. This is why we need another starting pitcher. We will need a 4 man rotation in the playoffs. Each of the cubans will s*** themselves(no matter what their history is) this year.

Its funny, when our offense clicks we hit pitches to right. Then they are forced to pitch inside and we pull line drive homers. When our offense blows, we lunge at crap away and try to pull it. Or we have excuse me swings on the outside corner and just slap crap to right. Square the ball up and hit it where its pitched. Maddux pitched us away and we got pull happy. Arow is definately trying to pull everything now. Joe Crede yesterday hit the ball the otherway. Today he fell over lunging at a pitch in the oppo batters box, rolling his wrists over. This is why he will be a 240 and below hitter in the majors. Conteras should not be allowed to think. Watching him shake off AJ in the first inning made me want to puke. How does someone who has a 96 mph fastball not want to throw it and just fall in love with his junk. He pitches backwards.

QUOTE(Milkman delivers @ Jun 24, 2005 -> 07:47 PM) Wow, it took you that long to get back? I'm glad I live 5 minutes away. Spent some time in the stadium club after the game. You have to celebrate you know. Live in Downers Grove, not 5 minutes away.

Just got back from that game. HOT AS HELL JUST LIKE OUR BEST IN BASEBALL WHITESOX. I had the privilege of having 5 drunken cub fans behind me that were talking so much crap before the game. Frank Thomas is hurt every other game. Then boom he hits a towering shot. When Pods got picked off, they said just walk them and pick them off is this ozzieball. A few innings later they were quiet. Then of course they said we have the best player in baseball. My boss summed it up nicely. What would you rather have chumps the best player in baseball or the best record. Sit the hell down before you make me get up. Its nice to have a boss who is 6'4 and about 270. They left by the 7th inning like all cubs fans and we enjoyed our victory with our fellow whitesox fans. SOX PRIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I know everyone loved the Thomas shot. I still love the right field shot off the foul pole by Crede. Good job going the other way with power Crede. AJ Oppo field shot, thats the AJ we knew as a sox killer. This team is starting to look like it can go off for a big run.