VAfan

I'm curious what folks think in answer to this question: Would the White Sox win more or fewer games, make or miss the playoffs, if we essentially stood pat this offseason? Given the fact that the Twins will be without Liriano for the year, I believe we would win more games and make the playoffs with essentially the same team, with the only adjustments coming from within. The reason we would be better? Our starting pitching. With added rest and a proper spring training next year, we should bounce back closer to 2005 levels and come close to matching the Tigers' pitching. I'm sure KW will NOT stand pat. But I hope he doesn't hurt the team making moves just to make moves.

I'm not writing off the offseason, contrary to the reactions of some. Really, I'm looking for some good answers to some thorny issues. So far, those answers haven't clearly emerged. That's all I'm saying. By all means, please offer some great fixes for the Sox' significant issues. The biggest overall problem as I see it is that we basically have to hope our guys pitch like it is 2005 again, because even if we trade out one starter, we aren't going to trade out the whole staff. If we pitch well, we will be in the thick of it again. If we don't, we won't. That's why I posted a thread when we were out of it proposing that we just roll the dice with our starting 5 again. After all, which one is going to be our best pitcher next year?? You could make a case for just about anyone but Vazquez. Trade the wrong one and we could have screwed ourselves. Anyway, I'm not really as pessimistic as the post sounds. I just think there are no easy answers and there is quite a lot of risk.

So far, this offseason is not looking good for the Sox moving back to the top of the AL Central. I suppose the best news is that Liriano is out next year. But there don't appear to be good answers to any of the following questions: 1. Starting pitching. Everyone wants to trade at least one of our top 5 starters, but which one? Garcia? Well, for all his troubles, he went 17-9, and was probably our second most consistent starter behind Jon Garland. Sure, Jose had a better ERA and was lights out early, but he won only 13 games. Buehrle, on the other hand, ended with an ERA of almost 5, and Vazquez was a mental midget, breaking down in the 6th inning of EVERY game. Meanwhile, Brandon McCarthy didn't exactly give me comfort that he would be a reliable and consistent replacement. Sure, he had one nice start once we shut Jose down for the year, but he also came in and surrendered the long ball too many times to count. That's always been his weakness. Plus, we still don't know if he can pitch 200 innings in a season without breaking down. 2. Left field. The universal opinion around here is that Scott Podsednik has to be done after last year. He couldn't hit lefties at all, couldn't get on base, and had only one decent stretch the entire season. Plus his defense, never great, went totally in the crapper. But who do we replace him with? -- Juan Pierre?? No thanks. This guy never walks, gets caught stealing a ton, and is way overpriced. -- Dave Roberts?? This guy is at the age where he's going to keep breaking down. He's not the answer. -- Alfonso Soriano?? Great option, but not at the price he's going to demand. -- Gary Matthews, Jr.?? Is he a one-year wonder? -- Josh Fields?? Not even close to being ready yet. -- Rob Mackowiak?? Should have spelled Pods last year, at least against righties. But he can't hit lefties at all. -- Carl Crawford?? Will the Rays even trade him for McCarthy/Fields?? Would you make that deal? -- Bobby Abreu?? I just put this in here b/c this is the guy we should have traded for last year. -- Ryan Sweeney?? Can we afford Uribe/Anderson/Sweeney in the lineup? I don't have the answer. Oddly enough, because the other options seem so bad to me, part of me is starting to think that with Pods' habit of alternating good/bad/good/bad seasons that next year he might put up another decent season. I'd take his World Series year again over just about any of the other options that have been put forth. 