VAfan

All very good points. Now all we need is for Ozzie to use McCarthy in the 6th and 7th inning of every future Javy Vazquez start and we may actually get to a point in the game where MacDougal is worth something to us!

One Championship is NEVER enough. It just makes you hungry for MORE. (Were you done after the Bulls threepeat? Wasn't the second threepeat just as grand?) That said, if we don't win again this year, I am so glad that the Sox finally won one in my lifetime. By happenstance, I was 2 years old the last time the Sox won the pennant, in 1959. Last fall, my son was 2, and the Sox not only won the pennant, but the World Series. So he knows what team to root for, even if he doesn't really understand all the nuances of baseball. And the other day, when I asked him what he wanted to be, he said: "baseball player." We're never going to lose memories like this of the 2005 World Series Champion Chicago White Sox. (After the season, I wrote a 17-page ode to the season just so I would never forget.) I also agree that it is helpful to take a break, and by all means SPEND TIME WITH YOUR KIDS! I'm off to Vermont in a couple of days to camp with my kids, and I'm not going to be anywhere near a newspaper. If I call my wife by cell-phone, I don't want to know anything that's happening with baseball. Given our 3-10 slide against our AL competitors, it is very good timing for a break. And maybe, just maybe, when I get back, not only will I be rejuvenated, but so will the SOX. GO WHITE SOX!!! BACK-TO-BACK WS TITLES!!!!!

Is a Soriano to the Sox trade going to happen? I think a trade of Soriano to the Sox still has a 50-50 chance of coming to fruition, with the core of the deal not making KW a liar. In other words, Pods and Prospects, but not Fields or Broadway. My main reason for believing this is that I don't think any other team in the running for Soriano is going to give Bowden anything of greater value than what KW typically offers. TIGERS -- Have a huge lead, and do not need to surrender young pitching for a rental like Soriano. TWINS -- Are loathe to surrender prospects for a rental, especially since they have no hope of signing him next season. ANGELS -- Bill Stoneman has no track record of making trades surrendering prospects. He's too scared he'll give up the wrong ones. YANKEES -- Need a RF, not a LF, with Matsui coming back. Mostly, they need pitching. And they don't have anything to offer in a deal. MARINERS -- Are out of the AL West race, if that's possible. But the real question is: Will KW be more or less likely to make this trade if the Sox are in 3rd place in the AL Central come Sunday? Personally, if I were KW, I would make sure to offer the Phillies for Abreu whatever deal I'm offering the Nats for Soriano. And I might sweeten the pot with an extra prospect if the Phillies were willing to take $4 million off Abreu's contract for next year. Abreu doesn't have Soriano's power, but he more than makes up for it with his OBP.

Here's Keith Law's (ESPN) take on the trade. I think this guy is a very good commentator who has a handle on minor league talent. ****************** If healthy, MacDougal's an upgrade. Monday, July 24, 2006 The White Sox's bullpen was one of its strengths in 2005, but the collapse of last year's setup man, Cliff Politte, and the offseason trade of Luis Vizcaino to Arizona left a void between the starters and closer Bobby Jenks that no newcomer was able to fill. Mike MacDougal has thrown just four innings since coming off the disabled list earlier this month but appears to be healthy, and in a tiny sample this year, has induced eight groundouts against just one flyout. He's one of the few pitchers in the majors who can miss bats and can get groundballs, so if he's healthy, he'll be a significant upgrade in the ChiSox's bullpen. This marks the first trade of the Dayton Moore Era in Kansas City, and it's a sensible one, as Moore moved one of his most tradable and least necessary assets (a closer) and added two arms to his farm system, addressing the organization's primary weakness. Like MacDougal, lefty Tyler Lumsden has had injury problems, missing all of 2005 after surgery to remove bone chips from his throwing elbow. Lumsden has an average fastball with good sink, a plus breaking ball and good control, but he hasn't had the strikeout rate you'd like to see in a starting pitching prospect; at worst, he should be an asset out of the bullpen due to his ability to get right-handers out as well as lefties. The Royals also acquired Dan Cortes, a 6-foot-5, 205-pound, 19-year-old right-hander who was Chicago's seventh-round pick in 2005. He has a fringe-average fastball and flashes a plus breaking ball at times but is still raw and has a fair amount of projection. He's an ideal second guy in a trade, especially given the paucity of pitching in the Royals' system.

