Chisoxfn

Yes...baseball begins

QUOTE(Queen Prawn @ Mar 29, 2007 -> 10:34 AM) I'll be in Texas helping with inventory so I won't know anything until I get back to my hotel room unless my coworker who is also a Sox fanatic lets me know. Looks like we are both doing inventories during the game. Mine is local and I'll watch the game on mlb.tv whenever I get home (but I'm going to the Angel game that night so this will be the first opening day game in forever that I didn't get to watch live).

Can I just say f***. I had a chance to win not only the Soxtalk pool but my money pool had UCLA won out. And that would have been a nice 1000 bucks.

QUOTE(Heads22 @ Mar 31, 2007 -> 08:18 PM) At this point, there appears to be no frontrunner. At this point the Iowa message boards are ridiculous. People are acting like we are the premiere job opening in the country. However, I think we could get either Lowery and I would be stunned if we didn't get Altman (who is my realistic guy that I want hired). Altman has made the tourney something like 6 out of the last 8 years, has had success in the midwest and as such should be able to recruit and utilize his contacts in the midwest and he's a pretty darn good coach. Lowery is a guy I'd really like but I think he'll go to Michigan because they would probably offer a bit more money. I also heard that Lowery was gonna get more like 500-550 from Southern Ill and that they couldn't go higher (and no I don't know anything other than I read and heard on ESPN about how much SIU can offer). I'd think Iowa could go into the 800-900K range, Michigan could go right around a mill (now I don't know if they'll do that) and to me thats too much money over a 4 or 5 year contract to turn down if your Lowery (especially to move into a conference that has a much larger margin for error; lets be honest, as good as the valley is, and its good, you still typically have only 2 or 3 teams make it which means you have to be damn near perfect to get in, where in the big ten even in a bad year you get typically six, sometimes more, which means you have a better chance of making the tourney and making noise). Lets be honest, we are talking about getting paid as much as an extra 2 million dollars over 5 years (that would be small if we are talking some 100 mill contract, but we are talking about a contract that would be either 2.5 million over 5 years or 5 million or so over 5 years (give or take a few hundred K). Thats a big freaking difference.

QUOTE(Heads22 @ Mar 30, 2007 -> 07:07 PM) Heh, the U of I hospitals might have had an impact. The scuttlebutt is he wants to bring BJ Armstrong onto the staff. Oh yes. So is this official? Or is Iowa still looking?

Holdman doesn't deserve to mentioned in the same sentence as Briggs or Colvin. Briggs is superior than Colvin and both were not just a product of playing next to Urlacher. Briggs is one of the 10 best linebackers in the league (no doubt about it).

Glad Buehrle is doing good because I just sent in my answers to an article I'm going to be a part of at Chicago Sports Review and one of the questions I answer says how Buehrle wins somewhere between 18-20 games. Oh, I'm also predicting Pods release by the ASB.

QUOTE(CYGarland @ Mar 30, 2007 -> 05:26 PM) I got the same thing. That is pretty sweet, although id much rather watch the games on TV....I do think Direct TV will have exclusive rights to the MLB package though, which sucks. I was actually optimistic about the cable company (at least Cox) coming through after getting that letter. A, I think it was wise because they probably have people pissed at MLB and not Cox and B, it showed they are negotiating and I think MLB should be happy that Cox is going to be paying them an assload in mlb.tv fees for all these customers (showing they really want to continue to carry the package). I'm real hopeful we'll get extra innings on tv and the best part is when that happens I'll have mlb.tv as well (for free). And I will be so freaking excited if I find out I get to just watch the games on tv (way better than streaming stuff). QUOTE(fathom @ Mar 30, 2007 -> 05:27 PM) I can't take off work on Monday. Too much vacation time having to be used for the wedding/honeymoon. If all goes well I'll only have to work half of the day on Monday to make up for all the extra time I've been putting in as of late. God I can't wait till some baseball happens.

QUOTE(danman31 @ Mar 30, 2007 -> 05:15 PM) McRoberts did not have a good season. He had a few good games, but plays like a dumbass. Don't give me this 'he has a high basketball IQ' crap. If you watched him play on a regular basis you wouldn't make that statement. In fact if you ask me its just the opposite. McRoberts actually has a lot of talent, upside and obviously potential but the problem is he plays stupid on the court and appears to be real lazy.

SPeaking of MLB.tv my cable company (Cox) is paying for my subscription (the basic one, so I'm only paying like 20 bucks extra to get mlb.tv premium). What a sweet deal. Got the letter in the mail from them yesterday. They also said they are still in negotiations and that as a past subscriber they don't want me to miss any action so they are providing me with mlb.tv for free (WHOOO).