129 507 80 147 28 1 0 177 25 47 75 59 23 .290 .351 .349 .700 3. Bullpen. Neal Cotts for David Aardsma?? This doesn't exactly get me excited. What if Cotts comes anywhere close to reverting to his 2005 form?? It seems to me we will have 3 reliable arms in the bullpen -- Bobby Jenks, Mike MacDougal, and Matt Thornton. Behind them, it is a total crapshoot. I suppose Aardsma is seen as taking David Riske's spot without upgrading it. And we have a bunch of arms available: Charlie Haeger, Boone Logan, Sean Tracey, etc. But all we have right now are question marks. 4. Hitting lefties. This really killed us last year. This was our batting line against lefties last year. .262 .329 .413 .742. Against righties we hit .290 .349 .491 .841. And it wasn't just an overall problem. For most of the year, Iguchi couldn't hit lefties, yet Ozzie had Pods/Iguchi/Thome lined up so that teams could use their lefty out of the pen to mow down 3 guys in order late in ballgames. Plus, we had other right handers who couldn't hit lefties very well -- Uribe and Anderson -- and no reasonable sub for Pierzynski. By the end of the year, Thome slugged under .400 against lefties. What is the solution? Again, it is not going to be an easy fix. We could use a left fielder and lead off hitter than can hit both lefties and righties, though the choices are not good. We can hope that Brian Anderson will hit better this season, and Uribe will finally learn to hit more consistently. We could swap Ross Gload's roster spot for a DH/1B sub that can kill lefties and use him to sit Thome down for 30-40 games. We need a right handed catcher who can hit. Trouble is, the guy we have in the system, Chris Stewart, can't hit at all. I don't have any good answers here either. 5. Center field. Brian Anderson is ++ defensively. And if his were the ONLY bat that was weak, I would be happy to carry him again and hope his hitting comes around. But we also have too many other outs in the lineup, especially against lefties -- Pierzynski, Uribe, Pods, even Iguchi. And we can't afford the defensive drop-off that comes by using Rob Mackowiak to sub for him. One choice might be to bring up Sweeney and let them fight it out. At least Sweeney is less of a defensive drop off than Mack is. But can Sweeney hit big league pitching? Will platooning Anderson and Sweeney stunt both of them? Are we ready to make a trade of Anderson already, then watch him blossom as a hitter with a new team?? I'm not ready to give up on Anderson. I think a trade would be a HUGE mistake. On the other hand, if we don't fix other spots in the lineup, we can't afford to carry BA's bat every game next year either. 6. Shortstop. Today's rumor is that we've offered Alex Gonzalez $15 million for 3 years. I hope not. He's Uribe without the power. My belief is we need to keep Juan through the length of his contract and work on his hitting. Like Crede, he has shown months where he has gotten it and been off-the-charts good. It took Crede quite a few years before he gained consistency. I sure want Juan on our team if he finds that same success. Still, I recognize that another year like last season is going to hurt us. But we do have Alex Cintron, who is a decent backup. Well, that's enough for now. I think this has to be KW's most challenging offseason. Everything is overpriced again. There are a lot of tough choices, and not many good options.