A very good set of comments. I want to add a 6th beef. 6. Total misuse of Brandon McCarthy. This has been the yoyo man of the Sox staff this year. First he's long relief, then short, then long, then short, then what?? He seems to warm up a lot and not make it into games. If we aren't going to start this guy, then use him like a starter -- to start the 5th, 6th and 7th innings as relief for starters -- Buehrle, Vazquez, Freddie, and Garland early in the year -- who don't have it that day, or (in Vazquez's case) are due to melt down the third time through the lineup. Granted, we had problems with Politte ruining our rotations, but that doesn't excuse the way Ozzie has completely failed in his handling of McCarthy. This guy could have helped Vazquez win his last two starts had he been inserted in the 6th innings of both games before Vazquez started giving up hits. You could make a case last year for forcing starters to go long. We had no long man in the pen. But this year, with a guy who you WANT to give 100 innings, to fail to use him in long relief when so many games would have been won or remained competitive if we had only gotten our starters out of the game in the 3rd, 4th, 5th, or 6th innings, is just terrible managing!! MANAGING REQUIRES A MANAGER TO ADAPT HIS STYLE TO THE TEAM HE HAS, NOT THE TEAM HE WANTS. We have more than enough runs to be successful. But Ozzie has to manage like Bobby Cox -- who, when asked on Sunday Night Baseball weeks ago how he was going to turn the Braves around said the only thought on his mind was how he was going to win that night's ballgame -- ONE GAME AT A TIME. WIN TODAY. The streaks will follow. **************** (Side note: I hope Dye isn't being punished for sticking up for Garland. If that were true, I'd fire Ozzie tonight if I were KW. Rather, it's probably because Dye had an 0fer with 4 Ks in the last Texas game. And Ozzie wanted to play Gload again after he laid down two successful bunts in that win. That kind of managing I don't mind.)

As it has turned out so far, these should be called the 15 games to oblivion. So far, we are: 1-2 v. Boston (only by miracle did we avoid a sweep) 0-3 v. Yanks 1-2 v. Detroit 1-2 v. Texas 0-1 v. Minny 3-10 with two games left with Minnesota, including facing Santana tonight. Over the last 10 games, we've lost 8 games in the standings to Minnesota. It is a complete meltdown. Can this team recover?? I hope so, but I no longer have any confidence that it will. (Once Minnesota gets past us, we could play .600 baseball for the rest of the year and not make the playoffs.) My biggest problem is not the starting pitching -- though that has been horrible (outside of Jon Garland and valiant efforts of Jose Contreras) -- it is with Ozzie Guillen. Between Jay Mariotti and the various hit batsmen incidents, Ozzie appears no longer to be manager of this team, but just a hothead who gives a lot of media interviews. Get it together, Ozzie. Your TEAM needs you.

