Chisoxfn

The scuttle-but is that the deal is done.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Nov 20, 2009 -> 01:56 PM) Yes. Unless there is some sort of rule which excludes this sort of activity during the off-season. I'm unaware of one but there could be one. So I take it back, I went to our expert, Kalapse and he has indicated such: This means that the Sox won't open up that roster spot on the 40 until the season begins and teams are allowed to place players back on the DL. However, if Omogrosso wasn't protected a team could have claimed him and easily kept him on the 40 man roster all season (without wasting his development, since it is essentially going to be him rehabbing). That is why the Sox protected Omogrosso and I am fairly confident that if we hadn't protected him a club would have picked him up. He's got the tools to be a pretty good reliever.

QUOTE (2nd_city_saint787 @ Nov 20, 2009 -> 01:53 PM) so we will have 4 open spots on the 40 si? Yes. Unless there is some sort of rule which excludes this sort of activity during the off-season. I'm unaware of one but there could be one.

What would everyone think about picking up a Ryan Garko to be our right handed bat off the bench. He could play a bit at 1st, be an emergency catcher, and DH. He actually could be a real good compliment to someone like Thome. Career .887 OPS vs lefties and he's likely to get non-tendered.

Omogrosso will be on the 60 day DL though so what does it matter? He really won't count against the 40 man roster in time, correct?

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 08:59 AM) Nah, I think that was the dude from Boston that married that super hot chick. He was on the Austin cast I believe, dented his face. Yep. Brad is pretty damn calm. This was out of character for him.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 08:35 AM) Why would Brad challenge a boxer to fight, even when drunk? His eye was blown up! Funny how Evan and Kenny stay out of everything, including the ruins. He absolutely lit Brad up.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Nov 20, 2009 -> 11:12 AM) Good point on the clubhouse stuff, since that seems to have been an issue. He could also replace Cora when/if he lands a managerial gig.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Nov 20, 2009 -> 11:09 AM) Totally agree. Even people want to piss on the "mentor" part of things (and I would also include a very young Gordon Beckham as a guy who could learn a lot of things from Omar), the guy is going provide great defense, smart ABs, and fill in over the entire IF defense, instead of just one spot. We also are getting a very stabilizing clubhouse guy in Omar Vizquel. This isn't a move that you get super excited about, but its the type of move that does so many little things that it could really pay off pretty nice. Great Defense, Great Baserunner, Can Bunt, Can Teach our young guys, very good clubhouse guy. Ya, I like this a lot.

Sox Close to Signing Omar Vizquel By Jason Gage SoxNet.net Ken Rosenthal is reporting that the Chicago White Sox are on the verge of signing Omar Vizquel to a 1 year contract worth $1 million. Vizquel, 43, spent the 2009 season with the Rangers as a backup at SS, 3B, and 2B and batted .266 in 62 games. SN Take: Vizquel makes a deep bench even deeper, providing Ozzie Guillen with a plus defensive backup at 3B, SS, and 2B. Vizquel is also expected to serve as a mentor to Gordon Beckham and Alexei Ramirez, much like he did last season with Texas rookie SS Elvis Andrus. The signing won't help sell tickets, it will put some pressure on Jayson Nix, and go a long way towards stabilizing the infield defense and clubhouse. Rule V Update: The Chicago White Sox purchased the contracts of Brian Omogrosso (RHP), Brandon Hynick (RHP), Sergio Santos (RHP), Santos Luis (RHP), and Stefan Gartrell (OF). The moves put the Sox 40 man roster at 37 and protect the above players from being exposed during the MLB portion of the upcoming Rule V Draft. Kyle McCulloch (RHP) and John Shelby III (OF) are the most noteable prospects that the Sox have exposed to the draft. Shelby is a toolsy outfielder who was a popular pre-season break-out prospect pick in 2009 and was most recently ranked by the Hard Ball times as the Sox 10th best prospect. McCulloch is noteable only because he is the last remaining of the Sox 1st round flops under former player personell guy Duane Shaffer.

http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/soxnet/200...r-contract.html We talk about the Rule V draft a bit in the above article

Shelby isn't going to get picked in the Rule V draft. He still has too much to work on, imo.