This isn't a new idea -- I think SantoDorf or someone put it up first -- but count me among those who think it is a good idea if Alou would settle for a 1-year deal, or maybe 1 guaranteed year plus an option, for something less than the $7.5 million he received last season. Our 2006 club couldn't hit lefties very well, and we had a huge hole in LF. Alou would very nicely help in both categories without standing in the way of developing other players. And he'd be a better lead off hitter than Scott Podsednik.

Back before the World Series I wrote a post that said we should sign either Soriano or Matthews Jr. At this point, it is pretty clear Soriano is going to be priced too high. It is not so clear what Matthews Jr. will fetch. For the right price, I'm still all for him. On the Dave Roberts post, I was a little late, but agreed with the poster who offered Moises Alou's name. I think Alou, who's 40, may be an excellent "bridge" candidate to carry us over while Brian Anderson/Sweeney/Fields develop. He kills left handers (which also makes him valuable as a sub for Jim Thome, who was pretty bad (sub-.400 slugging) against lefties). He's played for several winning teams. He would fit perfectly in our clubhouse. He would pair pretty well with Mack, who kills righties. The other value of a guy like Alou is that he's a free agent. We've thinned our depth by trying to always build through trades. I think this offseason the Sox would be well-advised to strengthen through free agency.

QUOTE(Tony82087 @ Oct 29, 2006 -> 07:42 PM) 2 Names I want to bring up. Bobby Kielty. Not as a starter, but try to get him on the Southside, make sure you somehow get him in the lineup when a LH is on the mound. We need more bodies that can hit LH, it's simple. The other interests me. Moises Alou. Before you just laugh and dismiss it, look at the splits. http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/spli...p;type=batting3 Almost 300 AB's vs. LHP the last 3 years, and owns a .337 average. Last year it was .349 in 83 AB's. He is not the answer for the lead off spot obviously, but as I said before, we need more bodies on this team that can hit LHP, plain and simple. Im not saying Alou is the answer. But as of right now, IMO outside of the pitching woes we saw last season, the biggest concern was our lack of hitting tough LHP, and we faced the most of it. No other team faced more LHP. It doesnt look like it's going to get any better either. You beat me to Moises Alou. I haven't been on Sox talk in a while, but when I noticed his name in ESPN magazine, it struck me as an immediate fit for the Sox. When he's not playing LF, he could spell Thome against lefties. Thome couldn't hit lefties at all -- slugging below .400 against them. Meanwhile, Alou slugged .571 last season. My biggest question is what kind of contract might Alou demand? He's 40, but would he take a 1-year deal? Is he looking for anything close to the $7.5 million he got last year? Could the Sox get him for a 1-year guarantee of $5-6 million with a second year option for a similar amount but a $1 mill. buyout? My other question is whether he's completely healthy (he played only 98 games last season). As for Roberts, he just doesn't do much for me, especially if he wants a raise. I'd rather sign a true hitter like Alou and use Mack to back him up or spell him against right handers.

All the talk about Ichiro is misguided IMO. First, Seattle is not trading him. He puts fans in the seats. Seattle is owned by a Japanese businessman. It's not happening, period. Second, why spend $12.5 million a year on Ichiro AND trade away valuable prospects to make it happen?? If the Sox want a prominent lead-off hitter who can play LF, then bid for Alfonso Soriano. He may end up costing even more than $12.5 million/year, but he won't cost any prospects, and he'll hit 40 more HRs. To take on either Ichiro's or Soriano's contract will probably require us to move one of our big-5 starters, but why not get something else in return for such a trade?

QUOTE(santo=dorf @ Oct 18, 2006 -> 12:54 AM) What about his walk rate? (PA/BB. The lower, the better.) 2004: 15.41 2005: 18.28 2006: 20.43 Yikes. To put it in prospective, Thome had a PA/BB of 5.58 this season. I'm not saying Joe should walk 100 times in a season, but once every 5 games is atrocious. You are right, that's pretty bad, and trending in the wrong direction. But I still see it improving, and if he went to the Yanks, I know it would improve, perhaps dramatically. Here, he was the end of the run-producing line, and his focus was driving in guys that were on (or hitting the ball over the fence), not building pressure so the guys behind him would get the RBI. Yes, Uribe had 70+ RBI, but along with Anderson, was almost always an out. If he went to the Yanks, I'd be surprised if he didn't crack 50 BBs his first year.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 17, 2006 -> 10:37 PM) Um... SoxTalk hype? I'm pretty sure I'm in the minority who want to see Gload start, and would be OK with him in LF. The hype is in the other corner on this argument. And I do think that, if he played regularly, he be as good as or better than Pods in LF. Will he ever be a great, or even above average defender out there? Probably not. Maybe more like average at best. I watched him play LF, in person, in ST this year. The guy isn't as horrible out there as people sometimes think (people are, I think, overinfluenced by a series of awful plays in RF against the Cubs some time ago). I thought Ozzie should have played Gload in LF this year when it was clear Pods was never going to "come around." I also think he's the perfect #2 hitter -- much better than Iguchi has been -- b/c he has a high average, very low strike out rate, is a lefty, and can bunt. His splits also suggest he doesn't have to sit against lefty pitchers. Still, I don't believe the guy has a position he can play as a regular. He doesn't have nearly enough power to hold down 1B or DH, and isn't good enough as a fielder to hold down LF for 500+ ABs. We ought to be able to do better. Still -- he would be a better choice than Pods or Juan Pierre. I totally agree with that.

QUOTE(santo=dorf @ Oct 13, 2006 -> 06:09 PM) Learning how to draw walks at the major league level is anything but "Easy." Statheads love to point to ISoD at both the major league and minor league level to show how a player will always have the same amount of plate discipline. If Crede went to the Yanks to draw walks, he'd probably hit .240 or so and be run out of town. I'll confess I haven't done a statistical analysis of this, but I have to disagree about the walks. Crede's batting average went from .239 to .252, to .283 over the last three years, as his K's dropped from 81, to 66, to 58 over that span. Thus, he's obviously able to put the bat on the ball better and do more with it. This has given him a lot more confidence at the plate than he's ever had. The next step for him would be to just lay off pitches out of the zone that he's been fouling off. I don't expect him to jump up to 80 BBs next season, but an upward progression to 70 over a couple of years shouldn't be that hard.

