caulfield12

QUOTE (knightni @ Sep 17, 2010 -> 04:00 PM) 1984-1992 was brutal. You don't want that. Not really. That 1990 White Sox team was my favorite of all-time. We were putting the pieces in place like Thomas, Ventura, McDowell, Alvarez, Sosa (that went bust), Alex Fernandez, Lance Johnson, Jason Bere, etc., for an extended string of winning baseball and also opening up the new stadium, which turned out initially to be a great disappointment but it was still exciting to be leaving Old Comiskey. In 1991 and 92, you could see the potential that would be fulfilled in 1993 and the strike-shortened 94 season. Unfortunately, the Indians' monster wasn't far behind. Now 1984-1987, I'll agree with you there. There was Ozzie to entertain the fans and that was about it. Thigpen, I guess. And Fisk, of course.

QUOTE (Lemon_44 @ Sep 17, 2010 -> 05:39 AM) Kenny is pretty good at acquiring pitching talent. Danks, Floyd, Jenks, Thornton, Jackson,Pena, and Peavy were all very good pickups without giving a bunch away. My problem with him is that he goes all one way with the everyday players.It's either been all power and no speed/contact or atttempting the opposite this year. Is it that tough to get a good mix of both. The Sox have enough pieces in place to make the proper adjustments. They just need to do it. Pena? Not so much. Peavy? We paid an arm and a leg, salary-wise. You can add Contreras, Loaiza, Santos and Jenks (for most of his time here) to the list.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Sep 16, 2010 -> 02:57 PM) He's had a decent success rate. It would be easier if he had the Yankees job. This year wasn't his best or the worst. He miffed on Teahan so far but was replaced by signing Omar. Maybe Teahan was a short term solution at 3rd to begin with. Jones/Kotsay hasn't worked out but they are still winning games more games than last year. I still get a laugh over the Peavy trade since everyone assumed he would be a Cub. I never thought the 2005 team before the season started would turn out with a ring. Never. I thought 2006 would be a repeat WS. It wasn't. There are some still in the boat claiming trading Rowand was one of the worst moves by Kenny. It would be easy to say go get Beltre but you have to outbid and JR doesn't like long term deals. I can't blame him either. Unless it's a long-term deal for Scott Linebrink or Mark Teahen, who nobody is bidding against us for...well, in Linebrink's case, the argument was always that WAS the market for successful short relievers but there's never been an explanation given for that extension.

Well, one thing's absolutely for certain. If/when the Twins do win the World Series, we won't have this 1 WS title and 12 playoff victories versus 6 playoff appearances in 9 years (and very nearly a 7th) and only one series win (against the A's) argument. I think that Beane's approach with a $100 million payroll gives us a chance to build something for 2-3-4 years and at least a 30-50% chance to beat the Twins every year. If you read the KW article, one thing that stands out is his propensity for tinkering...it's like he can never stick with a plan for more than one year without deconstructing it and throwing together another blueprint that might lead to success or disaster, but usually ends up somewhere in the middle. And that's always the elephant in the room for the Sox...to be great, we'd have to be horrible for 3-5 years and be in a "reloading" process. The problem is that KW doesn't have the patience to do that (remember how many times they said they'd never want to go through another 2007 again, both Ozzie and KW?) and the revenue loss in terms of season tickets, walk up and advertising/sponsors would be tremendous. We'd be back to the late 80's or late 90's again and talking about moving the team even to one of the few gullible/naive and economically anomalous markets left in the US, Mexico and Caribbean. The thing is, if you told White Sox fans they would have to suffer for four or five years with teams winning 65-75 games, then you'd be rewarded with at least one World Series appearance, most Sox fans would take that bargain. But the counterexample will always be where is that World Series for the Pirates, Orioles, Indians (they were close), Nationals, Royals, Blue Jays, Mariners, etc.