My list of beefs with Ozzie's management is growing. Feel free to add your own. 1. Mismanaging Javier Vazquez. JV's a great 5-inning pitcher. Third time through the lineup, he gets shelled. Knowing this fact and doing nothing about it, instead blowing a 2-0 lead to the Tigers and a 2-0 lead to the Twins in back-to-back starts, both times in the 6th inning, is just inexcusable. Lots of starters get yanked after 5 innings. When it is the only way to win the game, and you don't do it, it is inexcusable. Then, to leave Javy in this game FOR ANOTHER INNING -- IT'S CRIMINAL! 2. Focusing on irrelevant and petty things. Lashing out at Jay Mariotti. Lashing out at Jose Padilla. Yelling at Sean Tracey, the team, Jon Garland, etc. for not beaning someone. None of these things contribute to winning baseball. 3. Getting totally outmaneuvered. In the second loss to Texas, with the winning run on 3rd and 1 out, we had the choice of Ozuna to a rookie right hander or calling in a pinch hitter. Ozzie chose Pods when he knew Texas had a lefty ready in the pen. Pods can't hit lefties this year to save himself. Why not pinch hit: Cintron? Mackowiak? Gload? His WORST choice was Pods. Who struck out. 4. Dumb mistakes. Same game, next inning. Still tied. Thome draws lead off walk. No pinch runner means that Texas pitcher doesn't have to pay attention to 1st base at all. Then, AFTER PK strikes out, Ozzie puts in Mackowiak??? Instead of having Mack pinch hit the inning earlier and Pods pinch run immediately once Thome got on with the winning run, he waits inexplicably. Mack makes it to second, but goes no further. The key here was giving Konerko a better chance by distracting the pitcher. Or, you could have stolen second and given PK the chance to move Pods to third. This was brainless managing. 5. Misusing Jenks. With Thornton surrendering a lead off runner, then blowing away the next two guys, why bring in Bobby Jenks to get the last out of the 8th inning a tie game. It wasn't Manny Ramirez up there. Thornton could have handled him. Indeed, Thornton was a long guy in Seattle and likely could have handled the 9th too. Instead, Jenks gets the out in the 8th, but then seems to tire after two outs in the 9th, walking a rookie to get to Michael Young. Predictably, Young hits a two run single, and that's the ballgame. I'm just talking about a couple of games here. But I think the team is in a funk in large part because Ozzie isn't doing the necessary things to win. I got excited like everyone else here about the trade news today. But we've got a manager right now who has lost his way. We aren't going to win anything until he starts making the right decisions again.

QUOTE(Melissa1334 @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 09:40 PM) u can blame ozzie for this. yes, i sorta understand why he let him face cuddyer, but morneau?makes no sense at all What game is Ozzie watching? 6th inning, against HUGE rival, Vazquez turns a 2-0 lead into a loss. fish. Even Liriano got pulled after 5 innings yesterday. With Jose up tomorrow, Ozzie, use the bullpen. Best way to restore Vazquez's confidence is to have him get victories against Minnesota and the Tigers, not shattering losses. These games could be the season.

I totally agree. You could see it coming when, on Friday, Ozzie was talking about Padilla and warning him even though Padilla wasn't scheduled to pitch until Sunday. In the meantime, we lost two games, the second of which needed every second of the manager's attention.

QUOTE(soxpride77 @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 06:58 PM) I would still take him any day of the week if I could get him on my team. The guy is an all-star, and deservedly so. Well, I would take him too, but not at any price. What if you got this line out of him? 156 637 102 171 43 2 36 104 33 125 30 2 .268 .309 .512 .821 That's his line from last year, when he was in the AL. The guy has some great talent, but he's also got some real flaws.

QUOTE(soxpride77 @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 06:51 PM) I think maybe you're undervaluing his services. He's going to get paid big by someone in the offseason, he's a great player. Not just good, or very good, great. Well, he looks great this year, but he hasn't always looked so good. For Texas last year, he had a HUGE home/road HR differential. When he was with the Yanks in the playoffs, you could always get him out because he was such a free swinger. They dropped him way down the lineup because his OBP was so bad. The guy seems like a fantastic talent, but I still don't think he's a disciplined hitter. (This is the first year in his career his OBP is above .338. Not good for a lead off guy.) And he's never paid enough attention to defense to be a complete player.