Signing Juan Pierre would be the rough equivalent of the huge blunder made by signing Royce Clayton to play SS in 2001. Pierre was 51st out of 58 rankable outfielders last year in terms of runs created per game (RC27), which is a very good measure of offensive production. Yes, he beat out Scott Podsednik, who finished dead last -- 58th place -- but that's not saying much, is it? PLEASE, DON'T ADVOCATE SIGNING JUAN PIERRE!

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Oct 13, 2006 -> 01:03 AM) Here's my thoughts. Any deal involving 2006 Crede and a starter probably makes us weaker. The question is, will 2005 Crede be Crede the rest of his career, or was this a career season. I think Crede is between what he did in 2006 and what he did in 2005. No way he will be 2006 good the rest of his career, but he will be a plus player and great defender. Is is worth giving up him and a starter to get one of the best players ever, and get him motivated since he wants a ring and would be out of New York? I say yes, but I see both sides of the debate. I disagree about whether Crede will continue to improve offensively. He's only 28. I don't know where the up curve ends -- it varies by player -- but I think it is likely to continue at least until he is 30 or 31. He also has an "easy" area of improvement -- drawing walks. He's 9th among ML 3Bs in OPS, 8th in slugging, but horrible in OBP because he's last in walks drawn at 28. If he went to a team like the Yankees that stress plate patience, I would expect this number could quickly double or triple. If it did, Crede could be a top-5 offensive performer at 3B. He also has absolutely no protection in the Sox lineup, which is why I advocated flipping Crede and AJ in the order. I agree, however, with the idea that trading Crede and a starter for A-Rod probably makes us weaker overall. It certainly weakens our defense. We've seen what works best in the AL Central -- pitching and defense. When we had it, we won it all. Every other year since we won the division in 2000 has been led by a team with the best pitching and defense. That's where KW should focus his attention, not on chasing A-Rod.

As much as I like A-Rod's in-season numbers, the idea of sending Joe Crede to the Yankees as part of an A-Rod deal just sickens me. They would teach him how to take enough pitches to walk. He already has very low strike out totals. And if Joe Crede ever learns how to take a walk, his offensive skills would finally match his defensive prowess. We all know he's a much better clutch and pressure player than A-Rod probably has EVER been, even before he went to NY. Would you want to face the Yankees in the playoffs with Crede over there getting the clutch hits to win playoff games, while A-Rod goes into his shell again? A-Rod/Fields is surely a lot better offensively than Uribe/Crede. Defensively, however, it is certainly a step down. I've never seen Fields play 3B, so I don't know how far of a step down it is. So, it is not as if I can't see the positives. I'm just ambivalent about it.

The Yankee fans are ready to ride A-Rod out of town on a rail. But I can't believe Yankee management is going to be willing to part with him. In 2006, he had an off season, and still had a .914 OPS. The year before, he was third in baseball in OPS. If I were the Sox, I'd make an offer -- Garcia, Fields, Broadway sounds about right (I don't suppose they would have any use for Uribe, would they?) -- but I wouldn't hold my breath. The Yankees would probably want Buehrle, and as bad as he was this year for us, there's no way I would ship him off to NY. So, fantasize all you want. It's the offseason for us (and the Yankees). But don't expect A-Rod to get moved anytime soon.

A well-deserved trouncing of the Yankees. I'm glad at least one AL Central team is still fighting. And I'm really glad that the Yankees, once again, failed to buy the World Series. All is well with baseball.

