Vance Law

QUOTE (Al Lopez's Ghost @ May 13, 2008 -> 12:02 PM) He was 12-13 in 2006 for a team that was 18 games over .500. Last year he was 10-9. This year we all know. You are referring to win-loss records for a pitcher. That's rather silly.

We will never be able to put up offensive numbers like the speedy World Series Champs, the Boston Red Sox.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ May 13, 2008 -> 05:32 PM) Posts in game threads. Its like having a hundred drama queen girlfriends fret over a broken nail. Yes, but replace "in game threads." with "."

QUOTE (lord chas @ May 14, 2008 -> 12:16 AM) cant believe that greg walker can cash his checks with a straight face How about Jim Leyland?

Coop and Walker with a hell of a game tonight.

Walker with some nice hitting coaching tonight.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 6, 2008 -> 04:34 PM) On the other hand, in 2005, the Indians started the season out with Eddie Murray as their hitting coach, started out in a slump, fired and replaced him, and got super-hot for about 2 months with the bats. then 3 years later you used it in a post as "evidence" of causality.

I'm just glad we don't have Vlad Guerrero or David Ortiz or Travis Hafner or Ryan Howard or Ryan Zimmerman or Ichiro on our team.

Not that I love Uribe, but a) lots of players are slumping badly, he's not the one hurting the offense, and B) with Richar not available, this isn't the ideal time to chuck him. If it "shakes things up" and helps the team, I'm all for it, though.

It is an absolute abomination that this team is 4th in the AL in runs per game. The only thing that could be worse would be if the Sox were any one of the ten AL teams that are worse than them at scoring. The only saving grace so far this season is the sheer volume of whining and complaining that goes on on this website. The exaggerated hyper-focus and overreaction to anything bad coupled with a complete failure to put it in the context of baseball, the professional baseball season, sanity, or the performance of any and all of the other baseball teams is the main thing I look forward to each day. If the Tigers were to open up the season 0-7 I would ignore it immediately. But if the Sox were to lose a few games in a row I would make myself certain that they would never win again, that their horrendous 4th best offense would continue the rest of the season being just as horrendous and 4th best. Might also suggest that bringing up a minor leaguer would fix it all, potentially one who can't hit. Also, Walker should stop teaching that bat swinging style he has been doing this week, and go back to telling the batters to do it how they were doing earlier this year, when they were doing well. I don't know why he changed the way he was telling them how to hit.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Apr 30, 2008 -> 05:17 PM) I really wish people would stop comparing the 2007 lineup to the 2008 lineup. They are totally different because there's actually a bit of developed talent in the 2008 lineup. Their uniforms, identical to the ones worn last year, say hi. Let's see, you can't blame, Dye or AJ or Crede this year, they're all hitting well. You can't blame Swisher, Cabrera, or Quentin for having anything to do with the same old Sox hitting problem from last year since they weren't here. And Thome had an excellent season last year....that's 7 starters that completely fly in the face of the "These Sox couldn't hit last year still can't hit this year" 'theory.' That theory having been disproven, I will use every muscle in my body to willfully ignore the fact that the Sox offense is 2nd in the AL in runs per game and blame the low team batting average through 26 games on their uniforms.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Apr 30, 2008 -> 01:50 PM) A random, absurd statement doesn't really make your point at all. Yes, of course. I was being sarcastic. My point being, you can use the phrase, "there is absolutely no guarantee," as "support" for any claim you might have. For any ill-founded worry or fear a Sox fan posits out of the desire, no, need to come up with ill-founded fears and worries, you can come up with an equally ill-conceived guesstimate about any other team. The Sox are 1st or 2nd in the league at scoring runs. That in spite of the fact that a good chunk of their hitters haven't hit nearly as good as they will. A more legitimate concern is how well will the pitching hold up over the course of the entire season. I will be happily surprised of the combination of Danks, Floyd, and Contreras have a combined ERA of within one run of where they are now.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Apr 30, 2008 -> 12:28 PM) But there is absolutely no guarantee that Thome, Konerko, Cabrera, and Swisher will suddenly turn it on and hit their career avg.'s for the rest of the year. I just got really, really sick of hearing that last year. Nice. Absolutely no guarantee. There is also no guarantee that if our entire team hits .220 for the rest of the year, all of the other teams in the AL won't hit .145. Therefore, I have just proven that our offense is in good shape.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Apr 28, 2008 -> 02:21 PM) OPS is still the best basic way of telling how good an offense/offensive player is. The Sox are 13th in the MLB in team OPS at .754, which is good enough for 6th in the AL. That's a good offense. Yep, and it will get better. Swisher, Cabrera, Thome, Konerko, and Uribe will all end up with considerably higher batting averages, than they have now. You'll probably see AJ, Dye, and Quentin's collectively come down a bit. The Sox won't hit .248 for the season. WE ARE 25 GAMES INTO THE SEASON. The Sox have and will have one of the top offenses in the AL. Gavin Floyd will not maintain a 3.16 ERA. The Baltimore Orioles will not win the AL East. WE ARE 25 GAMES INTO THE SEASON. Utley will not hit 50 home runs. There is no valid argument that Swisher's lower than expected slugging percentage is CAUSED BY his hitting leadoff THROUGH 89 AT BATS. There is a good bet, however, that he will have one of his best seasons yet, going from a terrible hitters park to a great hitters park. Players will get in slumps for periods of time. Players will get out of slumps. David Ortiz will not finish the year with a .611 OPS. During a 25 game stretch any given player's numbers may be brutal or they may be amazing. Any player from Vlad to Uribe. We don't look at that. We look at their season totals. And some people get all out of whack staring at those totals even if the season is 17 games old.

