caulfield12

QUOTE (Papa Tru @ May 30, 2012 -> 09:04 PM) Im going to have to say Hudson, Holmberg, and Edwin Jackson for Zach Stewart pretty much is the worst cumulative deal KW has ever done. And Jaye, and Webb. And Teahen's salary was available to pay Floyd/Crain/Thornton instead of having to trade one of them.

In the end, Gavin Floyd, Quentin and Alexei Ramirez turned out to be HUGE acquisitions for the 2008 team. Just as important, if not moreso, than the Danks/McCarthy move in Dec. 2006. All of them were pretty much under the radar, in terms of expectations. I guess if you want to categorize every GM's moves (blockbuster, mid-level, under the radar/last page of newspaper transactions list, like Quintana)...well, that's ONE way to judge a GM, but not exactly a comprehensive look at the bigger picture.

And they shouldn't try to pitch to Cabrera, lol. At least they walked Fielder to face Young. Red Sox do have the lead back again. They desperately need Middlebrooks' bat, but he already made one rookie mistake at 3rd, which allowed Miguel Cabrera to score. Then again, he hit a homer. So they're crossing their fingers on Middlebrooks at 3rd and Gonzalez, who has no range or arm, in RF.

QUOTE (Papa Tru @ May 30, 2012 -> 07:38 PM) cmon man, did you really miss the point? Hes saying not to worry about Gio because the Royals arent worrying about Humber, or the Marlins arent worrying about De Aza. Neither of them showed anything with those teams and were let go. We take legit prospects (Young, Hudson, Gonzalez) and trade them away in stupid deals that end up being worthless. Im so sick of KW and his Stanford educated ego trip. Hes constantly made poor decisions in trading, for YEARS. Yeah he can get some projects and turn them into decent lighting, but god damn when are we going to come out of a trade on the EVEN end. Edwin Jackson trade, terrible. Carlos Quentin trade, terrible. Sergio Santos trade, terrible. Daniel Hudson trade, terrible since we just gave Edwin Jackson away for free anyway. you get the point, but then again I know you love KW. How can you have any idea what Hernandez and Castro will do for us? The Padres have a $7 million dollar injury-prone RFer they no longer need, soaking up a huge amount of payroll on clearly rebuilding team. Maybe Quentin will get on a hot streak and they'll get lucky to get a better return than what we got...but, remember, there's no Dayan Viciedo developing if Quentin's still here, or Quentin's coming back and Viciedo's being benched/blocked again. We gave Jackson away for free to save money from Teahen's deal and we have a serviceable reliever. Not a net win, but maybe those savings allowed us to hold onto Floyd, Thornton and Crain for all we know, instead of having to deal them, too. And where would we be right now with Sergio Santos on our team? Clearly better than with Addison Reed as the closer? They dealt Santos for a reason, and part of that reason is DL'ed.

QUOTE (VAfan @ May 30, 2012 -> 08:26 PM) It's not as if I'm having sleepless nights or anything. And I wouldn't give it more than a passing thought if this team hadn't turned into contenders overnight. Start of the season, I thought the Tigers would dominate the division. I thought there were too many things that had to go right for us to contend. But after this stretch, where nearly everything that needed to go right has, I think the team is very well positioned to fight for the division crown. But if we make the playoffs, will we have much chance? Possibly. With only Texas dominant, we'd have a chance. It's just that if we had one more dominant pitcher like Gonzalez .... I'd think we could beat Texas and make the World Series. Whatever. As I said, I just wanted to get this off my chest so I could move on. We actually could beat anyone. It will just take a few more things going right. But it's the same for every team...imagine how good the Marlins could be had they kept Cabrera? Where are Cameron Maybin and Andrew Miller now? Not in Miami. Or the Johan Santana deal. He was the best LH starter of his generation, and none of the players acquired are with the Twins right now. One of them, Humber, is playing for one of their biggest rivals. That's just the nature of baseball. Had we not been in the pennant race in the middle of 2010, we could have been a lot more patient with both Hudson and Sale (he could have been developing as a starter instead of relieving in the heat of a pennant race). All we can do is say that he put together a better team, spent $25 million less than last year to do, and that's all that matters. In the end, the coaching staff's changes and the steadying presence of Ventura might end up being the most important move of all...as you saw in AZ last year with the DBacks.

They said that Boyer and the marketing people were having to come in early these days to deal with new season/split season ticket package requests and walk-up sales. That was inevitable with an 8 game winning streak (12 of 13), first place, offensive fireworks galore. High 20's (27,000-30,000) is definitely realistic if their level of play continues. You'd never expect to consistently start bringing in 30,000+ until the season after a World Series or deep playoff run (and lag/bandwagon effect), but I sincerely doubt Reinsdorf is going to hold back the reigns this season....knowing that it probably will be our best shot at it for the next 2-3 seasons. Certainly, that window is closing again after 2013, with Konerko's contract expiring, and Dunn's the following season. But it always comes back to starting pitching (cue cliche track).

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 30, 2012 -> 06:27 PM) I might like that more if e wasn't a lefty. My word, 4 lefties in a bullpen? Im not sure if I would care how good they are. But Quintana's actually much more effective against right-handed hitters. Isn't having the right balance there more important than right or left-handedness?

