CWSGuy406

Not that I'd expect the players to say as much, but is there anybody in this organization who can just be honest and acknowledge how completely devoid of talent -- not grind, work-ethic or 'edge' -- this franchise is?

I think San Diego's three-headed monster of Towers, DePodesta and Alderson is one of my favorite front offices in baseball. They seem to make a lot of real nifty moves in free agency and in trading. If they can build up that farm system a bit they'll be a force for the foreseeable future.

QUOTE(Vance Law @ Dec 12, 2007 -> 06:16 AM) Thank you. Of course he's overpaid. He was a free agent. I'm still waiting for anyone to give one single instance of a free agent (without injury concerns) not getting overpaid. As overpayment goes, how much did we overpay by? A few million. 3? 4? 5? How much did Hunter get overpaid by? $20 million? 25? 30? Not only did we overpay by a couple million, we overpaid by at least a year. We also overpaid by giving him a NTC. And there are plenty of instances of guys getting underpaid in free agency. Is it really necessary to list each and every one of them? Okajima is one -- if you really believe that EVERYONE is overpaid in free agency, I'd question your thinking.

At this point I'd say I'd fully be behind only one move, and that's signing Mike Cameron to a short deal. He can still go get the ball out in CF and his numbers would be much better hitting at US Cellular. Of course, it would probably be best to sign him AFTER the Mitchell report is released (I'm not sure about the suspensions if he were to appear on that list, with the added 25 games he's already getting). I'd be lukewarm about Rowand. If they could get him for 4/$48 I'd be game but not thrilled. Then again, I think if Rowand REALLY wanted to be here, he'd already be here. My guess is we're not getting a hometown discount and that Rowand is going where the money is (I'm laying no blame or judgement here, BTW). Hell, I could take an Anderson/Owens platoon at this point. But please, then, don't feed us bulls*** the rest of the winter that we're going to compete. Who knows, maybe Anderson becomes the average player we were hoping for and along with Richar, Fields and Quentin, you have a nice core of decent (not great) players who will allow you to spend money elsewhere.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Dec 12, 2007 -> 04:56 AM) Money wise, it was basically (as someone pointed out) Garland for Cabrera and Linebrink, addressing two major holes. Plus even if Cabrera doesn't re-sign (and I think he may, mid-season, depending on how things go), Cabrera will fetch more picks that Garland would have. We don't know that the Sox are going to get picks. They're going to try their damndest to resign him. Also... what do Linebrink and Cabrera do for us when we're making a half-assed attempt at winning in 2008? Yippie, we get 75 wins instead of 70. It would've been one thing for the Sox to have landed Hunter or Fukodome or Rowand and then made the Garland/Cabrera + Linebrink moves. But now we sit here with two of those three gone, and the Sox don't seem to want to go all-out for Rowand (which is probably the right thing to do, but when your putting up a BS facade about trying to compete in 2008, you can't have Jerry Owens starting). I would've much rather had seen the Sox try and offer Garland for all these teams bidding on Bedard, Santana and Haren. No -- Garland is obviously nowhere near as good as any of those three. But you're telling me the Sox couldn't pull a B prospect or two (two Gio Gonzalez' circa 2007)?

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Dec 12, 2007 -> 04:53 AM) Have to disagree on this part. I think the Cabrera trade was and still is a good move, both individually and for the greater picture. How?

QUOTE(fathom @ Dec 12, 2007 -> 04:50 AM) No kidding....he really messed that up, especially considering Cabrera won't sign an extension. I hope Cabrera is smart enough to look at the division and see he's not going to win a division title with this club in the next few seasons. You know the Sox are going to do their best to resign another 30 year-old player in Cabrera. I'll support the trade if the Sox play out this season and offer Cabrera arbitration (he's almost assuredly going to be a type-A free agent). Also, 4/$48 for Fuko. Let the lambasting begin (or continue).

