chw42

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 02:13 PM) Yankees president lashes out at Brewers owner and his complaints about being unable to afford to sign his players, says "I'm sorry that my friend Mark continues to whine about his running the Brewers" Easy for him to say. This Yankee arrogance is such crap.

FanGraphs had a nice article about lineup optimization. Optimizing Yesterday's Lineups Using CHONE projections and a nice lineup optimizer tool, the writer compiled a list of how "optimized" the lineups were yesterday. Team Actual Best Dif TEX 5.017 5.033 -0.016 MIN 5.257 5.308 -0.051 OAK 4.519 4.571 -0.052 CLE 5.019 5.081 -0.062 KCA 4.379 4.446 -0.067 PIT 4.552 4.628 -0.076 * DET 4.698 4.776 -0.078 TOR 4.676 4.763 -0.087 CHA 4.759 4.858 -0.099 SEA 4.478 4.578 -0.100 LAA 4.891 5.016 -0.125 HOU 3.967 4.142 -0.175 COL 5.064 5.258 -0.194 ATL 4.898 5.106 -0.208 LAN 4.773 5.982 -0.209 ARI 4.704 4.916 -0.212 FLO 4.813 5.035 -0.222 SFN 4.294 4.522 -0.228 PHI 4.783 5.102 -0.229 WAS 4.410 4.644 -0.234 CIN 4.608 4.846 -0.238 CHN 4.660 4.899 -0.239 MIL 4.629 4.876 -0.247 SDN 4.176 4.431 -0.255 NYN 4.381 4.645 -0.264 STL 4.843 5.116 -0.273 The AL teams obviously have the better optimized lineups since we don't have a pitcher hitting, but take a look where we are. According to this, we had the 8th best optimized lineup in the AL out of the 10 teams in action yesterday. And to be quite frank, TB, BOS, NY, and maybe even Baltimore might be ahead of us. Meaning we would've had the 11th or 12th best optimized lineup in the AL on opening day. For a club that could be offensively challenged this is unacceptable. Kotsay hitting in the 5th spot is one of the larger issues (Pierre at leadoff is another, but that won't ever change). Taking something straight from the article. For the most part, we have this right. Gordon's hitting second, Konerko is hitting 4th, but Kotsay is hitting 5th... We saw this yesterday. Twice, Kotsay came up with men in scoring position, and twice hit the ball into the ground. If those ground balls weren't weak, it would have been two double plays, not just one. Had it been two, the Sox might have scored only 4 runs instead of 6 (since after Kotsay's ground out RBI, Quentin scored on a wild pitch). If it wasn't against the Indians, that could have made a hell of a difference. Ozzie needs to stop playing around and either put Rios or somebody more qualified into that 5th hole. Hell, I'd rather have A.J. there than Kotsay. Or, move Quentin to 4th, Konerko to 5th and Rios to third if Alex gets off to a good start this week. He can play Kotsay as much as he wants for all I care, just hit him lower in the order where he won't be put into situations that can decide the fate of a game.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 12:30 PM) Huh? They obviously fixed it... It was an error.

So I check out Zambrano's FanGraphs page today and was very surprised... They had nothing but hitting stats for him. Then I saw that his bat was actually worth 0.6 WAR in 08 and came away pretty impressed. After yesterday's outing, you'd think the guys over at FanGraphs are trying to say something, lol. Carlos Zambrano is the next Rick Ankiel...xD

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 12:45 AM) 2nd in the AL, first in the MLB. That's just how good he is. Does that make sense? lol.

