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Sox doing a poor job of bouncing back after tough losses. Bad game tonight. A pessimist might say our starting pitching suddenly stinks with just two excellent starters and three so-so starters (at best). Obviously Rodon will be excellent some day. Bullpen, as has happened ever since Joe Morgan said it was the best in baseball, gets off to a red-hot start now looks average (cept for the lockdown closer). I'm hoping Putnam will continue putting up zeros cause in theory he's a better prospect than Albers IMO. Sox are catching the Royals at a bad time. This team blows right now.

Central Division is very very weak this year. I'd expect 5-10 over .500 will win it.

QUOTE (fathom @ May 18, 2016 -> 03:45 PM) Albers is getting in trouble because every pitch is on the same plane. Needs to do a better job of changing the eye level of the hitter It's time to quit using him so much. He's pitched himself out of that role for now. Gulp, use the other guys more.

QUOTE (Middle Buffalo @ May 17, 2016 -> 01:38 PM) It's hilarious that there's even a controversy about traveling in the NBA. Yes, Westbrook traveled and dragged his pivot foot on that play. And he and everyone else does it the entire game. The traveling and dragging/moving/changing pivot foot makes the NBA borderline unwatchable for me. I don't even understand how you can play organized basketball your whole life and feel (in a physical-muscle memory way) like it's ok to travel. It feels so odd to me when I play to take an extra step. And pickling up or changing my pivot foot - out of the question. That's what the people I was with said immediately. A traveling controversy in NBA??? WTF. OKC is healthy; Adams has become a player; Kanter is useable. OKC in four, five no more than six! Bank it.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 18, 2016 -> 07:39 AM) Well, since we don't have any great internal candidates to replace him, Albers would probably be pushed back to the "second unit" with Petricka, Putnam and Jennings. Of course, that would leave the question of who can hold the lead in the 7th inning an open question. In all likelihood, they're going to have to trade for someone if it continues to linger as an issue. Personally, I think Albers is just a bit gassed. He doesn't seem to be in the greatest physical condition, he's an older/veteran player and he's been utilized a LOT by Ventura in the first quarter of the season. He SHOULD bounce back. It does seem his stuff isn't as crisp, not as much movement as before. They're unlikely to just DFA him at this point when he's been one of the major strengths of the team until the last 10 days or so. Our big three starters are going to need to go 7 consistently or we aren't winning anything. No playoffs again. Amazing that it's almost June already. My god the calendar flies by. It was just spring training.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 18, 2016 -> 06:49 AM) Greg, I advise you to look at the board of a collapsing unicorn start-up called THERANOS. If you look all around the world, there are former politicians working as hugely paid K Street lobbyists, on the "prestige" list for the most famous law firms in the world even though they haven't practiced since leaving office, making speeches, serving on corporate boards, tv/radio shows like Mike Huckabee/Alan Keyes/Ben Carson, etc. It was a good night for Bernie in the sense that winning KY doesn't mean anything because delegates were split 25/25, he ran away with Oregon and most already expected Clinton to win KY because she contested it the last two weeks, it was a closed primary (no independents or Republicans could cross over to vote for Sanders), etc. The results tonight pushed the campaign at least to California and potentially to some type of movement/disruption/protest at the Democratic Convention. The lead in ACTUAL delegates is still a spread of something like 300. That's not counting all the superdelegates where the Clintons control 90%+ of them, with only 40 something for Sanders. There's no way he can win at this point. However, Clinton now has to fight a "two front" war with Trump and Sanders at least through June 7th (California) and things are getting increasingly nasty and rancorous on the Democratic side after all the events in Nevada at the convention and the resulting letter from Sanders which showed he's not backing down (you should read that if you want something to cheer you up). And, Trump's actually polling ahead of or within the margin of error in states like WV, KY, Indiana, PA, Ohio and Michigan. The survey results show he's leading Clinton by 10-15% across all those states in terms of potential trust for dealing with the economy. Thank u Caulfield. It does make me feel better. ... You are on fire with your posts this year. You have become an intelligent poster. I think last year you were a C or B-. This year you are an A- or A.

QUOTE (ronkark @ May 18, 2016 -> 05:50 AM) We are officially slumping. DEFENSE: Saladino error, mental mistake. Jackson, 2nd dropped fly ball of year. PITCHIN: Albers is like a cat. If that cat was bad at pitching. Rodon: Still no command. Still can't tighten it up with runners on. Stop getting behind hitter. So we've lost 3 in a row heading into a Mat Latos start. I don't like it. Baseball is such a crazy game. Albers was king of the world, a probable all-star in April. Now he has to be considered as a possible DL candidate if he gets rocked in another appearance or two. I mean he's been THAT BAD he may have to sit. Right?? If this keeps up, he's killing the team after being a godsend.