It's okay, fellas, this just puts the Cubs in a better position to compete with us. I'm thinking more and more about the Garland-Cabrera trade. I'm thinking Kenny acted much too quickly. He said he had deals on the table where we would've gotten prospects back -- hell, I don't think it's a stretch to say the Sox could've gotten Milledge for Garland and somebody else (or some cash). We're so f***ed right now. I'm gonna laugh when Kenny tries to tell the fans we're going to compete in 2008 with Jerry Owens in CF.

QUOTE(fathom @ Dec 11, 2007 -> 05:38 PM) He'd be going from playing in two of the best hitting parks to the worst. I look forward to seeing him against Jake Peavy 6 times a season. Right now, I have a feeling though that Juan Pierre might be our CF next season. Just like Carlos Pena in 2006? It's funny... hindsight is 20/20, of course, but it's a shame that prediction didn't come true. And most projection systems seem to have Fukodome somewhere around .285/.350/.450 (I may be off on the batting average). With those numbers, it will all depend on how he handles CF defensively. If he's average to above average defensively, those numbers are certainly worth $12-15 in this market. If, however, he can't handle CF defensively, he's really not a heckuva lot better than, say, Jose Guillen.

QUOTE(Gregory Pratt @ Dec 11, 2007 -> 12:42 AM) Indicative of an inability to really rip the fastball. You could say that, I suppose, although I wouldn't agree with it. I don't think his bat speed is slow -- it's just the loading with the hands (or whatever it is -- "cocking" , whatever the term is) that seems slow. In any case I think you're much too harsh on Fields, although I suppose we shall get a pretty good answer from a full-seasons worth of at-bats in 2008.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Dec 10, 2007 -> 11:02 PM) I'm surprised you're a Fields guy, considering 95% of the time he's trying to hit it on to the LF concourse. To be fair, Fields isn't a dead pull hitter -- better than 25% of his homers at US Cellular were to right or right-center. Most of his other homers were to left-center. He only had one homer that ended up in or over the top of the Sox bullpen.

Brian Roberts is 30 years old and has only had one really *great* season. The past couple seasons he's been very good, no doubt, but not really elite. Seeing that non-great second-basemen tend to fall hard after (about) age 32-33, I agree with BB -- I'm not trading a whole lot more than Richar + Egbert for him. Seeing that Baltimore most likely won't give up one of the faces of their franchise without some serious overpayment -- probably Gio + DLS + Richar -- I'll pass.

QUOTE(Rowand44 @ Dec 10, 2007 -> 12:56 AM) I'm not high on Owens at all but I think the age thing is a little bit overblown in this particular case just because he's still young in terms of baseball experience. I understand what you're saying, but "baseball experience" isn't going to help him hit the ball out of the infield. He's developed physically, and because of that and his history he's not likely to ever slug over .375. He'd have to be one really really unique baseball player to ever be anything more than a 4th OFer, or a terrible 'third' OFer.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Dec 9, 2007 -> 11:34 PM) My point is pretty simple. Post All Star Break last year, he put up a .340 OBP in essentially his first continuous half season where he was starting most of the time. The jump from .340 to .350 is not huge and is something he should be expected to do just from learning the league better (indeed, his walk rate did in fact improve from July to Aug/September and it's visible in the stats). It took a September BAPIP of .400, IIRC, to raise his OBP, and his OPS was still terrible. He'll also be 27 years old on opening day. His ceiling is terribly limited, it's not even funny.

Gosh damn Byfuglien's got some hands.

QUOTE(Rowand44 @ Dec 9, 2007 -> 09:17 PM) If Uribe starts at 2nd, I'm going to be an angry person. At least Richar is left-handed. If he was righty, I'd have more concerns, but Richar should be getting all at-bats against righties and most against lefties. I'm not a huge fan of platooning young players. Let Richar prove he can't hit lefties before we platoon him.

