greg775

It's not completely Ozzie's fault. He doesn't acquire stiffs like Widger, Mack, Cintron, et. all. Everett and Blum woulda been better. But I agree he plays the B team too much.

Funny how these things can snowball. The Tigers have been wanting to expand this lead for some time now. We've somehow held them off until now. They keep winning two of three or three of three each series or three of four or four of four and we've somehow kept them at bay until now. If detroit keeps this up another week or two, the lead could be huge. It's all up to Detroit cooling off. One game at a time is so boring but that's what the Sox are going to have to do from now until we catch them. At 5.5 games out, it's gonna be a while before we catch them.

Sure we can catch them. The Tigers have played out of their minds for week after week. But will we catch them? Yeah, if their pitching starts to suck. If their pitching stays close to this strong the Tigers will by far have the best record in baseball. By far.

I agree with Donkey. This is what's alarming. One thing is for sure. If we make the playoffs this year, it's gonna be an entirely different scenario from last year. I just don't think we're going to catch Detroit, nor will anybody. The Tigers are gonna have the best record in baseball and the Twins, Yankees, Bosox and us will be trying to outdistance ourselves as the best of the rest. Hope I'm wrong, but the Tigers are the team this year like we were a year ago.

I hate seeing the B team so much, also. Is it just me, though, or are there a ton of lefties in the AL this season. It seems Thome has had to bat against a ton of lefties and Scottie and AJ sometimes sit when it's a lefty. Am I nuts or are there a TON of lefties starting against us???

Good point. I don't think anybody is overlooking Minnesota. The Twins are good. So are the Tigers. So are the Sox. So should be Cleveland. The Royals are the only schmucks of the division.

I agree with Steve. Hawk is the best.

The pitching in the AL may be a "lot deeper," but I still challenge you to look at every AL roster and you'll see some crap in the rotation save for Detroit. I realize the Sox should do better, and all that, but c'mon. Vazzy isn't worth the money he's getting obviously, so maybe he should be dealt, but he's as good or better than what most teams are putting on the mound in their 3-5 slots.

I still say Vazzy pitched a good game tonight. Bonderman is smoking our ass. Vazzy's mistake happened to be with 3 men on base. Not good, but an outing to build on. Fathom I understand your frustration about Vazzy and some of our arms this year, but have you looked around baseball? Except for the Tigers, whose staff has been pretty awesome, there are some rag arms out there. I seriously doubt McCarthy would be dominating this year either, if he was starting. Baseball is full of some really horses*** pitchers. Do you at least agree on that account? If it wasn't Vazzy and Freddie sucking, it'd just be somebody else. You ain't gonna find 5 reliable starters, no way.

I thought Javy had good stuff tonight. Too bad he chose that pitch. It was a bad bad call by he or AJ or both. But he pitched well tonight.

You would have to guess in the postseason he was trying to be critical in a column of the Sox. When a team is in the World Series, big city newspapers tend to jump on the bandwagon big time and they probably didn't want any negative crap coming out of the Mariotti camp. You have to give the Sox credit for shutting up all the pundits last postseason. If they would have choked it away to Cleveland in September it would have been monumental, still being written about with potshots. If they would have lost any of the series in which they grabbed the commanding early lead, i.e. going up 2-0 on Houston, etc. the talk of hexes and choking also would be there. Good job SOX.

Not by me. For some reason, some people hate the guy. I think it's his pretty boy California laid back I dont give a s*** personality, which some fans take as being a Judy. I think he's great. He beat a team that's been beating everybody except the Sox. Hope we keep it up. GO SOX.

That explains a lot to me, jim. Thanks a lot for the long post. I liked it.

I don't like the fact the Tigers are playing with the house's money. They have the healthy lead on us and can play loose. If they lose every game they still have first place. If they kick our ass, they are starting to pull way away. If we win this series, we'll certainly have earned it. It ain't gonna be easy with those assholes playing with nothing to lose.

By no means am I blaming Coop, but isn't it amazing how after last season the Yankees just had to have Coop. I'm sure nobody is clamoring to steal him away, now. And I am NOT blaming him. I think he's great. But when players don't perform, things change in a hurry. Is it just me, or do our starters, with the exception of Jose, not strike anybody out? Is this a sign of bad things to come? Why don't we get many K's?

Amen, Jim.

I think we'll win the wild card with a strong September. Do you think our starting pitching "problems" stem from the fact four of the five starters aren't striking out anybody to speak of? Are you alarmed at our lack of power pitching? No K's mean trouble?

Do we have any other catchers in the system who could be brought up in place of Widger, who has been pretty horrid? Do we ever win when Widge catches?

But it's still a catch 22. Why can't the guy Ozzie brings in from the bullpen get the job done? If the player (pitcher) comes through, we're not talking about this.

I'm saying the big picture is more important than "game strategy." You think if we examined Cox's games we couldn't find screw ups aplenty? The players like playing for Oz apparently and his enthusiasm is a big reason we kicked ass last year and if not for Detroit would have nothing to complain about yet this year despite a team that has a weak bullpen (except for Bobby) and some everyday personnel problems (no bat in cf; starting pitching being good, not great this year). I would take Oz over Cox. The only guy I might want instead of Oz is Piniella and like any manager he doesn't win when he doesn't have talent either.

Uh oh, better not let the national media get hold of this. Like you said, the animal cruelty people will be on fire. If this gets in the papers, look out. There will be protests at the Cell. Just kidding, but this is the world we live in now. Society for the protection of ants will be aghast.

Bobby Cox is so old our players would lose games out of boredom just looking at that guy.

Let's face it. The pathetic pathetic Royals are going to lose all 4 to the Tigers and Detroit's machine is gonna keep rolling. Hopefully we can win 2 of 3 somehow in NY and keep this thing under 5-6 games. As far as Ozzie ... players win games. Name another manager you'd rather have besides Torre, maybe. The big bad Yankees haven't exactly been dynastic under Torre. Ozzie is as good as anybody out there. La Russa? Give me a break. Dusty? Piniella? They are all the same. ROYALS SUCK GO SOX!

If we trade a starter, it better be Vaz. We do not need to be trading Freddie or Garland.

You are right balta, I just hope the second half doesn't show our guys have tired arms. Hope that isn't the case.