Maybe we can't afford him, but the best lead off hitter in baseball this year was Alfonso Soriano. If you don't believe me, I posted a thread that listed the stats off all lead off hitters. So, please add: Alfonso Soriano

Best choice? Alfonso Soriano. Speed, power, much better as a lead off hitter than down in the order, and doesn't cost any prospects. Probably too pricey, however. Second best choice: Carl Crawford. Didn't lead off well this year, and doesn't hit lefties that well, but he's signed long term, has speed to burn, and is still on upside of career. I'd be willing to send Vazquez and Fields, but not McCarthy. Probably won't be good enough to get him. Third best choice: Gary Matthews, Jr. Maybe he had his career year. Maybe he finally learned to hit -- kind of like Joe Crede. Even if he slides backwards a bit, he's a TON better than just about all of the names posted on this thread. As a free agent, he'll cost us no prospects. Best guy who got away: Bobby Abreu. This guy was the spark the Yankees needed at the trade deadline, and is the main reason they are likely going to waltz to another WS title. We would have done better if: Ozzie had used Iguchi to hit lead off and used Ross Gload to hit second and play LF. But this is not a solution for next season. Please, NOT: Juan Pierre (Willie Harris is just as good as Pierre), Dave Roberts, Coco Crisp.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Sep 28, 2006 -> 02:41 PM) People here want to spend a ton on both LF and SS, and trade BMac. But money-wise, that ain't happenin'. More realistically, think like you have a financial stake in the business, and that you have a budget to work with. Better to move one of the expensive starting 5 than BMac. And you probably won't be able to spend HUGE money on both LF and SS. So, with that in mind... Trade Contreras or Garcia. Also send off Pods and Uribe. Consider moving Fields as well. In trying to acquire new LF and SS, spend big money on one of those, for someone with a high OBP and who plays solid D. The other, go cheap... SS: Best available on the market, use some of the above as trade bait. LF: Ross Gload If you lose the 9M per year from Garcia/Contreras (replaced by BMac), and a few more million from Uribe and Pods (replaced by ??? and Gload)... That leaves you with 14M or so to play with per year for a SS and some bullpen help. Sounds pretty good to me. The SS? Furcal. Yeah, he's owed 13M next two years. But guess what? That is just KW's type, like Thome - negotiate LAD out of some cash. Pay maybe 9 or the 13M, and throw in Fields. So... Your lineup would be: Furcal, SS Gload, LF Dye, RF Thome, DH PK, 1B AJ, C Crede, 3B Iguchi, 2B Anderson, CF You just increased OBP by a lot (and added speed), maybe lost a bit at SS on defense (about even in LF), and freed up money for the bullpen. So since you are all so good at it... tell me what's wrong with my idea! EDIT: If Gload struggles in LF next season, that gives a chance for Owens or Sweeney. I would have LOVED for Ozzie to play Gload in LF this year and hit him in the #2 hole once it was painfully obvious Pods wasn't going to snap out of his slide. I'm sure I started at least one thread pushing this idea back in July or August. Gload would really be a great #2 hitter -- high average, lefty, very low strike out totals, hits lefties reasonably well. But if Ozzie wasn't going to play him THIS YEAR in LF, when we had such a desperate need, he's certainly not going to play him there next year, even if he's the only guy on the roster. Ozzie just has a blind spot when it comes to Ross Gload. Plus, you can hardly make the case that Gload is a quality defensive player in LF. As for adding Furcal, that's just too complicated. I don't think the Sox are done with Uribe, and I'm not sure they should be, given his 20+ dingers and 70+ RBI. (AJ, hitting behind the best 3 OBP guys we have, hasn't driven in that many runs, despite a .300 average most of the year.) Remember, it took a lot of years before Joe Crede finally did what he needed to do to become a solid offensive player. Uribe shows enough promise to suggest the Sox should hang in there with him too. And, until he gets it offensively, he's still a better defensive SS than we've had in a VERY long time. So, keep it simple. Keep Uribe, but replace Pods. Adding a RH DH to spell Thome against lefties and give him more rest, adding a RH catcher who can hit and/or play great defense (Stewart ready?), and adding a lefty CF who can field the position so we don't have to let BA sink us (Sweeney?), will also help. QUOTE(GaelicSoxFan @ Sep 28, 2006 -> 04:32 PM) Okay, the Nationals were shopping Soriano at the trade deadline. Here's the problem: they didn't just want McCarthy, Sweeney or Fields. They wanted all the top prospects. I praise Kenny for not selling the farm in order to get an aging, whiny veteran with a big contract and even bigger ego. IMHO, the leadoff hitter for the 2006 Chicago White Sox will be Jerry Owens. He's their top speed prospect. The reasons why they traded for Scott Podsednik are 1. Owens was two years away from being ready for the big leagues and 2. I liked seeing Carlos Lee hitting walkoff grand slams against the Cubs, but he's a member of the 'swing hard in case you hit it' club. Jerry Owens????? No way. That guy isn't ever going be a major league regular. ***************** Edit: So far, I'm sticking with making a run at Soriano. If he demands to play 2B, I'd say we'll give him a chance to prove he can field the position once Tadahito plays out his contract.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Sep 29, 2006 -> 11:50 AM) I've thought of it for one simple reason...he's a Free Agent at the end of this year. He is cheap, so he does have value, but I've gotten the impression from watching the last couple years that while people who watch teams intently realize the value of a good 2 hole hitter...a lot of times their stats don't go up enough to make other teams realize their value. Our best 2-hole hitter is actually Ross Gload, by a LONG SHOT. High-average, lefty, very low strike out totals, can bunt. Hits both lefties and righties. About as much power as Iguchi. Problem is, he doesn't have a position to play. Iguchi strikes out way too much to be a good 2-hitter. Plus, for most of the year, he totally sucked against lefties and couldn't hit at all on the road. The Sox need consistency out of that position, and Iguchi totally failed to deliver it. A lot of times he was just as bad as Uribe/Anderson/Pods, making a killer 4-out stretch in the lineup. But what's really bizarre is that Ozzie thinks Iguchi is an "RBI man."

