caulfield12

QUOTE (VictoryMC98 @ Sep 19, 2011 -> 08:03 PM) a voice of reason in this insane place.. Nicely done.. Nicely done... The other name I would love to see.. Billy Beane, just think if he had cash what he might be able to do. I don't know enough about the up and coming GMs out there to throw their name in the hat.. My only problem.. I don't know if Hahn is a KW right hand man, or just doing his job to save it.. ( you know what I mean) But, I agree this organization needs a reboot from the top down.. Does JR have the business sense to do what is right for the organization long term? Before the All-Star Break, Lillibridge was hitting .256 with an 816 OPS. He had already cooled off a little bit after his hot start when Guillen started playing him more and more sporadically. As far as Beane goes, what would the Oakland A's have been without 1) Mulder/Zito/Hudson/Harden and 2) steroids for Giambi/Chavez/Tejada? Terry Ryan of the Twins was/is a much better general manager. He just doesn't have the advantage of a PR machine, the sabremetrics world, DePodesta and JP Ricciardi, etc. JR doesn't have so many years left. He knows how important this decision is...and that bringing KW and Guillen both back will just delay the inevitable falling out and worsen the situation that much more than it already is.

What the hell is going on here? With the suspicious comments about SoxTalk from Ozney (I think it was him) and that CSN column...one almost is starting to believe that it has to be someone with the Guillen family, Cowley's family, someone who's stubbornly recalcitrant in their Guillen Knee Jerk Defense. The fact of that matter is that nobody could have done worse than Dunn over that time frame. Certainly not Lillibridge. There are plenty of others....DeAza (when he wasn't playing for Rios), Viciedo, heck, arguably Vizquel, Kuhn and Milledge, to name just a few. Or Flowers, when AJ wasn't playing. None of those aforementioned scenarios are empirically-refutable...just as there will be some arguing that Dunn has now been "ruined for life" because he was forced by KW to the bench down the stretch, using Rongey's "you can never sit your way out of a slump" argument. There are so many arguments going back and forth it makes your head spin. Does it really matter who's to blame, 75%/25% or 50/50 or "it's all Reinsdorf's fault." KW backed himself into the uncomfortable position of "doubling down" and JR obviously signed off on it. The entire organization needs to be torn apart (yes, that means Brooks Boyer and Rongey too) with the only two left standing potentially Hahn and Don Cooper. I really think Sox fans are going to go bananas if they have to listen to an entire offseason and then April of Dunn/Rios/Beckham excuses/explanations. Or how Jake Peavy will pitch like the Cy Young winner he formerly was after another offseason of recovery, etc. The whole situation is toxic. KW and Ozzie both need to be shown the door. Who knows, maybe Epstein will be available if Boston collapses. Then again, he wouldn't have the money or the organizational imperative to build a farm system (especially international signings), so I'm not sure why he would ever leave Boston unless he was fired or JR offered an open checkbook, which just doesn't seem to jive with the current economic situation the White Sox are facing moving forward.

QUOTE (gatnom @ Sep 19, 2011 -> 04:29 AM) All I'm really saying is that you don't need to be the Royals or Pirates or whatever team to rebuild your franchise. The main thing I'm advocating is that we should trade away our 2008 "core" since it's getting to the point where they need to be paid what they are worth, and we don't have a lot of money to throw around while we wait for our bad contracts to expire. Oh, and by the way, we could spend as much as the Pirates on the draft and still have a $90 million big league budget, assuming our "maximum" payroll is $100 million. Nothing is going to force JR and the owners to start pocketing an extra $30 million. So why keep Konerko and Buehrle as well if we wouldn't be able to compete until 2014 probably?

QUOTE (gatnom @ Sep 19, 2011 -> 01:02 AM) You really need to quit the rebuilding hyperbole. You can't exactly call it reloading, but we're much closer to that than any type of rebuilding why KW is still in charge. Maybe a new GM (Hahn) would be given the Marty34 directive, but, until that happens...it's a moot argument. One thing's for sure, it would take Ozzie Guillen another 3-4 years to be fired leading that youth movement into the ground...if his ego would even allow him to take a step back from the pretense of competitiveness in the AL Central and go with the Jerry Manuel late 90's program.

