Leaderboard

Trading Grandal would be one of the stupidest things the Sox could possibly do. Makes me sick.

This is where people should stop reading.

Fun fact: Slugging % and OBP are actually sabermetrics. I say this as someone that would be willing to give Mazara another chance, but is also perfectly fine moving on from him. The reason people want to use other statistics in addition to batting average, home runs, and runs batted in is because just using those three would be akin to finger painting with the three primary colors. Tim Anderson's batting average sank in 2020, his OBP was the same, but he was a better hitter and we can tell because of sabermetrics (and the eye test, but when you need objective proof, bam, stats.)

Its just insane. Sox sign one of the best 2 catchers in the game to a very reasonable FA contract. He is the guy he always was and remains an unbelievably good fit for the future lineup. And half the fanbase wants to trade him to make space for a guy that is measurably worse player, a measurably worse fit, and a FA that will command a decent commitment this offseason. Makes zero sense whatsoever.

Counterpoint: Yasmani Grandal is good and there's no reason to actively seek to limit his role

Welcome to Soxtalk!

Y'all we just went from Mazara to Gio Gonzalez. Why y'all do this to me.

And now we have mathematical equations which can actually quantify these numbers for each situation and tell us which is statistically most likely to generate runs, and which is projected to generate the most runs. So we have taken those BRAINS, and we have built new and improved ways of really understanding these situations. We didn't quit evolving in 1986. That's what modern statistical analysis is. So when you try to throw out these new fangled stats, as something have biases build in them, realize that there is much LESS bias built into these modern stats, than there was in the overly simplistic stats of the old days and the eye test. We can boil both offense and defense down to runs expectations, all of the way down to each individual pitch. We are SOOO far ahead of what we used to know about the game of baseball, it isn't even funny. Even the White Sox know this.

Greg, that’s just what nice, loving people say these days

No, Don Cooper just hated curveballs. Other teams still used them.

It means you're taking numerous long paragraphs to complete a thought that takes far less effort than that. The answer was simplistic because the question had a simple answer. And you merely contradicted what I said. You were called out for essentially saying that the difference between a stat guy and a non stat guy doesn't show itself on the field. That alone shows you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about and that you probably don't actually pay attention to any actual statistics. Whataboutism (you still have failed to acknowledge the fact that you called someone a weenie, which is serving no purpose, whereas I use the word dense, which actually does mean something), moving the goalposts, anecdotal evidence, and the entire reason you're in the hot water you've been in this topic was because you started with burden of proof. Virtually all your arguments are wrapped in logical fallacies. Your inability to stay focused on one thing and jumping from topic to topic as soon as you get called out for something is very telling.

Dallas Keuchel pitched better with Grandal. Let me ask you this. James McCann is on the roster and playing catcher. Who plays DH on the days McCann catches? Grandal, Abreu and Vaughn are on the roster too. None of this makes any sense.

Welcome to Soxtalk!!

I haven't been to this forum for a long time and the first thread I read, I encounter this sat pissing contest. Name calling and nonsense. Knock it off guys. The White sox signed Mazarra to hit home runs and drive in runs. He was a dismal failure of a signing. He had a total of seven extra base hits in 42 games. He hit the same number of home runs Yolmer Sanchez hit in his 16 games. He should not and will not return.

This would be a terrible use of limited resources

What has Ozzie Guillen done for the White Sox since he quit on this team and subsequently got sacked by the team he negotiated a deal with while still employed by the White Sox? Nothing. Ozzie Guillen has done absolutely nothing to earn consideration for the Chicago White Sox managerial opening, nor any other vacant manager job. Nor has he taken a coaching role in any organization to try to work his way back. He's had 8, count them, 8 years to rehabilitate his reputation and earn consideration for any MLB job. Has he? No. Which is why he's doing pre & post game shows. Ozzie Guillen is not now nor will he ever be a candidate for the manager of the Chicago White Sox again. The End.

Because he (wrongly) thinks is proves something.

Since you are too lazy to do your own work, and like to announcing things as fact, even when you are wrong, here you go. If you go over ONLY the 4 year period you have tried to keep this to, he was 8th in a league with 15 teams if you narrow the focus to ONLY AL teams, and leave out 2020. If you look at his batting average he was 12th. His OBP was 16th. Again, no matter how you try to narrow and rearrange this argument, Nomar Mazara is not a good RF. Even with narrowing this to one stat, only a specific four years to leave off his worst year, AND to ignore half of the RFs in baseball, your argument is STILL WRONG.

glad I can read a focused Bauer Blog now.

I love it when people make claims, can't back them up and then push their burden of proof fallacies while puffing their chests out so they can pretend they have done anything except lose an argument in embarrassing fashion. Not to mention claiming their time is being "wasted" yet they respond continuously regardless with empty paragraph after empty paragraph of meaningless rants. If you can't even pull data you claim you have access to, you need to stop asking other people to "prove" stuff. Anyone smart sees right through this egotisistical shtick.

