Balta1701

Freddy Garcia against a team that's 5-1, on the road, in a day game? I'll take that setup.

So, we've played 6 games, our team has hit 3 home runs, and Jim Thome has all of them. At least Jim Thome has some marbles. And Mark Buehrle has some marbles. The rest of you guys though...

QUOTE(Brian @ Apr 9, 2006 -> 02:37 PM) Where did Thome's bomb actually land? The camera lost it. Like 3/4 of the way up the stands out there, just to the right of the bullpen where the camera was.

He was up to 99 on the Comcast gun, and supposedly on the stadium gun also, a couple times today. He had only 1 fastball that fell below 97 that i saw. And he also was firing that slider up there at 91. Man, a 91 mph slider...you combine that with that 99 fastball, and nobody's going to be hitting htis guy.

Mark Buehrle. Ace. Hell of a game Mark.

QUOTE(DBAH0 @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 11:50 PM) So far in 5 games we've given up just over on average 5 runs a game, while scoring just over 4. Last season we only gave up on average 3.98 runs a game. It's amazing what giving up just over an extra run can make to a team. God I love small sample sizes. What would those #'s be if you excluded our first game and the Indians second game? Or if Ozuna caught those 2 fly balls? Or Pods had a few steals? Or Dye had played mor ethan 1/2 our games?

QUOTE(SAC @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 11:07 PM) Great.... I really hope he is OK He's all right, but just like Ozzie did last season, he tends to play it overly safe with these guys when they have small injuries early in the season. Which is probably the right move; better to have them miss 2 additional games now than have them hit the 15 day DL by reaggrivating something.

QUOTE(SAC @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 11:05 PM) Do you guys know if he will play tomorrow? It sounded today like Ozzie might hold him out until the middle of next week. Supposedly he's available to pinch hit or if they really need him in a game.

I read the Seymour Hersh story in the New Yorker, and decided it wasn't worth citing. Why? Because Sy Hersh published basically the exact same story almost a year ago, saying the U.S. was planning an attack on Iran over the summer of 2005. Some of Hersh's sources may be right, some may not be, but right now, I don't see why I should 100% believe him right now, when he's saying teh same thing he said a year ago and giving me no more named sources than he did at that time. The WaPo is clearly hearing something similar, but they're hedging their bets more than Hersh, so I ran with their story. But both places did say that nukes were on the table. Edit: Here is Hersh's piece from early 2005 on Iran. He's been hitting the same chords for over a year now.

Just like the country next door...more and more we're seeing these sorts of reports. Hopefully things won't even get to this point, but I found this to be the most disturbing part of the article; the military is saying there may be no way to do a military strike using only conventional arms.

Go Get em MB. Time for the stopper to be the stopper.

QUOTE(Chisox_fan @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 08:45 PM) The chemistry thing came to me too, as lame as it sounds. This team doesn't seem to be gelling together. As ridiculous as it sounds, maybe we did give up too many players in the offseason.. Garland didn't look good but defense wasn't exactly on his side last night either. Winning creates chemistry.

This incredible Tigers offense has also faced the dominating pitching staffs of the Kansas City Royals and the Texas Rangers.

QUOTE(CWSGuy406 @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 06:15 PM) See, Cerb, I thought it was on the outside half of the plate, but I didn't think it was off the plate. I'll have to see the replay again... I think it was right around the outside corner. Sweeney really did have to stretch to get wood on the thing. It was a hell of a swing. The one thing Sweeney did have working for him is that everything Cliff threw that AB was on the outer half, so he was looking in the right spot, but AJ was also looking to the dugout a lot, so I don't know who exactly to blame for the pitch selection.

QUOTE(Soxfest @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 04:14 PM) He'll be on the DL by mid May! Quite likely true. Only problem is, the Sox play K.C. 9 games before the middle of may, then we won't see them again until the end of July.

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 03:14 PM) He's just as bad as Baker, but since the Pirates gave him Ramirez and the Marlins gave him Lee and Pierre for nothing out of desperation to dump expensive players, people don't realize it for some reason. Great news here if you dislike the Cubs. The Pirates gave him Ramirez not even because Ramirez was expensive at the time. They gave him Ramirez because the Pirates are idiots.

