caulfield12

Guillen, you SUCK for not pulling him for Gray four batters ago. INEXCUSABLE. Rios, you SUCK once again. Nice throw. NOT. Cabrera, you're an ass for running through the 3B coach's stop sign when your team's up by 7 runs.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:48 PM) Who would have ever predicted coming into year that Quentin and Beckham would be only respectable defensive players? Hey! Konerko's saved at least two or three balls in the dirt today that should have resulted in the runner advancing to 3B.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:39 PM) Morel, yeah. Morel is 14th worst. AJ is the next worst, as the 35th worst player in baseball. Beckham is 42nd worst. But Morel is not a "qualified player" yet this year, so he doesn't show up on the list. The funny thing is that we were 5th in runs scored coming into today, STILL. Living off the first 9 games, but these last 12 games have been among the worst streaks in White Sox history in terms of offensive ineptitude. But it's not even the offense, it's the fact that our defense has let us down so many times this season (along with the closers) that we should still be over .500 and right in the thick of things. When things aren't going well hitting-wise, you have to do the little things to win, and we're failing miserably in that area, from bunting to defense to stolen bases. Pierre is getting more than his share of the blame, but it's going to start finding its way to every member of the team besides Konerko, Buehrle, Quentin and Vizquel.

QUOTE (Wanne @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:38 PM) I really don't know whether to be pissed or just laugh. You'd think at some point that these guys would be embarrassed...hell you have other team's announcers mocking them like they did in Tampa. I really don't know what to say at this point...so I'll probably say nothing which is probably best. All I do know is I need to just walk away from these dipsticks and check back at the end of may as to whether I want to cancel my Extra Innings and invest any more emotion. If heads don't roll soon...I'll lose all respect for JR. What a lifeless POS team...and they've been this way for the past 3-4 years. I want to put it on the players (which it should be)...but if you have a bunch of lifeless, clueless coaches...who is held accountable? I didn't know you could cancel Extra Innings...? I was tempted before when I lived in the US, but I never actually tried to cancel because I still enjoyed watching other teams play.

QUOTE (bobryansson @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:36 PM) Deserves a re-post. Ouch. Glad I have no razor blades around me... Luckily, the White Sox gave Dan Johnson his grooved homer pitch or he'd be at the bottom of the list.

QUOTE (TitoMB @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:33 PM) so we're looking at being 6-7 games out by May.. lmfao. Well, the Twins are in the process of finally passing us today and the Yankees in NYC loom. Hard to see it turning around soon. 5 1/2 games back if things continue like this today. One thing's for sure, they're not going to get over 25,000 for any of those Orioles weekend games. Of course, Brady Penny's now throwing 95 MPH for the Tigers. Figures. Let's see how long he stays healthy.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:30 PM) According to WAR, Carl Crawford is the worst player in the MLB this year. Rios if the 5th worst, and Pierre is the 7th worst. Lol, that's sooooo bad. And then there is Quentin who has been the 7th BEST player in baseball this year. And Beckham and Morel have to be closing in on them. Beckham did have the best at-bat of anyone so far today, but obviously he's struggling just like everyone else in the line-up. Hopefully we're not talking Gordo being in the bottom 5 of the MLB OPS numbers again at the end of June...if Rios and Dunn don't pull out of it soon, you just don't know where you'll get any offense besides Konerko, Quentin and Ramirez.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:27 PM) He does have toe pain that he's complaining about. He's had it for 5 years, but decides to complain about it now. I'm pretty sure Carlos was experiencing more pain with his plantar fasciitis but he never has complained about it. What next, Juan Pierre needs glasses or Lasik eye surgery?

"The White Sox just are NOT THERE." Tigers' radio guy. 26 years since the Tigers have beaten the White Sox eight times in a row. Their 84-85 teams were pretty darned good. And the nightmare continues. Cue Munch's "The Scream" or Scream 4, whichever is preferable. One of the best defensive plays of the year from Ramirez and we still don't get the out at home.

