caulfield12

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 09:56 PM) To be fair, most stars of the game don't have full, good, consistent (with consistent being the key word) seasons. Besides that, his 2006 was pretty damn good. Seasons where guys put up .283/.323/.506/.828 seasons with 30 doubles and 30 homers are pretty good seasons, and he was pretty damn good for the first 5 months with 1 terrible month. If that's not a full, good, consistent season, it's about as close as a player can get without actually doing it. With body size included, I imagine Viciedo will end up at 1B before Fields. Besides that, unless Fields develops into a .250/.350/.500 type player, I'm not sure he'll ever have the bat for 1B. Also, it wouldn't be entirely surprising to see Dye's option picked up, especially if he remains a productive player. It's doubtful, simply because the Sox may want to free up as much money as they can, but it's not completely out of the picture either. Well, what are the options for RF and replacing Dye? A trade. Or moving Quentin and replacing the LFer. In our organization, we're pretty limited. Viciedo, maybe...although 1B/DH is more likely the target destination...depends on his mobility and reads. Then you go down to someone like Shelby, who's far from being anything but a 4th OF/utility infielder (Chone Figgins Lite). Jordan Danks has to be a CFer because it's his natural position and he has limited power at this stage, seemingly precluding corner outfield play. We have a lot more depth at 1B. We have Konerko, Thome (theoretically), Fields, Viciedo and Brandon Allen, not to mention Tyler Flowers possibly profiles for that position as well if catching doesn't work out well enough on the defensive side.

I would say that he has more of a slider-speed bat....mostly due to his mechanics. He didn't put up 20+ homers two years ago hitting only offspeed pitches. Fields always had question marks surrounding his movement/feet and range at 3B, especially after he started to experience some injuries. He actually can run fairly well when healthy, but that's forward. The question has always been about lateral movement and also coming in on the bunts. He has a solid, slightly above average MLB arm, but nothing compared to Viciedo (according to reports). He really makes some outstanding plays, but he has lots of mental lapses and mistakes on routine plays, like Alexei in the 2nd half of the season last year. I think his physical problems with his lower body led to decreased bat speed and more thinking/guessing on pitches. He couldn't have gotten to where he was as a college player and first round draft pick completely feasting on junk. Of course, we also heard that Crede, Borchard and Anderson would never make it because of their long/loopy/hitchy swings, and they might have been right on at least 2 of those 3 counts.

QUOTE (fathom @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 11:15 PM) Wow, what's the reason for this? Can't buy a plane ticket with 50 cents? I hope if 50 Cent was there at the counter, he would be able to splurge for one in order to get KW to Sox Fest.

The Twins are 1-3 (their lone victory in 2002 against the A's) in playoff series this decade as the visiting team. Of course, when you're playing on the road against the Yankees usually, that's not very easy...at least until the last couple of seasons. They're 0-1 with the homefield advantage, getting swept out of the ALDS by the A's in 2006. I'm not sure what conclusions you can draw from that, other than that Twins/A's were fairly evenly matched and either team could win on the road against the other...AND, that it's almost impossible to beat the Yankees in the playoffs (especially as a visitor, w/o home field adv.) until recently.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jan 27, 2009 -> 06:26 PM) What I think alot of people fail to realize is that over a season the averages play out and looking at OPS works. This is because they look at averages against all teams and players. Once you get to the playoffs, the dynamic changes. You are going to face only the best pitching staffs and only the best from these staffs. This is where offenses will struggle. A good pitcher may only make a few mistakes. This is where the going from first to third or scoring with fewer hits make the big difference. With the slugging lineup unless the player hits the mistake for a HR the run isn't scored because the slow slugger didn't score from first or second on a hit or from third with less than two outs. This is what Beane found out in Oakland. The OPS with slow guys with great eyes worked against average opponent throughout the year but once they hit the playoffs they got smoked. These concepts are going to come back to the front of baseball with PEDs being phased out and especially the amphetamines. The younger athletes will take the place of aging sluggers and the slugging will go down. I think we're seeing this trend already But that doesn't explain the failure of the Twins as much. Because they were more of a fundamentally-sound team constructed, one would think, to take advantage of that philosophy and executional experience and apply it in playoff situations. Or you could simply argue they overachieved from 2002-2004 (and 2006) and that the talent level of the other playoff teams overwhelmed them in the end. It's not the like the Twins or the Braves (for most of their run) lacked good (or even great) pitching. With the Braves, they were more of a White Sox "slugging" team with lots of all or nothing hitters sprinkled through their line-up like Andruw Jones and Javy Lopez, for example. But the Twins seem to be a difficult team to understand in terms of post-season failure on such a consistent basis.

