Feeling the Doom...

[BobDylan]

This team is entirely too good to miss the playoffs. They can rip off 8-9 in a row at any time. I think they will and all this hand ringing will be for not.

 

That was said all through April, May, June, July and August. It's Sept. 8th and the only big winning streak the team had was against the terrible National League ... and they shared that streak with several other AL teams mopping up the NL.

 

It ain't going to happen, If this team makes the playoffs by some miracle, they better pray the offense comes into first half form or they will be embarrassed worse than in the 2000 ALDS.

[LVSoxFan]

We haven't had great luck in avoiding injuries this season. It only appears that way because they haven't been severe enough to warrant long stints on the DL. Buehrle, Contreras, and Dye have all been fighting through back injuries. Thome has been battling hamstring and other nagging injuries and CLEARLY isn't the same guy who hit 30 dingers before the All-Star break. Garcia isn't "injured" per se, but his arm strength is only at about 80% of what it was last season.

So, do these other players lose 5 mph off of their fastball (Buehrle) or have to alter their delivery (Contreras) when they experience back pain as well?

 

I think there's been more injuries than we've been told.

 

My baseball nut coworker said right away after Buehrle's slide started: he's hurt.

 

And I don't buy that Jose just decided one day to throw sidearm only, for the hell of it.

 

Freddy's just a mystery, that's for sure. A mystery an injury would explain.

 

And Thome's been kinda quiet second half, wouldn't you say?

[My Dixie Normus]

I am also a little sick and tired of everyone riding Brian Anderson like a rented mule. He has picked his game up since the ASG and is hitting .285 with 13 multi-base hits. I don't know how much you expect out of the #8-9 hole but since the halfway mark he has produced. His defense is very solid give or take an error here or there.

 

Our woes are these.

 

Paul Konerko kills far too many rallies with a 1 out, runner on first double play.

 

Pods sucks on both sides of the plate.

 

Our entire line-up is getting rolled over by rookie and/or just plain bad pitchers.

 

We fail to capitolize on good outings like Javy's this week.

 

 

 

Brian Anderson is NOT the problem.

[fathom]

I think there's been more injuries than we've been told.

 

My baseball nut coworker said right away after Buehrle's slide started: he's hurt.

 

And I don't buy that Jose just decided one day to throw sidearm only, for the hell of it.

 

Freddy's just a mystery, that's for sure. A mystery an injury would explain.

 

And Thome's been kinda quiet second half, wouldn't you say?

 

Well, if these players are injured and not telling Ozzie, then shame on Ozzie for not communicating well with his players. Buehrle hasn't lost 5 mph...he was throwing 88 mph last night, which is high for him. Look at how some other teams we're competing with have lost core players for an extended period of time.

[DABearSoX]

I don't know if its only one wheel. I think its the whole axle

[beck72]

This team probably isn't having the fun of the first 3/4 of the 2005 season. This is what repeating as champs is all about. It's a mental and physical grind, not a laugh a minute trip to the park each day.

 

IMO, the key is getting to the playoffs. If the sox can clinch, the pressure will be lessened. Then they can go back to playing more carefree, relaxed ball.

[Hangar18]

This team probably isn't having the fun of the first 3/4 of the 2005 season. This is what repeating as champs is all about. It's a mental and physical grind, not a laugh a minute trip to the park each day.

 

IMO, the key is getting to the playoffs. If the sox can clinch, the pressure will be lessened. Then they can go back to playing more carefree, relaxed ball.

 

 

Folding under Pressure ...... Thats not good.

[LVSoxFan]

In an overall sense, no matter how you break it down, what's glaringly obvious to me this season and especially post-ASB is our inability to put together any kind of... streak. Whoever's fault it was for this game or that game, I for the life of me cannot remember the last time we won more than, say, four games in a row. Can you?

 

Never mind 8, 10 games or something like that. This would be JUST the time to do that and it's very frustrating seeing that Detroit was once untouchable but now falling back to Earth, and yet we cannot do anything about it.