First triple of Alex Avila's life. Thanks, Rios. I'm almost wishing we had DeWayne Wise or Brian Anderson back, along with all the money KW's been wasting on Rios for most of the last 3 seasons.

Rios and Pierre absolutely need to be pulled off the field. Right now. Ozzie needs to take control of this season before the Yankees sweep us and the season's already in jeopardy.

Pierre absolutely is atrocious now defensively. Jordan4Life might be the prime suspect if he ends up disappearing from his hotel tonight. And Jackson can't throw a consistent slider to save his life. He's completely forgotten about the change-up he was using proficiently last year with us.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 03:54 PM) He is just about done w/ his adjustment period. His numbers in May will be considerably better than April. Or we'll be back to a Uribe-ish/Teahen/Vizquel 3B platoon all year. Cue the bring back Joe Crede threads.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 03:51 PM) The velocity on all his pitches are down this year. http://www.fangraphs.com/pitchfx.aspx?play...&position=P Unless you're able to compare it "year over year" to April 2010 or April 2009, it doesn't mean very much. Not very many pitchers are throwing quite as hard in April's cold weather as they will in the heart of the season. The main attribute of Jackson (and Colon in his prime) was the ability to sustain and increase his velocity over the course of an outing, getting better as the game goes on.

If nothing else, Penny dated Alyssa Milano. That's enough for me to give him props. Any girl who looks like that who's also really into baseball is cool with me.

587, 606 and 486 OPS numbers coming to the plate. Ouch. And then there's Rios. AJ=Thome/Dunn/Kotsay/Erstad, 4-3 out syndrome. Austin Jackson going through the dreaded "Sophomore Slump" that Beckham and 90% of rookies succumb to. Except on defense. Dadgummit.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 03:37 PM) Rios is swinging in the same spot every time, regardless of what type of pitch it is. Maybe it's time to reconstruct his swing, as there's nothing to lose right now. Which is a scary proposition, because this is precisely what Walker said he wouldn't do in 2009 after we'd acquired him....not until the off-season. So now what? You just have to wait...if they have to send Beckham down for swing reconstruction, it will be ugly. Rios doesn't strike me as the type of player who will be easily willing to do something like that, either. It's not as simple as merely changing his hands and bat position, I think he's too comfortable with that to change when it has been "imprinted" into his muscle memory. If it's anything like what Tiger Woods has gone through 3 times in his career, it will take 12-18 months to see any real progress and signs of light at the end of the tunnel.

QUOTE (maggsmaggs @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 10:41 AM) The Sox are only in it every year because they have the most resources in the division (their payroll). It really has nothing to do with KW; it's actually the opposite. KW is the reason we have this ceiling where we are in it almost every year, but not winning it. For all the good trades KW has made, he and this organization has drafted horrendously and developed players horrifically. The Sox will never be a consistent winner with KW because the Sox don't draft and develop. Unless you can spend like the Yankees and Red Sox, you need to draft and develop well. And actually the Sawks and Yankees do draft and develop well. It's also boggles my mind that the Sox are willing to spend so much on payroll yet they consistently neglect spending on foreign free agents and the draft. Like Ordonez, Carlos Lee, Tadahito Iguchi, Shingo Takatsu, Alexei Ramirez and Dayan Viciedo? If there's ONE huge issue every Sox fan SHOULD have, it's with the Wilder/Dominican fiasco and the fact we haven't been able to get any prospects out of Venezuela when it's Ozzie's homeland. Nor, in the end, has Ozzie been able to use his connections to get any free agents here, other than maybe someone like Omar Vizquel. I guess you have to give Guillen SOME credit for being able to get the Freddy Garcia deal done, that's one occasion that can be cited. Who's the last Dominican prospect we developed? Jesus Pena? And for Venezuela, Clevelan Santeliz? Pretty abysmal. If Sale and Beckham both become stars, that's a huge improvement from the draft picks of 2000-2007. And certainly, we've never gotten involved in a "posting war" for one of the Japanese stars, but you could argue that unless you're the Red Sox or Yankees, doing so hasn't been so wise unless we're talking about a "once in a lifetime" player in his prime like Ichiro Suzuki.

