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No but It’s absolutely an overreaction to see 1 inning of spring training ball and say he’s toast though.

This can't be understated. Rodon looked like an ace the other day. Just attacking and challenging every hitter with every pitch. His 4 seamer is lively and he was throwing it for a strike at will. Was using two different sliders and also getting them over the plate when necessary. Just better tempo too. He was getting the ball and throwing it against a Padres lineup that had a lot of their regulars in there. People have a right to be frustrated with Rodon. He's been a lazy guy over the course of his career who has not made good on the gifts he's been given. To me, that's the worst type of player. That said, he has so much natural ability. He has a decent track record of being more than capable as a #5 prior to the injuries. He has velocity from the left side and his fastball is dancing like I've never seen. His slider has always been an out pitch. This is really make a break or break season for him. I am trying to hold back my optimism because it's spring training but his outing the other day is the highlight of the Spring to me. It seems Katz working with him on his core is paying dividends. Apparently having a potbelly in your 20's as a professional athlete isn't going to serve you well. Go figure.

https://www.mysanantonio.com/coronavirus/article/COVID-Updates-Six-more-Bexar-County-residents-16026195.php?utm_campaign=mysa_breakingnews_20210317&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email 70% reduction in hospitalizations here in San Antonio. I still see a lot of mask wearing and hand sanitizing. Hopefully the trend continues as we get people back working. Good feeling.

Dustin Pedroia, ss, Arizona State University (2004) SCOUTING REPORT: Pedroia's tools are below-average across the board, but scouts say don't ever sell him short. He will be a big leaguer, and probably an everyday player. He's not physically gifted at 5-foot-9 and 165 pounds, but Pedroia is a classic overachiever and possibly the best player in college baseball. He has a tireless work ethic, an exceptional sense of the game and a tremendous on-field presence. No player is as hard-nosed or competitive, and he is without peer as a team leader. He's a blood-and-guts player who thrives under pressure and makes everyone around him play better. Scouts question whether he can be an everyday shortstop on an upper-division team because his arm and range are short, but he catches almost everything hit at him. He has very sure hands, a quick release and excellent hand-eye coordination, and is adept at cheating and anticipating plays. He doesn't profile any better as a second baseman than a shortstop, because more offense is demanded at second. While he leads the Sun Devils with a .412 average and eight home runs, he doesn't have a pretty swing and is mainly a slap hitter. But he has good strike-zone judgment and is a tough out. Among current big leaguers, he compares to Angels shortstop David Eckstein. On raw tools, Pedroia is not a conventional high-round pick but he's a perfect fit for a performance-based organization like the A's, who have four of the first 40 picks. --ALLAN SIMPSON (written May, 2004)

Ryan Pace is a complete fucking joke...I apologize to the board for even remotely trying to justify the Dalton signing as I should have seen something like this happening as a result. Good fucking god is George McCaskey totally clueless.

Keuchel is such dog poop. I've laughed every time someone mentions the whole 'the white sox have 3 cy young finishers' or whatever comment they love to make when talking about our pitchers... keuchel is going to regress hard and it won't be pretty

There is no reason a potential Lynn extension should factor into extending Giolito. Sox should not be moving to extend Lynn or Marshall in my opinion. They have so many guys locked up. Lynn is a deal now and he's in his 30's. All the risk is on the Sox extending him. We have Gio/Keuchel moving forward. Let's see what we have in Cease/Kopech/Rodon/Crochet and evaluate if we want to extend Lynn next offseason. Marshall is so cheap and under control for 2 years. While he's been incredible, he's a crafty righty on the wrong side of thirty with a dumpy body who gets by on his craftiness and incredible sequencing. Why guarantee him more money? To potentially save a 2-3 million if he keeps pitching at this pace? I'll take my chances. Gio should be the priority. Vaughn I want to lock up before he becomes the best first baseman in the AL. Heuer, if something like Bummer's deal was agreed upon, would be great. Marshall/Lynn - let's not get cute. Our owner doesn't spend enough to take unnecessary risks on righties in their 30's with beer bellies. The upside just isn't there.

Illinois will make the vaccine available to everyone 16 years old and older on April 12. Obviously it will still take a while to get everyone vaccinated, but this is huge news. I don't think it's unrealistic to expect herd immunity by mid-summer.

How about hitting the ball out of the infield at all, not 3000 times but 300 times, of the course of your career? The worst part of trading Tatis Jr for the ghost of James Shields is the unbelievable downgrade from TA and Tatis Jr up the middle to TA and Madrigal. Holy shit what a massive unbelievable downgrade that is.