I'm still not sure exactly what Cora or Baines have done with the Sox besides 1) being Ozzie's buddy and 2) Camp Cora, which has seen, at best, dubious results. (See Fields, Josh and Viciedo, Dayan at 3B)

QUOTE (DukeNukeEm @ Sep 18, 2011 -> 11:09 PM) I cant believe how comfortable people are with just dumping Mark Buehrle. Its so ridiculous. There's a difference between "dumping" Mark Buehrle and dumping Magglio Ordonez. He can't go to the Cardinals, their rotation is set for 2012. So unless we 1) don't want him back or 2) lowball him to the point where he's insulted, the likelihood of him returning to the White Sox would have to be considered at least 75%. I would love to have him back. My argument (in this particular thread) is you don't want Mark Buehrle (or Konerko for that matter) for 2012 if you're trading away Quentin, Floyd, Danks, Santos and Ramirez.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Sep 18, 2011 -> 08:54 PM) You must have Ramirez confused with a Hall of Famer. You can't argue both sides. He's either nowhere close to a Hall of Famer and can be easily replaced by Brent Lillibridge, Saladino or Escobar, or he's the most valuable trading chip we have in our stable, by far. Which is it? You'd rather pay Mark Buehrle $12-14 million per year to be the equivalent of a #3 or #4 starter, yet you don't see any value in keeping Ramirez around? Why would we bother to keep Konerko and Buehrle if we were basically dismantling the entire team? Isn't now the best time to unload Konerko's contract before he goes south, too?

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Sep 18, 2011 -> 09:35 PM) Too many sliders is my feeling on Santos. I get the feeling you want to keep this team together. Of course not, that's silly. But, unlike in the world of fantasy leagues, it's not easy to just get rid or Dunn and Rios. Peavy's not a great concern, seems that he would be the least of our problems in 2012. If we got replacement or above replacement level offensive numbers from Dunn and Rios, we would have been in a decent position to compete even with Beckham falling off a cliff offensively. If nothing else, you're arguing against the decision KW made in 2007, which was to keep Buehrle/Thome/Dye, etc., and move forward instead of tearing that team apart. Are we really worse off than we were heading into 2008? How so? This approach in 2007 would have prevented 2008 from ever happening...and, if Quentin hadn't gotten hurt, you can make a legit argument we could have gone much deeper into the playoffs, especially if we could have bypassed Javy and not gone down to Game 163.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Sep 18, 2011 -> 09:08 PM) I don't think Santos' shelf life will be all that long. Let's see what we can get for him. Appreciate the support for breaking the team up! This theory on Santos is based on what? A hunch? Having one of the best sliders of any reliever? A consistent mid 90's fastball? The fact that as someone who's only been a pitcher for about 3 years, he's already maxed out his ability? Or you're extrapolating based entirely on his recent blown saves against the Tigers? That he's going to fall apart as a closer eventually, that he's not mentally strong or tough enough? Do you really want Addison Reed as the closer for 2012? And then what happens when we get off to a similar start as 2011 when Thornton was the closer? We just sell off the entire team before mid-season and drive down the attendance to 1.2 million? Is this based on your idea that Reinsdorf was going to get paid for 2 million in attendance no matter what he spends on payroll...even if it was $50-65 million?

I'm not getting what the point is with Marty trying to tear the entire team apart. So we can play the likes of Escobar and Saladino in the future? In order to set the record for lowest attendance/lowest payroll/highest payroll efficiency in the AL? Sure, our payroll was only $65 million or so when we won in 2005, but that was a long time ago economically. As long as the Tigers are spending the way they are, that means with have to be 2-3X as good with our minor league development system. If the Tigers are spending twice as much, there's simply no margin for error. All of those trades (especially Santos, Danks and Alexei Ramirez) have to break perfectly for the Sox, like Danks/McCarthy, Quentin/Carter, Floyd/Garcia. At this point, we're not going to get anything close to a Top 30-50 minor league prospect for Quentin. But discounting the reality of how hard it is to find a reliable closer and how hard it would be to replace Ramirez...well, it sounds more like Marty is an accountant for JR rather than a baseball fan. And, in actuality, an accountant would know you have to spend money to make money. Why trading away Ramirez/Santos/Quentin/Floyd/Danks BUT keeping Mark Buehrle is going to do anything for our record or attendance, I have no idea. And it's not like the Indians or Royals can't threaten to come up and bite us, either. For now, with Morneau/Span potentially never playing again, the Twins can't be the primary concern.