QUOTE (TheBigHurt @ Apr 25, 2008 -> 12:48 PM) As I said, I hate this complaining from underage drinkers, because they shouldn't be drinking. That the drinking age is 21 in this country is absolutely absurd. Party on, under-agers!

Frank and Thome played football together at Auburn. Thome was a wide receiver.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 21, 2008 -> 11:18 AM) Stop and think of it this way... If I told you that Konerko and Thome would be hitting under .200 and Buehrle would have an era of about 6, what would you guess the Sox record would be? If I was a total jackass, I'd start complaining and saying this is just like last year, we suck, and Kenny should have traded Konerko. If you then told me David Ortiz has an OPS of about .524 and CC Sabathia has an ERA of around 10.0, I'd ignore that and continue complaining about my team.

QUOTE (shipps @ Apr 21, 2008 -> 08:12 AM) The Dbacks would say it doesnt mean as much as you would think. So would the 06 Indians, but for the opposite reason. And they'd all be wrong, because they were simply a couple of very rare exceptions.

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ Apr 21, 2008 -> 12:05 PM) Funny things is, if Ozzie would man up and tell everyone he's doing what's in the best interests of the team than OCab would move to 2nd and Uribe would go back to SS, where you can actually tolerate a sub .700 OPS from a guy with a laser beam and good range. I agreed totally with your thoughts above on Richar over Iguchi, but I don't understand this one. The suggestion you make has no effect on the team's offense, and most would agree, makes the defense worse as Cabreras's a better shortstop.

Hopefully we can trade Konerko for David Ortiz, who sucks even worse.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Apr 20, 2008 -> 12:27 PM) We are like the second or third lowest in team BA and he's bragging? And we are by far #1 in runs per game and third in team OPS in the AL, and you're complaining?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 18, 2008 -> 02:59 PM) It's also entirely possible that good performances by Anderson and Owens this year will give KW the motivation to do a salary dump and move either Dye (freeing up RF) or Thome (Freeing up DH) this offseason. Thome is #3 in the AL in OPS+ over the last 2 years and we have an option on him where we only have to pay $6 or $7 million.

QUOTE (rafacosta @ Apr 18, 2008 -> 06:56 PM) Pauly? Since when THome's first name is Paul? Thome and Konerko went back to back

QUOTE (rafacosta @ Apr 18, 2008 -> 06:52 PM) just bunt and see if the incompetent paul konerko can do something about it totally

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 18, 2008 -> 06:37 PM) I was just typing that DiFelice is the biggest asshole in baseball. If he was on our team, he'd be the smallest asshole. That umpire, though, is a turd.