caulfield12

QUOTE (Jenksy Cat @ Aug 15, 2010 -> 05:44 PM) The worst part for me is watching the Twins get inevitably swept in the first round. They have absolutely no f***ing chance against any playoff team meanwhile if the sox could put their s*** together, our team would be scary in the playoffs. Not necessarily. I do think they need to get Morneau back, but if Liriano, Pavano and Duensing continue to pitch as well as they have since the ASB, there's a 50/50 chance they could knock off one of the AL East teams. Their bullpen has been sturdy, kind of the "bend but don't break" defense.

Do they have a Thursday night game? I was hoping, since they're 4-19 against the Twins in the second half dating back to 2008, that they could just get that Thursday game out of the way quietly, in the middle of a hot and lazy afternoon when nobody would have to watch the dreaded carnage in front of their televisions at home.

That way the last 20-30 minutes seemed kind of anti-climactic. Ozzie, you might want to set aside that idea of writing a book about the 2010 season for the time being, because NOBODY in Chicago will care to read it with things looking as bad as they do now. Goodbye Putz, Jenks and Andruw Jones. It was nice knowing you. Hello, Sale. Hopefully Konerko, if this is the end of his Sox career, can go out on a better note and the White Sox can actually take 2/3 in Minnesota...I wouldn't bet on it happening, but there's always hope.

Signing JJ Putz, lol. What was once the best FA relief pitching sign of the offseason has quickly gone to MEHHHHHH. And goodbye to about $5-7 million. Don't see him getting a two year contract right now. He can be the 7th or 8th inning set-up guy, like a Dotel, but he's no longer a closer, that much is clear.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 15, 2010 -> 03:29 PM) Hawk is out today with an illness in the family. Hopefully back on Tuesday. Hawk would have been out with a coronary if he was there in person to witness this implosion. Seriously, this game would have been a lot for him to deal with...I was ready to believe we could take it to the Twins if we were able to complete the comeback, but now, not so much. The momentum change in this division feels permanent. It could change and swing back to us one more time, but we don't have the type of team or bullpen now to hang with the Twins, Yankees and Red Sox.

Linebrink and Putz both had four wonderful months in 2008 and 2010 and then POOF!!!

The only thing that would be the perfect topper to this game would be Jenks coming in now and getting booed? Hopefully they're not saying goodbye to the 2010 season. Everything was going great until Jenks blew that final game in the first series after the break in Minnesota. That will go down as the key game, the Mariners' loss when Vizquel keyed the comeback, losing 3/4 to the Orioles...not being able to beat the Twins 2/3 at USCF. The supposed strength of the White Sox, relief pitching, has abandoned them at the worst possible time. At least it doesn't feel like 2003 when we had the best team in baseball arguably. We're far from that.

Thanks for destroying any motivation the fans have for coming out the rest of the season. Well, the Yankees and Red Sox fans can at least give us some additional revenue for our payroll, that's about the extent of it.

Well, the Twins were down 4 1/2 games and were staring at THREE more games at USCF and they swept through those... Yet it seems impossible for us to do anything now but POSSIBLY win 1 of 3 games in Minnesota.

Cross Pena off the list for next year too. He's nothing but DJ Carraso with better stuff. Sure, he's had 2-3 nice outings when he went long and saved us, but he hasn't done us any favors recently. I'm actually thinking we would be better off with Brandon Allen fo 2011.

Well, thanks Tigers for proving the point that it would have been unwise to overspend on Putz for 2011. Now the problem is that we have to replace two back-end relievers with who exactly? Scott Linebrink? Pena? Sale makes sense, you can see him getting it done, but are we sure we want to make him the 2nd lefty out of the pen? Maybe.

Now, the better question is can we get a clutch hit in the 8th or 9th inning? Hasn't been our strength the last 10 days.

It seems that the White Sox are going to get a further reputation for second half collapses if this plays out the way it's looking...Jones home run notwithstanding. We can't come back just to turn around and lose this game. Horrible.

Gee, thanks Jones.

