caulfield12

I guess we can make this the "travel/tourism" thread. I lived in Colombia, South America, for one year and simply loved it. It does really help to speak the language. Have also lived in China, Philippines and Thailand. Currently, in my 2nd year living and teaching (university and ESL, two jobs) in Thailand. Loved Philippines and now Thailand, China not so much, although it's an amazing and interesting country, I never really felt comfortable there. And my wife is from Russia...although technically we're separated and will be getting divorced soon, I can still claim her debts, lol.

Nobody could have predicted with 100% accuracy Dye and Konerko falling off so much. As mentioned, Beckham slumping has hurt the team as much as anyone, even though most of the hits he has managed have been pretty darn clutch, like against Sabathia and Nathan. They managed to rally enough to hold off the Twins last year...that, in and of itself, was a minor miracle.

Asdrubal Cabrera hasn't proven himself yet...any more than Ramirez has. And anyone can put up decent stats in meaningless games, we saw it with Kip Wells for years with the Pirates. Escobar and Aybar, both maybes but it's far from clear-cut. Andrus, same thing. Scutaro, going forward, for the next 4 seasons? No way. Even Rollins might be in decline at this point in his career, but you'd have to take him over Alexei right now. But for 2012 or 2013...don't think so. THE Riot, Sanchez and Christian Guzman, not a chance...Tejada, on an already defensively-challenged team, would make things far worse. He has less range than Jhonny Peralta, if that's possible.

I guess we can now add Adam Russell to the list, too. I suppose you could also make a case for Charlie Haeger, although he's viewed as more of a starter.

Greg, Rios isn't going ANYWHERE. He has been a bust for one month, but there's no way in hell he's tradeable right now, so forget that notion. It was a calculated gamble/risk that hasn't worked so far, but KW won't pull the plug on it yet. Yes, the downward trend is alarming, but he has a solid career track record, he's the answer to our CF defensive problems and he should be in the prime of his career. Konerko has been a bust the second half, should we trade him too? Beckham because of his poor month of August where he hit in the .220's? AJ came with less than glowing recommendations and we won a WS with him, you can say that about many players the White Sox have taken chances on over the last 20-25 years.

Still, if you look at the real problems in terms of the payroll of the White Sox, he's the most effective producer, just like Quentin/Danks/Floyd were last year. Look at Contreras, Dye, Thome, Jenks, Dotel, Linebrink and Konerko if you want to assess where the real meat of our payroll is going, and how well that money has been spent. Contreras and Konerko have never produced what their salaries warranted, but those contracts were understandable after 2005 (although he would have been better off with one year less of Jose's deal). The fact is, we could get an Everett or Jack Wilson type, but if our biggest challenge is offense (or is it also defense), which way do you go if you're KW? Ramirez is far from below-average offensively, he's very explosive and capable of carrying the team at times and no mention has been made of his many clutch hits since the first six weeks of the season. You have to give him at least one more season to prove what he can do, at the very least, until June/July 2010. Then KW can make a move...it's not like he's giving us these numbers and he's Cabrera's age and salary, he's in the prime of his career, can run, is athletic (in the new mold of future/current Sox players like Rios, Beckham, Jordan Danks, Shelby, Getz, Nix, Mitchell, Trayce Thompson, Brandon Allen (oops) that are not all "base cloggers" like the core of AJ/Crede/Konerko/Thome/Dye and even Carlos isn't completely limited athletically.

Guerrier had something like a 2.25 ERA coming into this series, but he's a lot like Linebrink and Dotel, those numbers look better on paper than in "clutch" situations with the game tied or only up by one run. Francisco has been in and out as the Rangers' closer, but nobody has ever questioned his stuff...it has always been more about his head and a number of injuries have also set him back.