We might not be that far from greatness, but it's also hard to argue how we could possibly be improved... 1) Beckham would need to put up an 850-875 OPS 2) Quentin would need to hit consistently all year, especially on the road 3) We'd have to find the money to resign Konerko and AJ 4) We'd have to find a replacement for Jones/Kotsay with seemingly no money to spend (except on Manny Ramirez) 5) Peavy has to be 100% 6) The Twins would have to succumb to even more injuries or bad luck than they did this year (Morneau concussion)...and not bring in any new FA's, and possibly lose both Hudson and Thome, although I can't imagine Jim retiring OR not going back there again in 2011. And you know Ozzie and KW wouldn't bring him back, Jim would probably refuse after Ozzie's idiotic comments and if he did come back, he would be done after all. 7) The one big improvement would seemingly be Chris Sale waiting in the wings instead of Harrell/Torres/Pena 8) The bullpen has to replace Jenks, probably Putz, 50/50 KW lets Pena go, and Sale might be starting in the minors or majors (if Peavy isn't ready)...so that leaves Thornton and Linebrink, NOT good at all, and a huge concern coming off our 2nd half struggles in that area 9) Morel would have to come in and put up a 750 OPS and play Gold Glove caliber defense, because we can't rely up Teahen or Viciedo defensively, and Vizquel due to his age 10) We have to hope the "good" Alex Rios turns up again

The Rockies are kind of like the White Sox, except they're notorious for being hot in the second half of the season. They were pretty good in the mid 90's, went through a pretty long dry spell of rebuilding and losing about 1/3rd of their fanbase, but they've worked hard to become a competitive team through a combination of good drafting and some key trades like the one for CarGo. The Padres were pretty decent in the first half the decade and then turned to a rebuilding mode with the exception of holding onto Adrian Gonzalez. Braves fit that mold....the Rangers, to some extent, they had a core of players like Michael Young and Ian Kinsler, but most of that team has been built around those guys by Daniels, who started off learning on the job but who has rebounded nicely to become one of the best young GM's in the game, and his background was actually in retail/marketing at the corporate level.

Which means you have to make Quentin a DH or dump him and then have to replace both Quentin and Konerko offensively (making Rios, Beckham and Ramirez your top 3 offensive players)... And not having Teahen/Viciedo at 3B. You probably also can't count on Vizquel to repeat this season's success again...certainly not to be the starter at 3B. So that means Morel at 3B, Viciedo/Teahen at 1B/DH and a new RF/DH if/when you ditch Quentin. That's #1) a tremendous amount of offense to replace in the line-up and 2) a plan that will really ago awry if Morel, Teahen, Viciedo and possibly Flowers don't hit. I think Viciedo will hit, but we have no idea (we can guess) in terms of projecting out Morel, Flowers or even Teahen for a full season. One thing it does mean is that our pitching staff and bullpen will have even more pressure placed on them than the starters did the first two months of this season, with the scenario of losing both Quentin and Konerko. There's no way in hell they're going to be able to dump Teahen without eating 75% or more of his contract. So we're stuck with him, for better or worse. And the idea of Manny Ramirez coming back to Chicago is now officially laughable in the span of 10 days. That took some work, Manny.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 08:41 PM) Duensing should be up for Cy Young votes based on his amazing contributions this season (not really, but it's hard to argue with his productivity). Something they were talking about on the radio the other day is how the Twins are going to be a hot spot for FA pitchers, as everyone would love to pitch half their games in that cavernous park. And that's the scary thing...they're six pitchers deep right now, and that's not even including the likes of Perkins and Swarzak. Kyle Gibson has the ability on paper to be a 1/2, frontline starter in the Garza mode. We actually might have to trade away one of our four starters due to payroll concerns...we probably don't bring Garcia back (unless Ozzie's still manager) and who knows what we'll get out of Peavy. In 2012/13, things are looking even more bleak. The only thing that will save the White Sox is Sale becoming an ace, and the odds of that lasting (and we don't know how his velocity and mechanics would hold up over 175-225 IP) for 6 years isn't that great on the surface, either.