Mazara arguments go in the Mazara thread. Bauer comments go here.

I don't know about anyone else, but I have been a fan for a very long time, and have spent plenty of time and money at both ball parks, watching good teams, bad teams, and out and out shitty teams. That is what I have done for the White Sox. No Ozzie.

So to get this straight, the Trump administration pitted state vs state for PPE like The Apprentice, Governors edition, then told us they had this totally under control. Then said it should be gone by Easter or when it gets warm. Then said by Memorial Day it will all be behind us. Then told us they have this squashed, even declared victory , although there may be little "embers" from time to time to put out, to now telling us, nothing we could do except wait for a vaccine and therapeutics. Oh, and that $100,000 treatment of therapeutics POTUS got, if he gets reelected, that will be available to everyone for free even though there are 25k more new cases every day that the current number of treatments available.. What's not to believe? I do think one of the bigger problems with this pandemic is that it fell on an election year. If it happened last year or next, I don't think wearing a mask would have become a political statement. I think listening to the scientists even if that meant taking longer than the government wanted would have occurred, at least at a more frequent rate. I don't think shopping for a doctor on Fox News who says wearing masks do nothing, and no one would really be that sick would have been a priority to add to the task force.

I know they said that initially but they haven't referenced him since the day Ricky was dismissed. It leads me to believe that something is happening on the down low. We can be hopeful!

I think after Bauer, he's the best pitcher available in free agency. Strikeouts are great and all, but they aren't exactly efficient and aren't as great as home run suppression. Stroman keeps the ball on the ground. He has the lowest launch angle against of any pitcher in the majors, which keeps the ball in the park and induces double play balls. He's never allowed more than 0.9 hr/9 in any season. He's never had a FIP above 3.9. He's a bull dog on the mound, kind of a starter version of Colome. Put him together with a good defense and good offense he'd win a lot of games

I'm an old dinosaur and I love the shifting. It works, duh. Do we need to say more? Like make a rule that a fielder has to stand where he has the least chance of catching a baseball? Now, that's messing with the game we love.

Engel and Mazara. Mazara was coming around at the end, hitting the opposite way, true, but looking comfortable at the plate. Spend the money elsewhere. I think he was sicker than anyone is saying. But spend the money.

I'm "another one of those people" that can't even understand what you are saying (bolded part) or the coherence of your non-bolded argument. You are judging the process over the results? Kid got all the wrong answers but his process at arriving at the wrong answers is perfect so he gets an A? The White Sox have taken a path to contention and it sure seems we are talent rich now and free agency was part of that. If it makes me, and others like me, idiots for understanding that results are ALL that matters...I'm ok with that label.

The way I look at it, if you factor in the $20-30M Sox will certainly spend on starting pitching, we’re up against the same resource constraint in this climate as other teams I just mentioned (outside of Yankees who might be at luxury tax). There are other teams that need McCann more than the Sox, and there are who could offer more to McCann, both money and playing time, than the Sox could. I have said before that I think more players will take one year deals this off-season to wait for market to bounce back next year. The scenario I see with McCann resigning is he takes a 1+1 deal with a player option in year 2. He gets let’s say $8-10M a year and stays on a team that will put him in situations that will maximize his value and try this again next offseason.

And I also have to put Tigers as the dark horse to reunite with McCann - both of their catchers are free agents, and with a trio of young arms in Mize, Skubal and Manning, having a veteran who could work with the young arms is something they might invest in.

No. And you haven't been right about much yet at all.

You are literally just making up stuff as you go along. You get proven wrong, and then haul the goalposts somewhere else and set up with a new attempt. Just walk away.

Can we just rename this thread the anything but Bauer thread?

You are quite literally the first person who has publicly said they can't tell Gio Gonzalez from Lucas Giolito from the context of the discussions happening here.

Maybe because Giolio was already referred to as Gio on Soxtalk long before the Sox signed Gio Gonzalez? Gio Gonzalez had never pitched for the White Sox before 2020, why would we reserve a nickname for a player that had not been in the org for ages?

Going to be?

Please tell this fairly powerful person how that isn’t debatable. You can’t tell me how the problem we have is a lack of civil discussion when this is the leader of one political party and the current president. The president literally said that you are wrong about everything you said we can all agree on and that by saying it you are a loser who is just trying to steal the election and saying that should be a crime.

Again, it isn't. I actually took the time to do the search. You are wrong. Again.

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/867409-chicago-white-sox-allow-guillen-to-quit-completely-on-his-own-terms#:~:text=Chicago White Sox Allow Ozzie Guillen to Quit Completely on His Own Terms,-Jon Fromi Invalid&text=Ozzie Guillen isn't letting,Well%2C almost eight seasons. https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1033641-ozzie-guillen-marlins-manager-blows-up-over-quitting-allegations https://www.nbcsports.com/chicago/chicago-white-sox/reinsdorf-ozzie-guillen-cant-come-back-white-sox-manager https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/10/01/stone-ozzie-quit/

1986 called and they want their stats back.