QUOTE (Sec101Row1 @ Nov 20, 2009 -> 10:06 AM) Someone from the sox told me they've added 5 players to the roster today. Yep, a bunch of moves to protect players from the Rule V. I'm working on a small write-up on it as we speak. Hynick, Omogrosso, and Santos were some of the bigger names added to the 40 man roster.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ Nov 20, 2009 -> 09:37 AM) This would be solid. If you're gong to sign a veteran backup infielder you might as well make it an elite defender who's willing to work with the kids. Agreed. He can do everything that Nix could do accept better and add value as a mentor. Nix does have much more power though, but the defensive ability of Omar at multiple positions would be tremendous.

QUOTE (knightni @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 03:20 PM) Kind of like Teyo Johnson. Heck of a big college WR at Stanford, but he was too slow and huge to be an NFL WR. Then, when he got drafted, he couldn't adjust to TE with the Raiders and fell out of pro football. Except Lebron, if he does run a 4.4 40, is faster than most Wr's so he has the speed to play there. Bigger guys usually don't have the quickness to be effective on the outside and that is why they are moved to the TE position. Lebron evidently has that so there is no reason he couldn't be at the WR position.

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 10:30 AM) If really runs a 4.4 then he'd be a top 5 pick. Do you play him at WR or put him on the ends. With his strength he could hypothetically be a completely dominant DE. Or a dominant WR. Either way, if James hypothetically went the route of FB instead of Basketball I think he'd ultimately be a #1 overall type of pick. If you are putting him in the draft now, knowing that he hasn't played the game in years, he'll have an extreme learning curve and I'd think he'd still go in the 1st round but wouldn't make an immediate impact and the only place you could really draft him would be at the wide-out position because I think him picking up DE on the fly would be too difficult. In his first season I assume he'd be used on limited plays, particularly in the end-zone where you could use his height and size combo on jump-balls.

QUOTE (Ranger @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 02:19 PM) I'd like to think that without the Thome-PK-Dye trio in the middle of the order, the offensive mindset of the guys playing will have to change. To me, having those three guys when they were killing it (2006) was about as good as it could possibly get in the heart of any batting order. The problem is that if even one of those guys begins to disappear (2007, 2008, 2009), the players' mindset doesn't change because they've been used to it a certain way: the rest of the lineup is still waiting on those big boys to get it done, even though one or two of them is struggling. So, essentially, the team will go through stretches where they're waiting on a black hole to drive in their runs. That leads to a LOT of low-scoring games. I know a lot of fans hate the heavy reliance on the HR, but if you can ever have a 3-4-5 and good as those three guys were in '06, you'd be insane not to be happy with that. Now, since it's going to be nearly impossible to duplicate that again, I'm hoping next year's offense is more versatile and 6 guys aren't always waiting on the other 3 to do the heavy-lifting. Teahen was on the show with us this past Saturday (excuse the plug, but here's the link if you want to hear) and I asked him about the approach playing in the Cell and how players are affected subconsciously because of the tendency to be HR-friendly. And he said something telling, I think, that when he was with KC, they viewed the Sox players as waiting for the guys in the middle of the order to hit the HR. I'm wondering if maybe without that "safety net" for the other guys, if the offense as a whole will do a better job of working together to score runs instead of relying on 2 or 3 guys to do all the work. Obviously, I'd rather have 4 badasses in the middle of the order that I know are going to rake every night, but there is more than one way to have a decent offense. And when it comes down to it, presumably with this rotation, the Sox don't have to have a top 5 offense...they just can't afford to have a bottom 5 offense. Completely agree with you and I'm very curious to see how the clubhouse dynamic changes with Dye and Thome gone. They were clearly the leaders (along with Konerko and Buehrle, who remain) and I know Getz at times questioned the veteran leadership of the club and I really am curious to see a new waive of players step up and lead this club and I want to see the teams attitude change a bit on the field. With that I think we will see the offensive approach change to an extent and I think it might be for the better. Clearly it would be great to have three guys do what the Sox offense did in 2006. However, it is also important to remember that that offense died late in the season. With the rotation the Sox have, they'll need a solid bullpen (Jenks/Thornton is a damn good 8th/9th inning spot) but we'll need to see two more relievers (at a min emerge as being quality 7th inning and beyond guys) and just a solid lineup (having a league avg player at every position will work fine, especially if the team plays good baseball and does the little things) will be okay. Would it be great to have a dominant lineup and bullpen to go with our rotation, absolutely, but we don't need it to win it all and come July if we are missing that one piece, we'll be golden, cause Kenny will go out and get it.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 01:56 PM) 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. Lets not forget full seasons of Beckham, a healthy Quentin, an improved Rios (his career numbers indicate we should expect much more out of Alex Rios next season), Jake Peavy for a full-season, a better 5th starter (Garcia > most of what we ran out last season), a more seasoned Alexei Ramirez. Oh and Jenks should be better than last year (his career numbers indicate such), Pena has the potential to be better, Linebrink should be better (again, his stuff looked fine, control and mind-set were more of the issue...although by no means am I saying he'll be great, but he can't be as bad as he was last year, imo). So ya, I'd say there are a lot of reasons to be optimistic despite some of our obvious holes (no DH, no true top of the order hitter, could use another reliever). Bottom line, while we all focus on the negatives a lot cause we all know how many flaws last years club had, I think we also ignore the extreme positives and as a whole I really like our chances next season (for the above reasons), not to mention the fact that I think Kenny will be able to make some moves that give the club the necessary flexibility to make a few solid moves that fill holes.