Even with Baltimore and Seattle the last half decade? Oakland really hasn't been good for at least five years, either. The odds would be about the same of winning the AL West, considering only four teams....albeit the Rangers and Angels look super tough now. Yes, the Sox have had the highest or second highest payroll each year since KW took over. And yes, I'm fairly certain that the division has been home to 2 of the worst 3 teams in the AL in every year, too. That's only true for 2009. Last year it was Seattle, Balt and then KC. In 2008, Seattle, Baltimore then Detroit (KC and Oak one game better), 2007 Tampa, Baltimore and KC, and 2006, TB, KC and Baltimore.

Hanna...pretty good, a little bit like one of the Bourne or Bond movies, but not very much action, great film-making, cinematography and performances but not really a movie I'd ever want to watch again Insidious...very good horror movie, ending is so-so but I definitely enjoyed it more than most in that genre Scream 4....I actually wasn't as annoyed as some with the self-referential "meta" comments, but with the 3 stars aging, it did feel a little bit....stale, is the word...and the ending, while a pretty big surprise, was also not one of the best...more of a wait for the DVD movie

In all fairness, we've done plenty of damage against Verlander in the last five seasons. This line-up is just in one of their collective slides, nothing new for the last decade. And the opposing starters have a LOT to do with it. Just because you've faced someone 10 times doesn't mean you can then use that knowledge every time out to beat them. If that were true, then we would have turned the corner against Liriano, Santana or Sabathia a long time ago. Just like college basketball teams that get more and more knowledgeable about their opponents when they play 3 or more times in one season, it actually in many ways gets harder and not easier to beat someone like that. Think of it from the flip side. Everyone's seen what Mark Buehrle does for the last 10 years. There are no secrets about it. His stuff now is basically what your average high schooler in a top notch program features. Yet he's had 2 no hitters and has gone through numerous teams like a buzzsaw during his career. It's not that those teams weren't prepared to face him, they were just out-executed, out-thought and usually swung at his pitches or got themselves out. That's the nature of hitting and pitching. Normally, over 5-6-7 innings, you'll take 3 runs off Verlander (as long as it's not 0-1-2 runs), hope your own starter holds them down and turn it over to the bullpens.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 07:10 AM) I forgot about Mark's contract kicker, so that could be a problem. If Jackson posts a 3.5 ERA and the acquiring team only has to pay him $4 million or so, yes, I think you'd get a very solid prospect in return. Dunn has a heck of a track record and I don't think his contract would provide much of a barrier, but yeah, you might have to hold on to him for a year or so and then deal him. Thornton has been one of the best setup men in the league for a few years now. I don't think the contract extension really would scare many teams away. Danks/Floyd/Quentin would probably be the biggest draws, and I think the haul would be pretty decent, along with Jackson. You're (the acquiring team) guaranteeing at least $12 million that Matt Thornton will get it back together again. How many teams out there could afford to take that risk? For a set-up guy? If you do manage to find a trading partner, you're not going to get much back in return, just a salary dump (which does have some value, except in putting a competitive team back out there as soon as possible, assuming the payroll would consequently take a huge hit again). If we traded him anytime in the last 2-3 seasons, with his bargain contract, we could have gotten back a good haul, but the devil's in the timing. Otherwise, we could have gotten something back for Jenks or Crede.