I love Majerus but I hope he actually plans on sticking around, unlike the USC job.

QUOTE(danman31 @ Mar 29, 2007 -> 07:48 PM) Unless things have changed Russell is viewed as a reliever. I was slightly surprised to see him in AA again. With a good spring and a possible move to the pen you'd think they could push him to Charlotte after 10 starts in Bham last year. I think that was the perception but I think this spring changed everything. He worked with Contreras, started throwing from various arm angles and was able to keep his plus velocity and add a lot more movement to his heater. Overall I think of all players, no one's stock rose more than Russel's. A close second would obviously be Danks (but his stock was already high, he just surprised people by earning the job a bit sooner) as well as Robert Valido (who looked very good yet again this spring, at least in the games I saw). I would be surprised if Honel is in the rotation. I'd imagine the pen is a more likely spot for him now.

QUOTE(ScottyDo @ Mar 29, 2007 -> 10:56 PM) I would say that's a fairly good analysis of what spring training is and how much the numbers mean. Our key hitters had good springs so offensively I'm not worried about much. I'm actually not that worried about most of our pitchers either, with the notable exception of Buehrle. He's shown next to no improvement, he's still keeping the ball up and over the middle of the plate every 4th pitch or so. You can do that if you're the Randy Johnson of old, but when your fastball barely tops off at 90, you're gonna get spanked every time. Keep it DOOOOWN Buehrle! I'm actually most concerned with Jose Contreras because I think he's the guy that is our ace and if he's healthy he'll be that but I don't know if he'll ever be healthy again (100% healthy). But I guess we will see. It sounds like his stuff has been there all spring, but he seemed to lose his command a bit due to his nagging injuries last season. As far as Mark goes, his velocity is back up and he's in very good shape. He's earned the benefit of the doubt to me and I think he'll have an excellent year. All in all I may be crazy and I'll be the first to admit I don't put much anything into spring training (except for the performances of young players and health) but I'm really not that concerned. I'm most concerned with the team staying healthy and some of our young pitchers in the pen living up to there potential (because I'm pretty sure we'll have some injuries in the pen and some of those high talented arms will end up flaming out or not panning out).

QUOTE(WCSox @ Mar 29, 2007 -> 10:02 AM) I don't expect Bonderman and Robertson to have career years this season, either. Detroit will be a good team this year, but they're not going to win the AL again. Bonderman is a flat out good pitcher. He has front of the rotation stuff and has done nothing but get better each and every season at the major league level. He's still very young, has progressively thrown more innings, and barring serious injury (and he doesn't have a history of them) he should continue to get better and develop into one of the better pitchers in all of baseball. Robertson on the other hand has absolutely no talent and I have no idea how he did as good as he did last season. Rogers is in a similar mold and I would expect a serious regression from Verlander due to him being overworked last year compared to the amount of work he had in prior seasons (he didn't get a nice steady innings increase like young pitchers should and it will likely result in some arm troubles). However, if Verlander stays healthy there is no reason why he won't duplicate last years numbers. They also have Andrew Millers dynamite arm, although I still think Miller is far too raw to succeed as a major league pitcher right now (he'll need more time). QUOTE(Kalapse @ Mar 29, 2007 -> 11:25 AM) Again, how was last season a career year for Bonderman? It was his best season as a pro mainly because he's 23 but that's certainly not the best season he'll ever have in the bigs unless something goes seriously wrong. A 'career year' implies it was a fluke season (ex. Loaiza, '03) and he will never again reach the level of success he realized in 2006. Bonderman, frankly, scares the hell out of me as a Sox fan. 24 years old this season with just nasty stuff and no real history of arm ailments. I was thrilled when the Tigers were talking about dealing him for a bat. Too bad they didn't go through with that. I also dont' mind Maroth, he's a decent pitcher and Ledezma is a good arm if he's healthy. Ledezma struggled a lot early in his career with the Tigers (than again so did Maroth and Bondy when they first came up) but he has some darn good stuff from a lefty and can strike out pretty much anyone. He's the type of guy that if I were a GM I'd be all over picking up and trying to use him as a starter, otherwise I think he has a career as a stud left handed set-up man.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Mar 28, 2007 -> 01:29 PM) Phillies release Garcia. Haha, I was about to say wow, how far has Freddy fallen, haha. Than I realized it was Karim.