QUOTE(Flash Tizzle @ Sep 28, 2006 -> 11:48 AM) It seems with all Williams positive traits, he doesn't know the damn thing about trading players at their peak value. I'm not merely suggesting this due to Buehrle's troubles. I've stated before it was ridiculous (IMO) that not one starter was delt after the World Series. Any reasonable person would have guessed their collective statistics would likely regress; and if it didn't, they were going to command a higher salary the following season. What made it even more difficult to comprehend is f***ing Brandon McCarthy was available to replace whomever was traded. AND Vazquez was acquired. It honestly made too much sense not to trade a WS starter. Our bullpen was noticeably weak -- trading one could have replenished that part of our team as well. How many games has the bullpen cost us? Or an entire season without McCarthy? I can't say these moves would have been the difference between our current standings and a playoff birth, but I believe we'd be better off than our current situation. But, in fact, what KW did was make ONE TOO MANY TRADES last offseason, when he shipped El Duque, Vizcaino, and Chris Young to the Diamondbacks for Javy "Meltdown" Vazquez. At the time, I accepted this move b/c neither Garland nor Contreras had inked extension deals. But in retrospect, this was the deal that hurt our season the most. Instead of having BMac in the rotation, he languished in the bullpen, misused more than any other player by Ozzie. El Duque proved in the postseason he could pitch out of the bullpen, and would have likely done better than McCarthy being jerked around from short man to long man to in-between. And Vizcaino would have gone a long way to soften the meltdown of Cliff Politte and pitched the whole season better than Politte's backup David Riske. Plus, we'd still have Chris Young. If we didn't want to keep him, he probably could have fetched Alfonso Soriano at the trading deadline. Now that we stand where we do, I've written that KW should keep the starters for another season. Part of that is trying to pick the one to let go. Part of that is deciding that 2006 was the off year, and 2007 is much more likely to be an on year. If I had to let one go, it would be Vazquez. Problem is, he certainly won't bring back 3 players. He likely won't even bring a Chris Young straight up.