QUOTE(Flash Tizzle @ Dec 6, 2007 -> 09:30 PM) I'd like to hear someone explain why they believe the roster, as currently constructed, can make up the 28+ wins necessary to reach the playoffs. I'm glad you had the 'plus sign' there, because according to Pythag, the Sox were actually lucky to win 72 games. As far as where those wins will come from, I'll try my darndest (?) and put my black-and-white shades on for a second: +2-3 wins from Quentin upgrade over pile-of-crap from last season. +1 win from one-year-older Fields over bad-month-of Crede and one-year-younger Fields of 2007. +3-5 wins from Cabrera over Uribe. +1 win from Konerko bouncing back from a semi-down year (I'm only doing this because I have the shades on -- I'd argue that Konerko's 2007 season will be closer to his next three seasons than his 2005-06 years). +1 win from Dye bouncing back. +3-5 wins from bullpen upgrade (this isn't attributed to Linebrink, either, but regression to the mean -- it's just difficult for me to believe, statistically speaking, for the Sox bullpen to be as bad as it was last season). -(minus)2-3 wins from Garland downgrade. Optimistically that's +13 wins right there, with the glaring omission of CF. Our CF spot won't be any worse than it was last year. Even in a worst case scenario where the Sox have to platoon Owens and Anderson, the Sox won't be any worse -- if they grab Cameron, Fukodome or Rowand, that's anywhere from a 2-5 win upgrade. So anymore improvement would have to come from the rotation, assuming nobody does something super-extraordinary (and hey, it could happen -- for example, I think there's a somewhat reasonable chance Quentin goes off for a .260/.350/.460 line, which would be a what, .150 point OPS improvement over last year's group of crap in LF?). Danks is going to have to take a step forward into that 5.00ish ERA range and the same will be needed from Floyd (and Contreras for that matter). So putting a bow on this, I'd say the slightly optimistic scenario has the Sox playing meaningful games in September but ultimately falling several games short (think 83-89 wins). And at this point, I think that should be pretty realistic goal -- play the young guys who have shown some amount of promise (Richar, Fields, Quentin, Danks, Floyd), don't sign anyone to a long-term contract, don't sign a SP to a contract that will ultimately block Gio or DLS (I'd say this about position players but we have none in AA or AAA) and do your best to keep some asses in the seats (that's where winning around 85 games will help) so we can keep this $100 million dollar payroll (even if it will ultimately go to waste on guys like Linebrink). Disclaimer: The wins are in no way a statistical calculation of any kind, just moderately educated guesses. Go ahead and give me some guff for them if need be, I'll be around.

Bye bye Bucky. Bye bye home winning streak. Got every call imaginable at home, got to the line every other time down the floor, got the Bo treatment from the refs and still couldn't put it away. Now please, please, try and win some games in the Big 10, help us out a bit. Thanks much, -Marquette

Great finish to the Pitt/Washington game. A Washington player went coast-to-coast and hit a shot at the buzzer, but replay confirmed he didn't get the shot off in time.

Bring it on, Bucky! Can't wait, so pumped. Gonna be tough sleeping tonight. The Badgers are most likely going to execute much better than Marquette will. If Marquette tries to play a half-court game, I'm rather sure Bo will have his way with Crean and Wisconsin will be kings of Wisconsin yet again. I'm hoping for a track meet, as we they don't have the horses to keep up.

