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Hideaway Lights

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  1. QUOTE(StrangeSox @ May 11, 2007 -> 10:34 AM)
    For the second half of last season, the Sox were near the bottom in runs scored.

     

    post all-star break 2006 I have 10th/14 AL teams and 16th/30 MLB....the 7th place AL team scored 11 more second half runs whereas the bottom team was nearly 30 runs worse

     

    is that really "near the bottom" or just "slightly below average"?

     

    This season they are 14th/14 and 27/30...I don't think the two are comparable frankly

  2. QUOTE(witesoxfan @ May 9, 2007 -> 08:54 PM)
    and I'm seeing pretty much that exact same product on the field right now.

     

    No, the product is a lot different actually right now. For one, the 25-man roster has changed by 6 or so players, for another, the hitters are struggling and the pitchers are performing, which is dead opposite of last season.

     

    Also, you say it's about expectations...I don't see how anyone honestly expected this team with this roster to truly EXCEL given our April schedule, the fact that the back end of our rotation was probably going to struggle a bit (I know they haven't much), the fact that we were crapshooting in relying on pods to bounce back (not to mention erstad), and the relative strength of Cleveland, Detroit and even a Liriano-less Minny. I mean what were we really expecting? 20-10? Even 17-13 would be a bit optimistic given those factors (and taking into account the injuries to two starters).

     

    I expected us to be a .500 team this year, and now it's looking like we'll be a bit better than that, because I think the dropoff in pitching is going to be much less than the boost our hitting will eventually receive, and I think we'll get a LOT better with Thome back.

  3. I am just absolutely dumbfounded at this board's general inclination to blame ozzie for absolutely everything wrong, and give him absolutely none of the credit when things go right. Yes, he makes some bad in-game decisions. It's a dead horse already.

     

    I place 100% of the blame on Mike MacDougal. Up 4-1 in the eighth, the bullpen has got to perform in that situation. We should have never even been in the Morneau situation in the first place. Who got us there? Mike MacDougal.

     

    I'm sorry, but tied 4-4 in extras at the metrodome, if you honestly thought we had a good chance to win that game no matter what the situation, give me some of what you're smoking. I chalked that one up as a loss as soon as we headed to extras.

     

    Some of you are making it seem like we automatically won the game had morneau been intentionally walked.

  4. Why? Because the hitting HAS to come around, whereas the pitching does not. There are just TOO MANY at bats per team for anything THIS statistically abnormal to continue all season. We are batting .221 right now. The worst team batting averages in the last 7 years are the 2003 Detroit Tigers with a .240 team average, and the 2002 Pittsburgh Pirates with a .244 team batting average. Neither lineup was major league caliber.

     

    Even if I ceded that only 5 of the 9 batters were major league caliber hitters (Thome, Konerko, Dye, Pierzynski, Crede), I would think those 5 would come around to bat .265 collectively. The other 4 slots, we are looking for .240-.250 from. In any case, I feel the absolute worst this team could bat collectively, over the course of an entire season is .250. Which means we are probably going to hit a collective .260 the rest of the way.

     

    With the pitching performances we have been getting, a 40 point boost in batting average day to day turns at least 5 of those losses into wins.

     

    Simply put, I'm much more comfortable with our team this season than I was last season. Call me crazy, but our pitching has been really really good and to me, that's all that really matters.

     

    You can argue that this team doesn't have heart, and maybe a shake-up needs to happen, but it's absolutely insane that people are already jumping ship, especially when our pitching has been so damned good. We are 1 game under .500. Yes, this will be a very tough division to win, but the WC is probably coming out of the central this year with the west being mediocre and the yanks appearing to finally be finished as a team. Which means we don't have to leapfrog three teams, just two, and those two have as many holes as we do in my opinion.

     

    I feel great about our starting pitching and our bullpen, and once the hitters come around (THEY WILL), this will be at least an 86 win team, probably even more than that, which puts us right in the thick of things.

  5. Not sure if it's been mentioned, but this schedule, combined with this weather, has been brutal for us thus far. Cleveland is a very tough team, we never usually do well at Oakland, we had to face Santana already and we have other series coming up against contenders (@ det, det, LAA). The only easy games we have this month are the two @ KC and the three at home vs. Tex, and there's no guarantee either will be pushovers.

     

    If we can get out of this month at .500 I think I'll be pretty pleased.

     

    In May, we have 15 Chicago games in a row against a lot of soft opponents:

     

    vs. KC

    vs. NYY (not soft, I know)

    @ cubs

    vs. Oak

    vs. TB

     

    That is a pretty juicy part of the schedule where we should be able to go 10-5. Three of those teams just aren't very good (I know, I know, rays beat santana and bonser in the dome).

     

    In June, we have four NL series in a row against these teams:

     

    Hou, @ Philly, @ Pit, and Florida. I like our chances there to go maybe 8-4 and pick up some games there as well.

     

    And additionally, our second half schedule features 10 KC games, and after an extended road trip to open the second half, we play 35 of our final 62 games at USCF and we don't even ever leave the midwest in september.

     

    In other words, I think as long as we can survive this early part of the schedule, it should be easier going as we move along.

  6. QUOTE(caulfield12 @ Apr 12, 2007 -> 09:26 AM)
    Not divorce papers, he was notified that day that there might be a case against him for smuggling, involving the $200,000 he paid "independent contractors" (being nice) to bring his family into the US from Cuba.

     

    Oh my bad, I heard it was divorce papers

  7. QUOTE(RME JICO @ Apr 12, 2007 -> 08:14 AM)
    How about:

     

    In 5 bad innings they let up a total of 19 runs. (34.20 ERA)

     

    In the other 67 innings they let up only 13 runs. (1.74 ERA)

     

    bad innings are gonna happen every so often, that's just baseball. However, Jose's opening day 1 inning fiasco has never happened before, and he bounced back so well it seems like it's not likely to happen again, and now that we've heard that he may have been served divorce papers 15 minutes before he took the bump that day, it seems like we can almost throw that inning out the window as completely anomylous.

  8. after Jose's 1+ inning blowup on opening day, the white sox have a combined ERA of 3.05 in the subsequent 70.2 innings

     

    wow!!!!! I sure like that from our pitching staff a hell of a lot more than what we got last year...

     

    :cheers

  9. QUOTE(Controlled Chaos @ Apr 11, 2007 -> 03:02 PM)
    yeah that's our problem!! nice work!!

     

    I'm just asking how it's fair that we keep having to go to the colisseum, a park we notoriously suck at, almost sixty percent of the time over 6 years

     

    since 2003 it's even worse than that... 64% of our games vs. oakland have been at the colisseum

  10. seriously...how is this f***ing fair?

     

     

    2007, 6 at oakland, 3 at home

    2006, 3 at oakland, 3 at home

    2005, 6 at oakland, 3 at home

    2004, 6 at oakland, 3 at home

    2003, 3 at oakland, 6 at home

    2002, 6 at oakland, 3 at home

     

    so at the conclusion of the 2007 season, we'll have played 30 games at oakland vs the A's, while hosting just 21 games against them over the last six full seasons

     

    f*** you MLB

  11. for those keeping a tally on losses directly attributable to ozzie, a few questions:

     

    1) Is Ozzie ever directly attributable to a win, or is that just the players?

    2) Why do you assume Anderson would've thrown a perfect strike, or that AJ would've held onto the ball 100% of the time?

    3) How is the offense and/or bobby jenks not at least equally accountable for this loss?

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