Well, the theory (one of many) at the beginning of the offseason was that maybe Crede and Cabrera would end up as the left side of the Twins' revamped infield, with Punto as the super-sub and one of Buscher/Harris traded along with either Blackburn/Perkins to bring in a dominant RH set-up guy (most recently, they were talking to Gagne, please take him!) and/or 3B, like Adrian Beltre.

The Tigers' big hole isn't Cabrera-related. Miller has been a bust, the odds are 50/50 that Maybin, as much as he has been hyped, could ever equal Granderson at the major league level. It's a combination of bad contracts (Sheffield, Willis, etc.) and the bad Detroit economy and horrific unemployment numbers that hamstring the Tigers right now. If they think Lyon's going to be a great AL closer, well, good luck with that thought. Maybe they catch lightning in a bottle like we did for awhile with Takatsu and Hermanson, but Joe Borowski or Keith Foulke (recent vintage) results are more probable. The Jurr-Jurr trade to the Braves wasn't such a wise move, either.

I mean, it's not like we weren't just about the ONLY team right on Alexei Ramirez...or I suppose all those guys with their lists had him tabbed as a ROY candidate? I agree with the thought that had he ended up with the Red Sox, Yankees, Cubs, Mets or Dodgers, he'd be somewhere at least between #1-20.

http://articles.latimes.com/2001/aug/19/sports/sp-35951 Speaking of the Dodgers, I came across this really inspiring story that could warm up all but the coldest hearts...

Of course, the other scenario comes into play...maybe it's like 1930 during the Great Depression and things will only get worse over the next 2-3 years. Then it would be better to take whatever you can get now (for 2-3 years) instead of facing even more of a bear market in 2010 or 2011, right? So definitely 2 quite distinct schools of thought on this subject from the agents and owners as well.

The most recent article on Wigginton has him interested in the Phillies and vice-versa. Not sure about bringing an NL player over to the AL either, at his age...but, beyond that, we have Beckham and/or Viciedo projected at that position, along with Fields. Now if Wigginton was clearly the better option than a healthy Josh Fields, then I would agree....that he wouldn't be a bad insurance policy to have. OTOH, the days of spending that type of money ($3.5-5 million) on a Uribe or Wigginton are long gone, I'm afraid. At least for the next 2-3 seasons.

Strange that Oliver Perez is supposedly worth $10 million per year and Garland only $5 million. Wolf has a long injury history, and I would put Looper closer to Pedro Martinez/Schilling/K.Rogers than I would to Garland as well. Garland's not worth $10 million in this market (or even his $12 million from last year, which could have been cut to only $9.6 million had he accepted arb.), but it's equally hard to believe that he won't get $6-8 million at his age and with his durability. FWIW, I'm elated we don't have to pay Javier Vazquez $12.5 million in 2009. Garland at HALF or $6.25 million for one year, on this Sox team, would seem like a pretty good bargain, but it will NEVER happen under KW. Theoretically, Pettitte, Sheets and Oliver Perez will all sign for at least $10 million per year, if they do sign.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0368226/ I don't think I've seen TOO many non-Paris Hilton movies below 5 on the IMDB ratings. Are you sure? Or you're joking with us?

I was thinking of Defiance, that was the $50 million budget. The Reader was $32 million....so both that movie and Frost/Nixon (still under $10 million) will have a ton of problems being profitable, although I think Frost/Nixon should do fairly well in rentals. Gran Torino's an interesting case. Is it the subject matter...Clint Eastwood's age....or just his character's irascibility in general? Just wonder why (and how) the decision was made this wasn't a 1500-2000 screen opener. Just kind of strange, there aren't so many movies involving Asians that are non-martial arts, that niche in terms of film watching isn't there yet. India has Bollywood and is making lots of inroads, and the African American (like Tyler Perry) and, to a lesser extent, the Hispanic market also have been strong niche markets, but there's really no "niche" for serious/dramatic movies involving Asians. Somebody will say the Joy-Luck Club, Snow Falling on Cedars or Memoirs of Geisha/Last Samurai....but I mean movies made from an Asian perspective that are meant to draw an Asian audience, rather than movies made from a white male/Western perspective with Asian characters that happen to be a large part of the story. I'm sure there are some other examples I'm leaving out, but I'm thinking in terms of American/European cinema producing Asian-themed movies.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-0...,2690841.column Phil Rogers takes a couple of shots at Danks for skipping the WBC. In his other column (MLB whispers), he speculates about Ivan Rodriguez coming to the Sox as back-up catcher and part-time DH.

