KevHead0881

We know how Kenny is and there is a good chance he's just blowing smoke here, but these comments still seem noteworthy... Vazquez officially headed to South Side Some other good quotes from Vazquez as well.

QUOTE(nitetrain8601 @ Dec 20, 2005 -> 07:39 PM) Walker has touched everyone's swing so they become dead pull-hitters. I think that's a major reason why A-Row's production went down last year. Uh, Walker was the hitting coach in '04 as well. I think '04 was more of an abberation for A-Row. I doubt his decline offensively had much to do with Walker.

QUOTE(bschmaranz @ Dec 20, 2005 -> 08:59 PM) Does anyone else find it hilarious that they have a Jacques and a Pierre in the outfield? "Boycott the Cubs!"

I've always thought Jones was kind of a peckerhead. Combine that with the fact that he isn't very good and he'll fit right in with the northsiders.

I'm just glad we won't have to endure another year of "anti-Timo" threads. I think those where more tiresome than actually seeing him in the lineup.

QUOTE(Steve9347 @ Dec 20, 2005 -> 12:07 AM) we must realize that this is a very tiny blurb in a trib article. there is no evidence that there is any truth to it. Uummm... ...unless the Trib is just pulling this info out of their ass, or Jaime Torres isn't Contreras' real agent, sounds pretty legit to me.

Contreras doesn't like 1st offer

Where the hell is NUKE's victory thread?

QUOTE(Middle Buffalo @ Dec 19, 2005 -> 10:53 AM) Yeah, let those people fend for themselves. Our world "leaders" will get around to addressing poverty when they're damn well ready to. Seriously, I don't care much for his music, but I have nothing but respect for the charitible work he does. Yah, he has a lot of money and can be described as a camera hog, but there are billions of worse things that he can be doing with his time and money. Unless there is a side of him that I don't know about, I don't see what the problem with him is. Feel free to fill me in if I'm totally missing something here.

Looks great! Still, I have nothing against college baseball, but I'd have a tough time getting a baseball game that didn't have the White Sox in it. The graphics and features are enticing though.

QUOTE(Dam8610 @ Dec 19, 2005 -> 10:00 PM) Did I miss something here? I think its because a lot of the stuff getting posted in ATH was also getting posted in Trade Winds. It was basically like having two of the same forum. My guess is that Trade Winds will now be used specifically for Sox rumors, and ATH for everybody else. Having ATH as a subforum of Trade Winds just emphasizes this. I'm just making an assumption here, so I could be totally wrong.

Here comes the Gooch bomb! That almost sounds dirty.

QUOTE(Steve9347 @ Dec 19, 2005 -> 06:38 PM) its the 4 World Series games. that is it. Thus the title World Series. It will NOT include ALDS or ALCS games. Not saying you're right or wrong, but the title "2005 World Series" doesn't necessarily mean its only the 4 World Series games. The Red Sox set was titled "2004 World Series Collector's Edition", yet included all 7 ALCS games. Personally, I'm thinking we get the 4 World Series games, and a couple other significant ones (the clinchers?). With it only being 7 DVD's, getting the entire playoffs ain't happening. Needless to say, I'll be buying it anyway.

This was a no brainer. Kinda funny that he's only been here a year and it feels like he's a mainstay...like he's been here forever. AJ

Yah, if its 7 discs, I doubt they'll have the entire playoffs. The Red Sox set was 12 discs and had the 7 ALCS games and the 4 World Series games. Even though our entire playoffs are 12 games in all, it would most definitely have to be more than 7 discs. Still, it appears that they'll have more than just the 4 World Series games. If they do it like they did for the Red Sox, it'll be 1 game per disc...which means they'll obviously have 3 extra discs to go along with the WS games. By the way, I think I just broke the record for the usage of the word "disc" in a post.

Its nice that we're getting more recognition and probably more fans, but I don't care much who's town it is. Didn't care before we won the World Series...didn't care after. I always left it to Cubs fans to worry about s*** like that.

