caulfield12

How can Nick Markakis have only 43 RBI's this year?

C'mon Ancient Darren Oliver, one more out against Hudson and they'll have escaped with 'mo on their side.

Well, at least Guthrie's not doing this 5-6 times per season against us pitching for the Indians. That's about the only positive I can draw from this game. And nobody's gotten hurt.

Hmmm...looks like we're going to have to either win this game or really hope promoting the Yankees and Manny Ramirez can draw the crowds and not our being 5.5-6.5 GB in the standings.

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 07:37 PM) You're right, because it would be great to get this beat up bullpen even more innings to cover. Baltimore fans could argue Floyd threw at Jones after the HR. Great job, Gordon. UGH. Since July 15th, it seems we try to minimize every scoring opportunity. With how this season's heading, I think this is one situation where some juices flowing and a brawl like the 2000 one with the Tigers might be enough to wake this team up and get them headed into the right direction with the Yankees looming on the horizon. It's a big risk, you don't want to get anyone injured, but SOMETHING is needed to bring this team back to life. Whether it's Manny Ramirez, a brawl, ANYTHING!

Yay, we didn't hit into a double play. Nice execution by Juan Pierre there...he's turned into someone I don't cringe completely with when he's batting now with RISP.

Floyd's got to nail someone and get tossed from the game. We haven't protected our hitters all season, and Beckham's too valuable to this franchise. We've already seen how a hand injury affected Quentin for a full season.

Can we please score this run and tie it up? Thanks. Also, Michael Young, you absolutely suck at defense. No news there.

Floyd really aiming the ball instead of just letting it go. Getting away with it, for the most part...but a little offense against Guthrie would be nice. We've consistently struggled against that guy this year.

I thought Carlos was supposed to only hit like crap on the road. What happened to Quentin and Rios?

At least the Rangers are rallying. Missed another run on the ground rule double, 3-2 Rangers now. The last week is starting to feel like the end of 2008 all over again...except we're a bit further back.

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 06:35 PM) They need to hire the Blue Jays hitting coach. Strange results with that team. Leading the majors largely behind Bautista, who was averaging about 15 homers per season coming into 2010. But you've had players like Wells, Rios and now Hill and Lind totally go into the tank over the last few seasons. Not consistent results...but amazing individual seasons. We don't need Luke Scott, either!!!! Kotsay will carry us through.

I think we've reached the "everything that can go wrong, will go wrong" stage that we were mired in the first two months of 2010.

QUOTE (The Ginger Kid @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 06:47 PM) DET is rolling. good thing they don't have the pitching to sustain it. Don't be so certain of that...Verlander, Galaragga, Porcello, Scherzer and Bonderman, there's no reason those guys couldn't get on a roll together. On paper, that rotation looks just as good or better than what the Twins have been throwing out there all season. Just that the results haven't been there on a consistent basis, but the talent is there.

Pretty quiet game thread. I guess Manny Ramirez will be injecting (literally and figuratively) some life into this franchise the last month, one way or the other. LOL at the fact that spending $6-7-8 million over the full season obviously would have been a better allocation of resources than $4 million over one month in absolute desperation.

I was talking about in OUR ALCD.

It seems we've let up a little bit against the Indians and the Royals the last couple of seasons...maybe we're overconfident against them, and the Royals' style of play always seems to give us fits. Historically, we play the best against DET, and most fans/announcers there consider the White Sox their biggest rival, although the Twins are the ones who knocked them out of the ALCD title at the end in 06 and 09. For whatever reason, maybe it's because of Carlos Guillen/Ordonez/Cabrera, Ozzie is more enthused about beating these guys. I think another reason might be that the Tigers feature a lot of "stuff" pitchers like Verlander who we tend to do better against, because the White Sox historically have been a fastball hitting team this decade. But yes, no division title winner has ever finished below .500 against their divisional opponents since the realignments and going to 18 games per season...at least since 2001, maybe it goes back even longer than that. In 2000, 2005, 2006 and 2008, we did a much better job taking care of our business with the other four teams.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 21, 2010 -> 01:12 PM) I can't figure out how I fit into this one. Aforementioned poster said he wanted all White Sox fans saying complimentary things towards the Twins to die in a plane crash. Close enough. I think that would qualify as a "fiery explosion."

QUOTE (since56 @ Aug 21, 2010 -> 06:34 AM) Did I touch a nerve,quitter? Not anymore, Bobby Jindal (reference to a certain poster's sig).