Santodorf, Which movies with big-name stars are you talking about? I hope not Mickey Rourke, unless we're back in the 1980's and Lisa Bonet is also classified as big-time. Sometimes, it's simply about the marketing budget and how much they think they would have to spend in additional advertising to get a good ROI. This time of the year, these campaigns are almost always focused on Golden Glove and Academy Award wins/nominations. That has been really helping Slumdog...although it's still far from being the cultural phenomenon that My Big Fat Greek Wedding became where almost everyone simply HAS/HAD to see it, seemingly. I think I read where Frost/Nixon cost quite a bit of money to make (around $50 million), it's one of the arguably best movies of the year but it will still end up as something of a financial disaster, because there's almost no way to extract international box office from it. But that animated movie that was made independently, DELGO (sp?), I'm sure a book will come out of that disaster eventually...such an interesting story how it finally came to the big screen and then became the biggest dud in recent history in terms of box office. Of course, many times, a movie will come out with a lot of negative buzz and/or no screenings/reviews, and the studio will basically anticipate an early death and wash their hands of it. That's one thing I was surprised, with Valkryie, it has held its own fairly well, at least as well as Seven Pounds and maybe better. Of course, many have argued 7 Pounds is one of the worst movies of the year, while the Tom Cruise movie is a pleasant surprise.

While this isn't as questionable as Farnsworth and he's only Type B, the Tigers are going to end up more like the Detoothed Lions with LYON as closer. They're still unsure about Rodney, Zumaya's really a huge mental/physical question mark coming into this season and Dolsi's too young and raw/inexperienced for the role. This sort of reminds me of the Indians' experiment with Borowski as closer. We all know how well that went.

QUOTE (santo=dorf @ Jan 24, 2009 -> 02:16 PM) It's rotten at 59% at rotten tomatoes.com It opened wide yesterday The Wrestler is still in only 566 theatres, so I wouldn't call that wide exactly...maybe wider. Unless it gets above 1,000 (which it might with an Academy Award for Rourke or Tomei...which I'm not sure she deserves exactly, except for taking off her clothes and trying to act out of her traditional character/type as sort of a b****), maybe that's the new definition of wide. Two movies which ARE doing terribly are Inkheart (the new Brendan Fraser movie) and Defiance, the WWII/Jewish resistance movie, which is okay but not great. Daniel Craig has a long way to go to prove he can open up a non-Bond movie with his name alone. When Munich came out, he and Eric Bana were far from household names, people went to see it because of Spielberg. I think there's a law here in Thailand that every Brendan Fraser movie that comes out must be shown here...we're going to have to sit through Inkheart, too. Why we got a movie like City of Ember but are still waiting for Marley & Me is beyond my cognition. Bedtime Stories finally arrived this weekend. Oh, and every Jason Statham movie as well, who I actually like. As someone pointed out earlier, like Denzel Washington or Kevin Spacey, his presence in most movies (although the David Gale one was pushing it) makes nearly every movie they're in at least watchable/somewhat enjoyable.

QUOTE (fathom @ Jan 24, 2009 -> 09:40 AM) Sure...but they're no Little Big League. That's the one where the kid manages the Twins, right? Pretty clever movie...much better than Mr. Baseball! The Natural and Bull Durham have to be up there in the Top 5 as well. I guess the very first Major League deserves some kudos as well. I remember going to a couple of Indians games in Memorial Stadium where basically anything you wanted to say to the LF could be heard by the entire outfield and the few fans sitting in the bleacher seats out there.

Fathom, did you at least like Field of Dreams or Eight Men Out, lol? You can at least enjoy watching Marisa Tomei sing RATT songs with Mickey Rouke in The Wrestler, right? Just saw that tonight...too bad it wasn't the Marisa from My Cousin Vinny, but she's still cute at her age. I think I have the market cornered on washed up actors/wrestlers/boxers/martial arts stars, also watching JCVD (Jean Claude Van Damme), which was also enjoyable but not nearly as impactful as The Wrestler. Gotta love those 80's songs. Hollywood just loves to bury its stars and then dig them back up from the dead for their comebacks...maybe the recent phenomenon started with John Travolta in Pulp Fiction, carrying over to the resurrection of every 70's/80's music group and now anyone can be resurrected, except for perhaps Minoso on the White Sox another decade.

I've now seen Slumdog, Revolutionary Road, CCoBB, Frost/Nixon and Doubt. By the way, Defiance is a WWII/Holocaust movie that won't win many awards. The Jewish Rambo movie, I think of it as. Rev. Road was obviously not very easy/comfortable to watch or a "feel good" movie in any way, shape or form....in a completely different way than In the Company of Men or some of LaBute's others. I'm not quite sure why its automatically compared to American Beauty, I guess simply because of Mendes' presence/involvement with both. The actor who played the "insane asylum" patient is the one who sticks out to me the most upon reflection later. Thought he was very good in his small part. And I really think Richard Jenkins was awesome in The Visitor, up until now the 4th best movie I've seen from 2008. FWIW, I would give BEST MOVIE a tie currently between Doubt and Slumdog...but I haven't seen The Wrestler or Gran Torino yet. Wall-E would be a close 3rd, I suppose. By the way, "W." is one of the worst, if not THE worst, Oliver Stone movies I've ever seen. Maybe he should have stopped thinking about that project after Fahrenheit 9/11 came out. I think Josh Brolin was pretty good, but Langella as Nixon was superlatively better. I liked Brolin more in NCFOM. And I still really like Vicky Cristina Barcelona, except for Penelope Cruz' histrionics disguised as acting. BTW, has anyone ever seen a movie called THE FALL? Some people rave about it...I see at imdb that the reviews have it above 8, which is pretty rare over there.