If lynn and the Sox would be open to a two year extension I would want that . It’s good to have the depth and a veteran in the playoffs.

This place is in midseason form: Carlos Rodon now a #1 Dallas Keuchel now a #4

I'm just here to overreact

Sox like Ruiz a lot and (spring training of course) he has looked nasty in ST. I've been saying they should cut Zavala for over a year now and its probably safe to assume they do since its a catcher that needs the 40 man spot. They're not cutting Adolfo/Rutherford/Gonzalez/Sheets. I get its easy for you to say cut them all, they all suck but we both know the Sox wouldn't do that. There are investments in these guys. There is upside with some of them. All that said, the post you quoted was in response to the idea of Burr breaking with the team. I am not cutting any of these guys so Burr can make the roster. I'm surprised you're ready to dump Sheets or Adolfo or Rutherford so a fungible guy like Burr can get the last spot in the pen. If they're going off of Spring performance Collins has hit more than anyone else. I think that the Sox go with Medick because of what you're saying with Leury. Moncada always seems to have some naggy injury, TA has been hitting the DL, Madrigal coming off surgery, etc. I do think Collins provides more and the Sox could quickly call up Mendick if someone got hurt but not the end of the world either way.

This has been bothering me all day, so I'm going to write it. If you'd told us a year ago that there would be days where 1200 people died in a day, and that 50,000 people were going to die, we'd have said that no matter how bleak things looked at the time they wound up worse. We were somewhat aghast when the former President said that 60,000 dead would be doing a good job. 1200 people are dying of this a day right now, and we are on a path where another 50,000 deaths are possible right now. So you'll forgive me if I don't have a good reaction to the sentiment that this looks like it's over - the next month or two will give results that are worse than we would have imagined a year ago, and that's just the tail end of this. So maybe it's not that things aren't bleak right now, maybe it's just that we've become immune to the horror of what we're watching.

I just think he threw Bob a bone. He can't gain any edge through the press. Giolito holds all the power. He doesn't have to sign an extension. He doesn't have to give JR a discount. The fact is JR will have to pay market rate, or really close to it to get Gio to sign. I really question whether he is willing to do that.

First shot done!

🐒💨

I think you are right - I think Pace was green lit to tear this thing down after they couldn’t get Wilson. On one hand - this is the right thing to do - on the other hand - not often a gm gets to do it twice. But directionally - as long as pace is building capital and not trading it away - I’ll be a happy camper.

Cutting Fuller and losing Hicks (if it happens) puts this defense close to bottom 3rd in the league. The Defense was the only thing artificially keeping this team above mediocrity during this Pace/Nagy era. This might be a blessing to hopefully suck enough to finally dump these two clowns. Yes, 2 seasons too late. And yes, the same Circus Ownership gets to make another hire. But obviously this current football operations regime is a complete joke.

It’s so fucking dumb...like so dumb that any competent team president would fire Pace on the spot, but unfortunately we have an accountant overseeing football operations.

Who put a laugh emoji here and why? WTF is wrong with you? This is a perfectly reasonable statement.

Bye Kyle! Hope Andy was worth it!

I'm excited about the team. I'm not acting as if Rodon has suddenly figured it all out and is going to flourish. Rodon's problem has and always will be health. Arm health really isn't related to conditioning; you can either handle the motion or you can't. Rodon has been an all-arm thrower for a long time who has utilized a slider (bad on arm) more than most traditional pitchers. He was overused at NC State (a concern coming out of college) and he's been unable to maintain health and his delivery in the big leagues. Expecting a guy in his 7th year of MLB baseball to suddenly turn it all around after suffering from arm injury after arm injury is just a hope and a dream IMO. Rodon has looked unhittable MANY times in his big league career; times where the games actually counted. That has not been his problem. The fact is, most players are who they are, especially at 28 years old. If he stays healthy, he'll be fine and serviceable but I certainly wouldn't bet on Carlos Rodon to throw over 160 innings this year. Would you? Edit; Oh and if you need a wake up call as a professional athlete at 28 years old to "start trying harder" then you legit don't have what it takes to be an elite professional athlete. There's no switch you can turn on.

How sharp is your axe at this point

I'm optimistic, too. It's great to have good news. Had my second shot some hours ago, and so far am not feeling any side effects. Not even a sores shoulder, and I felt nothing at all when getting the shot. Spoke to my niece and she said a co-worker is hesitant to get the vaccine because she thinks it will "rearrange her DNA." Takes all kinds.

