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Alex "Mother-Bleeper" Rios


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http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

Guillen on Alex Rios - "What have I seen from Rios? A lot of outs. The only batting ninth guy making $5 million was me. This mother [bleeper] is making $10, $12, $14 million, he ain't going to be batting ninth [in 2010]. I'm going to make sure he earns his money. But right now I have to put him there because he's struggling. Next year, if we have Rios batting ninth we're in deep [crap] once again.''

 

So, perhaps Rios will work harder to fix that swing now?

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Don't miss out on this gem:

 

Guillen on his hitters failing to beat pitchers they have seen for the first time - "I mean you're not going to take anything away from the pitching staffs that we've faced, but we've been facing some pitchers this year it's like, 'Who the [expletive] is this guy? They don't even belong in the [bleeping] big leagues and they just kicked our ass.' I'm not going to lie to anybody. I know who beat us and I know who should beat us. We've faced some guys where they've called him up, faced us, and get him back to [bleeping] Double A, get the [bleep] out of here. That's how bad we've been."

 

http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

Awesome stuff, Oz.

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QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Sep 12, 2009 -> 11:08 PM)
http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

Guillen on Alex Rios - "What have I seen from Rios? A lot of outs. The only batting ninth guy making $5 million was me. This mother [bleeper] is making $10, $12, $14 million, he ain't going to be batting ninth [in 2010]. I'm going to make sure he earns his money. But right now I have to put him there because he's struggling. Next year, if we have Rios batting ninth we're in deep [crap] once again.''

 

So, perhaps Rios will work harder to fix that swing now?

 

I really like that he did this. Someone certainly needed to. Maybe that will be enough to shake him out of it a little.

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QUOTE (iamshack @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 12:12 AM)
Don't miss out on this gem:

 

Guillen on his hitters failing to beat pitchers they have seen for the first time - "I mean you're not going to take anything away from the pitching staffs that we've faced, but we've been facing some pitchers this year it's like, 'Who the [expletive] is this guy? They don't even belong in the [bleeping] big leagues and they just kicked our ass.' I'm not going to lie to anybody. I know who beat us and I know who should beat us. We've faced some guys where they've called him up, faced us, and get him back to [bleeping] Double A, get the [bleep] out of here. That's how bad we've been."

 

http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

Awesome stuff, Oz.

 

Heh, at least Oz is honest :D.

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This is good too:

 

"And when this team doesn't score, this team looks very, very, very bad. Very slow, no energy, but it's not because we don't have that, it's because we're not hitting. When we hit it's like, 'Oh, OK here we go.' ''

 

http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

So they know it too, guys and gals. It's certainly not just us who gets frustrated by it.

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QUOTE (The Ginger Kid @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 04:25 AM)
rios could come back to make kenny look like a genius, but right now the guy doesn't even deserve to be playing

I think Ozzie wanted Rios to get comfortable before he said anything. Hopefully this will light a fire under his a$$. Rios is a very talented CF. Offensively he needs to stop pulling away from pitches. If he could take notes from Beckham or Pods he would do wonders for our lineup. He needs to become a contact hitter. Go with the outside pitch and drive it into RF etc. . .

 

Yesterday he hit the ball hard a few times. But he also struck out in a key situation. Walker better make Rios his offseason project like he did with Crede in the winter of 05.

Edited by GreatScott82
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IIRC, Walker talked about Rios less than a week ago. Walker said he didn't get into specifics with Rios about fixing his swing until recently, saying something to the effect that they wanted Rios to get comfortable before they tried to "fix" him, give him advice.

 

I think the sox should have looked into fixing Rios right away-what do the sox gain by having a guy struggle, look horrible, and make the offense weaker as a result. Now, if the sox approached Rios and Rios said "thanks but no thanks, I can get myself out if it", then screw him. But Walker seemed to suggest that the sox hadn't really worked on fixing what was wrong with Rios until just recently.

 

 

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This is where the sox had said they had a "hands off" approach with Rios.

 

http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09..._with_rios.html

 

They should have given Rios a few days of looking horrible at the plate and then given him suggestions to correct what was wrong. There was no time to wait for him to get things fixed. Why wait until he was "drowning", and waste 2, 3 weeks of at bats in the middle of a pennant race before you give the guy advice?

 

And Walker's quote, 'the last thing you want to do in Sept. is work on mechanics'? It is what it is. If Rios' mechanics are off, work to correct them, whether it's Sept. or April.

 

Again, I don't know if Rios is taking the advice, being stubborn or what. But it sounds like the sox didn't take immediate steps to work on what was wrong with him, and let him continue his struggles, IMO, unnecessarily.

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Let's go by the full 3 weeks of the sox being hands off of Rios.

