caulfield12

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ May 24, 2011 -> 03:50 PM) See, I disagree with that. I supported both moves at the time, but I was a much bigger fan of the Peavy pickup. The value of an ace is significant in the post-season. Getting a guy with ace potential is practically impossible, unless you have a Dan Haren package of prospects available or have $150 million to spend in free agency. So I was glad KW rolled the dice on Peavy, even if there was a reasonable chance it wouldn't work. I'll happily take such a risk if it improves my chance of winning a World Series. A good CF on the otherhand is easier to attain, especially if you're willing to spend $55 million. I was still willing to gamble on Rios due to his immense potential, but I had much more worries about him due to his past struggles. That's probably the ONE great move the Angels have made in the last 2-3 years, picking up Haren when he was hurt and not 100%. For most of this season, he's looked like a legit top-of-the-rotation guy again. Scott Kazmir, not so much.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ May 24, 2011 -> 03:45 PM) Well, yeah...the obvious problem is that he'll hit that way for 6-8 weeks per season and the rest of time look like he belongs in AAA or being the spokesperson for Mercy Hospital with his homespun twang (albeit still a better pitchman than Alexei, lol).

I hope not. That means his contract has become a bust OR Carlos Quentin has returned to 2008 MVP form. We need both the "old" Dunn and 2008 Quentin to make a charge. That said, the 2008 Quentin hitting 3rd makes perfect sense, he's much more dangerous and has the higher OBP than Dunn. Still, you have to believe in the ability of Dunn to drive him in now, instead of HOPING Dunn would somehow get on with a walk or double or anything non-strikeout related and then Konerko or Carlos could plate him.

Back to Beckham. Do you guys have more confidence in Rios or Beckham to pull out of it this year and end up with close to a 775-800 OPS for the season? I'll go with Beckham, simply based on the fact that he has to be an 825-850 OPS guy at 2B in the future for this team to have any chance. I can live with Rios at 725-750, but not anywhere close to 600. That's Juan Pierre bad. In fact, worse than Juan Pierre, and AJ, and Dunn (around 670-680 because of the walks and doubles), and Beckham. (Final comment, thank God they replaced Kiera Knightley in Pirates...I just saw her in a movie called "Last Night" with the scrumptious Eva Mendes and Sam Worthington and she REALLY looked anorexic, her hip bones were jutting out. Penelope Cruz and the new mermaid were at least a change of pace from previous POTC movies...)

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 24, 2011 -> 03:23 PM) Rios was never just potential alone. The gamble you were taking was on his character/desire/consistency. The talent had manifested itself in actual production before, just not consistently. Regardless, I still think he's close...I'm not ready to call this a failure yet. Maybe that was a stretch. Potential to rebound after looking horrid. It's the whole "back of the baseball card" argument, ignoring the novedive. Not unlike the Yankees taking Swisher off our hands, but with much less inherent risk. Although I'm sure some stats person who works for agents who represent "defense first" players will keep pushing and pushing to develop a formula to say that Gold Glove defense is STILL worth $12-13 million per season even with a sub 600 OPS (to think we would have been happy with Anderson at 675-700) because of the dearth of quality hitters at that position, not unlike shortstop before the steroids era. And, the other problem is that Rios isn't playing nearly as well defensively as he has in the past. He hasn't been close to Pierre bad, but there have been a number of memorable misplays already in 2011. Enough to where you could make an argument that Lillibridge was at least his equal for 2011, if not better.