Ryan Gosling’s artsy thriller Drive raced into third place with $11 million. The R-rated FilmDistrict production, directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, played mostly to an older crowd, as 75 percent of the audience was 25 or older. Unfortunately, not everyone who saw the film liked it — despite strong critical reviews, audiences issued Drive a harsh “C–” CinemaScore grade, which does not bode well for its box-office longevity. Hopefully this is not a sign of things to come to Gosling/Refn collaborations. The film earned a fair $3,818 per theater average. Looks like yet another movie the critics and public will disagree completely on. If movies like The Zookeeper can get a higher CinemaScore grade, you just wonder what the world is coming to... By the way, watched one of Gosling's first movies, "The Believer," that movie is almost as good as American History X. Contagion was a bit antiseptic (no pun intended) for a medical thriller. The first 45 minutes were good...but it seemed more like something from a textbook and you never cared about the fate of any of the characters involved despite the many big names in the project. Matt Damon wasn't as good as usual, IMO. I guess many filmgoers were happy Gwyneth Paltrow was knocked off in the first five minutes.

QUOTE (Reddy @ Sep 18, 2011 -> 10:55 AM) did you really just take this thread seriously? And write a mile long post about it? Only caulfield. If you actually think that's a mile long post, well...I'm not quite sure what to say. I guess I should be like Oney and just out sent tweets.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Sep 17, 2011 -> 03:08 PM) Wow, Morel's walking and hitting for power. Never thought I'd see this happen. But we've seen the same kind of thing out of Josh Fields, Beckham or even Brian Anderson. Let's see if it's sustainable for 150+ games....especially when the White Sox are still in the race and every game counts.

The thing is...and even if it's just a theoretical exercise, 20 years ago, having this conversation would get everyone laughed at. With the success of "non-traditional" backgrounds such as Ivy Leaguers and MBA's succeeding now as GM's, the door is open, but only a bit. In that sense, many future executives do have Billy Beane to thank...for making nerdy but stat-saavy cool. However, as a manager...it's very hard to this day to imagine someone without any professional baseball experience 1) getting more than a job interview and 2) getting the respect of his players, unless he could prove right off the bat that he could help them individually perform as well as make the team stronger than the sum of all its parts. Scouting, same thing. The areas that have really opened up since the early 90's essentially have been broadcasting and the front office. If you took anyone who posted at SoxTalk and made them manager this year, they wouldn't have won more than 85 games or lost more than 90. There's more to it than Steve Fisher just rolling out the ball for the Fab Five every night and letting them do whatever they wanted.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Sep 16, 2011 -> 11:47 PM) I thought I'd heard that the Cardinals' rotation was already set for 2012? For the first time in years the Cardinals have some expectation of depth. 'Waino’ (Wainright) and Carpenter should project for a combined 400 innings even if the club handles Wainwright gingerly post-surgery. Jaime Garcia is locked up for 4 years. Jake Westbrook and Kyle Lohse are under contract through 2012 for about $20 million combined. Kyle McClellan, Lance Lynn and Brandon Dickson offer alternatives, though the arbitration-eligible McClellan may fit better in small-market rotation. The Cardinals love what Edwin Jackson has provided since his July 27 acquisition; however, the Cardinals are all about short-term contracts given their current posture. Seems like there's not a place for him (Buehrle)...or they would have to trade Lohse, and that would make their rotation (with the Carpenter signing) way too expensive to even dream about bringing back Pujols. Read more: http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/rou...l#ixzz1YCvNK9Mb

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Sep 16, 2011 -> 11:17 PM) Thor was second to the first Iron Man for superhero movies in the last few years. And it was close. X-Men/First Class and Captain America were arguably better than Thor. Hard to beat the first Iron Man, though. Hard to be much worse than Green Lantern, as well.