QUOTE (chisoxfan09 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 12:44 AM) How would we rank Rios as a CF in the AL, MLB? 1. Gutierrez 2. Upton 3. Jones 4. Cameron 5. Granderson 6. Rios 5th or 6th is appropriate I'd think. BTW Jones, is Adam Jones, not Andruw.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 12:40 AM) LOL. They just talked about the Sox for a couple minutes giving us love for the strong pitching, then Nomar and Bobby Valentine gave love to our hitters.....sort of... Nomar: "With that lineup, they got Alexei and Pierre at the top. You know, Pierre is an excellent 2-hitter." Bobby: "And Gordon Beckham is remind a lot of people of a Nomar Garciaparra. And Beckham will really bring up the bottom of that lineup" Alexei at the top? Pierre in the 2-hole? Beckham hitting in the bottom of the lineup? I appreciate them dedicating a few minutes for this team, but wow, the boxscore alone would prove these wrong. Also to note, Nomar gave Beckham the nickname "The silent killer" In MLB 2K10, Kruk said that Ramirez was going to be a top of the order hitter last year, but sucked too much so he had to be put in the bottom of the order. I think there's something around ESPN that thinks Alexei's a top of the order hitter. I don't know why.

QUOTE (SoxFan1 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 12:37 AM) God do I hate ESPN. Nomar said on Baseball Tonight that there is good diversity in their lineup. He said we have a great thing at the top of the order with Alexei Ramirez. He also said "Juan Pierre, who is great in that 2-hole." Then Bobby Valentine said that Beckham will remind people a ton of Nomar, and that he'll bring up the bottom of the order. I also saw this. Looks like Nomar had some nervousness going on.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 11:40 PM) If MLB '11 The Show adds this in it's game, I will trade for him immediately...... Sammy Gervacio with "The Stare" Marmol does a similar thing.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 12:04 AM) Brandon Wood looks absolutely horrible. It's now or never for him this year. Seems like he's been a prospect since I was in HS. He's the best AAAA player ever.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 04:04 PM) Just caught the highlight of Heyward's HR on Gameday. I absolutely loved (I think it was) Chip Caray's home run call. "Swing and a drive. Belted right. WELCOME TO THE SHOOOOOOOOOOW!" Heyward had a really solid "I've done this before" style HR trot and arrival at the plate too. MLB 10 The Show?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 08:46 PM) The amazing part is that Buehrle was so incredible, no one is talking about Rios's catch. Which would have been a easy double had he, Franklin Gutierrez, Grady Sizemore, (insert great CF here), not been in center.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 12:46 PM) Brian Anderson strikes me as more of the next Jersey Shore cast... He needs to work on that tan.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 05:25 PM) I got the image of Scooby Doo in disco threads pitching. Hahahah. xD Ultimate Warrior should start every game thread.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 07:52 PM) if you follow that facebook post, it is absolutely hysterical. Some totally insecure cubs fans spewing out hilarious garbage About the usual crap. Mostly attendance, lol.

QUOTE (earthshiner @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 05:54 PM) I'd compare MBs play to Alexei's play where somehow flipped it to Konerko who caught it barehanded in this play too Except Buehrle's is better since he had his back to first base when he did it.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 04:38 PM) Against a RHP it's still the right move until Teahen shows he's not terrible. Jones actually hit righties better than lefties last year. Jones is also a neutral hitter in his career, he's not much better or worse against pitchers from either side. Plus, with the way Rios looked today, it shouldn't be long before he's the full-time 5 hitter.

Man Zambrano sucked. At least he didn't hit any Gatorade machines.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 04:52 PM) How bout Obama? Heard he put a Sox cap on right before throwing the first pitch.

QUOTE (Reddy @ Apr 5, 2010 -> 03:33 PM) for some reason i KNEW he was going to catch that. Same here. If I remember correctly, Mauer hit a ball around there in Floyd's near no hitter and Swisher was about two whole steps away from catching that. And the ball Mauer hit was more of a fly ball than a line drive like the ball Rios caught.

A great start to what can possibly be a great season. I like what I see.

Rios, WOW. BA who?

Thornton has video game stuff. LOL HAWK. "HE GOOO-NO"

If you're the Indians, you should really try splitting up Hafner, Choo, and Grady. That's 3 straight lefties that can be neutralized by left handed pitching late in the game. Matt is just blowing them away.

Come on Matty, finish this one up.