QUOTE(bmags @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 06:45 PM) JR has continued to suprise us with our budget, however. But, i do see what you mean now. I, admittedly, would love this deal, if the participants that mac, jurko, and harry mentioned would truly be those men being shipped off. So i may be a bit starry eyed at being realistic right now. The overall budget can go up, but I don't think a guy like Soriano would receive an offer from us that would make him the guy WE pay the most. (Remember, a big chunk of Thome's money is paid by the Phils, and Vazquez's deal is paid in part by the Yanks.) That said, this is probably one additional reason why Bobby Abreu was likely never even on our radar. Philly wasn't going to pay his contract, and we wouldn't come close to making a guy like that our highest paid player.

QUOTE(AbeFroman @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 06:39 PM) thinks he will command? He'll get Konerko money... maybe more He may, but we won't give it to him. I think KW's under some tight salary constraints, including how various contracts compare to each other within the team. Do you think they are going to pay a guy like Soriano more than the team captain? I don't. For the same reason, he wouldn't go any higher on Contreras. If the trade price is low enough, we might make a deal with the hope of signing Soriano or getting draft picks if he walks. Then the hope would be that he likes the team well enough to give us a discount.

The one thing that makes me think this isn't going to happen is that I think Soriano overvalues his services. Accordingly, he's not going to sign a deal in the next few days at any level the Sox would offer. I mean, the Sox aren't going to give him Paul Konerko money. Yet I think that's what Soriano thinks he can command.

QUOTE(JimH @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 06:19 PM) Nice of you to pat yourself on the back, but lots of people on this site have been saying for months the White Sox (KW) have no intention of trading their major league pitching. Well, for all the ridicule I've received on this board -- from you especially -- it certainly isn't because I've made dumb calls. Last year, I was one of the most vociferous posters against trading McCarthy. This time I'm saying it just doesn't make sense from where KW is sitting. Still, I wouldn't be surprised to see KW get Soriano, as long as it's only Pods plus some combo of minor league guys. And at the end of the day, I don't think Bowden's going to get that much more than that.

Whether the deal is dead or alive, I think I may have been the first on this post to say there was no way KW was trading McCarthy for a rental. So what's out there instead? I think Bowden's going to find that the price for Soriano is not all that high at the end of the day. The Yanks won't part with Phillip Hughes, and otherwise have nothing to offer. Bill Stonemen of the Angels is values his prospects too much to give any of them up -- and probably doesn't know which of them are just potential and which ones can really play. Dombrowski is sitting on a 6-1/2 game lead and needs a lefty hitter, not a right handed guy who strikes out and doesn't walk a lot. His whole team is filled with such players. So, I wouldn't be surprised if we end up with Soriano, but for a price that would include Podsednik and pitching prospects who are not on the ML club (Sean Tracey?). The Nats need guys who will be players in 3-5 years, when the new stadium will come on line.

BTW -- I love the fact that Birmingham is such a pitcher's park. It helps the trade value of guys like Lumsden, yet didn't hurt the value of Chris Young.

QUOTE(GoSox05 @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 04:55 PM) Sox gotta make room for him. Who leaves? Sean Tracey is my bet. I still don't think there's any way that KW deals McCarthy for a rental like Soriano.

QUOTE(LVSoxFan @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 04:53 PM) I've yet to hear an explanation of how, if it's not Soriano in LF and Pods in CF, Soriano's going to fit into the lineup. What, as a backup for Iguchi? How about Soriano in LF and Anderson in CF? Why is that so hard to figure out? Pods is the weak offensive player here. Anderson may be so now, but watch the month-to-month splits. Anderson may have a better OPS by September.

QUOTE(Flash Tizzle @ Jul 24, 2006 -> 04:49 PM) Winning now isn't guaranteed. Our position now in the standings doesn't even guarantee a playoff spot. And often the idea of "winning now" kills an organization several years down the line. Decisions are made which are regretted later. Ask San Francisco how they delt with "winning now" when Pierzynski was traded for. Or the Mets with Scott Kazmir. Above all us, we traded Lumsden to a division rival!!! We're giving them a legitimate starting pitching prospect to pitch against us in the future. To answer Chaos, I'm concerned about our farm system because I'd like an arm or two available in several years when this rotation is disassembled. Lumsden seemingly gave us hope, and had good peripherals to project as a mid to upper starter in the rotation. Now, what do we have? What do we have?? If he stays healthy -- which is the only risk -- we have a very hard throwing right hander who has been tested as a closer but will only be asked for set up duty. This was an essential ingredient to solidifying our bullpen into one that could go into the postseason and matchup with any of our rivals. Is Tyler Lumsden another Scott Kazmir or Francisco Liriano? I don't think so. I trust KW enough for him to trade the right arms.