Your choice. I see a light at the end of the tunnel. We have a President that takes this seriously. We have a vaccine that is getting into people. Our medical facilities aren't being overrun. No shortages of critical supplies. I'm optimistic.

It’s his first start this spring. He won’t have a 1.99 ERA again, but he is pretty good. BTW he actually has won a Cy Young.

Bears evidently met with Golladay. He would be a good get. Maybe Bears could than flip Robinson for Brown and upgrade oline and maintain wideout - 2 birds one stone. Leverage Mack and the 1st rounder to move up in the draft.

Agree on Moncada.

Honestly rather him at #2 than Grandal.. But I'd have Moncada and Robert ahead of both.

What a complete joke of an organization from top to bottom.

I’m on Vaughn extension watch today, as he’s sitting on a day he usually plays based on the rotation

Nothing would make me happier as a Sox fan.

Please let it happen.

How about Charlie Blackmon at the deadline. Colorodo on the hook for 23 mil per 2021 & 2022 plus 10 mil buyout in 2023. Sox send Eaton , Rodon or Lopez and we receive 7 mil per year from Colorado...thoughts? LH hitter, big upgrade from Eaton. More power better defender.

Fwiw, that’s the kind of guess you’d make right now if your account was just spouting BS with no real access and you wanted to build credibility by getting things right anyway.

Not quite...he left early August 2019 and is due back July 2021.

a Vaughn extension would be nice, a Giolito extension would be amazing.

The latter.

Rooting for Mendick over Collins. Unfortunately the AAA season doesn’t get guys playing for real in May, but I’d like to see Collins get regular at bats somewhere instead of mostly sitting.

Max Scherzer 😆

Here's what I do: I DVR the game, get things done, start watching it like an hour and a half or so into the game, and watch the game on fast forward x1 to see the pitches and plays (stopping to play when something good or interesting happens) and then I FFx2 or FFx3 through commercials, Sox math, and other forms of televised bullshit. I get through the game quickly and I still get to see everything that happens. If it's the playoffs or I'm just chillin' I'll watch the whole game. But I don't mind the length. As far as other people go, all you have to do is move the start time up an hour. But they won't do that because they want the best chance possible to put people in the stands. But that's an easy answer. Otherwise, do this to shorten the game: -Raise the mound -Take a little more of the bounce out of the baseball -Let the fielders be positioned anywhere on the field the manager wants, so long as there is a P and a C. -Force a mandatory 20 feet of foul territory on both sides of the line from home plate to the wall -Force a mandatory 6' minimum height wall on all sides of the playing field, which is heavily padded, so that the players can freely chase down flyballs without worrying about hitting brick or concrete, or falling into the stands or dugout, etc. That will encourage P to work more in the zone and keep them healthier. It will also force a lot of balls which are normally going out of play and extending ABs to be kept in play, and it will make it easier for defensive players to catch foul balls. Innings will go much quicker and games will have lower scores. Of course none of these ideas will ever be up for discussion because it's not just about shortening the game, its about shortening the game AND diminishing pitching and defense in favor of more offense.

Your favorite NFL team plays once a week, your favorite MLB team plays 6-7. NFL games are mostly on weekends when we have all day to watch football. For people who have to get up on weekday mornings for work or school, MLB games running longer start to cut into your sleep, especially if you're watching a game in a time zone west of where you live. I don't know what the best way to do it is, but something has to be done to get the average game length down to 2:50 or so.

There are dozens of rule changes they could experiment with to shorten the game, but if they're serious about it, I hope they understand the actual root cause of why games are longer now: A generation of hitters has been taught to "be selective," to only swing at "good" pitches, and to take a lot of pitches in general and work deep into counts, with a walk being seen as a very good outcome for an at bat. These days, the worst thing you can do as a hitter isn't strike out, it's swing at the first pitch and make an out. There's an emphasis on getting the pitch count up. Meanwhile, a generation of pitchers has been taught that a "power arm" is the best thing you can be. So pitchers train and develop with a focus on increasing velocity, even if it means sacrificing control. Which in turn leads to a generation of MLB pitchers who throw really hard and have spotty control, which means more balls, which means more total pitches thrown. The interplay of these two things is the root cause of longer games, not all the tangential stuff (like pitchers throwing over to first base or mound visits).

Ball Four with the Ball Five addendum.