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What’s the point of these posts? Nothing personal to you, but he was out for season so that was never an option.

Kimbrel is broken. I'm not sure if putting him in the closer's role alone is going to fix his issues. His fastball is down half a MPH with the Sox than it was when he was on the Cubs. You can maybe attribute this to him not having the adrenaline of a save situation. This velocity is more or less similar to what he threw with the Cubs in 2019 and 2020. He's also throwing the fastball for a ball 42% of the time, up from 34% with the Cubs in 2021. Even when Kimbrel was bad for the Cubs in 19-20, he only threw his fastball for a ball 36% of the time. The biggest difference is how his curveball has looked and performed since he moved to the Sox. Below are 3 pitch heatmaps of his knuckle curve. The 1st is his time with the Cubs in 2021, the 2nd is his time with the Sox, the 3rd is his time with the Cubs in 2019 and 2020 (when he was pretty bad). 2021 Cubs 2021 White Sox 2019-2020 Cubs His map with the Sox looks a hell of a lot more like his map with the Cubs in 2019 and 2020 than in 2021. Granted, maybe his location hasn't been quite as erratic, but he's clearly throwing the pitch more out of the zone and towards the left handed hitter's batter's box. If this is the shape of his curve, there's no way he can effectively throw it to left handed hitters without hitting them (which he did in his outing against Oakland). It may explain why he's struggled with lefties so far with the Sox and why he's throwing the knuckle curve about 5% less. His curveball with the Cubs in 2021 was mostly in the lower part of the zone or out of the zone, but not enough to hit a left handed hitter. I read this FanGraphs article earlier in the year that stated how Kimbrel kind of fixed himself in ST: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/craig-kimbrel-is-dominant-once-again/ If you've watched him so far, this looks like it's happening again. He's missing with the fastball a lot glove side and his curveball is once again inconsistent and all over the place. Whatever he did in ST to fix himself, he's gotta do it again. A change in roles alone won't fix him.

Why did Tony give a no comment about the Vlad AB? Did he just find out that he could intentionally walk him afterward?

First off the kimbrel trade even if he sucks will not be a disaster of a trade. Heuer will be an okay player and Madrigal is a run of the mill second basemen whose only tool is that of a slap hitter essentially a dime a dozen. Let’s back off the ledge.

Yeah, fuck World Series-winning Ozzie for his Sunday lineups in '05. I'm sure that extra rest had nothing to do with the team going 11-1 in the postseason. Should've focused more on the fans, dammit. And fuck La Russa too for keeping his team fresh. Not like he knows anything about winning 3 World Series and 6 pennants. And fuck La Russa again for not playing TA against the professional MLB trainers' recommendation. Reinsdorf needs to wake up. Stop hiring these bums like Ozzie and La Russa, and look at the talent pool we have on SoxTalk.

This board is hilarious.

He is not Dustin Pedroia but not many second basemen are. Anyways the point is moot for this year, i get the gamble and hope it pays off. I didnt like the trade at the time and i still dont.

Gents and ladies, I'm going to preface my comments by acknowledging that our offense blows right now and pretty much has in key parts of the season.........BUT..... This Kimbrel trade could a disaster for this team and organization. This supposed great reliever has no clue where the ball is going. He is a disaster........this was the Craig Kimbrel the Cubs saw in 18 when they signed him. He is reverting back to that dude he was in 18.....absolute hot garbage. I'm so tired of watching this guy as he has blown leads, given up tying or winning hits or wild pitches. Lets open our eyes and see how bad this guy really is. He has been scored upon in the majority of his white sox outings. This guy, if given the opportunity, is going to rip our hearts out in the playoffs.

Gotta love him blaming the rookie. Yell to the umpire, put 4 fingers up Tony.

Exactly this, I don’t understand why everyone thinks there is this switch that can be turned on and off by a team whose core has 3 games worth of playoff experience. Trying to do my best to stay away from the ledge but these types of losses against contenders (whether the Blue Jays make the playoffs or not) is still concerning.

What a horrible and stupid comparison. Seriously you thought this was good?

Carlos Rodon went from getting DFA'd by the Sox and no one claiming him to arguably being the best AL SP on a per inning basis. Dylan Cease is currently 16th in fWAR amongst pitchers. He's gotten Reynaldo Lopez on the right track with improved mechanics. The role he played in turning around Gio's career has been documented 1,000 times already. The Sox also lead the majors in pitcher WAR, and have the best strikeout rate for pitchers despite the fact they play in the AL. He certainly hasn't had smashing success with every pitcher, but on the hole, adding him to the organization has been a HUGE positive.

Team making a huge mistake thinking they can coast and turn it on on October.

The team in Chicago, playing Oakland. There is a reason why I think home field advantage is a must for this team in the playoffs.

They’re resting the guys...for the important games they’re going to have to play at the end of the regular season.

You mean the way that probably every other manager would do and every single analytic

Of course it has. Pitching to Vlad there is ridiculous

We're fine, if we need a pinch hitter late, we have some pretty great options, in Zack Collins and Jake Lamb.

TLR: "Vlad, that isn't sportsmanlike to swing 3-0!"

Konnor Pilkington continues to dominate AA. He's got a .95 whip, 10.8 SO/9. I thought it was an overpay then and I think it is an overpay now. Could have gotten Escobar for scraps.

Agreed. A top 5 of Robert, Moncada, Abreu, Eloy, Vaughn seems a lot better.

