CaliSoxFanViaSWside

Very tough call. Hunter too much money and years for his age but the most consistent year in and year out. Jones was a true superstar coming off a down year. Boras client but might be had for a 3 year contract with incentives. Only 30 but speculation has him an old 30. Rowand's a fan favorite but too expensive considering he's coming off a career year and hasn't put together consecutive good years. Crisp possibly least expensive of all (besides Owens ).Hampered by injuries last few years upside not as good as the previous 3. I'd go with Jones followed by Hunter a very close second. Worst case scenario is none of the 4 become a White Sox.

QUOTE(Beltin'Bill @ Nov 20, 2007 -> 08:06 AM) Here is a dumb idea. If the market for Crede is as low as some people project, is there any thought to trading Paulie for one or two of many reasons (youth, starting pitching, leadoff hitter, relief corps, etc.), sliding Crede to first and keeping Josh at third? I know Crede is the far better defensive option at 3B at this point in his career, but with his back issues, it may make more sense to keep him as a mentor to Fields and rest his back playing a less strenuous position. He would do well at first scooping throws in the dirt and allows you flexibility next offseason. If his back is still balky, you let him walk and hopefully Fields has improved. If not, you still have some flexibility on what to do with him when Boras comes asking for the moon. The two big questions would be 1. How can KW screw up a Konerko trade? & 2. What happens if Crede goes down again midseason? The second is the biggest gamble and could be the breaking point in the season. 2 pages back. ...Personally I think Paulie may be next to go. Seems the emphasis this offseason is on defense ,speed, and surprisingly a looser clubhouse. My feeling is it's possible that we keep both Crede and Fields. Keeping the superior D of Crede at 3rd and possibly moving Fields to 1st base though within the organization we haven't heard of Fields playing 1st. Paulie could possibly net us a left fielder/ leadoff hitter though my feeling is with a somewhat expanded payroll youth may be served with Owens ,Fields, Richar, and starting pitching. Maybe Paulie could bring a top notch reliever and a top prospect or a SP , reliever and B level prospect. ... It would be easier to convert Josh to 1st. Keep Crede where he's best suited and keep the worse glove at 1st which is a far less demanding position defensively.

If the Sox sign Hunter after having adding Cabrera I am very excited about the early impact during the offseason. Both Cabrera and Hunter are superior fielders, good hitters , have speed and both are good clubhouse guys. If you've ever seen Hunter on Best Damn Sports Show he has personality galore and a good sense of humor and the same is being said about Cabrera. Personally I think Paulie may be next to go. Seems the emphasis this offseason is on defense ,speed, and surprisingly a looser clubhouse. My feeling is it's possible that we keep both Crede and Fields. Keeping the superior D of Crede at 3rd and possibly moving Fields to 1st base though within the organization we haven't heard of Fields playing 1st. Paulie could possibly net us a left fielder/ leadoff hitter though my feeling is with a somewhat expanded payroll youth may be served with Owens ,Fields, Richar, and starting pitching. Maybe Paulie could bring a top notch reliever and a top prospect or a SP , reliever and B level prospect. I think Kenny is trying to find guys this offseason with proven track records so the likelihood of signing Japanese relievers will be a last resort since Kenny's admitted he's having a hard time finding teams willing to trade quality relievers.

When he signs with Texas.

Reading what the press writes is the same as reading Soxtalk. It's all speculative except for the occasional fact like the Sox have til Wednesday to decide to pick up Uribe's option. Outside of that I put no credence whatsoever in it.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Sep 3, 2007 -> 07:07 PM) Thome got blasted last season for only hitting 42 homers, driving in 109, hitting .288 having a .416 OBP and 1.014 OPS. So this season he will be considered worthless. People want to replace him with someone who does about half of what he does, but someone who can play a position for those 9 away games at NL parks, obviously not realizing that will misplace one of the other regular players. Personally I love Thome and he deserves to DH on a contending team and get a ring. I'm hoping its possible to get him to waive the NTC , trade him to a contender and get some value in return. We need young talent plain and simple.