QUOTE (Ranger @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 02:36 PM) Oh I'll be around, but I should let you know that I am also in an open relationship with WSI. She doesn't mind. She better not. And just like over there, I'm sure I'll get into with some of you, sometimes some of you will hate me, somtimes I'll hate some of you, but there will be plenty of love to go around. I hope this team plays well so I don't have to be crabby. They will. It is easy to look at the holes the club has, but hard to ignore the fact that this club has a promising young nucleus, a tremendous starting rotation (which includes an ace), and almost zero players coming off of career years. Yes there are holes, but Kenny will do what he can to fix those holes and this club is going to be a whole heck of a lot better in 2010.

QUOTE (Kenny Hates Prospects @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 12:43 PM) Honel had terrific upside but he got hurt. I pretty much agree with the rest though. I never liked Broadway or McCulloch and I generally don't like the idea of taking a closer prospect in the first round unless the FO thinks he'll work as a starter. If you had seen much of Honel in the minors, he really only had one plus pitch. The knuckle-curve he threw was extordinary, but his fastball wasn't a plus pitch and his change-up was solid. BA advertised him having a plus fastball, but the reality is he was a one pitch starter with a mediocre fastball that he didn't spot that well. He also got hurt. I believe people expected him to add velocity as he filled out, but it just wasn't the case. I remember one summer when he was being super hyped BA was talking a bout him sitting in the mid 90's, I go watch him pitch and he's throwing in the upper 80's, while ocassionally hitting 90/91.

QUOTE (Thunderbolt @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 10:57 AM) A lot of people are going to take what JR said he wrong way. He's not saying we're not going to make any moves, he's just saying we already made our biggest commitment to Peavy. I think he's basically saying we don't have the budget to make another big splash and that ultimately if we make a splash it will be via the trade front. I still expect us to maybe sign one or two guys that ultimately get non-tendered or left out on the market. We could get more aggressive if the club is able to free up payroll via trade.

http://chicago.whitesox.mlb.com/news/artic...sp&c_id=cws Another great article talking about the Sox off-season plans.

JR: We've Already Signed Our Free Agent By Jason Gage SoxNet Bob Nigthengale, USA, today is one of a handful within the media to report that the White Sox will be one of many teams to stay away from free agency (which officially begins tonight @ Midnight, EST).

Ya, I don't necessarily agree with those people. The good thing is, both have crazy high upside and thats a good thing. The next question is can our coaches help them develop and will they put in the time it takes to develop. I certainly hope so!!!

QUOTE (scenario @ Nov 19, 2009 -> 10:26 AM) I forgot McCulloch. He's eligible too. See you.