Yeah, Gio and Hudson both hurt. But, if we can keep on replacing them with similar production out of unheralded guys like Humber or Quintana, it doesn't really matter. (Or Jenks and Santos in the bullpen, for another example). There's no GM in baseball who hasn't made his share of moves which later look bone-headed. Do you think the Marlins' fans are all going crazy because DeAza has played well for us? Royals'/Twins' fans are upset about losing Humber? Or look at the money the Yankees invest in their starting pitching...even to the point of bringing back veteran Andy Pettite. Are they up in arms they "lost" Quintana or that we seemingly stole him right out from under their noses, or still upset we not only took Contreras, we also got a subsidy back to pay for his salary? And, of course, there's no way to empirically prove they both would have pitched as well in Chicago, or at USCF. Maybe Gio needed the confidence of pitching with a huge park and foul territory to become the pitcher he is...in Chicago, his control issues early in his career and his penchant for surrendering long balls/fly balls might have derailed his career in its early infancy. If anything, the success of Hudson, Gio, Brandon McCarthy or Clayton Richard makes our farm system's productivity look better and makes other teams more willing to trade with us.

With Fister, he was fine his first start and then it started getting progressively worse and worse. Lost his velocity, movement and command, team was getting concerned about him changing his arm angle to lessen the stress on his oblique. Will probably be out another 4-6 weeks. Best available RH bat the Tigers now have is Gerald Laird. Raburn experiment over, down to AAA. In the market for hitting/2B. Right now, Danny Worth also likely to be receiving more playing time.

QUOTE (flavum @ May 30, 2012 -> 06:14 PM) I don't actually think they should do this, but the thought came to me that maybe they should shut Sale down now until after the break. Keep Quintana going through interleague and the rest of the first half. If he's good, then maybe you feel comfortable trading Floyd. Then Sale gets 15 starts/100 innings in the second half. That would put him at 155-160 innings going into the postseason. ptac seemed encouraged about his mechanics. It almost would seem more likely if you just shut him down and limited his side work that he might end up being more likely to get injured when he came back and then felt too strong...I don't think what's the science behind that view, but whatever the eventual strategy turns out to be, it's going to be second-guessed. Cooper's already getting annoyed with the "rear seat driver" criticism.

When is the last time a major league team sent down on any pitcher who had two starts with under a 2.00 ERA (combined) and had held right-handed batters to a 1/24 clip (0.042)? When someone is THAT effective against RHP, that's arguably more valuable than holding onto Ohman/Santiago. There's no reason not to let Santiago get some more work in the minors and get a better feel for his offspeed stuff and then bring him back up when/if Stewart and/or Quintana falter. And they're not just going to eat Ohman's salary. Even though it isn't a huge one. Robin was about to use him in the 8th inning in a key situation against Carlos Pena. He's not getting released/waived.

Reed is universally AdmiREED.

4 sweeps this season. Get well, Alejandro. Don't want to see Fukudome or Lillibridge out there with the way our same starting line-up has been going day after day after day.

12-1.... Didn't think Reed would be able to hold that save, but for someone who's a rookie there's just a sense of calm compared to anyone else closing.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ May 30, 2012 -> 02:56 PM) Old Q has 2 HR today. He is hitting .545 with 3 HR and 6 RBI in 2 1/2 games this season. That'll work. And then they'll trade him. He's something like 12-13% of their total payroll.

I don't think I can stomach another Zobrist walkoff. That one was off Matt Thornton, I'm pretty sure. Also remember a Carl Crawford walkoff against someone.... There was one horrific blown save by Billy Koch on the 4th of July, if memory serves me correctly.

Crap. Rios has been more locked in than any hitter recently with the exception of Viciedo.

Konerko has been cursed by not having his own personal bats make the trip from Chicago.

Dunn with 4 K's, 7 LOB LOL.

Can we really send down Quintana (over Stewart/Santiago) when right hand batters are batting 1/24 (0.042) on the season on him? Please rest more...Mr. Danks.

Not going to Will Ohman here. Pena, if he hits, would probably face Ohman. So it's Reed's game to close, 1-2-3 top of the order in the bottom of the 9th.

1 game lead over the Indians, Royals 6-3. Broxton loaded the bases with one out but Jose Lopez hit into a DP.

Thornton just tied Bobby Thigpen for most relief appearances by a Chicago White Sox pitcher, career-wise.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 30, 2012 -> 02:23 PM) If there was a warning given, it's the right call, IMO...if there wasn't, it was a big overreaction. Although umpire supervisor Charlie Reliford was clear that no warning is needed by the ump was deemed to be intentional. Which it surely was. Crain vs. Rodriguez.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 30, 2012 -> 02:20 PM) DeAza is one of the feel-good stories in all of baseball. Hopefully he'll soak that knee real good on the day off. I bet he misses one game max. I bet they call it a bruise. Greg, relax. It's not like the JFK assassination here. Peavy, Rios and Dunn all qualify as more "feel good" stories than DeAza. Heck, Humber's perfecto alone has garnered more attention Crain will come in next.