It's hard to say about Holliday. With our current roster, you would have had to bench or platoon Dye and/or Quentin, and neither move would have made a whole lot of sense at the time those moves were made. Couple that with the Boras connection and the dubious likelihood of signing him in the offseason (although he would seem a good fit to put up numbers at USCF), it's a non-starter as a move. Anyone can look back at a particular year and say, well, if KW had just had the foresight to get Edwin Jackson and insert random RH reliever (Brandon Lyon), we'd have been well-set. KW has to figure out some of the statistical anomalies this year, like why even our best hitters like Beckham struggled so much at home, which should be a launching pad? The weather??? The defense? Execution with RISP and less than two outs. Baserunning in general, although Pods seems like 75% of the problem and I want no part of him as our leadoff hitter again in 2010. The fact is that this was only our 2nd come from behind victory ALL YEAR, we did that routinely in the first half of 2006, the last time we had a consistently devastating offense (the presence of BA notwithstanding). It doesn't seem very likely they'll trade Konerko, and that would be another hit to season ticket sales...because they're not going to get anything at all back for that move but a barrage of Hineybird-esque attack/wolf pack articles from the beat writers. Better to work Tyler Flowers slowly into the rotation at DH, 1B (possibly) and catcher. They really have to decide what to do with Nix, Getz, Ramirez, Beckham, Fields and the infield in general, especially finding the best defensive alignment. There are about 100 different directions they could go, but I'm back in favor of leaving Beckham at 3B or moving him to 2B (but not short). If we could find a stellar defense-first SS (names like Adam Everett or Wilson come to mind), we SHOULD be fine....but that puts a ton of pressure on Quentin and Rios to perform next season, as they'll have to pick up the slack.

Matt Guerrier Frank Francisco Jon Rauch Nick Masset Mike MacDougal David Aardsma I think this just goes to show how "year to year" the bullpen can be, and you can't really fault Williams for letting most of those guys go when he did...if you look back at specific circumstances. Aardsma has started to return to White Sox form (wetting the bed in pressure situations) and it's hard to judge numbers put up by the likes of Mac or Masset in the National League...any more than you can say Clayton Richard would have led us playoffs if we hadn't traded for Peavy. Clearly, the White Sox are in very good position to compete coming into 2010. That said, Linebrink and Pena are going to be the keys, and we're going to have to find one or two more righties down in the pen...especially if we deal Jenks, although I'd say the odds are looking no more than 33% that KW deals him, knowing how weak the bullpen already is and how inconsistent Thornton has been on a year-to-year basis when he can't locate his fastball. As others have noted, the "Williams approach" that we tried bringing in 13 castoffs to compete for the LH relief job in 2006 just doesn't work...especially when you trade the best of them in LHP Javier Lopez to the Red Sox and see him blossom. We have Carrasco, Thornton, and MAYBE Jenks to count on, everything else is a crapshoot. Hopefully KW can once again find one year (or half-year) Takatsu's, Hermanson's, Cotts and Cliff Politte's again. We heard names like Link a lot coming into this season, and they never even sniffed the big leagues. Maybe Nunez or Santeliz can factor in, but I hope KW has bigger and better ideas than Ehren Wasserman or the likes of Russell (yes, I know he's gone now) or Omogrosso for 2010 to fill the void on the RH side. Maybe Hynick can be one of the answers, we'll just have to wait and see.

I would think SS, it would have to be Jose Valentin. For 2B, good question...Durham MIGHT be the answer. I don't think Iguchi would have it... On second thought, it might be Alexei Ramirez from last year for 2B. Uribe would be second for homers at SS I would also guess.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ Aug 31, 2009 -> 09:38 PM) Cabrera, Huff, Thames, Ordonez, Granderson, Inge, Guillen and only 6 positions to play them. They're rather deep. Not to mention Clete Thomas and Ryan Raburn, two "under the radar" rookies who have both had very solid seasons and quickly replaced Josh Anderson...and they had enough depth to trade Matt Joyce in the best move of this off-season, the Edwin Jackson acquisition. With Jackson on the Sox instead of the Tigers (or the Twins, for that matter), either of those two teams run away with the division. Of course, you could argue if we had Mo Rivera or Pujols, the same would be the case, but there aren't many players who have had the impact on a new team that Jackson did in DET.

I'm not understanding at all why they would want to commit that kind of money to Dye for next year... We need to move on. This is as good a time as any. I think that includes Pods too, we don't want to start the year like we did with Anderson/Owens/Wise/Fields/Lillibridge/Miller and then end up having to find another "quick fix" like we were lucky enough to get that spark for one last season with Pods. Beckham, I'm still not sold on the fact that he would be an improvement over Ramirez at SS. This is based more on our disappointment overall with Ramirez's season (attitude, attention lapses, lack of focus...and maybe a lot of it goes back to the lawsuit and sophomore slump), but that, in and of itself, does not make Gordon a wonderful defender at that position just because he's NOT Ramirez. It's the old back-up QB analogy. You want him to play until you actually see him play, then you want the old starter back (and quickly). Unless they sign someone like Beltre or Figgins, it's very unlikely Beckham's moved off 3B. He will never have the range (and Ramirez has been criticized by playing too far back...too much into the hole, too much up the middle to overprotect, like Getz has to do going to his right)...OR THE ARM, and Beckham still would seem to profile better at 2B than SS/3B in the long-term.

