CWSGuy406

QUOTE(SoxFan101 @ Mar 6, 2005 -> 09:19 PM) ummm good base runners will tell you its easier to steal third than 2nd.... at least according to the hawk Good basestealers maybe, but whoever is saying that is a real dumbass... It's simple -- the catcher has a longer ways to throw the ball to get to second, thus, increasing the chance for a more innacurate throw, and giving the runner more time to steal.

QUOTE(SoxFan1 @ Mar 6, 2005 -> 08:39 PM) Pro with Sliders. Wow -- don't take this as me being an asshole to you or anything, but how can you even have fun playing like that? You're 20-4, you're worst pitcher doesn't even have a four ERA, and you're worst hitter is still hitting .298...

QUOTE(El Piervizdyeguchansodnik @ Mar 6, 2005 -> 10:45 PM) GUYS. It's f***ing COLLEGE BASKETBALL. Who gives a f***? It's a bunch of people who won't even play on the team in a few years. I still don't see why people get so f***ing worked up over college basketball unless they go to the school. Wow... :headshake Maybe it's because there's no money going to this kids, so they lay it on the line every single day, unlike pro-sports, where win or lose, they're still pulling in 7 digits...

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Mar 6, 2005 -> 10:17 PM) I don't understand why people worry so much about where exactly something gets posted I concur. So what if it's posted here, we have smart mods, they'll move it if they feel it need be. That's definitely good. I'd rather face Westbrook/Millwood than a healthy Sabathia...

Ugh. Jenks is overmatched.

QUOTE(danman31 @ Mar 6, 2005 -> 10:29 PM) Oh that's right, you are the crybaby NIU fan. No wonder there was so much hostility after a mostly innocent comment from me. Whatever, I'm enjoying Illinois' loss. You come in here gloating in an Illini loss, knowing full well what's going to happen. You're antagonizing. If I were an Illini fan, I'd be b****ing your ass out too. That's like you coming in PaleHose after a Sox loss and saying your glad they lost. The response won't be well received.

QUOTE(Punch and Judy Garland @ Mar 5, 2005 -> 10:06 PM) anyone recall what he is referring to with Sexson trade rumors? My best guess would be Levine...

I'm heading down to All-State to see Depaul take on Louisville at 11:00. Should be fun, I always like going to All-State, good times down there...

Jim, when you go down there, I have one favor. Find out how hard Hermsanson throws. I don't have a definite idea, I've heard 96, I've heard lower (like 93), but nothing definite...

Excellent. I'm starting to play some damn good baseball, early in the season, as I'm off to a 6-1 start. So far, my middle infielders have been great for me, both Uribe and Iguchi. Crede has been garbage, although he did come up with a clutch two run homer in Cleveland. Rowand is slumping but hitting the ball hard, and Dye has been awful. Same with Podsednik. My pitching staff is lights out, I'm going to keep turning up the difficulty on the pitching meter, as well as adding to CPU Contact. Steve, I know you're not playing with sliders, but turn foul balls up a lot. You have some real, real awesome AB's where you really need to work to get a strikeout. I remember, this one AB where Travis Hafner must have fouled off five in a row, brought the count full, and I got him on a backdoor curveball. It was an awesome AB...

What do you guys (so far) think is the hardest pitch to hit in the game? And, the hardest pitcher, too? For both accounts, I'll go with Johan Santana, and his circle-changeup -- in two games against him, I've been held to three hits over 18 innings, no runs. His changeup goes from 80 MPH, and that damn pitch looks like it's a foot off the plate, and then it hits the outside corner, and then he comes back with a 97 MPH heater. Ugh. And, while I haven't faced him yet, I assume Shingo is damn hard to hit. 56 MPH frisbee, followed by a 88 MPH heater...

Even though I'm not an Illini fan (though I do greatly enjoy watching them), I voted for Illinois. Just because, (most) of the fans deserve it. We (Bulls) fans have had our good times -- hell, we Sox fans ask for one World Series Title, the Bulls gave us six. I think it would be great around here to get a little pride as far as our sports teams go, and a collegiate team winning it all would be a great start.

QUOTE(witesoxfan @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 09:18 PM) No. The leadoff hitter is THE most important factor in a team's overall success. If you can have a guy that gets on at a .400 clip, you will have a very solid offense. If your leadoff hitters gets on at a .300 clip, your offense will not be nearly as good. You can look across the league, and some of the better offenses(or some of the more underrated offenses) have very solid leadoff hitters. The second most important factor in a team's overall success is the #2 hitter...if he can do the same as the leadoff hitter, you will have a lot of guys on base for the big hitters in the middle of the lineup. And that is one of the reasons I think, and many think, that Oakland will be way better then people give them credit for. They have a .400 OBP guy and a .370 OBP guy at the top of their order, so they will be getting on base like crazy, and when you have runners on base, you will score runs. Some have thought that they had one of the worst offseasons in the majors, and I am thinking the exact opposite. That's a little off subject, but it pertains to the point anyways. I will say however that when done properly, stealing bases, or just the general idea of stealing bases, will get in a pitcher's head and will hurt him down the road, while helping the offense. I think it is useful, but that it is not necessarily important. Great post, witesoxfan. I also love a lot of the arms that Beane has stockpiled -- I personally think their staff may be better than last season... Calero/Cruz were great pickups for the bullpen, and their rotation will be better than people think.

One more thing... The more times that Scotty Pods is on base this year will also mean the more times that teams will be forced to pitch to Thomas, unless they want two on, one out (assuming that our number two hitter, whoever it is, is able to stay out of double plays).