Dick Allen would be the CFO. What was Tex's job, again? Sox Advance Scout/Contrarian?

The White Sox have led the AL (and possibly the entire major leagues) in quality starts since 2003. What hitting category have we come close to leading for such a long time span...one that would actually be considered beneficial to winning baseball games?

The first review I read claimed it was the best baseball movie since "Bull Durham," but that movie had a clear love triangle playing out. It will interesting to see what holds the interest of the viewer in this one, since Sean Penn's ex (Robin Wright Penn) and his daughter seem to be figures in the background of the story. Even the first Major League was largely successful because it was not only about baseball but the relationship between Tom Berenger and Rene Russo. It seems to me that Jonah Hill is getting most of the attention, along with Pitt. So far at RT, 14 positive reviews and only 3 negatives (and Keith Law, as well, haha) http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/sep/09...kin?INTCMP=SRCH UK woman who's obviously not a sports fan http://www.screendaily.com/reviews/the-lat...5031811.article http://www.slantmagazine.com/house/2011/09...ken-with-plums/ Audiences, on the other hand, are likely to be sated until they realize that the film's ostensibly down-to-earth, human orientation contradicts its central historical truth: that, despite Malcolm Gladwell's belief to the contrary, intuition can very often be defeated by the precise and mechanical. Take that, Ozzie Guillen!!!

The first review I read claimed it was the best baseball movie since "Bull Durham," but that movie had a clear love triangle playing out. It will interesting to see what holds the interest of the viewer in this one, since Sean Penn's ex (Robin Wright Penn) and his daughter seem to be figures in the background of the story. Even the first Major League was largely successful because it was not only about baseball but the relationship between Tom Berenger and Rene Russo. It seems to me that Jonah Hill is getting most of the attention, along with Pitt.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Sep 15, 2011 -> 11:15 PM) Wow elrockin also wants to keep Oz. I wonder if it's just us two. I think there's another 2 Oz supporters on this board though I forget their names rite now. I know there's at least one more besides me and elrockin. Marty34

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Sep 15, 2011 -> 08:21 PM) They are mental midgets. Losing is a habit for them. Not unlike us against the Tigers, Twins and Royals for most of the past 3 seasons. Where our homefield advantage went is one of the biggest mysteries yet unsolved by this organization.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Sep 15, 2011 -> 07:50 PM) Package him with Quentin or Ramirez. If you can get a bonafide Top 25-30 Milb catching prospect, sure. Realistically, the biggest need is 1) the bullpen, especially if Sale goes to the rotation and 2) leadoff, if KW isn't satisfied with DeAza/Lillibridge. It would be a bit ridiculous not to at least pencil in DeAza as a platoon player going into 2012, but who knows with Williams. We're not going to be getting rid of Morel or Beckham, in all likelihood...nor Dunn and Rios. So catcher, bullpen (which makes it kind of silly to trade Santos for yet a younger, more unproven prospect), slappy leadoff version of Pierre, (but MUCH younger) and starting pitching depth. How likely is that? Who knows, really?

QUOTE (greg775 @ Sep 15, 2011 -> 07:53 PM) Boy the Sox stink. 6-2 KC. Royals see this as a statement series to show what the Sox and rest of the division are in for next year. They are on the upswing with young hitters. Still shaky starting pitching tho. Greg, how many years have we been saying this about the Royals? Until they get the quality starting pitching, at best they are a .500 club but probably not even that unless Moustakas can start hitting with authority.

But is it really any more bleak than at the end of the 2007? Back then, the only hope for the future was Josh Fields. Owens, Wasserman and Andy Gonzalez made some contributions...but it was pretty clear those guys weren't exactly "can't miss" prospects. Maybe because of the payroll this year and the ongoing disappointment of 2009-2011 as well as the discord between KW and Ozzie...it might be a bit more bleak, but 2007 really was quite a slap in the face after 2005 and 2006.