This is why I love Guillen so much. He is even more honest in Spanish, and open (abierto)...he said a reporter made the comment that they had the talent to win the World Series again this year (on paper), and he said something about delusions of grandeur but the fact was that Ozzie did agree, the talent was there, that it was basically a failure of execution. It was kind of an interesting analogy he made to the fact that from here on out it was going to be like climbing a giant mountain and he wasn't sure that we had the "legs" (see Thome/Konerko/Dye/Linebrink/Dotel/Pods) to get there at this point. He understands this team better than anyone...he knows that 2005 is long gone, and a transition is happening, just like when we replaced Valentin/Thomas/Ordonez/Lee (well, Big Hurt did make a brief contribution but essentially Everett took his place). "Last week a Boston reporter asked me if Jose again for Chicago to start a game and I said I have three kids, and I would love to be alive when my grandchildren are born. I really do not want to die of a heart attack early..." Said Contreras was a warrior and fighter, and that he was STILL the best possible option to win that game. "Some of you in letters, say they know him (Contreras) from his days in Cuba, and which may be lack of concentration (now), which is not pitching for underarms (too much from the side), you are not using the fork ball, and another long list of reasons..." Lots of comments from Spanish/Cuban letter writers about trying to fix Jose and what was wrong with him. Some posters here have made comments about DFAing the likes of Contreras and Linebrink (even more silly), and you can tell that Ozzie really loves Contreras, will stand by him until the end, even if he will be second-guessed for not using someone like Torres or Hudson, he would rather go with guys like Jose and Freddy that have been there before. El lunes comenzamos la última serie de la gira en el Metrodome, donde los Mellizos parecen imbatibles. Imagino que será una buena oportunidad para demostrar que aún estamos vivos, que todavía tenemos deseos y que seguimos en la lucha por el título de la división que con tanto sacrificio ganamos el año pasado. "Monday begins the last series of the trip in the Metrodome, where the Twins appear unbeatable. I imagine that that this will be a good opportunity to demonstrate that we are still alive, that we still have desire to continue the fight for the AL Central Division title that we sacrificed so much for last season..." My translations, a little rough but probably 75-85% accurate.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Aug 31, 2009 -> 09:46 AM) I guess I can see the Sox acquiring Figgins, but it'll cost us. And if we do get Figgins...hell, even if we don't, I think Alexei more than likely will be gone. I agree with the rest of your post. I voted for Kenny being on the hot seat next year. He's put together a solid team for the 2010 season on paper, but let's face the fact that his teams have vastly underachieved since 2005. So, if next year ends up being another bust, then it's time to cut him loose. Based on the results this year, clearly last year's team overachieved. The 2006 team just ran out of gas and the starting rotation started to show signs of too much wear and tear from all those innings pitched. Garcia and Contreras were never the same pitchers again after the second half of 2005/first half 2006. This year's team wasn't set up to compete until mid-season. Then we maybe got a little too optimistic, but who have we really ADDED? Yeah, Pena/Kotsay/Rios/Castro, but the most important acquisition hasn't pitched...it's probably been a net negative because Clayton Richard arguably would have had better results in that spot than what we've received since we traded him...although certainly not nearly as well as he's done in SD. KW really has his work cut out for him with the leadoff spot, 3B and bullpen. They can survive with an unknown fifth starter, but they have to solidify the infield defense, bullpen and replace Pods adequately.

QUOTE (OilCan @ Aug 31, 2009 -> 09:44 AM) And the Sox would be very, VERY smart to do so. Replenishing the farm system with two additional picks will be good. Also, do the not get an additional/comp pic for not signing Morgado, the kid from Tenn? I think you missed the point in there that NO WAY will they offer either Thome or Dye arbitration, and JD's contract will be bought out for next year. Would be VERY VERY shocking if they offered Dotel...they didn't with David Riske, although he was a notch or two down from OD, but the risk is way too high of bringing him back at an exorbidant salary that looks good in ROTO leagues (like Javy V.) but isn't so great in reality. In other words, we will lose Contreras, Dye, Thome and Dotel without gaining a single draft pick for any of them. There's still about a 30-50% chance either (on or the other) Thome OR JD will be back as the DH for 2010, but it's diminishing with every loss. I think KW's to the point where he would rather see what Flowers or even Fields can accomplish (again) rather than relying on the aging veterans to be the core of his team anymore.

