Theories? Why do the White Sox fade in Aug/Sept. every year?

[Greg Hibbard]

The Rays took 2/3 from Houston, 1/3 from the Marlins, 1/3 from the Braves, 1/3 from the Padres, and 1/3 from the Diamondbacks.

 

They had two series with the Marlins, going 2-4. Certainly the D-backs are as bad as the Nats, Cubs and Pirates, but I don't know if the Marlins are in that bad of a class.

[kitekrazy]

No matter who was managing the White Sox, we would still kick the NL's ass, and our team would still be constructed with holes in it because our GM tells us we have to live with choices like Mark Kotsay for budgetary reasons.

 

Glad to see someone got the memo realizing this isn't Ozzie's team.

 

[kitekrazy]

People need to stop playing this card. The Sox have been bad over the past week because the same players that dominated the league for the past two months haven't been executing. It's as simple as that.

 

You get an A+.

 

Their offensive categories aren't really as much as people think.

 

[Greg Hibbard]

This team is built to be about a .500 AL team, like it is built to be every single year, and an awful lot of that is because of the division we play in. Year in and year out, 87, 89, 91 wins does it in the AL central. Sure, there are exceptions, but that's the general level. In the AL east, year in and year out it's a 100 win division minimum, with 95 usually getting the WC. We always construct this team to be competitive in this division.

 

Gammons had an interesting thought going into the season - he said the entire organizational strategy is predicated that they will be built to be competitive every year, to always have around 80 wins minimum, and that the organization plays for that one "lightening-in-a-bottle" swing that takes us the 10 games over we need to be in order to ultimately win the division. He said that's been the M.O. going back to the end of the Schuler days. Look at the late 90s - we were still hanging around 80 wins year in and year out.

 

We happen to generally dominate the NL because of the style of play that the GM and manager have agreed to build the team around.

 

If we were playing in the AL east, we'd be a 70-75 win team, as built. An interesting note is that the Toronto Blue Jays might just be running away with the division if they played in the Central.

 

 

[stretchstretch]

glad to see we got this thread back to addressing the OP, some good theories and stats have come out of it.

 

personally, I find the fact that many other top teams have mediocre second halves revealing as it puts us in the company of the "elite" squads in comparing 1st half to 2nd.

 

now, couple that with an observation that MN is unique in seemingly being able to fill injured spots with "no-namers" out of the minor system at almost any position, and they come in immediately contributing, would really answer the 2nd half trend

 

Morneau goes down, no problem, Nathan lost for the year before the season begins (Sox fans jump with glee), no problem....no need to go out to the FA market, or squeeze something in at the trade deadline, just pull up a guy that no one has ever heard of and he comes in with rock solid defense, speed, smart baserunning, above avg offensive numbers, and so on.......how many times can someone recall a MN guy make his big club debut who sits at or above the Mendoza line for weeks? or a pitcher than with ERA north of 5 over a period of three weeks, consecutive blown saves, etc

 

 

[fathom]

No matter who was managing the White Sox, we would still kick the NL's ass, and our team would still be constructed with holes in it because our GM tells us we have to live with choices like Mark Kotsay for budgetary reasons.

 

What?? You mean the same GM that was willing to bring back Thome, but Ozzie said no? Ozzie was the person who towards the end of last season, he said re-signing Kotsay was the team's top priority as soon as the season ended.

[LittleHurt05]

What?? You mean the same GM that was willing to bring back Thome, but Ozzie said no? Ozzie was the person who towards the end of last season, he said re-signing Kotsay was the team's top priority as soon as the season ended.

 

In the end, KW is the general manager and he is allowed to make his own decisions. Ozzie may have been the one who convinced him to not take Thome, but KW still gets all the credit or the blame for personnel moves.

[fathom]

In the end, KW is the general manager and he is allowed to make his own decisions. Ozzie may have been the one who convinced him to not take Thome, but KW still gets all the credit or the blame for personnel moves.

 

99% of the time, I'd agree with you. However, the situation with the 2010 Sox is extremely unique, and we talked about it before the year how it almost seemed like KW was trying to set up Ozzie to be the fall guy if this offensive (in more than one way) strategy didn't work.