For a SI Swimsuit type model, she's (B. Decker) not what I would call thin...more the Kathy Ireland type, if you remember way back when. Of course, like almost all 90's-00's "It" girls, she's done the whole boob job thing, so that makes her look a bit unnatural. For her sake, I hope she's nothing like her ditzy character in the "Just Go With It" flick that was absolute cringe-worthy and almost Taylor Swift/Valentine's Day bad. And the new Transformers girl from Victoria's Secret does absolutely nothing for me either, at least in the previews/pictures I've seen so far. ewwwwwwwwwwwww, too, those big butt Brazilian girls. Now the lithe/thinner ones with the dancer's legs at Carnivale, that's more like it.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ May 24, 2011 -> 03:11 PM) You know, I forgot to list it too because, well, JFP had a nice start so we're all hope and happiness, but add Jake Peavy to the list of epic failure. I mean, trading for an injured starter just can't ever be a good idea. And the lack of results from the Javy trade, although that always felt like more of a salary dump and "change of scenery" trade...a mutual parting of the ways after how 2008 ended. But never would have thought in my wildest dreams that Lillibridge would be far and away the biggest "prize" from that deal.

And the obvious problem with dumping Rios (and it's moot due to its impossibility now) is that it once again shows the complete disaster which has been CF for the White Sox since the Aaron Rowand years. While never a huge Rowand fan, at least he was an average major leaguer or above for his time with us, especially considering his contract and age. We've gone through Brian Anderson, Mackowiak, Jerry Owens, Erstad, Swisher, Pods, Griffey, Wise and probably forgetting at least 2-3 more...not to mention trading Anthony Webster, Chris B. Young and Jeremy Reed. If nothing else, this development failure led to 2 other related fiascos..."reaching" for Alex Rios based on talent/potential alone AND having to trade for Juan Pierre at this stage in his career. I can't even remember the last time we really had a GOOD lead-off hitter over a long period of time. Maybe Lance Johnson or Tim Raines in his first couple of years with us, although he wasn't nearly the base-stealing threat he'd been at that point. Or Ray Durham. And now Mitchell has a LONG LONG path to get to the point where he's even Carl Crawford Lite.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 23, 2011 -> 11:21 PM) No one is going to want to take on Rios and Peavy's contract right now. You're most likely going to have to eat a very good portion of that money, which, if that is the case, is not really accomplishing anything since you have no one waiting in the wings that they are blocking. Unless you simply DH Viciedo and played Jordan Danks on the OF, but that's a huge stretch. I don't think they'd want to make Dayan a full-time DH at this point in his career...and that leave a huge gap not having a LH power hitter in the line-up. Greg, as for the Yankees taking Rios/Dunn, they're already stuck with Posada's contract, I can't see where they would allocate $30 million THIS YEAR (plus 3 more guaranteed years for Dunn) for the DH position until/if Dunn proves he can hit, in which case he's probably more valuable to the Sox to retain anyway. As far as Rios goes, they already have Swisher/Granderson/Gardner for the OF, and we've already covered the DH issue. And you certainly don't trade for Rios to DH him...you'd have to DH Swisher and play Rios in the OF. That's a bit more logical for the Yankees to do, but I'm not sure they're ready to just give up on Posada yet or eat his contract. Maybe in another 4-6 weeks a better picture will emerge there. Or Colon/Garcia will go down for the rest of the season and their hands will be forced to find another starter.

I posted a long time ago that the goal was to be 6 games below .500 heading into the DET series. Even if we go 4-6 on this road trip, we have DET and then SEA at home and should be able to get to .500 or close to it around the All-Star break. As long as Cleveland's not 22-26 games over .500, we should be okay. EVEN THEN, we were 6 1/2 or 7 games back of the Royals at the 2003 ASB and made that up in about 2 weeks....both teams (Sox and Twins) did, in fact.

When are the Indians going to cool down at Progressive/Jacobs? 6-1, Indians over the Reds at home now.

QUOTE (The Ginger Kid @ May 22, 2011 -> 12:32 PM) but you have to admire the way the veterans called out the younger guys on the way they've been playing and losing. I respect the fact that there's a sense of zero tolerance for this brand of losing in the clubhouse, and while it may not change their fortunes, it sure beats the hell out of saying "we're not panicking." Who was that, Denard Span? Cuddyer? By the way, the Indians still don't suck. Poised to sweep the Reds at home.