QUOTE (elgonzo4sox @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 11:18 PM) Great post Quinarvy! There's been far too much Twins Envy and Twins Love on this website. The Twins aren't invincible, nor are they light years ahead of the Sox. In fact, the two teams are about as evenly matched as they could possibly be, with the Twins holding a big edge in head-to-head W-L due more to good luck than anything else. Here is my proof that the Twins and Sox are just about dead even this year. The Twins 4 game edge in the standings sounds big, but it is merely 2 head-to-head wins. The Twins have beaten the Sox 10 times, but 7 of those wins are by one run. Pick your most agonizing two Sox losses to the Twins, and change one thing in those two games to make the Sox win, and the teams are tied in the standings. What if Bobby Jenks nailed down the save in the game when the Sox lead by 3 in the ninth? What if Thornton threw a letters-high fastball to Thome (who can't catch up to high heat) instead of a belt-high one, and he whiffs instead of hitting a walk-off home run? When you lose 7 one-run games, it's easy to find one thing in a couple of games that, had it gone differently, would have flipped the outcome. That is how far back the Sox are behind the Twins: two bad pitches, or two missing clutch hits, or two Twins seeing-eye singles that just eluded a Sox fielder's glove. The Twins are +4 games ahead of the Sox in the standings, but +5 games ahead during head-to-head play. That means the Sox have played the rest of MLB one game better than the Twins so far this season. If the Twins are so great, why do the Sox have a better record vs. the rest of MLB? The Sox and Twins have played 15 times so far this season. With tonight's 11-0 shellacking, the runs scored by both teams over those 15 games now stands at 71 runs for the Sox, and 72 runs for the Twins. If those 71 and 72 runs had scored at different points in time, the games won/lost would be something other than 5 games won by the Sox and 10 games won by the Twins. In fact, if the runs were basically evenly distributed, the Sox would have won 7 times and the Twins 8 times. And the teams would be tied for first. Yes, I realize that at the end of the day all that counts is wins and losses, but when you look at the evidence, the Twins and Sox are a lot more evenly matched than most people probably think. The difference right now is very small, and the Sox still have 3 more games versus the Twins at home to close the gap. So as Bluto would say: LET'S GO-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O!!!!!! What's the number one sign of a great team? Their record in one and two run games. Actually, about a month ago, we were close to #1 in this category, but we had a pretty bad record in two run games. Now we're closer to the middle of the pack for record in one and two run games...and it's 75% a function of our bullpen's problems. The most important runs are usually the ones scored in the first inning and in innings 7-8-9. This has always been an issue for the White Sox...you can compare our OVERALL offensive statistics with almost any team in baseball from 2000-2004, but our runs were never evenly distributed or consistent, nor was our starting pitching, mostly because the problems at the back end of those rotations. You could also do the same thing with the 2006 offense...but we scored a disproportionate number of runs in the first four months of the season. In the end, it's great that you're TRYING to spin it in a positive way, but I am thinking how I would respond to fans of the Red Sox or Angels in 2005 who said we just got "lucky" or didn't deserve to beat them. Great teams also create their own luck...lesser teams fall victim to bad luck, injuries, "circumstances beyond their control." It's just the nature of baseball. It's also the reason we don't have an MLB "Pythagorean" champion or "Beane Count" champion.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 07:06 PM) Only Masset was a prospect when we got him. The rest were all MLB pitchers. Although Sisco really felt more like a "project/suspect" than an established veteran. He had a very good first 3-4 months in his rookie year and struggled mightily from that point on in his aborted career.

Hmmm...great early hitting, but feels like we should be up 3 or 4-0. Rios and Beckham, we can't win without you guys.

Thanks for keeping 1B awake...Hudson was actually expecting that one, Mark. Way to keep the right side of the infield on their toes. It will be interesting to see how long Ozzie goes before he inserts Andruw Jones defensively. We absolutely have to win this game...and Teahen's defense in RF is basically equal to Quentin's, with Mark having a stronger and more accurate arm.

Seems that of everything that's gone wrong the last two weeks, it has been Alex Rios no longer being a huge threat in our line-up that sticks out the most to me. Obviously, there are other factors, like our starters collapsing and the failures of Jenks/Putz and even Thornton.

Let's try to get a lead at the beginning of the game instead of playing catch-up guys.