It would be ONE thing is we were starting a pitcher we expected would hold the Tigers to 2-3 runs. But the way Garcia's going, to ask the White Sox to outscore the Tiggers with that offense, I don't think so. Stranger things have happened, but it just seems the bad stretch this team was due for is upon us. Or it could be just an omen when a building they're constructing here in Thailand at my old university just collapsed an hour or so ago and 30-40 workers are missing or presumed dead at the moment.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Aug 15, 2010 -> 01:27 AM) Caulfield, I was just going by the analysis of Hawk and Stoney who, even as homers, crucified AJ on the play. Said on ball four it was inexcusable to throw the ball. Stoney said AJ "knew" that ball was high. I love AJP, I'm just going by our announcers. Curious as to why you see this one differently from those two. Remember it was ball four. We should have a separate thread on Soxtalk's feelings about AJ. I sense some growing disgust with him this year. I still like him, just don't understand his batting stance sometimes. I think there was a similar play the day/game before...where the ball went into CF because nobody covered 2B, the infield was shifting for a pull hitter. At least that's my recollection. I think this was a different situation.

And Aaron Rowand. That would have killed us, having had Linebrink/Contreras/MacDougal was bad enough. Torii Hunter, I don't like guessing about his health the final years of that contract, but he's a born leader. I would have been "okay" with either Hunter and now Rios. You're overpaying for both, but not by huge amounts. Unfortunately, the Marlins were seduced by Miller and Cameron Maybin, or we would have ended up with Cabrera.

That ball that AJ threw into CF was 100% on Alexei Ramirez. There was a "Thome shift" on at the time and he didn't get over there to cover to communicate with Beckham about who would be taking it. Not AJ's fault.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Aug 14, 2010 -> 10:02 PM) "Having Marv Throneberry play for your team is like having Willie Sutton play for your bank." Marvelous Marv Thornberry NY Mets 1962 Ok now compare that line to one we can come up with for Jenks and Putz and have some fun Inviting Bobby Jenks to Crispy Kreme when they're hot out of the oven Putz your playoff chances into prayers for Santos (meaning Saint in Spanish). Sorry Greg.

Rogers signed with Minnesota for two million a season. Kenny confirmed he offered him one million before the Twins topped the Sox offer. (How often do you hear that?) Kenny wasn't comfortable making another offer and the rest is history. I found that actually doing a google search which ended up at a WSI thread, from Mark Liptak. I think Boras was also Rogers' agent at the time. FWIW.

Victor Martinez's bat would be great, IF IF he's healthy. The problem is that his bat belongs at 1B/DH, not catcher. I just don't think it's a wise move to spend $8-10 million on Martinez, then risk him being hurt...not to mention that he used to be about the only catcher in the AL who could throw out a lower percentage than AJ (to Pierzynski's credit, he's been much better since Contreras left and Danks started learning from Buehrle). With Edwin Jackson now in the projected payroll, where's that money for Martinez going to come from? That's already assuming AJ, Jenks and Konerko are gone, yes?

The problem is that AJ and Flowers don't seem to mix very well. So you'd basically just be keeping Tyler around and praying he could get his game together while banishing him away from the big league camp and any kind of discussion about him taking AJ's job. You'd have to bring in Castro and AJ on one-year deals, telling them the team is basically in a holding pattern for one more year and waiting to see who emerges from that 3 headed group to be the starter in 2012.

Leading to the now "almost infamous" KW offering arbitration and Orlando failing to accept it scenario...which would have precluded Alexei Ramirez from becoming the shortstop we all know and love, lol. I think Dick Allen wrote 350-500 posts about that situation, if I remember correctly.

When did we trade away Garland? (Too funny, I didn't even remember this trade, I was thinking of the trade we almost made for Erstad with the Angels). And 2003, we didn't have a fifth starter and every team in baseball could have picked Kenny Rogers off the scrap heap and the Twins were prescient enough to do so, even though the guy's a total jerk. That's three seasons where we could or should have been playoff-bound and KW made massive mistakes. I'll give him a bit of a pass for this year, because you don't expect to go to the playoffs when Peavy goes down, but we were in position to do so...and still theoretically are, unless we get swept by the Twins on the road next week.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Aug 14, 2010 -> 09:19 PM) Danks better not go anywhere except into Reinsdorf's office to sign an extension. Jackson is looking good ands if we have five solid starters I say keep them. Pitching wins games Hello, Ranger! Joking. Of course, it's not the offense to blame for any losses this season. We can simply blame it on Jenks and Putz and make them the convenient scapegoats, right?