I think you'd have to cut the difference in the middle. It all comes down to what you can get back for Danks and Quentin based on his hot start. You have to find the right matches with teams needing pitching (easier) than someone needing a defense-limited corner OFer/DH in CQ. Ramirez and Beckham, logically, wouldn't be traded....although I can see some arguing that Ramirez will be out of his prime by the time the team's competitive again. You could definitely shop him, but I doubt they want to go back to Beckham at SS, it would have to be Escobar or another prospect we acquire, and that severely puts a crimp in the offense. Jackson could get you something back in return, definitely. Floyd, as well. Buehrle, Konerko and Dunn, not so much. You're still left with all those contracts like Rios, Peavy, Pierre, Teahen, AJ, Crain, etc., that aren't going anywhere regardless, so the end result is just cosmetic and it's hard to totally rebuild even if you want to. Trading Sale, Santos or even Thornton (after his slow start)? None of those are logical moves, either.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 06:52 AM) I think with sabermetrics becoming more and more mainstream, a lot of people are just looking at stats to determine how guys in AA and AAA project. Jeremy Reed and Jeff Abbott had minor league hitting stats that would project them to be perennial all stars. It didn't happen. Josh Fields was going to be a star because of how he lit up some pitchers in some meaningless games, then the league realized they didn't have to throw him strikes. The biggest jump isn't from A to AA or AA to AAA its from any level to MLB. Personally, I would like the Sox as an organization to put some value on making contact. Its not like they are developing 40 homer guys or 30 homer guys or even 20 homer guys right now, and I'm not emphasizing small ball or bunting. I know contact all around baseball has be de-valued for a long while, although I laugh that a strikeout is just an out like any other out. Its OK some guys strike out a lot, but they should be run producers who also walk a lot. Not every hit is a rocket. If Jordan Danks struck out 80 times instead of 150 and made contact those other 70 ABs some of those 70 would find a hole even if they were weakly hit. Which was the essence of the problem with guys like Brian Anderson or even Getz K-ing like they were 30 homer guys. We can afford to have guys like Morel and Pierre and AJ, we're not going to have 7-8 twenty homer guys again in our line-up. However, if you start having Beckham, Rios and Ramirez K-ing 100+ times without making productive outs, the whole structure of the line-up becomes severely hamstrung. Outside of Quentin and Konerko, nobody's been hitting, so there are targets throughout the line-up for criticism. Not to parrot Rongey and DJ/Farmer and Hawk/Stone, but we've had a long string of facing some really good starting pitchers, since the beginning of the A's series. Farmer made an interesting comment about Morel not being the same since facing Jared Weaver, and Beckham and Rios both look totally lost. Dunn, you know, somehow ends up with his numbers, but hopefully he learns the league quickly and those are Albert Belle 1997 "meaningless" stats where the season's already been lost.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 07:00 PM) Please, give me a reason? Is it his numbers this season? Because then Chris Sale sucks too. Look, Hudson isn't a surefire Hall of Fame lock, but he should be a damn good number three starter for the Diamondbacks in the NL. I was indifferent towards the trade. I still think it was an overpay, but Jackson could very well be our ace this year so I accepted it. Threads like this are just to whip your dick out and yell "I WAS RIGHT!" and bait people into reacting. Right now, if I had one game, I'm taking E-Jax. If I'm planning for the future, it's Hudson. If we somehow resign EJax, get a good pitching prospect, or draft one with whatever picks we hopefully can get for him (I believe he is a Type-B FA right now) then we win the deal. If we don't, we lose, because Hudson represented value. It's like the Charlotte Bobcats pick for the Bulls, you could strike gold or you don't and Hudson looked like he had damn good value until we called him up, then got it back in Arizona. Had he bounced back like that here we'd have been talking about Chris Sale in the rotation and trading Hudson in a package for a closer, probably Heath Bell. The problem is that we'll never know if Hudson or McCarthy or anyone could have done the same things if they'd stayed here. Heck, you can add Kip Wells and Josh Fogg while you're at it. We only know what Jackson has done since the trade. I can't imagine a rotation of Danks-Floyd-Buehrle-Sale-Humber would be doing all that much better. You'd have to argue that Heath Bell would have been available straight up for Hudson AND that Sale could actually outpitch E-Jax this season. We can argue with Bell they would have had 3-4 less blown saves, but it's all murky conjecture. I don't think you can state either with anything close to certainty, especially the idea of Sale outpitching Jackson in 2011 as a starter.