QUOTE(3E8 @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 07:54 PM) How did you come up with this number? Just a general range. No specific reason it's at .340, just I'd want him to be on at that clip. His stolen bases will help us, because he'll (hopefully) have such a high success rate that the times he gets thrown out won't be that often. I think .340 will have our offense flowing (not great, but enough with our *healthy* pitching staff), but even better if it's higher. Just a slight conclusion here -- the past two years, when our leadoff man has done well, our team has (generally) done well. Is that a fair conclusion?

QUOTE(Rowand44 @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 07:08 PM) To tell you the truth cheat those stats mean absolutely nothing to me. The fact remains with a better offense Kotsay scored 78 runs while Scott scored 85 in an awful year offensively for him. I'll take a league's correlation over a comparison between two guys, but whatever... And, FWIW, I don't mind the fact that Podsednik can steal bases -- in fact, I like him stealing bases. However, I don't like the fact that he's had one good year, and he's never touched a .379 OBP (or whatever it was he put up in '03) ever in his career (I could be wrong about his minor league career, but I don't recall him touching that in the minors, either) -- and it's vital, absolutely vital, that he has an OBP over at least .340 if we want this offense to be successful. And, Kotsay >>> Pods, but that's a bit off-topic.

QUOTE(AddisonStSox @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 06:32 PM) Please don't lump me in that catagory. I have formed my own opinion. This has nothing to do with blindly following anyone, espcially Ozzie. Believe me, I don't put much faith into anything Ozzie says. I wasn't pleased with his hire last year and he still has to prove to me he can cut it as a manager in the bigs. Right now, I can't even picture Ozzie holding up an AL pennant, and def. not a WS trophy. So, cut me a little bit of slack here, I by no means am a blind Ozzie follower. Seems to me like you're pretty confident in Ozzie's/Kenny's decisions to trade Lee, as well as get rid of Harris, but maybe that's just me. BTW -- Rooney and Farmer seemed to have only good things to say about Harris. They realize his situation, but I don't remember them harping on the 'bad attitude' that is so often brought up. And, so what if Harris can't hit left handed pitchers? I'd venture to say that over 70% of starting pitchers in the majors are righties. A guy who can get on at a .370 clip against righties is a very useful asset...

QUOTE(daa84 @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 03:30 PM) uribe is younger than harris for starters. two, he is way way way more projectable than harris is offensively. Harris's ceiling would probably turn him into a dave roberts type player. uribe probably will hit upper 20s to 30 homers in his prime and might even touch .300 during that stretch. uribe also plays 3 positions on the infield. harris plays second and an average center field, on a team that already has 4-5 guys who can play center (rowand pods timo carl and borch). sure looking at career numbers for uribe is fine, but if you are gonna do that, than dont just look at willies numbers from last year, but his as a whole as well. I'm not comparing potential, or ceilings -- I like Uribe a lot, I think he has a chance to be a real good shortstop. And his ceiling is much higher than that of Harris'. I'm just saying, he's not a 'sure-thing', like the poster who I was responding to called him...

QUOTE(Reddy @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 04:46 AM) but hes also consistantly improving. i guess we'll see... The same can be said for Harris, no? He improved heavily based on his AB's from 2003 to 2004 -- AVG went up .050+ points, OBP improved .080+ points... Other than Jim, many critics of Harris are awful quick to turn a blind eye to others who have the same problems. But I'll leave it at that, because I definitely don't know what goes on behind the scenes (read: work ethic, etc.) -- but that's not me labeling him as a hard worker, or a lazy man.

QUOTE(Reddy @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 03:45 AM) i dont think uribe is anywhere near the question mark of harris. we know he can hit ML Pitching... that streak he had going was amazing last year and he ended up w/ 23 hrs to boot. Harris doesnt match that... theres no way he's as valuable to the team... Uribe is a career .266 hitter with a .307 OBP. And, all of this coming while playing in two of the best hitting parks in all of baseball. Sure thing, huh? Certainly not, IMHO. That said, I'm not going to stick a label on neither Harris nor Uribe yet. Both of them have

Cheat, I am awaiting Sickels review on our top 20 prospects, as I've enjoyed reading his other top 20 lists... I assume he'll do the Sox, correct?

QUOTE(JimH @ Mar 4, 2005 -> 02:18 AM) Looking at it strictly by the numbers, yes. The team didn't win though. Plus there are some real questions whether or not certain players played a team game, however Guillen defines it. Some of those guys are not here any more. They changed the dynamic and we'll see how it works out. Jim, I agree with you that that aspect didn't work, but it wasn't the lineup's fault. Our pitching has sucked the past three seasons. It hasn't been the lineup's fault -- it's been on the shoulder of some really bad pitching. Even in 2003, we didn't have a legit number five. Also, Soxbadger, you sort of touched on this, but I wanted to post this, and I didn't think it deserved it's own thread. This excerpt is from an article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel -- registration is required, but just an email address, free. Link It's about Carlos Lee... Just kind of funny, how Ozzie never addressed this when Carlos was in town, yet now he does it, now that Lee's out of town. Just interesting... And, Badger -- Cheat -- Jackie -- a big to you in this thread.

Game over on a liner to right-center. 4-3 D'Backs take the game.

QUOTE(AnthraxFan93 @ Mar 3, 2005 -> 10:19 PM) Lets worry about that starting April 4, for now lets just be happy that baseball is less than a month away Touche. Bases loaded, one out. 1-0 Count. Munoz very wild...

Munoz in for the bottom of the ninth. 2-0 count.