 

http://espn.go.com/mlb/players/gamelog?playerId=5880

 

In those 3 weeks, starting on 8-12, Rios would have started 16 games, w/ 3 days off, and 2 games w/ no AB's as he went in for defense. That would take us to Sept. 4th before they started working with him. That would mean Rios has had 7 games working with the hitting tips/ new advice Walker gave him.

 

Now, I'd be pissed if Rios wasn't taking advice from the sox, knowing how he's struggling. But from the sounds of it, the sox haven't given the guy much to work with in terms of advice. I'm pissed at the sox for letting the guy struggle, knowing full well he's doing something wrong and looking horrible at the plate, like they want the guy to HAVE to take their advice.

 

 

 

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QUOTE (beck72 @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 07:17 AM)
Let's go by the full 3 weeks of the sox being hands off of Rios.

 

http://espn.go.com/mlb/players/gamelog?playerId=5880

 

In those 3 weeks, starting on 8-12, Rios would have started 16 games, w/ 3 days off, and 2 games w/ no AB's as he went in for defense. That would take us to Sept. 4th before they started working with him. That would mean Rios has had 7 games working with the hitting tips/ new advice Walker gave him.

 

Now, I'd be pissed if Rios wasn't taking advice from the sox, knowing how he's struggling. But from the sounds of it, the sox haven't given the guy much to work with in terms of advice. I'm pissed at the sox for letting the guy struggle, knowing full well he's doing something wrong and looking horrible at the plate, like they want the guy to HAVE to take their advice.

That has been the Sox philosophy for quite a while now and it's probably one of the main reasons we've been so bad at developing prospects over recent years. It's fine to take that approach with proven veteran Major League baseball players like Rios, but this was the same thing they did with Brian Anderson as one example. They decided to let him get by on talent for as long as he could without trying to fix anything until he failed. The problem was, Brian failed at the MLB level, and when players have enough raw ability to make it that far, then you can't just put off making changes like that. Now, we did keep Dexter Carter in Kanny to work on his change before we traded him in the Peavy deal, and Carter's numbers alone warranted a promotion. And I don't desire to turn this into yet another BA thread, but I REALLY hope the DCarter situation was a sign that the "don't fix it until it's broken" mentality is completely gone from the farm system.

 

But back on topic, again, I think it's fine to do that with proven players who have had success in the Majors before. In fact I'd actually recommend it because you can always find a hitting coach who doesn't like a given player's approach, but if that player is hitting or was hitting in the recent past, and if the player is new to the hitting coach, it's best not to mess with anything until you definitely have to. Even if Walker was considered one of the best hitting coaches in the AL, it's unlikely he'd be able to make a change that would show results right away. By making mechanical adjustments he's taking the player back to square one in a way and it'll be a while before any benefits are realized. Lately it seems like Rios is going out up the middle and to center more, so hopefully that's a sign that some progress is being made here.

Edited by Kenny Hates Prospects
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QUOTE (iamshack @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 12:12 AM)
Don't miss out on this gem:

 

Guillen on his hitters failing to beat pitchers they have seen for the first time - "I mean you're not going to take anything away from the pitching staffs that we've faced, but we've been facing some pitchers this year it's like, 'Who the [expletive] is this guy? They don't even belong in the [bleeping] big leagues and they just kicked our ass.' I'm not going to lie to anybody. I know who beat us and I know who should beat us. We've faced some guys where they've called him up, faced us, and get him back to [bleeping] Double A, get the [bleep] out of here. That's how bad we've been."

 

http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

Awesome stuff, Oz.

That's my favorite one out of all these. Now, if by some chance the Tigers get EXTREMELY lucky and win this division - and this is very, very unlikely and would be similar to each Tigers player individually getting stuck by lighting 3 times on the same day - then, if I were Ozzie, I'd send a message to the hitters by calling up as many no-name pitchers as possible and playing them in the field. Fill out the lineup 1-9 with pitchers like Torres, Whisler, Colon, Linebrink, Randy Williams, etc. (because I don't want our good pitchers running the bases or fielding) and let's see if these guys can score one more run than our offense scored off that Fister guy in Seattle. If they can, then each hitter in the lineup that day gets beaten over the head with a dildo in front of their mothers. But that's just how I'd handle it, although it won't matter since we're winning this thing.

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QUOTE (Kenny Hates Prospects @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 01:37 PM)
That has been the Sox philosophy for quite a while now and it's probably one of the main reasons we've been so bad at developing prospects over recent years. It's fine to take that approach with proven veteran Major League baseball players like Rios, but this was the same thing they did with Brian Anderson as one example. They decided to let him get by on talent for as long as he could without trying to fix anything until he failed. The problem was, Brian failed at the MLB level, and when players have enough raw ability to make it that far, then you can't just put off making changes like that. Now, we did keep Dexter Carter in Kanny to work on his change before we traded him in the Peavy deal, and Carter's numbers alone warranted a promotion. And I don't desire to turn this into yet another BA thread, but I REALLY hope the DCarter situation was a sign that the "don't fix it until it's broken" mentality is completely gone from the farm system.