I'm not averse to getting ripped on this board, and I would agree there are drawbacks to both Soriano and Matthews Jr. But all who have responded to this thread I'm sure would agree keeping Scott Podsednik for another season is NOT AN OPTION. Accordingly, if you have a better plan for LF and lead off, LET'S HEAR IT. I'm not strongly wedded to any of the offseason ideas I've posted over the last few days. I just want to push the debate. Aside from fixing the starting pitching problem and strengthening the bullpen, getting a lead off hitter that can hit righties AND lefties and score well over 100 runs (with Dye, Thome and Konerko behind him) has to be the biggest offseason priority of the Sox. Wouldn't all of you agree? So let's hear your ideas. -- One thing I might add that I put in the Carl Crawford thread. Please evaluate how your guy hits as a lead off man. Crawford's splits suggest he SUCKS as a lead off hitter, but excels in the #2 hole.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Sep 27, 2006 -> 11:31 PM) The problem was not just that BMac was in the bullpen. The problem I saw was the way BMac was used out of the bullpen. When BMac actually got regular work, he was able to work with some level of effectiveness out of the bullpen. June and July are prime examples. He struggled in May when he was asked to make 1 spot start and then given 10 days off afterwards. He struggled in September after he had a long off-time in late August with what was rumored to be an injury. Brandon was never used in the role he needed to be used in. He needed to be used any time one of our starting pitchers started struggling. ANY time. He needed to get to 100+ innings this year. He was used instead as just another righty setup man, while all the effort and all the innings were again given to the starters. Our bullpen is going to wind up with the fewest innings pitched in baseball, by a lot. BMac alone should have made up some of that difference, and I think it hurt both him and our starters that he wasn't used that way. Balta, you disagreed with another of my posts regarding BMac, but I noticed this and I couldn't agree more. We had 5 starters that struggled big time at one point or another during the season, one of whom, Vazquez, predictably melted down in the 6th inning of at least 10-15 of his starts. You could have planned to have McCarthy start the 6th inning of all of those games AND used him to relieve the other guys who struggled. So the issue is, what do you do next season? If we had a do-over, the easy answer is to never make the Vazquez trade. We could have used El Duque in the bullpen (or traded him somewhere else) and to keep Contreras on his proper arm angle, Vizcaino certainly would have helped, and we'd still have Chris Young, who among the trio of BA, Sweeney, and Young, probably has the highest upside. But we don't have a do-over. I would agree that we can't trade BMac, but which starter can we trade? If I had to pick one it would be Vazquez. Decent stuff, but doesn't have the mental makeup to be a winner. Would the D-Rays take Vazquez for Crawford?? No. But would they take Vazquez and Fields? To my mind, that should be more than enough. I know Crede's got back issues and Scott Boras is his agent. Still, I think he's a gamer well worth whatever the Sox will need to pay to keep him. And that leaves Fields without a real position to play. One problem with Crawford, however, is his splits suggest he SUCKS as a lead off hitter. By Batting Order AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB HBP SO SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS Batting #1 87 14 22 3 1 0 9 9 0 15 5 1 .253 .323 .310 .633 Batting #2 342 53 111 13 11 15 49 20 2 46 31 7 .325 .363 .558 .921 Batting #3 159 19 45 4 3 3 18 7 2 22 20 1 .283 .321 .403 .724