This is continuing on some of the discussion that was going on in the game thread. Vaughn has hit an atrocious .043 with runners in scoring position and less than 2 outs and we're obviously wondering...how? How does a guy who looks so good the rest of the time be so horrible when it really matters? With RISP and 2 outs, Vaughn is striking out 28.6% of the time and walks only 4.1% of the time. This is in comparison to a 20.6% K rate and 10.6% walk rate with no runners on. It's like he's a completely different hitter up there. But wait, that's not all. Below are the pitch profiles he faces in these 2 scenarios. The first one is with RISP and 2 outs and second is with nobody on. Notice how the pie looks pretty different? That's because with no runners on, Vaughn sees some type of fastball almost 60% of the time. He only sees a slider on 23.6%. With RISP and 2 outs, he sees a slider 43.7% of the time. That's a huge difference in pitch profile. Vaughn's numbers on sliders: .136 AVG with a 35.4% K rate. Vaughn's numbers on fastballs: .344 with a 12.8% K rate. Most likely explanation: when the going gets tough, teams follow the scouting report a bit more and possibly throw pitchers who have better sliders against Vaughn. Who, despite his improvement this year vs. righties and sliders, still struggles mightily against them.

Don't believe it until you see them on the field. We've heard all this before.

It is complete nonsense. Even if the White Sox play .500 the rest of the way Cleveland would need to play .750 baseball. If they can do that they deserve the division.

I like how we sat him against Oakland to prepare him for games on turf only for him to maybe play once on the turf.

Tony likes to give you a day off when you're hot. If Ceasar needs a day off he better start hitting.

Bring back Nick Williams you fucking cowards.

Time to start a winning streak. LFG

Dude is coming off a serious injury and has been grimacing this game. I know all the backseat managers know best here, but that is probably why.

Meanwhile we intentionally walked 2 guys with first base occupied and paid for it both times against the Rays.

This will never happen in October guys rest assured…

The unfortunate thing about Tony is the number of very obvious in the mistakes he makes

With starting pitching as our strength, we seriously find a need to carry 9 guys in the 'pen. Meanwhile, the bench is a whole 3 players, one of which is sitting out hurt.

Offense is fine, I'm just glad we're carrying 9 bullpen arms!

This offense is just bad now. They haven’t been hitting mediocre pitching, so it’s hard to be confident they will hit around quality starting pitching. But hey, Hahn thought Garcia and Engel and Goodwin were the answer

Gordon Beckham getting these announcing gigs is pure white privilege. He sucks

The white sox don't have any of what I consider to be professional hitters. Seems everyone guesses a lot, swinging at anything close and getting themselves out. While the raw numbers can look good a team like Oakland makes a pitcher work and get better results.

Pito padding his defensive stats again. Calls everything and anything.

It’s going to get swept if this bullshit keeps up. Toronto has enough power to get a few out each game.

Hopefully the Sox can dump Yoan's contract before everyone realizes he's so bad

This is kind of the point, though. So many unlikely (but not impossible) events need to occur for this race to go from non existent to maybe if you squint hard enough and don't think logically or look at playoff odds you can find a reason to have mild concern. That would still leave the Sox in a position where they're a vastly superior team, have the 2nd largest division lead in baseball, and a very cushy upcoming schedule. Even if that were to happen, I think the Sox would still have playoff and divisional odds in the 99% range. So, no, I would not be worried. You've essentially just described the position the Brewers are in now (but with 4 extra games off the schedule, which would matter) and I don't think you would say the Brewers are in real danger of losing the NL Central, would you? And they have a much better team chasing them than the Sox do. I'm not smart enough to do the math on this, but the pace Cleveland would have to outplay the Sox by (if extrapolated over 162 game season) to make up 9.5 games in a 6 week span is so extraordinary it's not something I spend anytime worrying about. And when there are objective measures like playoff odds, particularly this late in the season, giving Cleveland a 0.1% chance of winning the division I see no reason to go against that.

At this point, he's not just sore anymore. It's an injury.

Not sure if using the result the measure the process is the best approach, but nonetheless it has worked out. Counting on Billy Hamilton and Brian Goodwin being released and being contributors isn’t really something you can bank on. That’s more of a fringe competitor strategy. Counting on guys like Jake Burger is absurd. I’m not suggesting they don’t know what they’re doing, moreso that they have a tendency to act like second place teams instead of big boys.

Farhan Zaidi (apologies bc I’m too lazy to check name spelling if I’m wrong) recently said the most overrated thing in terms of roster construction is the 26 man roster. He is 100% correct. Most teams never/rarely see this offseason primo roster actually come to fruition. as usual, the Sox were bad at creating solid depth in the off-season. To some credit and some luck, they managed piece things together.

What? Seriously? Kenny was the problem there? Not Ozzie demanding an extension with a year to go on his deal and then ditching the team with a few games left in the season?

What does that mean?. Pedroia in his first year hit below .200. Madrigal may have a better career or worse than Pedroia. Time will tell. Making that statement after Madrigal's brief stint is ridiculous.

Seriously. A team of writers couldn’t make this shit up

Tony seems like more of a ranch guy.

Hernandez has been a disappointment but he is an upgrade over Garcia and Mendick. Just give it time. Now losing Madrigal is going to hurt long term but you really have to give up something to get something and Madrigal is not Dustin Pedroia.

Haven't heard much about the greatness of the Padres recently from Caufield!