QUOTE(Wanne @ Aug 31, 2007 -> 11:40 AM) Gooch was basically addition by subtraction. What was the point of keeping him. Plus...I think Kenny felt bad he traded damaged goods in Garcia. Frankly I don't understand the concept of a " make good" deal. The trade was made . Garcia broke down. Too freakin' bad for Phillie. They knew the risks going into the deal.

QUOTE(Jeremy @ Sep 3, 2007 -> 01:05 PM) If we jettison Thome, our best hitter, and consider sticking with Uribe, our worst hitter, then I think our league worst offense will be worse next season, regardless of whether or not we sign Rowand. I never said stick with Uribe I said get Furcal. With a full year of Fields and Crede and possibly better years from Dye and Konerko and a good year from Rowand I think Thome is replaceable. I realize his limited no trade clause is intact but on a team I'm thinking about there no room for one dimensional players. Speed, defense , pitching. So often the impact of great D is overlooked. We saw where great pitching and D along with timely hitting can do in 2005. We need to get younger more talented players not hang on to the aged and aching . That premise removes Thome , Contreras, Pods and Erstad. If Owens improves enough to bat .280 or higher and draw some walks I think the offense would be fine. I know theres a lot of what-ifs but its always that way when speculating about future performance of players.

QUOTE(santo=dorf @ Sep 2, 2007 -> 05:13 PM) Make Terrero the 4th OF to face left handers and Owens as the 5th OF to pinch run. f*** Erstad, Podsednik and Gonzalez. This team needs a major shake up. Terrero, Pods and Gonzalez will not be part of this team next year. Erstad possibly in the role we all thought he'd be in this year. We will sign or trade for a productive outfielder. Owens deserves a chance to improve. I like his D except for his arm and his speed.

QUOTE(kwolf68 @ Sep 1, 2007 -> 06:58 AM) Chicago White Sox = Baltimore Orioles This team is not one or two players away from contending. We've got last-place talent in Chicago, and the minors hold very little promise. We have the fourth-highest payroll in baseball. Don't think failure is the result of not being aggressive in getting high priced veterans; we're not the Twins trying to decide which of our home-grown superstars we can afford to re-sign and which we'll have to let walk. No, our problem is that we've overpaid for players in their decline phase. This is a fact and adding Eckstein, Hunter, or Jones would be going down that same path of failure we've already seen from the Orioles and now the White Sox over the last two years. What we need is young, cheap talent in our system. What we do not need is more declining veterans with eight-digit pricetags and multi-year demands. I agree. Eckstein is not the answer either at short or 2nd base. Uribe for all his pitifulness batting plays good D and has a great arm . I'm sure the pitching staff loves him at short . If you want to play Go-Go White Sox baseball that starts with pitching defense , and speed. Couldn't Furcal provide defense and speed ? That should be KW's primary target. Then pray Contreras wakes up and pitches good the rest of the season so we can dump him. Next should be finding a way to rid ourselves of Thome. Old slow and injury prone doesn't fit in with a team who will already have plodders like Konerko , AJ , Crede and an aging Dye. It's not necessary to have one constant DH. Dye , Fields, Crede and others can share that role. Next sign Rowand . Maybe not the best option out there but fills a huge outfield hole adds speed and defense , adds to team chemistry reuniting the 3 stooges and stimulates fan interest. We need to keep drawing fans if we want to sign key free agents.

QUOTE(Linnwood @ Aug 11, 2007 -> 09:42 AM) I totally agree. I was watching SportsCenter and they mentioned it as an afterthought when recapping the game. If it was a BoSox/Yankee it would have lead the broadcast. I was a lil bit miffed also . Baseball Tonight barely mentioned it if at all. I mean 38 straight outs. 12 2/3 perfect innings !! Come on now that is an amazing feat !

QUOTE(RME JICO @ Aug 10, 2007 -> 06:43 AM) 62 games left? What league plays 176 games? There are 48 games left to complete the 162 game season. The Sox would have to go 28-20 to get to .500. Possible, but it is not gonna happen. There are too many variables working against the team. I would say 78-84 is a safe bet. Sorry I could've swore I heard Hawk say 62 games left during the last game against the Indian's. Thought that seemed like too many. Didn't bother fact checking.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Aug 10, 2007 -> 08:39 AM) Francis? I didn't see that one, so I had to really make a big deal of it, you know. Back to Pods - anything you can get for him is fine at this point. With the Cubs willing to probably overpay a bit, it's good to get something for him, if the Sox can. Francis I believe is a reference from the Bill Murray , John Candy comedy "Stripes" > A Bill Murray classic .