Don't you love how a few days ago, KW said: "EVERYTHING'S QUIET. I'M NOT MAKING ANY TRADES. ZZZZZZZZ..............." Meanwhile, he's the only GM with the balls to give up talent to get talent. Hey, it may not work out, but I was tired of watching the Sox having our brains beat in over the last two weeks by our rivals. SMOKE EM, KENNY! Put a charge into this team!!!

If MacDougal is tied up through 2008, then this was a deal well worth making. We need pitching, and if we can't fix our rotation, we had damn well better have an airtight bullpen. The only problem with that theory is that Ozzie then has to use the bullpen properly. Which means yanking starters like Vazquez at the very first sign of concern.

MacDougal makes great sense, even if KW once again "overpaid." McCarthy is not the obvious guy that is being replaced -- Sean Tracey is. Or, frankly, Ross Gload if we decide to carry 12 pitchers. But it is contingent on MacDougal staying healthy more than 50% of the time, which he has been unable to do.

Here's some stuff on MacDougal. Updated: July 13, 2006, 11:08 AM ET Royals activate closer MacDougal from DLSportsTicker DETROIT -- At least the Kansas City Royals will have their closer for the second half of the season. MacDougal Mike MacDougal, who had 21 saves in 25 opportunities last season, was activated from the 60-day disabled list on Thursday. Without MacDougal, the Royals used Ambiorix Burgos and Elmer Dessens as closers this season. Burgos leads the team with 14 saves, but has also blown six save chances. Dessens has two saves, but also squandered two chances. MacDougal had been on the 60-day DL since March 24 with a right shoulder strain. He began a rehab assignment with Double-A Wichita on June 18 before moving on to Triple-A Omaha. MacDougal made eight appearances with Omaha and was unscored upon in his last six before the All-Star break. Last season, MacDougal, 29, pitched a career-high 70 1/3 innings and went 5-6 with a 3.33 ERA. He converted 15 consecutive save chances from May 19 to Aug. 20. In 2003, MacDougal made the American League All-Star team as a rookie. He set a club record with 68 appearances that year and recorded 27 saves. ****************** The good news is that if he was a rookie in 2003, he's tied up by arbitration for at least a couple more years.

Here's some stuff on MacDougal. Updated: July 13, 2006, 11:08 AM ET Royals activate closer MacDougal from DLSportsTicker DETROIT -- At least the Kansas City Royals will have their closer for the second half of the season. MacDougal Mike MacDougal, who had 21 saves in 25 opportunities last season, was activated from the 60-day disabled list on Thursday. Without MacDougal, the Royals used Ambiorix Burgos and Elmer Dessens as closers this season. Burgos leads the team with 14 saves, but has also blown six save chances. Dessens has two saves, but also squandered two chances. MacDougal had been on the 60-day DL since March 24 with a right shoulder strain. He began a rehab assignment with Double-A Wichita on June 18 before moving on to Triple-A Omaha. MacDougal made eight appearances with Omaha and was unscored upon in his last six before the All-Star break. Last season, MacDougal, 29, pitched a career-high 70 1/3 innings and went 5-6 with a 3.33 ERA. He converted 15 consecutive save chances from May 19 to Aug. 20. In 2003, MacDougal made the American League All-Star team as a rookie. He set a club record with 68 appearances that year and recorded 27 saves. ****************** The good news is that if he was a rookie in 2003, he's tied up by arbitration for at least a couple more years.