 

But back on topic, again, I think it's fine to do that with proven players who have had success in the Majors before. In fact I'd actually recommend it because you can always find a hitting coach who doesn't like a given player's approach, but if that player is hitting or was hitting in the recent past, and if the player is new to the hitting coach, it's best not to mess with anything until you definitely have to. Even if Walker was considered one of the best hitting coaches in the AL, it's unlikely he'd be able to make a change that would show results right away. By making mechanical adjustments he's taking the player back to square one in a way and it'll be a while before any benefits are realized. Lately it seems like Rios is going out up the middle and to center more, so hopefully that's a sign that some progress is being made here.

With the sox focus on getting younger, and the vets moving on after this year, Walker might not be the guy to lead the Sox hitters in the near future. Even small adjustments could be made to a hitter-veteran or young- that don't require getting back to "square one". If Walker can't do that, he shouldn't be in charge of young hitters who will be making up a majority of the sox roster in the next few years.

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QUOTE (beck72 @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 07:57 AM)
With the sox focus on getting younger, and the vets moving on after this year, Walker might not be the guy to lead the Sox hitters in the near future. Even small adjustments could be made to a hitter-veteran or young- that don't require getting back to "square one". If Walker can't do that, he shouldn't be in charge of young hitters who will be making up a majority of the sox roster in the next few years.

I agree in the sense that if Walker isn't the answer, we need to dump him as soon as possible. If he's going to be replaced then let's get some else in before the rest of the kids come up.

 

The "square one" comment I guess I put the wrong way, depending on the hitter it might be a simple mechanical adjustment and that's all, not like reworking a swing or anything. But I guess what I meant by phrasing it that way was that the hitter is taking everything out of his mind when it comes to his old approach and trying something different, no matter how small a change it is. The hitter has to not just try something new, but he also has to buy into it and believe it will work and not feel compelled to revert back to what he had been doing. From there he needs to rebuild his confidence within the new approach, and as results are slow to come that must be hard to do. So the whole thing, even if just a simple adjustment, could take quite some time because it's not like Walker or anyone else qualified would have problems telling the hitter what is wrong and how to go about fixing it. If Walker is bad at anything as far as a hitting coach goes then I imagine he is a poor communicator who has trouble gaining the trust of a lot his players. Maybe he can get through to certain guys and not others. But anyway, the point about the "square one" comment was just to intimate that it's quite a lengthy process that involves mental adjustments, faith, confidence, and breaking old mechanical routines even before any results come, so in a way making a change is kind of like clearing the slate and starting over to a degree.

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QUOTE (iamshack @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 12:21 AM)
This is good too:

 

"And when this team doesn't score, this team looks very, very, very bad. Very slow, no energy, but it's not because we don't have that, it's because we're not hitting. When we hit it's like, 'Oh, OK here we go.' ''

 

http://blogs.suntimes.com/whitesox/2009/09/oz_being_oz.html

 

So they know it too, guys and gals. It's certainly not just us who gets frustrated by it.

 

OG also should also mentioned Greg Walker failures as a hitting coach this a 3 plus year struggle!

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QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 05:46 PM)
So the carrot didn't work, now they are trying the stick...

Carrot nothing. All Walker offered Rios was pitching reports for 2-3 weeks, then gave him 7-10 games to fix things once they offered some advice.

 

If Rios turned down offers for help, then he deserves the stick. But the carrot seemed to consist of a "welcome to the sox", fix things on your own until we've had enough, and then we'll complain that you can't hit.

 

I haven't bashed Walker in the past. But this screams of neglect on his part. And now they're blaming Rios for not hitting.

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QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 13, 2009 -> 09:46 AM)
So the carrot didn't work, now they are trying the stick...

^

 

Ozzie's already started the post mortem and I'm happy to hear it. Call some people out, it's not a blame game. Detroit's not a great team but they've beaten the teams they should and lo and behold, they've got a strangle hold on first place. The sox should be ashamed, I'm glad to hear them admit it.

 

 

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I wouldn't blame Walker or Oz for neglect. I would suspect you wouldn't want to mess with a new guy right away, except making sure he has tapes and all the extra hitting at his disposal.

 

He might kick ass vs. Detroit. I hope if we get it close Oz doesn't bench him during those games. Baseball's a wacky game. He might explode in the head to head games vs. the Tigers. Maybe not, but it would be a chance for some redemption for Rios. At least let him play in the first two vs. the Tigers and see if he has anything to offer vs. Detroiit.

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