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Sep 27, 2006 -> 09:27 PM) Those are some honestly poor ideas all around. 1. BMac showed today why he is a.) so much more valuable as a starter and b.) so much better as a starter. He should be our #4-#5 starter next year. No questions asked. 2. Soriano? If we free up the $ either through the ticket sales this year or by trading a starter, I could live with that. Matthews Jr. is honestly a very poor option to me. He will get more $$ because of his dominant season this year...he's 32 already, he has had 1 great year...he's got a real chance of being another Adrian Beltre in terms of not earning the contract he'll sign. 3. Ryan Sweeney should not be used as a platoon player. Brian Anderson should start 150+ games next season barring injury. 4. Josh Fields is probably not ready to swing a bat in the big leagues. Josh Fields will probably perfom like Anderson if he comes up now...struggling for a long time. As a platoon player with Thome, he'd be in even worse shape, especially considering he'd be facing Santana, Lee, Sabathia, etc. all the time. 5. Neal Cotts is a very risky option. It may do us well to trade him right now. We also have Logan as a potential option...we have 3 lefties for 2 spots. This may be something that is not resolved until the end of Spring Training. Hermanson is an even more risky option. As a last guy in the bullpen, he's not a terrible idea, but that's if he's only the 4th righty out there. Which means we need to have Jenks, MMac, someone better out of the pen than McCarthy before we use Hermanson. He should only get mopup duty of he stays. Charlie Haeger is looking like a non-terrible option for the pen right now...but I don't want Haegar and Hermy. Too risky. BMac is a dominant starter and a terrible reliever. Why we'd even consider making him a reliever again i can't even fathom. We need to find 1 right handed reliever somewhere. 6. We had a long discussion of this in the game threaed. I think Stewart works on this. He will hit poorly. But he can play good defense, and he is cheap. The money we would spend on a backup catcher would be much better spent on a new LF or on a new right handed relief pitcher. These are fair comments, but I disagree with most of them. My problem with replacing a starter with BMac is -- which one?? (See previous post.) And what do you do for depth if you get an injury? (We didn't have any this year other than Contreras's short stint on the DL.) BMac's problem is he got jerked around and misused by Ozzie. He should have started the 6th inning of every game started by Javy Vazquez. He also could have really helped if Ozzie had yanked the other starters when they got in trouble instead of always leaving them in for 100 pitches. My other problem with trading one of the starters is they will likely bring very little in return since all (except Garland) are coming off career-worst years. (In hindsight, I would have been happy if we'd never made the Vazquez trade (though at the time, neither Contreras nor Garland had re-signed) and still had Chris Young. But I'm not sure I'd trade Vazquez now since we aren't going to get a Chris Young back.) I greatly prefer Soriano to Matthews Jr. too. But not if his demands are going to be $15 million/year. Sweeney as the platoon player would actually stand to get more than 1/2 of the ABs. Frankly, I'd make this a contest and may the best man win. Brian Anderson is not a lock to be a major league hitter and I wouldn't bet another season on him coming around. Certainly, BA is the better defensive player, however, and if he ends up outplaying Sweeney, it won't stunt either one's development. I said I'd consider Fields, but I'm willing to drop this idea. There are some pretty cheap guys out there who can hit lefties well but can't field. One of those guys would be worth adding instead of Gload. Thome probably shouldn't play more than 130 games given his second-half drop off this year and pathetic sub-.400 slugging against lefties. I haven't seen Stewart enough to judge whether he can be the righty-backup, but he's certainly the cheapest option. As for Hermanson, what's the risk to the deal I proposed? He costs us $500K to boot out the door. If everything on top of that is incentive, then if he comes up lame, we haven't lost anything. But if stays healthy enough to give us 50-60 appearances, I'd say he's probably better than a lot of other options. As for Cotts, set up relievers are like mutual funds. If you bet on the guys who finished high this year, they are likely to finish low next year. Is he really done as a pitcher? I think he has as much chance of bouncing back as our 5 starters. I'd take him over Logan forever. ************** At the end of the day, we probably aren't that far apart. I assume we both agree we need a new lead off hitter who can hit lefties as well as righties. We need to get the rotation to bounce back. We need better depth (we had a huge hole against lefty pitchers this year). And we need to strengthen the bullpen. Some might think we need a new SS, though I don't. (I'm willing to give Uribe another chance given his 20+ HRs and 70+ RBI and still very good defense).

QUOTE(fathom @ Sep 27, 2006 -> 09:10 PM) So we're going to have a payroll around 120 million? As I said in my Soriano thread, if we have to drop a $10 million contract of a starter to add him, it would probably be worth the trade off, unless Soriano gets ridiculous in his contract demands. In that case, sign Matthews and keep the starter. (Can you pick the starter that needs to go? Contreras was our best starter early. Garland was our most consistent starter for the longest stretch. Garcia has had better starts down the stretch than any of the others. Vazquez, though a head case, is actually a great pitcher through 5 innings. Buehrle has been the most consistent over the longest stretch.)

Reload. 1. Keep the 5 starters unless someone makes us an offer we can't refuse. Use BMac as a long-reliever/spot starter -- a role he was rarely used in this season -- to reduce the workload on our starters. 2. Sign Soriano or Matthews Jr. to replace Pods. 3. Bring up Sweeney to platoon with Anderson in CF. (Let Ozuna go.) 4. Find a right-handed hitting DH to give Thome a rest against lefties. (Let Gload go.) (If we would actually use him, I'd strongly consider making Josh Fields this guy.) 5. If Hermanson's back is okay, re-sign him to an incentive-laden deal (his $500K buyout would become the base, and the balance of his option would be in terms of performance incentives). Bullpen would be: Jenks, MacDougal, Thornton, Cotts, BMac, Hermanson. (Let Riske walk.) Though Hermy may not be perfectly reliable, we need that veteran presence down there. 6. Find a right-handed hitting backup catcher that can hit lefties and/or play solid defense. Win 2007 World Series!