QUOTE(Brian @ Mar 28, 2007 -> 08:18 PM) So we have no long reliever? Sweet. Lets see, Masset and Sisco are both capable of throwing more than a couple innings so I think those count. Plus, lets be honest, long relievers are vastly over-rated and rarely used, especially for teams that have four veteran starters like the Sox have. The last thing I'm concerned with is not having a good long reliever because usually if a long reliever or two are key to your club its a bad sign because your starting pitching is either very banged up or flat out terrible and I don't expect that to happen. I'm also far from concerned because I watched this team the prior couple springs put up pretty pathetic records and still play very well in the regular season (and lets be honest, last years team, while it was terribly dissapointing and pour at times was still a very good team, better so than the team that won the world series, imo). I know Ozzie plays a lot more youngsters and he lets them take a beating. That said there is no doubt that a lot of our veterans struggled as well but again I do buy into the fact (to a point) that veterans know how to get ready for the season and they have earned the benefit of the doubt because they've produced at the major league level relatively consistently in the past. Really, the only thing you ask for out of spring training is health and development and while we didn't win as much as I'd have liked and our pitching really was inconsistent, I'm still glad this team is healthy and I know it has a lot of top notch major league talent on the squad and that is a necessary quality if your going to win in the regular season.

I assume it will be Logan and Aardsma and I'd be dissapointed if those guys aren't up. I think Floyd and Sisco should be down in AAA working in the rotation and working on the stuff Coop is working with them on.

QUOTE(beck72 @ Mar 27, 2007 -> 05:32 AM) I remember seeing Jose Molina's name come up in an ESPN article of bats that were supposedly available via trade. Jose would make a lot of sense and while I don't have anything against Molina (i'll be the first to admit he's one of the worse back up catchers in the game) I am not overly concerned since we I don't expect him to be the reason we make or don't make the playoffs (sorry but backup catcher is truly a minute worry). And yes, I think Kenny will eventually trade for someone to catch for us but it may be a couple weeks into the season when he makes said move.

QUOTE(greg775 @ Mar 27, 2007 -> 08:21 PM) I hate to say I've been stuck at work swamped all of march and haven't had time to check the stats. But I've just now checked them and I'd say, Yes, I wish BA would be starting ahead of Erstad. Hopefully with all the lefties in our division, BA should play a lot. He hit 290 in the spring, did BA with a better on base than Erstad which should have given him the job. Hope Darin doesn't suck in April and May. We have to stay pace all season with the Tigers, Indians, Twins and maybe even the Royals, who have our number. Erstad has played a lot lot better than BA has this spring. I've been watching quite a few games and BA is still very lost at the plate. In terms of Erstad, he's looked healthy out in the field (and thats a good thing because his defense has been solid and we'll really get to see what he's made of when the season begins) and at the plate he seems to be taking better pitches. He's already our best base-runner and at the plate he's been having good AB's. Anderson has had a couple hot streaks but he's not having good ab's and still has a terrible swing. I like BA a lot, but Darin should be starting (we could argue that it should be in LF over Pods with a quality righty platooning with him to keep him fresh) but thats another debate.

While I think Perez could have helped out, I just don't see the Sox splitting time with Thome so I really don't see where Perez was going to get AB's, especially considering we don't need any 1st baseman and he really is a horrendous outfielder who makes Pods look like a freaking gold glover. On a side note, its pretty ridiculous that some of you think Perez is the difference between a potential first place White Sox squad and a 4th place one. The key to this team is the arms and in turn the defense, not the offense.

Danks looked really really good when I saw him pitch on Friday. He has great tempo, changes speeds, changes locations and gets ground balls (or at least he was in the start I watched). I really was impressed with his make-up. In the same game I got to see Gavin Floyd who looked good in one inning, horrible in another, but overall I think Floyd still has a ways to go. His mechanics just look out of sync and he seems to have trouble putting together a consistent delivery. Floyd is a good talent but he's the type of talent that needs more time in the minors (despite him having spent a lot of time there already).

Was listening to the Reds game and Brantley (who I hate) was saying how Hermy has more life on his stuff than he had during the World Series year with the Sox. Apparently Dustin is really feeling good and while some of that may have been Brantley-KoolAid, its still nice to hear and I'll be pulling for Dustin.

I was listening to the Mets/Dodgers game yesterday night and they said Sandy was going to announce his retirement this week. I wonder if the Sox call him up or if they stick with Molina and his defense. I saw Chris Stewart play in game for the Rangers on Saturday, but I actually didn't think Molina looked all that bad.

I have a chance at winning this still apparently. Of course I need to win out and Georgetown beating UNC prevented me from having 4/4 in the final four.

Bruce Pearl isn't leaving Tenn for Iowa. That said if Alford goes I'd think we'd even consider making Neal the HC. I think we would have liked to have had the ISU coach and Iowa is the school he'd have preferred to go to (compared to ISU) but that is done now. I don't understand why Alford would rather go to New Mexico. He has a good contract at Iowa although I'm sure he knows he's in pretty deep right now.