Hopeful that we hire back an arrogant loudmouth who literally quit on the team? No. Too many fans have such low standards and expectations.

Random article that lists us as one of the top five destinations for Bauer. Obviously this means nothing, but it’s better than arguing against a delusional Mazara fanboy. https://www.radio.com/sports/mlb/gallery/trevor-bauers-top-5-potential-landing-spots-in-free-agency#chicago-white-sox-ckgmga8570061u4pc0d1ngpfm

Mark Trumbo has played 12 games since August 19 of 2018. He has more Home Runs over that stretch than Nomar Mazara.

I'm going to start a new discussion about pitching and hopefully with no Mazara speak. JUST Bauer or PITCHING. Thank you

Yeah, they just say everyone is a candid except Ozzie to throw everyone off. ozzie has to be the choice, assuming Terry Bevington doesn’t want to come back.

Your analysis here is excellent. People tend to ignore history. That is short-sighted.

I’m all for eliminating the shift. Baseball needs more scoring to draw in casual fans. I know old timey baseball purists hate rule changes but they keep the game updated to compete with the NBA and NFL. Casual fans don’t want to see a pitcher’s duel.

Shifting has always happened, but it's spiraled out of control in recent years. I guess I'll be the lone one in support of this if it happens. I've always found it lame to stack one side of the infield. Put the onus back on the pitcher to not let the hitter get hard contact.

Manfred is such a giant bag of shit. I'm not going to rant on about this but I can't stand these damned rule changes that eliminate portions of the game which have evolved naturally within the proper context and spirit of the game. Example, the 3 batters rule. You give a manager 25 players to roster and he is likely going to pick 2 specialists, a lefty and a righty. If you give him 5 or 6 less players then he won't, but with 25 or 26, you allow him to specialize and devote specialist players to specialized roles that are important enough to designate as being so special and worthwhile. The lefty and righty specialist evolved naturally out of good competitive spirit. But of course everything about being a commissioner is about revenue and specifically appealing to a seemingly increasingly idiotic generation of people with constantly decreasing attention spans. So of course the desire is to cater to these people because they have money. But I don't give a shit about these people. They're bandwagoners anyway, and for hardcore fans like me, I think the long length of the game and the long length of the season has a lot of appeal. I like to work while having the games on, or put the game on the radio in the car. It's a nice chunk of my day that is made more enjoyable by baseball, and I'm not going to b**** about the length of it. I think a lot of people are like that. Eliminating the shift or trying to is trying again to eliminate another element that evolved naturally within the spirit of the game. Put a bunt down you stupid oaf if you don't like it. Oh you can't bunt? Ok fuck you then, hit the ball on the ground to the 3B playing SS. Grab some bench. That's excellent baseball and IMO isn't doing anything different than before. People just record more information now and use it better but they could have spent all of the 1940s shifting if they wanted to. Eliminating cheating is great. Improving accuracy of the umps by replacing them is great. Making the game more fair for all teams is great. A pitch clock is a great thing. I would love for technology to be added that allowed the pitcher and catcher to communicate wirelessly by their own signals, but ONLY the pitcher and catcher, because adding the dugout into the game allows for micromanaging of everything and really ruins the spirit of the game of pitcher and catcher vs. hitter. But adding tech to the game to make it more fair is great. A pitch clock is great, but must be reasonable. The pitch clock should be longer during the AB. E.g. for the first 5 pitches it is X seconds between pitches, then for pitches 5-8 it is X+2 seconds allowance, and pitches 9-11 it is X+4, and pitches 12+ it is X+6 or something, to allow for extra thought to exist in moments of greater need for strategic thought. But simply b****ing about the length of the game just because a bunch of dumb bandwagoner fans don't like and a bunch of people generally with the attention span of a fly can't handle it is really ruining the game for pitiful benefits. Think about these Yankees vs. Red Sox games that take like 4 hours because the lineups are stacked and every hitter is a tough out and every pitcher has to make a great pitch in like every AB. When you stack a lineup full of great hitters then you are doing a great job as a FO. And as a hitter, if you can survive deep into counts routinely, that makes you a great hitter. As a P, it is one thing to fiddle with your hat and your ass for about half a minute off the rubber before getting back on it but also in the spirit of the game, the P should have the ability to set himself up mentally to make a tough pitch in a tough situation. Really, these long games are often the result of some of the best of the best of the game playing each other. This is a good thing. I wish Manfred was a fly on the wall and I could just swat him. He doesn't care about the game at all. As far as the man on second rule, I actually don't hate it as much as I thought it would, but I would prefer a normal 10th, a man on 1st in the 11th, 2nd in the 12th, and a man on 3rd in 13th and beyond, or something like that, if the rule is going to stick. And in this case I do not believe it harms the spirit of the game because it's about keeping players healthy and members of the pitching staff available for future games. And I believe it should only apply in the regular season and should not apply in any game 163 or playoff game situations. But anyway fuck Manfred with a rusty flag pole.

A trade for Calhoun seems like something the Sox would be interested in