62 games left 35-27 the rest of the way. Eh why not ? Doesnt hurt to stay positive contrary to popular belief.

QUOTE(The Ginger Kid @ Aug 7, 2007 -> 08:17 PM) why the hell didn't he let owens try and steal, then sacrifice?? I was thinking why sacrifice at all when you're 2/2 in stolen bases already with neither being close. Giving away outs in the 9th inning is not something I like when you only have 2 hits to that point. I was begging for the steal of 3rd after the sacrifice and Owens would've scored on the Thome fly ball had he done it.

I'll assume around 10 pitches an inning and thats rather low so at least 160.

I'd love to see someone like Rod Carew brought in to work with Owens on his hitting. Carew was a great bunter and slap hitter much like Ichiro who got out of the batters box extremely quickly. I think Owens has the potential to bat .300 in the majors , steal 50 bases and play a decent CF. I've seen him make a lot of diving catches recently. He's got no arm at all and doesnt walk much but if he earns a little more respect by hitting better the walks will come because he does seem to have a good eye up there.

Uribe opposite field granny !

Dye with a homerun in the 2nd. 1-0 Sox in the top of the 4th. Buerhle 1 hit 1 BB through 3 .

QUOTE(iamshack @ Jul 28, 2007 -> 01:45 PM) You cannot ignore the turn the market has taken. You cannot judge Kenny's trades at this moment on what he or other GM's could have gotten in past years. That's comparing apples to oranges. Unfortunately for us, we chose a really poor time to be a seller at the deadline. It's a strange coincidence that when we might have been buyers in the free agent market the salaries go out of sight and when its time to rid ourselves of players the market is poor. Broken promises broken dreams. Wait til next decade.

Ha Rowand n Gooch hitting bombs . Can't wait till we get them back . Yea right . Just turned it on like 10 minutes ago . Glad I got to see the Gooch homer.

I got flamed pretty good in the off season when I started comparing the Sox to the Marlins. I wish I knew how to find wtf I actually wrote but every time I try the search engine is off. And even if it wasnt I'm not exactly sure how to go about it. I love the Sox and don't hate any players because not everyone can be a star. However that being said its time for KW to pull the switch on some huge trades. I have no doubt we'll see some major changes. High salaried players and oft injured players will depart and we should get some athletic youth near major league ready. It would be a shame to see anyone on the starting staff go besides Contreras and it sures seems like Dye will be gone too. Doubt those 2 will bring as much talent as we need so others will also be gone. I wouldn't be shocked if even Konerko, Buerhle or AJ is traded. Kenny can't half ass it like he did in the off season. Promises were made by Sox management to keep improving the team if the turnstiles kept turning then they reneged when they professed shock over the rising costs of free agents. Thats when I think I knew we were in trouble. Very rarely can you compete when you go cheap and rid yourself of talented players. Kenny caught lightning in a bottle with the moves he made to bring us a title. Every move he made seemed to pan out well. As many have stated before me I'll be forever thankful for 2005. But its time for follow the Marlin blueprint and see if we can get back to the playoffs in 3-5 years. I know that seems like a lifetime to some of our youthful posters. Many of our forefathers lived n died rooting for hapless White Sox teams. It isn't that long when you keep it in perspective. So Kenny pull the trigger and do it right . There's a lot of holes to fill.

Geez lighten up guys. My post was not a commentary on the departures of those players. Its more of a Murphy's law thing. I've been around too long and seen too many bad Sox teams to cry over spilled milk. I 'll take the World Series win anytime.

Yes 6 for 6 with 6 rbi u heard me right . 666 the devils sign . now u know exactly why we suck this season.

Interview with Albert Belle who had 2 great years with the Sox. He looks back on those years fondly apparently.