[kitekrazy]

The weird thing...since the AS break, we're in the middle of the pack in terms of ERA in the AL, and actually slightly better than we were in the first half so far, and we're 3rd in the AL in runs scored since the AS break when we were only #9 in the first half. We're actually playing slightly better right now than we played on the whole in the first half, based on those numbers.

 

The problem is...the Twins have the #1 offense and the #2 ERA in the AL since the AS break.

 

That team ERA will get back to reality if they make it to the post season.

 

[kitekrazy]

99% of the time, I'd agree with you. However, the situation with the 2010 Sox is extremely unique, and we talked about it before the year how it almost seemed like KW was trying to set up Ozzie to be the fall guy if this offensive (in more than one way) strategy didn't work.

 

I agree. There's a lot more to signing a player since they have an agent with demands, owners have budget restrictions ect.

 

http://www.suntimes.com/sports/deluca/2606...fe.suntimes.com

 

There's some intelligent comments (not by the author).

 

Did anyone ever consider that Thome may be a better fit for the Twins than the Sox? 31 teams balked at signing Thome and the Twins may have offered his last chance at being on a team only at their demands. The DH by committee is only a failure because it's filled by Kenny's lightning in a bottle approach. Kotsay was kept to help give PK a rest at 1st while Paulie can DH. Thome gives you no options other than needing a pinch runner. His 2009 numbers are not what you want from a DH anyway.

 

 

 

[kitekrazy]

glad to see we got this thread back to addressing the OP, some good theories and stats have come out of it.

 

personally, I find the fact that many other top teams have mediocre second halves revealing as it puts us in the company of the "elite" squads in comparing 1st half to 2nd.

 

now, couple that with an observation that MN is unique in seemingly being able to fill injured spots with "no-namers" out of the minor system at almost any position, and they come in immediately contributing, would really answer the 2nd half trend

 

Morneau goes down, no problem, Nathan lost for the year before the season begins (Sox fans jump with glee), no problem....no need to go out to the FA market, or squeeze something in at the trade deadline, just pull up a guy that no one has ever heard of and he comes in with rock solid defense, speed, smart baserunning, above avg offensive numbers, and so on.......how many times can someone recall a MN guy make his big club debut who sits at or above the Mendoza line for weeks? or a pitcher than with ERA north of 5 over a period of three weeks, consecutive blown saves, etc

 

Their philosophy is much different than the Sox and maybe closer to Ozzie's. My biggest rant about the Sox organization is playing defense is the lowest priority. How many kids on the organization that fans recommend to play DH or 1st?

 

[witesoxfan]

I agree. There's a lot more to signing a player since they have an agent with demands, owners have budget restrictions ect.

 

http://www.suntimes.com/sports/deluca/2606...fe.suntimes.com

 

There's some intelligent comments (not by the author).

 

Did anyone ever consider that Thome may be a better fit for the Twins than the Sox? 31 teams balked at signing Thome and the Twins may have offered his last chance at being on a team only at their demands. The DH by committee is only a failure because it's filled by Kenny's lightning in a bottle approach. Kotsay was kept to help give PK a rest at 1st while Paulie can DH. Thome gives you no options other than needing a pinch runner. His 2009 numbers are not what you want from a DH anyway.

 

1B isn't a hard position to play, and backups at 1B are not particularly hard to find. Mark Teahen could have been a perfectly adequate backup to Konerko at 1B with Vizquel filling in on the left side, and if someone else was needed, you can call up Josh Kroeger or sign Jeremy Reed or sign Jermaine Dye or call up Dayan Viciedo or even retain Mark Kotsay while getting rid of Randy Williams. A backup 1B should not be on the priority list of things a contending club needs.

 

Beyond that, I don't understand how a .249/.372/.493/.864 is not something you'd want from a DH. He keeps innings alive by walking a ton, and he gets runs on the board by being on base and hitting for power. Mark Kotsay is not very good at either one of those things, and he requires a pinch runner too (or he should, at the very least). But by god, has he played a remarkable backup 1B this year.