QUOTE(Tony82087 @ Dec 8, 2007 -> 05:26 AM) Couple things. 1. Did you think the Hawks scored on the no goal? 2. Did you think the Ducks goal a few minutes later was legit? I thought Bulin got crosschecked. 3. I don't know if you noticed tonight, but it seems like Kane has really hit a wall. I think we knew it would happen, but at least to me, you are really starting to see it, 1. No goal, Brian's got it. Puck was on the red line but not completely over it, several Anahiem-feed replays (overhead shots) confirmed it. Sure, maybe they should've went upstairs but it wasn't a goal. 2. Yeah that one was a fine 'no-call' too. I'm pretty sure it was Duncan Keith who knocked Bertuzzi into Khabi. That was another lucky goal -- kudos to Anahiem for crashing the net, sure, but for the puck to bounce right on his tape like that? Damn. 3. Yeah, Kane's seemingly having a tough go at things. He's turning the puck over a little more than I'd like. Still, he's dangerous any time he has the puck. Havlat came back at exactly the right time, though, as it seems both Toews and Kane are slowing down a bit. BTW, crowd seemed fantastic from a TV standpoint tonight and the Anahiem commentators made sure to point that out immediately after the anthem. I liked the well-timed "Let's go Hawks!" (Not "Let's go Blackhawks!", f***in' newbs ) chants, the crowd got into it at the right times. I also think it's a shame Byfuglien is being jerked around like this, as he's played some great (okay, 'great' is a bit too strong -- he's still played pretty well, though) hockey. When he sets his mind that he wants to hit someone, that guy is probably going down. He absolutely dropped that one Anahiem defenseman tonight. I'd still rather see him at defenseman and I hope he's not forgotten when Bourque comes back. Buff is the only semblance of a PP QB this team has right now and despite his gaff at the end of the game tonight, I'm glad Savvy hasn't been gun-shy about putting him on the first-unit at the point. It's really too bad Cam Barker is stagnating or taking so long to stick in the NHL.

Damn. I'm sure there were several people who were at the game tonight who will comment, but I thought the effort was pretty f***ing good tonight. I know nobody wants to hear this, but I'd say they got extremely unlucky -- Havlat had that one that was inches away from going over the goal-line and Ruutu hit the iron again. Anahiem had what, five goals on 22 shots? Khabby hasn't been in top-form the past couple games. Zyuzin is really, really getting on my nerves . He just doesn't seem like he does anything well and on-top of that he makes a lot of head-scratching decisions with the puck. If there's one 'goat' on this team it's him IMO. This is tough. We've last the past couple in a row even though I don't think we've played terribly (although my attention was averted during much of the St Louis game so I can't comment on that one). The West is a real b**** -- obviously there's still a ways to go but as of now I think the Hawks are on the outside looking in. I'm not terribly worried as two wins in a row potentially puts the Hawks back into fourth place, that's how close it is. It sucks to lose these games but I'm confident. The crowds have been getting better and the team seems to playing with a lot more energy at home -- we just gotta end up on the other side of these one-goal losses.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Dec 7, 2007 -> 08:31 PM) Oh I have a feeling that there will plenty of people obsessing about everyone of their moves and non-moves for some reason... I love the half-assed veiled shots at certain posters here. Of course we're going to obsess over their moves -- it's a message board, what are we supposed to do? Kenny told has repeatedly told us fans that we're going to compete in 2008. If he were more reasonable and said something like, "We're going to do our best to compete in 2008 without sacrificing our long-term chances in 2009 and beyond", people would be more reasonable and level-headed with him. But instead he's been making stupid comment after stupid comment the whole winter -- "‘‘All this has done is put the Tigers in a better position to contend with us.’’ If I was a reporter there I would've burst out laughing right in his face.

Scratch Samsonov AND Perrault for tonight. And Brian, I agree with everything you said above but did I read that you said Buff has bad hands? If so, that's the only thing I'd disagree with -- I think he's got some of the best on the team, in all honesty, or at the very least, some very good hands for a defenseman.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Dec 7, 2007 -> 04:49 PM) I think you start this season with Anderson and Sweeney in AAA, Owens in CF, and keep giving them chances to perform. Because if they don't, what do we lose? Certainly doesn't make us any worse off than we are now. Why does Owens automatically get the job? We know who the better defender is (when healthy) and there's nothing to say Owens will be a better hitter than Anderson. I'd think if it really came down to it, Ozzie could find a good amount of at-bats for both at the major league level, especially with Quentin in LF.