Why couldn't we use the money we were gonna

[southsider2k5]

If you base it on stats alone its unfair to say he is declining. Would you say hes a much more mature pitcher than when he first started?

Sure he is a smarter pitcher now, and his numbers have been in a steady decline for 3 years now. What does that say?

[CSF]

I think pitching more than 450 innings in a little more than 2 yrs finally caught up with Buerhle and it showed during the 1st half of last year. However, it also looked like as some of the other pitchers picked up the slack and took the pressure off of Buerhle that his numbers improved. The key is Loaiza, Garland and the pen. If they can help pick up the slack, not all the pressure is gonna be on Buerhle, and he won't have to pitch 8 innings a start.

[witesoxfan]

A few things come up in this thread.

 

For starters, Rex really did hit it on the head with why we didn't spend the money...it's because we didn't really have that money in the first place. Colon resigns, and you are looking at a team without Koch and Konerko, or a team without Maggs, whichever KW could have gotten the better value out of.

 

Second of all, Colon is a stud. He is the definition of a horse. He brought an attitude to each and every game and could flat out dominate you on any given night. His 15-13 3.87 stats are not impressive(while his 240 innings are very impressive), but I have said, I personally felt that Bart was the backbone of the rotation, and that with him gone, you will see the rotation struggle more at times this year. He seemed to stabilize the rotation, whether it was the fact that he almost routinely gave the bullpen rest or that he could just flat out dominate, I'm not exactly sure, maybe it was both...all I can tell you is that his prescence, or lack thereof, will be felt greatly this year.

 

Finally Buehrle's numbers have declined slightly. Whether it is a sign to come or not remains to be seen, but it is scary to look at it.

 

(these numbers are 2001, 2002, and 2003, in that order).

ERA - 3.29; 3.58; 4.14

K-BB ratio - 2.625; 2.197; 1.951

WHIP - 1.10; 1.26; 1.37

 

And the one thing people bring up to counter this is the fact that he has won. They don't mention his W-L % has dropped each of the past 3 years as well.

 

W-L% - 66% of his decisions in 2001, 50% win% overall; 61% win% in decisions; 56%(and that is the main exception, and that has a little to do with him getting a ton of run support and having a lot of decisions...a 19-12 record is 31 decisions, and that is, quite frankly, a s***load...that means he only got 3 no-decisions, and I can think of atleast one off the top of my head(the Yanks game where Foulke gave up the 3-run bomb to Giambi)); 50% win% in decisions, 40% overall...so really, even that has declined. If this trend continues, you could be looking at a potential 12-15 4.50 1.650 K-BB, and a WHIP of around 1.45-1.50....that is a serious, serious, serious concern, and if this has not been looked at by the White Sox front office by atleast someone, we could be in deep s***.

 

That being said, I think Buehrle rights the ship this year and puts up Colon-esque numbers, without the domination. I honestly think he'll put up about 15-13 3.85 235-245 innings with a solid, but not great WHIP. I think Esteban will pick up Buehrle's innings from last year, and Garland will do the same for Loaiza. I can just hope that Scho can throw 190 innings and I can just hope that our #5 starter(s) will actually get us more then 3 wins this year.