[caulfield12]

With Thome, the best theory I've heard (I think it was Fathom's) was that it was going to be very difficult for Thome to come back as one of the lowest paid members of the team after having been the second or third highest player on the team in 2010.

 

Although I don't know if you'll ever come close to hearing Thome say that was an issue, the guy's made so much money in his career, and he doesn't seem like the type to fritter it away, either.

 

No doubt, in some clubhouses, this would be a huge deal for a veteran to be asked to take a $10 million PLUS paycut and still come back to the same team. I'm not sure how many times that has actually happened in modern baseball history, actually. Perhaps that was Ozzie's thinking process, that it would be sad to see a Hall of Famer who meant so much to the Sox in a diminished role where he'd only get 125-150 at-bats or having to release Thome like the Mariners ended up doing with Griffey as it tore their clubhouse apart. Maybe KW and Ozzie feared the repercussions with the veteran leaders of the team (Buehrle, AJ, Konerko) if they brought back Thome/Dye only to cut them lose. Who knows?

 

And part of that wasn't even KW's fault, he inherited a huge contract from the Phillies and wouldn't have dreamed of taking it on without the subsidy to go with it.

 

 

[kitekrazy]

1B isn't a hard position to play, and backups at 1B are not particularly hard to find. Mark Teahen could have been a perfectly adequate backup to Konerko at 1B with Vizquel filling in on the left side, and if someone else was needed, you can call up Josh Kroeger or sign Jeremy Reed or sign Jermaine Dye or call up Dayan Viciedo or even retain Mark Kotsay while getting rid of Randy Williams. A backup 1B should not be on the priority list of things a contending club needs.

 

Beyond that, I don't understand how a .249/.372/.493/.864 is not something you'd want from a DH. He keeps innings alive by walking a ton, and he gets runs on the board by being on base and hitting for power. Mark Kotsay is not very good at either one of those things, and he requires a pinch runner too (or he should, at the very least). But by god, has he played a remarkable backup 1B this year.

 

This is not about Kotsay vs. Thome. You have to remember CG is a fragile player. I have no problem with a rotating DH.

Yes those numbers suck for a DH who can only offer swinging a bat. Yes, he got on base but that was because you knew he wouldn't steal.

You missed the point.

 

[kitekrazy]

With Thome, the best theory I've heard (I think it was Fathom's) was that it was going to be very difficult for Thome to come back as one of the lowest paid members of the team after having been the second or third highest player on the team in 2010.

 

People forget there's also an agent who wants his chunk of change.

 

[Vance Law]

Did anyone ever consider that Thome may be a better fit for the Twins than the Sox? 31 teams balked at signing Thome and the Twins may have offered his last chance at being on a team only at their demands. The DH by committee is only a failure because it's filled by Kenny's lightning in a bottle approach. Kotsay was kept to help give PK a rest at 1st while Paulie can DH. Thome gives you no options other than needing a pinch runner. His 2009 numbers are not what you want from a DH anyway.

 

I couldn't disagree more with all of this.

 

Thome was glaringly a better fit for the Sox, who had, and still have no left handed power and no legitimate DH. The Twins didn't have room or a need for Thome. He was simply too good of a deal to pass up. He played way less than he deserved in the first half because the Twins have full time starters in outfield, 1B, DH. He's so clearly good that they found at bats for him against righties. And the smartest thing- what are the chances that at some point one of your outfielders, first baseman, or DH gets injured? I'd say not insignificant. It doesn't hurt so much to lose Morneau when Thome is putting up pretty comparable numbers.

 

And it wasn't 31 teams (there are 30 major league baseball teams) that passed on Thome, it was 12 other than the White Sox (14 teams in the AL). Of those 12 you logically exclude any of the low payroll teams with no chance of contention (why would they spend money on a DH) and the potentially competing teams who already had a DH (Boston, Yankees, Mariners, Texas, Rays, Detroit, Angels).

 

[kitekrazy]

I couldn't disagree more with all of this.

