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I'd start Peavy if he has an average to good spring. Jake seemed like an ornery bulldog during his few starts with us in September. I doubt Mark will mind.

His attitude isn't any different from most guys who have been as productive as long as he has. Lots of these guys are proud (cocky) and tend to make excuses for their decline in productivity. Nothing new there. So what if he's whining. It just takes one team to pick him up. He's not going to be highly paid, however. He's going to have to adjust to that fact mentally. It'd suck if the team that picks him up gets a less than stellar effort from JD just because he thinks he's underpaid. I'd be surprised if he and Thome both don't wind up with some team. But it's interesting that nobody has gobbled them up yet. I still say JD wasn't that disgraceful of an outfielder, but it sure took a long time to get those long legs moving sometimes.

I was against this until I read previous threads that said Omar's number was 13 and Oz had it. This is indeed simply a tribute. Nice.

I enjoyed your post, Smokey, but don't know if I agree with this statement. You think our infield defense is acceptable?

Great pictures. Fans wearing jerseys and posting with players is cool in my book.

I'd have to say that's about what I expect from our team this year as well. Hopefully all the question marks will be exclamation points and then we'll have something special. I'm just not big on any of our acquisitions except Peavy.

This stuff about Jones being in great shape is the cliche offseason story. Baseball writers laugh about it. It means nothing.

These well written glass half empty threads scare me. I'm trying to remain optimistic. I'm pretty convinced our offense will be average at best. However our starting pitching is wonderful. My question to you all is ... objectively speaking, how will our defense be??? That is pivotal to go with our starting pitching and decent relief corps (decent if our starters can go 7 full innings much of the time.

I just don't agree with this if you are saying Kotsay and Jones and Omar ARE good enough to be on this team. WTF? Jimmy I think can still hit righty pitching. I hope our righties own him. What's the over/under on how many dingers he hits against Cliff and Freddy. Hopefully Peavy is nasty enough to retire him.

Jordan I do worry about this with former players, especially if they go to the Central because we play them so many times.

Caufield's post is kind of scary. If his point of view is correct, our team better throw a lot of shutouts or we could be in trouble. He makes some good points, but it is the glass half empty take on the team.

Kotsay and Jones aren't exactly guys you can say that "change our approach." You just know Thome's going to go to another team in our division and kick our f***ing ass. Oz better know best. Oz obviously is sick of the shift and slow Jimmy. By the way, these paragraphs in Cowley's story are scary: Thome told the Sun-Times in October that should he not return to the Sox, his preference would be to stay in the American League Central, and he was most intrigued with the idea of playing for the Twins in their new outdoor stadium. Without Thome, it's still a rotation of Andruw Jones, Mark Kotsay and Omar Vizquel, plus Carlos Quentin and Paul Konerko should expect time in the DH spot when they need a breather. ''It's weird because since I've been the manager, we've always had the big boys in the middle,'' Guillen said. ''We have a little different philosophy. I'm very, very optimistic. I don't want to say I've put my job on the line, but I've been telling Kenny for three weeks that I like what I have.''

Man that is very true. I have very high hopes, but very low expectations, for our lineup. I have high expections for Paulie, AJ, CQ and Lexi. I have high hopes but low expectations for Teahen.

Rios. Both on offense and with the glove. We need him to play well.

I'd also hate to see Jimmy with the Twins. Just sign him for one more year. Oz falls in love with certain players like Kotsay, who is decent, but my god, Jimmy is a threat in the middle of the order. Limit his at bats some, but sign Jimmy.

I used to hate the Royals; but I feel sorry for 'em and kind of like them now. But they are in our division and I desperately want the Sox to win the division every year.

Whatever happened to the annual thread where they rate posters like most annoying poster, most fun to go to a bar with, etc? I figured this year after such a wild September I might be voted most hated poster. Sorry this is in a different section but I've been looking for the awards.

You need a threat of a big bomb in there. Helps everybody in the lineup, or so they say.

Bring back Jimmy, the shift be damned.

I love Paulie. Ranger ... is Paulie as upstanding a guy as he appears? He seems like a decent guy as well as one of the all-time Sox greats.

Big deal. Congratulations on the interview. Hopefully Rios will be a stud this year. Our lineup is counting on him big time.

I'm glad Fisk spoke out on this. He was a stud. As far as being a jerk, Chet, are you basing this on this article or insider knowledge? I never heard Fisk was a total dick.

Nobody will be down on him if he produces. He was just another MLB middle relief hack last year.

Yes but why sign a guy like Jones over Dye? Money? I think we could sign Dye on the relative cheap. Unless he'd be all upset and is bound and determined to play elsewhere.

That's what I'm hoping as well. If our starters can consistently go 7 innings ... wow that would make our pen so much better. This five and six inning crap is a different story. Please give us seven strong innings, Sox starters!