QUOTE(Flash Tizzle @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 03:17 PM) I didn't mean to give the Indians credit for developing him. A sizable portion of the Indians club was assembled from trades as it is. I know Sizemore and Lee came over from Montreal during the Colon trade, and I believe Belliard was aquired from Colorado (?). I'm sure there are several I'm forgetting. If after this season, we started going and offering guys like Buehrle, Konerko, etc., up in Trades, like they did with Colon, Thome, and a couple of their other big pieces, in a few years, we may very well have that much talent built up as well. Just watch Florida in a few years But we've got a bigger salary, so we're actually able to do something better than that; we can stay competitive every year, by bringing up a few pieces (BA, BMac) and holding on to/finding the more expensive pieces that it takes to win every year. Personally, I think I like where we are.

QUOTE(WCSox @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 04:06 PM) Garland definitely has the best chance. But 18 wins and a 3.50 ERA for a guy with a career ERA of, like, 4.30 isn't easy to duplicate. I think that 15 wins and a 3.90-4.10 ERA is more likely. Cotts, on the other hand, will have to pitch ~60 innings with an ERA under in the 1.9's to equal last year's output. That's a REALLY low ERA. I think he'll be closer to 2.50. I still say you just can't look at the career ERA of a pitcher who pitched his first 4 years before he was 26. Not to mention that he pitched those years with Jose Valentin @ SS while trying to be a sinkerballer. Over a career, yes you regress to the mean. But when a pitcher is my age...you barely know what his mean is yet.

QUOTE(NUKE_CLEVELAND @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 04:02 PM) Worry now? Not a chance. If we're struggling like this on Memorial Day then it's time to worry. There's a difference between worrying and panicking. Now is an ok time to worry. Hell, I'm a White Sox fan...December's a good time to start worrying about the upcoming season. But it is not time yet to panic, about any part of this team. They are just not clicking right now. They have no Marbles.

As soon as Grudz got that single to lead off the 8th, I knew we were going to wind up losing that game 4-3. I wasn't online to say it (the fiancee was using the computer), but I sat there on the couch & said that one of those pitches was leaving the park. If it wasn't for Sweeney, we might have lost 2 games to the Royals in the last 2 years.

QUOTE(WCSox @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 03:59 PM) I agree. The question is: How much better? A lot of things have to go right to win a championship. A number of guys are going to have to step up to make up for the fact that Garland, Cotts, Politte, and Hermanson aren't going to put up the same numbers as last year. I see no reason at all why Cotts and Garland cannot put up numbers equal to, or in JG's case, better, than what they did last season. Especially Garland.

QUOTE(WCSox @ Apr 8, 2006 -> 02:54 PM) I remember this being disucssed in a thread during the third week of ST. I was one of the "don't worry, the bullpen will be OK" crowd. Pass the salt, I have some crow to eat. :puke I for one am still holding my ground. This bullpen is better than what we've seen thus far, and in fact, so is the entire pitching staff. I'll give you an example. With Politte on the mound today against Sweeney, every pitch was on the outer half. Never came inside really once, even just to knock him back. Now, here's my question...who called for those pitches? Clifford wasn't shaking AJ off...but AJ was looking into the dugout before putting down the signs. You throw Sweeney pitches in the same spot and eventually he's going to find one. I think we almost asked for that one just based on the pitches we called for. Our bullpen will be better than it is right now, as will our starters. MB was beaten by Perez on a good slider inside, IMO. J.C. had 1 bad inning. Garland wasn't sharp, but he wasn't helped by his defense. Garcia, well, he was totally off. Vazquez was pretty darn good. Politte wasn't throwing terrible pitches today, he just didn't throw the right pitches. Logan has had 1 bad at-bat and a couple of pretty good ones. McCarthy has been dominant as all hell. And we've still hardly needed Jenks at all. We are still going to be better than what we've already seen.

You know what we really need? We need the Gooch to go around to everyone on the team and tell them that: "YOU HAVE NO MARBLES!"

Anyone else feel right now like they did last August? I sure do. This team needs a good swift kick in the ass. Bases loaded in the 8th and you GIDP. Getting yourself stuck pitching to Sweeney as the lead run. Argh.

Oh. My. f***ing. God.