QUOTE(SoxFan1 @ Dec 15, 2005 -> 11:00 PM) 4th line buddy.... Obviously, I saw the name. Just never heard of him. I guess I could have worded it differently. Whatever.

QUOTE(Chisoxfn @ Dec 15, 2005 -> 09:34 PM) There is a reason why he's ranked by some to be one of the 10 best prospects in baseball. The guy has some serious power and he shattered all kinds of records this year in Bham (a total pitchers park). The guy has one of those "live" bats. Well, I edited my post a bit to reflect that you know more about this than I do, but I still think 20/30 is a safe prediction. And for the record, I believe he'll be damn good. Still have no problem with the trade (but I guess thats for another thread).

QUOTE(Felix @ Dec 15, 2005 -> 09:13 PM) How come when I say he's a possible 40/40 guy, I get mocked, but when you say he'll hit 30-40 and possibly 50 HR's, nothing is said to you? If it makes you feel better, I think both of you are reaching a little bit. I'd say, realistically, he's a 20/30 guy. Based on his minor league statistics, Mike Cameron seems like a good comparison. Decent average, good power, very good speed, lots of strike outs. But who knows? This is just my opinion, of course, but to predict 30/30, 40/40, or him hitting 50 homers, when you haven't even seen him against major league pitching, sounds a little overboard if you ask me. And if people around here seem to take Chisoxfn's word over yours, I wouldn't take it too personal. The guy knows his s*** when it comes to the minor leagues. While I disagree with him here, I'll even admit that it would probably be better to take his word over mine on the topic. But I stand by my prediction!

Not sure who the writer is, but he's from MSNBC and has some very nice things to say about our offseason:

QUOTE(SSH2005 @ Dec 15, 2005 -> 08:23 PM) Fourth outfielder? Doesn't Rob Mackowiak fill that role?

QUOTE(daa84 @ Dec 15, 2005 -> 01:59 PM) mlb.com announced their this year in baseball awards today. Congrats to Ozzie for winning manager of the year and Neal Cotts for winning set up man of the year Nice! And to think that I thought Kevin Walker would be a better option than Cotts coming out of spring training. Me

For those who think we keep getting the losing end of trades, I think it comes from the desire to have us rip off our trading partners. And this is an unrealistic way to operate a team in our situation. I look at most of Kenny's trades and think that the deals worked out great for both teams. Nothing wrong with that. While it would be nice to get the players we want for almost nothing, it doesn't work that easily. Most of the deals we make are for players who's contracts aren't expiring and/or for players whom the other organization involved will pay a substantial amount of his contract. Since we work with a limited payroll, this is a completely necessary strategy. And in order to get players who are indeed under multi-year contracts, or to get another team to pay for a good chunk of that contract, you'll have to give up some good talent, if not major league ready players. Now, one of the few examples where we gave up minimal talent for a top player was the Bartolo Colon trade. Colon's contract was expiring at the end of the year, and if I remember correctly, the Expos didn't pick up any of his contract. Thus, all we had to give up was Rocky Biddle and some spare parts. Its easier to be the clear cut winner of these deals, but there is still enormous risk involved. In Colon's case, we lost out thanks to his departure at the end of the year. There are plenty of examples of this. Take the Cubs for example. They totally fleeced the Pirates in the Aramis Ramirez trade, but would have had to give up a whole lot more if Ramirez was under contract past that year. Now, they have money falling out of their ears, so their chances of resigning these guys are pretty good, thus why they have no problem making trades that have this risk of an expiring contract. This is a luxury we don't necessarily have. The point is, in order to get the guys we need to win, and to do it for long-term results at an affordable cost, we have to give up more talent then preferred. You can look at almost all of KW's moves, and its obvious that all these things are taken into account. And as nice as it would be to completely fleece other teams with our deals, I think our way of doing things works out pretty nicely as well.

Shawn "Look at me, I'm sexy" Abner

My personal favorite: Fred Manrique!