I think it all depends on Duensing. If he can take some of their LH hitters out of play and somehow beat the Yankees, the Twins have a 50/50 chance to beat the Yankees. It's really hard to pick just three starters...they can set up for the playoffs early, or decide to go with Baker/Slowey/Blackburn as the 4th. Blackburn, since being recalled from AAA, has probably pitched the best of those 3 guys at the back end of the rotation, although Duensing has faltered a little bit as well.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 09:11 PM) Nice try. The pitching sucked. When that sucks along with defense (2 years in a row, starting 3rd baseman loses job)nothing can overcome that. Next. When we've had Vizquel at 3B and Andruw Jones in RF, it has been the best White Sox defensive alignment since the late 50's/early 60's ballclubs with Aparicio and Nellie Fox. Actually, most of the time, although the Twins are first in fielding percentage, the White Sox have actually been the better overall defense because 75% of the Sox errors have come in bunches and Kubel, Cuddyer and Delmon Young are all horrible whenever they attempt to play defense (except against us).

QUOTE (southsideirish71 @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 09:08 PM) The team was built poorly. They were built on the idea that we could recreate the 2005 pitching staff and be lights out and win 3-2 games all year long. This is not the NL. We play in the American League and in a stadium that plays like a bandbox in the summer. We took a valuable position and put two bench players and made it into a mess. Its the typical Ozzie formula, take a crappy player that should be the last man on the bench and overuse him. The first two months when we had a horrible horrible offense might of been mitigated a bit if we say actually had 9 hitters up there instead of 8 and a pitcher. And yet we had our surge in June and July, two of the hottest months when the park played smallest and we hit a lot of homers. The offensive numbers, overall, aren't terrible at all, and probably better than most of us predicted. It has been the bullpen and more recently again the starting pitching that has really been the reason for our downfall...along with a tougher schedule and the fact that the Twins have been playing out of their minds without Morneau for the second year in a row down the final stretch.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 09:05 PM) You don't know that. If we got off to a better start this year, especially offensively. we would have had a lot more breathing room. Don't forget Kotsay's horrible ability to hit with RISP and the rally killing that resulted. It would have helped if Pierre and Ramirez hit in the first two months as well... Just so many things you can point to, AJ's hitting pretty much all season, Beckham being last in the majors in OPS about 3 months ago, Quentin's complete inability to hit on the road, the list goes on and on. Pierre and Kotsay were egregiously horrible with RISP during that timeframe. And yet you can trace a lot of the problems to starting pitching (with the exception of Garcia) the first two months and the bullpen struggles over the last two months.

Yeah, the Tigers were chased down both times by the Twins, but I was talking about the 2008 and 2009 seasons specifically. The weird thing is that most Tigers fans consider the White Sox to be their biggest rivalry, and yet the Twins have been the much better club.

QUOTE (southsideirish71 @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 08:59 PM) Well pre-season predictions mean s*** when you are in first place after the ASB. Its one thing to play good fundamental hard nosed solid baseball and lose. Its another thing to get taken to the woodshed by the crap in the AL and then bend over for our annual Twins slam. The last two years, of all the teams leading their divisions at the All-Star break, I think it was only the Tigers in 2009 and the D-Backs in 2008 who didn't make the playoffs (10/12 teams eventually made it or at least got the Wild Card). Add the White Sox to the casualty list.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 08:50 PM) Gavin's ERA going to be over 4 now...but yeah, safe to say Twins starting pitching is just a little better than ours. Not according to Rongey. How many times have we said this season would go down to the final series of the year? Doesn't look like it's going to happen in 2010. The thing is, even with Hudson instead of Jackson, our rotation wouldn't be unbeatable because our offense in 2011 is going to struggle mightily. We spent the past offseason worrying about that element of the club, and things are going to look more dire now, because resigning Konerko at elevated dollar figures based on 2010 is a recipe for disaster...OTOH, it seems impossible to imagine bringing in another bat to replicate Konerko's stats this year. And Hudson in the rotation frees up $8 million or so for that aforementioned bat. Still, if they can spend $3.8 million on a worthless Manny Ramirez, they SHOULD be able to spend SOME money. But I don't see any easy solution to get out of this mess...we're boxed in by the Twins and the probability of the Tigers having a much-improved club next year if they spend even $30-40 million in new contracts to replace the $60 million of contracts coming off the books. With Cabrera, you don't need many pieces to build an offense around him, and Austin Jackson looks like a keeper.