 

It literally seems like every win is followed by a loss to offset that win. I don't remember a season like this. In 04 we were in it for a while but pretty much slid from the beginning of September so you had no illusions.

 

I agree with the idea that were we to get in the playoffs, everybody will relax. They certainly did last year. It was like a gorilla off their backs, and you could tell. The tightness and frowns and frustration visible on the team this year does remind of September last year.

 

But it is amazing to witness them ring up 10 runs one night and then get stuck at two the next--now THAT reminds me of 2004.

 

That said, I actually am looking forward to the California trip. Maybe the nice weather and change of scenery will wake them up. It feels like we've been playing scuffleball in dreary series with Central opponents since the ASB, even if that's not factually the case.

[greg775]

This has been more painful than the September slide, because this .500 stuff has been going on for months it seems.

 

I think the September slide was worse. That really was excruciating especially with

the media and fans mentioning it would be the biggest choke in chicago sports

history, surpassing the 69 Cubs and all that.

The fact we won it all last year made this much less maddening for me.

This is more sad than painful because it's all there for this team.

It's just that the team simply can't get it done. Whether it's BMac getting torched

in the pen or a starter sucking on a given night or Pods reeking ... we just can't

get it together. And yet we're 20 over .500. Wild.

[The Ginger Kid]

embrace the doom. You know it's coming. We've seen them play an entire season and have yet to see anything to suggest that this will be a successful road trip. If they were somehow to go 3-3 I would be surprised and delighted, but I think we're looking at 1-5, maybe 2-4.

[LVSoxFan]

It is pretty amazing that we are 20 games over isn't it? Talk about a cursed season:

 

-Detroit is even more over than that for most of the season

-Minnesota's asleep first half then pulls a Cleveland 2nd half

-KC is a bottom feeder but was killin us this season when we needed to win

 

We manage to sweep LAA at their place--usually a house of horrors--but would get manhandled here by teams like KC or Tampa Bay.

 

We get smoked by longtime nemeses like Santana or Sabathia but yet get smoked by rookies with losing records.

 

It's just been a grind of a season, especially second half.

 

LOL even Saturday night, which should have been a rock n' roll fest as we're pounding them 10-1, becomes a nail-biter. Or was that Friday? I don't remember.

 

Here's what I feel about this second half, which is CERTAINLY different from last year: whenever we lose a lead anywhere near the middle of a game or later, a sense of doom creeps in.

 

Whereas last year we're down 4-0 in Houston during the WS and I'm not even concerned. This year, though, that sense of horror just creeps in.

[LosMediasBlancas]

Wow, 2 games back in the WC, 3.5 games back in the frickin' division which two weeks ago seemed out of reach, with like 19 games left to play.

Yeah, things are bad and I feel the doom.

[Steff]

Wow, 2 games back in the WC, 3.5 games back in the frickin' division which two weeks ago seemed out of reach, with like 19 games left to play.

Yeah, things are bad and I feel the doom.

 

 

Ahh.. so now that you've moved out of Illinois your true fairweather fan colors are showing..

 

 

 

 

 

 

[The Critic]

Ahh.. so now that you've moved out of Illinois your true fairweather fan colors are showing..

Yeah, he thinks no one can come get him now, but he's forgotten about GAGE THE MERCILESS!!!!

[LosMediasBlancas]

Ahh.. so now that you've moved out of Illinois your true fairweather fan colors are showing..

 

Yep, I've just been false flagging....for 37 years.

[LVSoxFan]

LMB "feeling the doom" was from last week and originally was intended to describe how the team seems tight, there's apparently some squabbling going on, things are being said to the press, etc.

 

It wasn't meant to say the season's over or anything like that. But rather, if we're gonna lose, let's lose guns blazing--not because there's all this distraction going on.

 

At this point, no: our problems on the field are oviously what's hurting us. Which I can live with.

 

Yes, we're still in it, and yes I'm cheering the whole time. Because I do know if we manage to get in, it's like a "reset" button. And seeing that we didn't get "hot" apparently this season, look out if that's when it happens.