Even the Angels have flaws in their rotation and bullpen, that's why they went out and got Kazmir. Vladimir Guerrero is a shadow of his former self. I think that team is 50% a product of a very weak AL West. Also, dream on if you think the Twins will give us Denard Span. They'll give us Delmon Young to contribute to our underachieving offense, but they're not going to part with a young/affordable/effective young player like that, especially with the stress on their budgets trying to keep Morneau, Mauer and Nathan. It will be interesting to see what happens with Cuddyer and Kubel going forward as well, that's too much young talent for them to keep more than 2 of those hitters (not including Span because he's still pre-arb).

QUOTE (knightni @ Aug 31, 2009 -> 09:28 AM) I never said that we were compared to the Pirates, that was rangercal. I said if we have to lose games, we might as well have a lower payroll and lower ticket prices. Less wins got us Beckham, I fail to see how 2007 hurt anyone but the fan. Au contraire, we lost some season ticket holders that offseason. After you win a World Series, you have a "five year window" to take advantage of it, as we did in 2006. 2007 stopped all of our momentum vis a vis the Cubs dead in the water. However, we look to have ourselves back in very good position and we should be one of the co-favorites to win the ALCD going into 2010, especially if we can add one more piece....hopefully a leadoff hitter to replace Pods.

Was it predictable that Quentin wouldn't really make a full comeback and Linebrink would be garbage? Probably 75% yes. I just think KW got out-GMed by Dombrowski, the key two moves of the offseason were dumping Sheffield and bringing in Edwin Jackson. Sheffield was a clubhouse cancer over there, and that team really was reborn with a better attitude this year, despite the Magglio/Boras controversy. And we all knew Verlander had the talent, he just hadn't pitched that well since his rookie season. But you have to give them a lot of credit for Jackson, Porcello, Raburn, Thomas, etc. We can look at the home record (DET vs. CHW), head-to-head losses (the Wise 'out at home' game), the combined records against BALT/CLE/KC, but this White Sox team never had an identity, and that's more on KW than Ozzie. You look at the talent in that line-up, it looks like an X-Box team or 2000 all over again. But they've never jelled together, except for maybe a couple of weeks in the middle of the summer, and then culminating in the no-hitter, when we were TIED for one day with DET at five games over .500. I'm all for the Peavy and Rios deals, they're aggressive and forward-thinking. It's just that Dombrowski has done an even better job, and that farm system has filled in some holes....such as Raburn, C. Thomas and the AA catcher Avila.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 29, 2009 -> 06:57 PM) After looking through the 2010 free agents, I'm genuinely convinced the player you're asking for doesn't exist. Or at least not without a trade. I wouldn't mind overpaying a bit for Frank. Gutierrez, that guy is a really quality defender. On paper, the M's don't look that great, but Jack Z. really improved that defense as his #1 priority in the offseason. Unless we let Jenks, Dye, Thome, Dotel AND Contreras all go, it doesn't like we could afford to bring in someone like Adrian Beltre for 3B and move Beckham back to SS and Ramirez to 2B. That would improve our infield defense immensely, although it would also put the careers of Getz and Fields to bed with the White Sox, with Nix probably staying on as the super sub. Another option is rolling the dice on CoCo Crisp in LF, Rios in CF and Quentin RF (that they all can stay healthy).

QUOTE (knightni @ Aug 30, 2009 -> 05:30 PM) Exactly. How's that different from the last few years minus 2005? 2001 - 83 wins 2002 - 81 2003 - 86 2004 - 83 2006 - 90 2007 - 72 2008 - 89 2009 - 80* (projected) Except the payroll would be way lower, which hopefully would equal lower ticket prices. You did a nice job "skewing" this statistically by not including 2000, when we had 95 wins. So let's take out 2007, since, you're leaving out 2005 and 2000 coveniently. That gives you an average record of 88-74 over the decade...a record of sustained success we haven't had in, say, forever. In fact, if you go back all the way to 1990, and put together any long stretch of baseball from then until now, we're usually somewhere around 3rd or 4th in overall winning percentage as a franchise behind on the Yankees, Braves and Red Sox. I'd hardly describe that as being like the Pirates. THREE division championships in a decade is certainly not like the Pirates, unless you go back to the Clemente-era Pirates, We Are Family Pirates or the Bonds/Bonilla/Leyland late 80's/early 90's Pirates.