Tough tough night for me. Bernie blistered Hillary in Oregon but lost by a meager .5 in Kentucky. The sweep might finally have gotten the pundits to admit momentum. You realize how close that was to a sweep?? P.S. In a CNN article tonight: "In total, Bill and Hillary Clinton gave 28 speeches in 2015 for $6,725,500." Hot damn that's a lot of money. I wish CNN would go to all the speech organizers and see if Hillary gave 'em hell at any of those speech sites, as in was she difficult? The Clintons can thank America for putting them in a lap of luxury since Bill left office. My gawd, just for giving speeches they earned that kind of jack. Hillary has to be nuts to want to be president instead of just continuing to rake in the $$$ giving speeches in her latter years. If Bill keeps giving speeches though, the $$$ will continue to roll in the Clinton coffers. WOnder what Chelsea gets and will get the next eight years??? Wow Chelsea is gonna have so much $$$. It can't be illegal for her to go off on her own and give speeches. I wonder if anybody is gonna ask Bill, Hillary or Chelsea if they admit their privilege? Talk about easy money compared to the hard working 99 percenters! I know I know ... they earned that speech money by gosh and it's Hillary's turn. She deserves to be queen, oops I mean President.

QUOTE (Deadpool @ May 18, 2016 -> 05:21 AM) 162 game season. No reason to dwell on 1 Not one, but two. That loss in Texas ....

I think we add Anderson during the season and Markaikis would look good as an option.

Could we talk Torii Hunter out of retiring? What about a trade with the Braves who are going nowhere. Get AJP back and dump Avila. Acquire Francouer for some Class A non prospect. Or what about acquiring Markakis for a Class A stiff.

QUOTE (fathom @ May 18, 2016 -> 05:10 AM) Really Albers has just completely collapsed the last week. Even the rest of the pen hasn't been awful. He's simply lost the Sox three games. That gopher ball was inexcusable. Anybody could have ripped that pitch out. Pisses me off. Note the difference in that last pitch to Avila. Slop. He waved at it. QUOTE (Lip Man 1 @ May 18, 2016 -> 05:13 AM) maybe one game can make that big of a difference. I've seen it happen before to the Sox. Mark It happens all the time to the Sox. You usually can point to one game as starting the collapse. What makes me mad is tonight we could have reversed all the bad karma. We had the game in the ninth. Abreu finishes it off and the Sox would have been jumping up and down and all that. Instead a horrible loss and now we have to worry about losing this series, too.

QUOTE (fathom @ May 18, 2016 -> 05:06 AM) Horrible lose. Umpiring and pitching a joke Also some miserable individual at bats. Bullpen is a major concern suddenly except for closer. Albers was looking automatic until the last 3-4 appearances where he's blown chunks. Now we need to get our starters to go 7 strong innings, and they go lefty, righty matchups in the eighth, paving the way for Robertson. Sorry for the brainfart question about Hawk. It is such a weird decision to not do home games I was thinking for a moment there he didn't do ROAD games. The Royals legend Denny Matthews skips most road trips (not to bring the Royals into this). p.s. If I were Robin I'd alert the media that we can't protest the game but MLB will be alerted to that play. It's like the game was fixed. The batter steps right in the way of the catcher and not one umpire rules him OUT????

That's what you want a lefty reliever to do, throw slop past the lefty hitter. That was a BAD loss as it turned out. We're starting to drop games in bunches like the Royals were doing. Sucks.

Just a single, Avila. I've never liked you. Prove me wrong.

Way to go, Adam. You, sir, are a good man.

QUOTE (StrykerSox @ May 18, 2016 -> 04:59 AM) Enough about the umps. We lost this game. Albers can't finish innings anymore, Abreu has consistently failed to be a dangerous run producer, we played an absurdly weak lineup against a tough pitcher and we failed to use Frazier. Should have used him in the ninth, where he could have ended it or continued the threat, which Saladino's much celebrated SF did not do. This is on us. Not an ump. True ... but .... If they make the easy call, the right call, we get a chance to win it in the bottom of the inning. Never know. Sox mighta won it there. Good post, though.

What was Saladino f***ing around with the bunt? Just concentrate on stroking a hit, you dummy. Two out.

s***, I don't care about the standings. Why are they even discussing that? It's about playing good baseball. Nice fight, Sanchez. Nice stroke there. Good job.

Sad we couldn't put it away in the 9th. Houston was looking like it was ready to go back to the hotel but Abreu couldn't get the hit.

That ump should be disciplined.

The sudden collapse of the bullpen changes the outlook of the season big time. Better hope our defense remains rock solid. AND we're gonna have to have our starters step it up and be able to go a full seven from now on.

They took advantage of the non interference call. Very alarming, though, is our bullpen. Albers is throwing meat and it's only mid May. We ain't winning this one, barring an amazing comeback.

QUOTE (BigHurt3515 @ May 18, 2016 -> 04:49 AM) Are you serious? He doesn't do home games. It is May, you should know that by now Greg Oops. I'm sorry. Brain cramp.

He definitely interfered. I noticed that Avila made a dismal throw but it wasn't his fault!!!!