 

Thome was glaringly a better fit for the Sox, who had, and still have no left handed power and no legitimate DH. The Twins didn't have room or a need for Thome. He was simply too good of a deal to pass up. He played way less than he deserved in the first half because the Twins have full time starters in outfield, 1B, DH. He's so clearly good that they found at bats for him against righties. And the smartest thing- what are the chances that at some point one of your outfielders, first baseman, or DH gets injured? I'd say not insignificant. It doesn't hurt so much to lose Morneau when Thome is putting up pretty comparable numbers.

 

And it wasn't 31 teams (there are 30 major league baseball teams) that passed on Thome, it was 12 other than the White Sox (14 teams in the AL). Of those 12 you logically exclude any of the low payroll teams with no chance of contention (why would they spend money on a DH) and the potentially competing teams who already had a DH (Boston, Yankees, Mariners, Texas, Rays, Detroit, Angels).

 

Good pint. I don't think Thome is the difference where the Sox are. Overall offense production is still there. The woes began when your fifth starter was your ace at the beginning of the season. The whole rotating DH looks much bigger because the pen can't finish and Freddy looks washed up. If they had won only 20/30, we would still be talking about next season.

 

[witesoxfan]

There are more than a few games where actually having a DH instead of Kotsay and Jones would have helped the Sox out bigtime. Instead of being 9 under and 9.5 back, it's very realistic to think they would have only been 7 under and 7.5 back.

[greg775]

I wish somebody could go through all the threads last year saying how people were sick of Thome.

I can't believe suddenly big Jim is so popular around this board when people were glad to see him go.

[Balta1701]

I wish somebody could go through all the threads last year saying how people were sick of Thome.

I can't believe suddenly big Jim is so popular around this board when people were glad to see him go.

I think a whole lot of us vehemently disagreed with the folks who said Thome was part of the problem. I know I did.

[BigSqwert]

I wish somebody could go through all the threads last year saying how people were sick of Thome.

I can't believe suddenly big Jim is so popular around this board when people were glad to see him go.

Why is this so difficult for you to understand. Many of us were OK with going a different route but we replaced him with DFA worthy fodder.

[kitekrazy]

I wish somebody could go through all the threads last year saying how people were sick of Thome.

I can't believe suddenly big Jim is so popular around this board when people were glad to see him go.

 

Didn't you know he's a legend for hitting a homerun in game 163 against the team he is now playing for?

Ozzie has betrayed us to the Twins.

 

[kitekrazy]

There are more than a few games where actually having a DH instead of Kotsay and Jones would have helped the Sox out bigtime. Instead of being 9 under and 9.5 back, it's very realistic to think they would have only been 7 under and 7.5 back.

 

Maybe he would have been that 6th starter when Peavy wasn't looking so CY and everyone thought MB was now washed up. Floyd looked like a BP pitcher and Danks had bad luck.

 

[Vance Law]

I wish somebody could go through all the threads last year saying how people were sick of Thome.

I can't believe suddenly big Jim is so popular around this board when people were glad to see him go.

 

You can also just go back to to an enormous thread in the offseason during the period Ozzie was deciding whether or not to pick up Thome and see a very large number of posters expressing shock, dismay, and horror at the idea of letting Thome get away in favor of Kotsay.

[Buehrle>Wood]

I agree. There's a lot more to signing a player since they have an agent with demands, owners have budget restrictions ect.

 

http://www.suntimes.com/sports/deluca/2606...fe.suntimes.com

 

There's some intelligent comments (not by the author).

 

Did anyone ever consider that Thome may be a better fit for the Twins than the Sox? 31 teams balked at signing Thome and the Twins may have offered his last chance at being on a team only at their demands. The DH by committee is only a failure because it's filled by Kenny's lightning in a bottle approach. Kotsay was kept to help give PK a rest at 1st while Paulie can DH. Thome gives you no options other than needing a pinch runner. His 2009 numbers are not what you want from a DH anyway.

 

Read the sidebar:

 

Sox DHs: 109 games, 409 ABs, .235/.305/.399, 15 HRs, 49 RBI

 

Jim Thome: 80 games, 204 ABs, .265/.387/.578, 16 HRs, 41 RBI

 

Any discussion on whether not resigning Thome was the right move or not should end with those numbers. It was a disastrous decision on our part that may very well cost us a division title and play-off appearance.