That was a crazy managing job by Gardenhire. They were up 4-1, then 4-3, then 6-3 and 6-5 before the grand slam. Obviously made a desperation move there to bring in Capps in the 8th with no outs. I think at that moment, only Swarzak and possibly Slowey (although he pitched yesterday and has been getting rocked in the pen) were available behind the closer. Nathan pitched well, though, FWIW.

Before trying to trade for a third baseman, the Rockies probably will see what they can get from Josh Fields. The former White Sox player entered the weekend hitting .363 with seven homers and 30 RBIs for Triple-A Colorado Springs. from Phil Rogers' "Whispers" at www.chicagotribune.com/sports

QUOTE (ROC Sox Fan @ May 21, 2011 -> 09:32 AM) I believe if Mark gets traded an additional year on his contract is automatically invoked. That was last year (and it would have jumped to $15 million guaranteed for 2012 had he been traded in 2011). But he still has the NTC.

If they're not in the hunt, I can see several changes. Buehrle has been pitching exceptionally well lately, so he'll command at least two first-round pick type talents. The Sox still need protection in case he's dealt, so they'll need at least one top pitching prospect as Danks is 1 ½ years away from free agency. Think Mark G. has the Buehrle compensation a little exaggerated with the salary he's making. Don't imagine in my wildest dreams getting two first round pick talents back. For Danks, yes. from Mark Gonzalez mailbag www.chicagotribune.com/sports

We're tied with the Pirates and Astros with only 8 home wins (8-13). I guess on the bright side, we were 5-12 not so long ago. Ahead of only the Twins with their measy 4 wins. So much for Santos being the sure-fire All-Star pick. Back to 50/50 with Konerko.

Can't believe Dunn's now 0 for 27 against lefties. Thome-esque. Well, I guess there's nowhere else to go but up.

It's still hard to discount the fact that Omar played such a huge role in 2010 getting us going and has had a number of key performances already in 2011. The team's 9-3 recent record (I'll use greg775 logic here) argues that Ozzie's been right more often than not about line-ups the past 2 weeks.

I'm sure Ozzie's just trying to get Morel with the most favorable pitching match-ups to raise his confidence and batting average. Obviously he'll play against all lefties, but I have no problem with it until Morel gets in a real groove offensively, as long as the team's winning. Morel just had another error saved there. Has Morel always thrown from so far down or was that just sloppy mechanics on a slower runner where he had all the time in the world to throw him out?

That was encouraging. Humber's had a knack for pitching out of jams so far this season. For a minute, maybe he thought he was still pitching for the Mets against the Dodgers. CLE and DET are both trailing by 4 runs. That's encouraging. Looks like pretty brutal weather there in Chicago. On Stranger Tides, indeed. Hawk called that Rios looper an RBI just a bit too fast there.

Maybe Beckham's homer will get him going again. Then again, he could get homer/pull happy.

If we can beat the Indians again, there might be a genuine renewal/reversal of hope by at least 50% of the bandwagon that's been lost.

QUOTE (DirtySox @ May 17, 2011 -> 10:04 AM) Royals to call up Danny Duffy. Really looking forward to seeing him pitch. Huge fan of him and Hosmer. I hope we get to see Moose & Montgomery sometime this year too. I'm pretty excited for Royals fans. http://mlb.sbnation.com/2011/5/17/2175418/...ffy-royals-news What is it with this organization? Between Greinke and Duffy, that's two guys with huge ability that wanted to quit the game. Robert Smith-itis.

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?g...id=mlb#continue Merkin game write-up with lots of good quotes. And Ozzie still wants to manage in the NL and have every game be 1-0, decided on sacrifice bunts/flies, stolen bases and hitting to the right side of the field. He should trade places with Gardenhire, that style is a lot more suitable for Target Field, Safeco, Oakland Coliseum (I refuse to call it overstock.com) or PetCo.