Just as I was beginning to write a piece advocating the White Sox pick up a number a former All-Stars on minor league or near-league-minimum contracts, Freddy Garcia, the Sox second possible scrap heap pick-up for the rotation, has agreed to terms with the Mets. Garcia's deal is a minor league deal, which means it's non-guaranteed, but reportedly carries incentives which could raise his salary to near 8 figures. A few days ago, I mentioned that I though Garcia was worth more than Bartolo Colon, as Garcia, a year off of shoulder surgery, figures to be a better injury risk than the perpetually injured Colon. That being said, I don't think the Sox could have matched the Mets offer even if they had offered him a guaranteed deal. We have the Sox current '09 salary obligations at about $94MM right now, but that doesn't include the $4M signing bonus to Dayan Viciedo, the '09 buyout of Pablo Ozuna's contract (yeah, they still owe him), and the $3+MM or so which will be paid to the near-minimum guys. The Sox are looking at about a $100MM opening day payroll. Kenny Williams has said the Sox were bumping against their "payroll ceiling" numerous times since November, and given their actions this off-season we have no reason not to believe him. It's my feeling, however, based on nothing other than my own intuitions, that the Sox have a little bit of wiggle room left. They were "in" on the Garcia derby, after all. That wiggle room is probably no more than a million dollars or two, nothing in baseball terms, certainly not enough to sway the hubris of a former All-Star from a possible $9MM payout. But I had hoped it would be enough to entice some semi-interesting guys looking for work in a tough baseball (and world) economy. ....... Which brings me back to what I had intended to write about today. Thanks to the economy, there might not have been a better time in the free agent era to go dumpster diving. For let's say $2M, you might be able to pick up 3 or 4 down-and-out players who have significant upside. And in the AL Central where there's no clear favorite--I'd give the nod to Cleveland right now--it might be those pickups in the last month of free agency that make the difference. From SouthSide Sox (Heads) This is new/updated article also including Jenks' new one-year contract numbers...and maybe the ST relocation money earmarked is a factor, we can't really know unless someone asked KW/JR directly if this was the case.

QUOTE (whitesoxfan101 @ Jan 23, 2009 -> 03:25 PM) Oh I completely agree, but I just wish we could have seen what Bonds would have done had he never touched steroids. He obviously would have never hit 73 home runs or broke the all time home run record, but he'd still be a guy with 600 something home runs in all likelihood to go with all of the walks, steals, gold gloves, and MVP's. He cheated himself using the stuff because he didn't need it. In his mind, big literally and figuratively, Sammy and McGwire were inferior players who "stole his thunder" in 1998 with the HR chase. He wanted to get back on top and grab/hold the country's attention, because he felt underappreciated as the greatest "pure" baseball player up until that point in time, in terms of once having been a 30/30 type of guy and Gold Gloves defensively...he was so thin (like Sosa when he came up), he seemed that he'd have a lot more trouble hitting homers than stealing bases.

QUOTE (whitesoxfan101 @ Jan 23, 2009 -> 03:22 PM) He's the ONLY steroid-related player I would vote for. I hate him for what he did in the 2000's, but he'd have been a hall of famer no doubt had he never touched the stuff, and he's the only guy I can for sure say that about. What about Ivan "Pudge" Rodriguez?

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ Jan 23, 2009 -> 11:52 AM) what is there, 31 teams? So assuming a random distribution you'd expect every team to have a least 3 guys in the top 100. So Sox are just average there. anyways, I put very little stock in Law's observations. He goes and watches a player once or twice than passes judgment. He basically admits as much in the article. Not my idea of proper scouting, which should be a mix of DETAILED and SUSTAINED observation and statistical analysis. On a positive note, we do have 3 of the top 57 but nobody in the Top 30. I really think nobody has a firm idea where to slot Viciedo. Legitimately, based on his hitting skills alone, he's thought to be a Top 5-10 guy. We'll have a much better idea down in Arizona what we might actually have on our hands...or we might be wishing we had used that $11 million to sign Ben Sheets instead. Could go either way. Interesting question though...would you rather have Ben Sheets in 2009 or Viciedo in 10/11/12? If the Viciedo bidding happened again, it might be somewhere between $4-8 million instead of $10+.