greg775

I once saw the wildest thing at Old Comiskey. We were sitting a few rows behind one of those rails on the third base side and some drunk fan for no reason bends over the railing and just smashes some guy in the face as he walks by. Also, Veeck used to let fans go on the field between games of doubleheaders for contests. I was in a watermelon eating contest. It was good watermelon. I didn't even try to win cause there were some big fat guys eating. One of the Sox players walked by and said, 'don't choke on the seeds.' Also my grandfather fell one time and hit his head leaving the game and we had to go to some hospital nearby. Sox personnel couldn't have been nicer. I wrote Veeck a letter thanking him and he sent me a letter back and I saved it for posterity.

Kenny's quote makes me wonder what he thinks our record will be if the season started tomorrow. Do we magically become a division champ and WS contender just because of Peavy, Teahen and Hudson being added and Dye, Thome off the team? If we have no glaring holes in the GM's mind, I would think he'd get rid of Ozzie if we play slightly below .500 ball again as next season plods along. The way Jerry and KW talk, we've got all the talent we need. So we better be way better than a .500 team or it's somebody's fault. I prefer to say they've overrated our talent, including bullpen and lineup's ability to produce runs. But they are paid to judge talent and they think it's great, so let's see it in the W-L column, Kenny and Oz.

Is Paulie really this bad a player compared to others at his position? I guess baseball is full of stud first baseman cause Paulie had a f***ing great year offensively. He also is a damn fine fielder. I realize he's aging. A lot of baseball teams don't mind paying a decent salary. I would think whomever gets Paulie will be a happy camper.

We just have to get used to the fact we are going to trade minor leaguers, our top prospects. It's OK to do that, I just wish we wouldn't hear so much about our prospects, if we're ultimately going to deal them away. It used to be you didn't hear much about prospects. Unless they are named Beckham or have Beckham like talent, we apparently will deal our top prospects. Nothing's wrong with that, but it is a shock to the system when we trade guys we hear so much about. also You said: Konerko has almost no value at this point, he'll provide you decent production from the first base position (right around league average if you're lucky) while making nearly twice as much as he should." I guess I can buy the "no value" thing if you are talking about money. But the kind of year he had last year seems "valuable" to me. He wasn't half bad. It's not like every regular in the majors has more "value" than Konerko. I mean, what is value?? Does Rios have "value?" What is AJ's "value?" Does Granderson still have "value?" Just curious what you mean.

Interesting read except for that. Why would we want to pay that guy 5 mill? Pitch one of our young guys for hardly any money and let Dotel go be another star with Washington.

Do you ISU fans like coach Jank? He's excellent.

Acquire a position player the fans can get excited about. You did it with Peavy, KW, on the mound. Now do it in the field. Granderson would be that guy. Get him. Or Nate McLouth. Get him. Or Dunn. Or Manny. Get us a name position player or DH type.

I would agree. KW has made some good trades, but some questionable ones, too. If the Tigers are high on some of our prospects, they might try to get KW to overpay for Grandy, who I bet would love to play in his hometown. Do the Cubs have anything the Tigers might be interested in? From all I've ready about Grandy, I would like to see him in Chicago regardless. If they won't deal him to us, let him go to the Scrubs. I bet you the Tigers will indeed try to deal Grandy to the Sox, but it will be such a lopsided trade in favor of Detroit with prospects, KW will correctly refuse the deal. Probably both of the Danks as well as Flowers for Grandy? Or Danks, Dayan V, and Flowers for Grandy. I would not make either of those trades if I was KW, but it would be amazing to get Granderson. Do the Yankees still have good prospects to surrender? I'd say whatever team dangles the best 3-4 young prospects gets Grandy.

Makes sense. What doesn't make sense is moving Gordon from third to second. I think it's safe to say he was becoming a damn fine third baseman. Mark Teahen is not the answer. Believe me. To move him for Mark is insulting. I guess if they are moving him for Vicieno (sp?) I would buy that if indeed he is our future third sacker.

YES. YES. YES. This is the kind of player that would totally excite me and would make me totally excited about our chances. Grandy in center; Rios in right. I'd even be willing to part with a good player like Bobby to get Grandy. Prove we can trade with other teams besides the Royals, Kenny. Give them a good player or two and get Grandy.

Bad backs are not a good thing obviously. I heard the Hawks lost some guy to back surgery. How the hell will that guy ever come back, getting checked in the back. Or a football player with a back injury ... wow. I wonder who will sign Joe.

Please go to an NL team so we don't have to face yet another motivated guy to kick our ass. That won't happen, so go to Texas. The Rangers beat us always anyway.

Paulie had a good year last year and can still play. Not every team thinks our players are s***. Paulie returned to his old form last year, lot of key hits that were not home runs. I don't know why his salary would scare off teams that have money.

I thought his arm was basically toast.

Sounds like we won the last WS title we had with starting pitching and big boppers. This time, KW wants to go back to the Go Go White Sox with little offense, manufacturing runs, but great starting pitching.

Good post except for this. Crisp is another outfield hack with a very weak arm.

There won't? Home run hitters have treated us well at the Cell. You don't want to go all speed in the Cell.

Why do you think Coco is greater than Pods?

Oops. My bad. Thanx.

My gosh, Bolt. If you lived in Kansas City you'd be mocked for your comments on Mark. He is considered kind of a joke around here. Not a good fielder; strikes out a ton. The excuse you could make (which would be an excuse) is he got moved around too much, no good players around him blah blah blah. We can hope, but this is not like we've acquired anybody good. It was basically us trading average to below average talent to the Royals for average to below average talent. Both sides hoping lightning will strike. To Teahen's credit, he is regarded as a guy who plays hard and when hurt and is good with media and teammates.

Don't we need to add somebody like Dunn to excite our fan base? Or will tickets be gobbled up by fans giddy over our strong starting rotation? If we make no real changes, CQ, Paulie, Rios, Teahen and Gordon better be mashing some home runs, 20 minimum for all of them, hoipefully 30 and up for CQ and Paulie.

That was one of the signature plays of our season. It was really bad. Should be interesting to see how KW replaces Pods and Dye. Like somebody said, on paper that's losing a lot of offense. Somebody mentioned Ross Gload recently. I kind of see Teahen more of a Ross Gload than a Gordon Beckham type prospect.

I'd have to agree with everything here. Kind of scary.

It just makes no sense to move Beckham to second for Mark Teahen. The obvious right move would be to keep Beckham at third, where he played very well defensively as the season progressed, and platoon Teahen with Nix at second. I will support Teahen and hope for the best but this makes zero sense to me.

Thanks chw42, I read every word. I can't say your piece encouraged me much, especially your last sentence about the bad defense. Nice writeup though. Good sabermetric analysis.