Never would have predicted a Twins-White Sox game thread for this series would be at only seven pages long one month ago. We made up 14 games, and now we've lost almost all of them back, only 1 1/2 game differential from where we were at the "low" point of the season when we were 9 games under .500 and 9 1/2 back. Of course, our overall record will be pretty decent...85-86-87 wins, but nothing to write home about. We're back in that position in September where we might as well lose games and get a higher draft pick next year, because the attendance from here on out is going to be abysmal, except for the Red Sox fans that might show up at the end of the season (undoubtedly, they'll be out of the WC race, so even that will be a pick-up of only 3-5,000 fans).

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 01:48 PM) Not sure what that means. It's basically saying we're better than the Twins despite their 6/9 ALCD run (very easily could have been 7/9 and 1/10 for the Sox) because our 12 wins from 2005 and 2008 more than cancel out their few playoff wins this decade. In fact, the only team that the Twins beat was the A's in 2002...and the only team the A's beat was the Twins, likewise. They were swept last year and have been blown out of every playoff appearance by the big-market teams.

QUOTE (nitetrain8601 @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 01:35 PM) Oh please. The sky is falling. I agree the Sox need to draft better and put better resources in Latin America. At the same time, we have, but haven't given them time to pan out yet other than Alexei. I think Viciedo very easily could turn into a Kendry Morales type hitter. Honestly, it would be a super duper dark day if the Sox rolled out a starting lineup of: C Flowers 1B Viciedo 2B Beckham 3B Morel SS Ramirez RF Rios? CF Mitchell LF - Danks That's a pretty awful lineup. Seats would be completely empty, even for series against the Yankees. The team wouldn't recover and we would be strapped with a KC type payroll in a large market. That would be doom. Now if you threw in a Carl Crawford here (unfortunately he will be out of our price range), Beltre at 3B (assuming he could repeat his two strong, and perhaps anomalous offensive years, one with LA and now with BOS), a productive Carlos Pena at 1B, that line-up becomes at least league-average if Mitchell becomes a star. Of course, that's a big if. I feel pretty confident about Viciedo going forward, with Flowers as a huge question mark and Danks, I wouldn't even connect his name with a starting position. Morel might be a tweener, you'd really have to surround him with a lot of offensive pop at USCF, because he's not the kind of hitter who you could consistently expect to put up anything over a 750 or 775 OPS. That would be fine, if he fielded as well as many think he's capable of...

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 15, 2010 -> 01:25 PM) So basically we want to be a mid-market payroll team with reasonable ticket prices that makes the playoffs every year and is nearly unstoppable once they get there every time, and we're going to call for management reorganizations until that happens? The closest models we have to follow, if you throw out the Twins...probably the Cardinals and Angels, in terms of the upper tier franchises. The problem is that the Cardinals own the entire St. Louis market, and their fanbase might be the best (overall) in baseball. So perhaps the Angels, because they were the "second tier" team in that market and have really battled the Dodgers (especially since the McCourt divorce fiasco) to a draw, almost. Other teams that come to mind include the Braves, Mariners in the early 00's and Giants, although we're never going to consistently spend the money SF has under Magowan (examples like Zito and Rowand come to mind right away). I think the St. Louis comparison is appropriate because they're now quite payroll conscious, especially since Jocketty left, but even before...they were in the process of operating more and more like a mid-market team economically while simultaneously being the home of the game's biggest superstar. I can't wait to see how things shake out with Rasmus, LaRussa and a new deal for Pujols.