At the very least, we should accord Jose the respect he deserves for coming back so quickly from an Achilles' injury when he could have pulled a David Wells and just sat out the season or came back only in the 2nd half of the season to market himself to other teams for a new contract. Then, there's 2005 and 2006. You will never convince me otherwise that we could have won anything that year without him on the roster. He was the most dominant pitcher in baseball for 4-5 months stretching across those two seasons. He also signed a below market value contract (at the time) which later became similar to Konerko's (a bad contract), but was really a combination reward/pat on the back for good work for 2005, just like Konerko's deal in that offseason. The fact is, Torres, Garcia and Hudson probably won't give us solid results either, or they would be the "clearcut" choice to be starting, and they're not....nor is DJ Carrasco. Jose had "mini-runs" in 2009 and 2008 (first half) where he looked very very good, especially the first 2-3 months of 2008 before he started trying to pitch through injuries. And he's 40+ still throwing a 95 MPH fastball....he's gotten himself into remarkable physical condition, it's just that the pitching game for Jose is 95% mental and that's always been his bugaboo.

Trading Jenks and moving Thornton to closer leaves you questions about every single member of the bullpen coming into 2010, with the exception of Carrasco. What does that tell us about next year when perhaps the most predictable/reliable/consistent bullpen member (for his projected role) is DJ Carrasco? It tells you that if Linebrink and Pena can't ever get it done AGAIN, we're really in big, big trouble going forward.

I'd rather fire Guillen than Walker. That won't happen, but I'll agree with Fathom he's been pretty horrible since the Buehrle no-hitter (of course, so have Buehrle/Dye/Konerko/Rios/Beckham/Pena/Linebrink/Dotel).... I think Ozzie has one more chance in 2010...but he will be on thin ice if he struggles early in 2011 and the team suffers with chemistry issues throughout 2010 too. We let Swisher, Vazquez and Cabrera go to improve our clubhouse, and it clearly hasn't had the ameliorative affect that KW predicted it would have on the team.

I don't get why he wanted to give all the young guys a chance then a few months into the season dump them because he thinks we're in a pennant chase (.500 record?)... We've traded away and gave away Poreda, Richard, Allen, Brian Anderson, Lance Broadway and I don't think we would be any worse if these guys were still on the roster getting major league playing time. That goes to show that BIG changes need to be made next year and I think they will. I think this team is gonna go for a world series next year. I think some bold moves will be made this offseason, and I think Dye will be gonna, Jenks will be gone, Pods will be gone, and a move like trading one of Floyd/Alexai/Konerko will be made. I think he will sign a long term RF, lots of bullpen help for cheap, , and keep Kotsay to platoon with Thome at DH and play OF/1B. He will also resign Wise and trade more prospects. The Peavy trade was a bold one, let's wait at least one season before giving Clayton Richard the NL Cy Young. KW had left the roster too weak at the beginning of the year and then thought he could ride Beckham/Pods/Quentin/Rios/Peavy to take the division, didn't turn out that way for a number of reasons. Anderson and Broadway? REALLY??? The jury's still out on Allen, and it will look pretty stupid if Pena can't take over Dotel's work AND we lose Thome/Dye AND we can't find a LH, power-hitting 1B/LF/DH type on the FA market, like a DUNN or Abreu. No way Kotsay is part of a DH-platoon. Forget that idea, he's not a strong enough hitter anymore. He's a 5th outfielder, last player on the roster on a really good team, and defensive replacement at 1B. They very well might trade Konerko or Ramirez, but Konerko won't get ANYTHING back (you'll have to pay part of his salary probably), so the only marketable players you have to trade are Ramirez, possibly Jenks (to a much lesser extent than Ramirez) and some of our minor leaguers, who KW needs to hold onto and not trade (Flowers/Hudson/Viciedo/Danks/Mitchell).

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Aug 29, 2009 -> 12:51 PM) He's clearly the better option over Getz Getz MIGHT be fine if he could actually stay on the field for a prolonged stretch...he and Carlos are fighting for the title of most fragile/injury-prone team member.