QUOTE (chiguy79 @ Sep 14, 2010 -> 09:12 PM) I expect we will be picked 3/4th this offseason also, motivation hopefully. I just have a feeling KW is a repeat of the subprime mortgage mess and we are going to have to pay for the "I want it now" mentality soon and the house of cards will be exposed and we are going to have some tough years...hopefully I am wrong and we have some good surprises out of the system...who knows I know I didn't expect a WS in 2005! Hope springs eternal come February 2011!! Having acquired Ramirez and Edwin Jackson now is looking like the death/freeze of/for any offseason moves and probably facilitates the depatures of Konerko and AJ as well...

QUOTE (southsideirish71 @ Sep 14, 2010 -> 09:09 PM) Its the same thing over and over and over. Their game plan is simple. Throw lots of breaking pitches and pitch backwards. We get very aggressive and get ourselves out. When we get men on, throw breaking pitches and expand the zone. Our game plan is the opposite. Throw lots of fastballs, because for some reason in all the years we have played them, we haven't figured out that they hit fastballs. They catch the ball and play good defense. We pucker up and kick the ball. They hit the cut off man, We over throw the ball and allow the trailers to get into scoring position. They shorten up their stroke and make contact with men on. We swing from our heels and have no game plan. 3-1 and 0-2 are the same count as far as we are concerned. They pound the zone with strikes, we like to get behind hitters. Because you know, no one is expecting a 2-0 fastball. The twins run the bases aggressively. We run fast, sure into outs more than other teams, but we run fast. The big change besides running into so many outs and caught stealings is sacrificing so many potential big innings by bunting runners over. I knew as soon as I saw that Guillen was going to have Alexei (already with 2 hits) bunt the runners over to 2nd and 3rd that somehow the bases would end up loaded and we would inevitably fail to get them in. That's been the formula all season long against Minnesota for the Sox.

I think 78-84 wins was what the majority predicted, as Minnesota was clearly the favorite, with many picking Detroit second. That said, after 90 games, we were in first place by 4 1/2 games and had the Twins reeling and on the ropes before Jenks choked the fourth game of that series away and that was the beginning of the end...followed by the loss to the Mariners that Jenks also blew the following series.

Well, we can cheer for Aaron Cunningham (now hitting .325), Jon Garland and Clayton Richard to hold off Uribe and Rowand, haha. I really hope the Padres win that division...and to see Chapman become a star for Cincy in the post-season (Dusty's return to glory), definitely rooting for Atlanta over Philly, and likewise the Rangers and the Rays. Anyone but the Yankees or Phillies.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Sep 14, 2010 -> 08:54 PM) Flowers, Viciedo, Lilly, Morel for starters. They might actually, you know, beat the Twins. I guess we're still "in it" though, even tho we are 7 out. You know if we win the next two, it's just five out. So cmon out and pack the Cell, fans, will be the marketing cry. Don't give up. I think White Sox fans know better. With the exception of one "lucky" post-season game (because of the coin flip, a rule later changed), that's the ONLY possible reason to have hope...but yet here we are with another late-season, second half home game against Minnesota "choking" it away with the bases loaded and the relievers blowing up in innings 7-9.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 14, 2010 -> 08:51 PM) yep...for as hard and unlucky as he hit the ball the first few months, he's been the exact opposite since the ASB. Balta was so freaking right about trading him when his value was high. His contract is going to be such an albatross. I wouldn't say that...yet. Look at players like Alexei Ramirez and Beckham who looked completely worthless the first two months, or Quentin looking like an MVP and now untradeable again in the span of 45 days. Gavin Floyd was one of the worst pitchers in baseball the first two months and one of the best ever since. This team is like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. That's why it must be so difficult to decide what direction to go in for the front office and JR.