Marty34

QUOTE (Princess Dye @ Apr 1, 2012 -> 03:28 PM) Viciedo has a chance (not to be pessimistic)...but a chance to be a colossal disappointment. Defense just there--oh boy. He has been overrated by the Sox organization and some Sox fans because he is all there is in the minors.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 1, 2012 -> 12:38 PM) What on Earth do you mean? A crowd of 25k and 1/2 of them as Yankee fans, in Florida, is normal. Right. It's also normal for the Marlins to draw 10K a game. The park will change that in the very short-term, but there's no reason to believe anything will change in the long-term.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 1, 2012 -> 12:32 PM) What are you asking? Good question. I have no idea what happened.

Watching the exhibition game between the Marlins and Yankees and I'm surprised at the number of Yankees fans in attendance. They limited ticket sales for the game to 25,000 and I'd say half of the crowd are Yankees fans.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 05:52 PM) Three years too late. I don't think at this point in his career, he would have enough of an effect to off-set his huge contract dollars with an uptick in attendance and souvenir/merchandise sales. Probably, it would be Viciedo and prospects going the other way. No thanks. With finally being able to rid themselves of ONE big contract, they're not going to add another....unless by some miracle Dunn and Rios are both living up to their contracts at the time of the deal. Ichiro is a free-agent after next year and the Sox will have traded Viciedo for BJ Upton in June anyhow.

Sox trade for Ichiro at deadline.

QUOTE (Elgin Slim @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 03:58 PM) Peavy said in an interview w/Rongey last spring that he shouldn't have pitched in 2009 because his ankle wasn't ready yet. He further elaborated on it saying that he changed his mechanics to compensate for the ankle injury, and that the altered mechanics caused his detached lat. The Sox were out of the race by September 2009, they should have shut him down at that point let him heal. The Padres shut him down for the year after he hurt himself. The Sox tried to rush him back when he wasn't healthy enough to pitch. Jake likes to talk.

QUOTE (Elgin Slim @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 03:45 PM) That is your opinion. When you take advantage of a player's personality to prove a point to the fans, consequences for the player and your team be damned, I disagree. The Sox organization mismanaged his ankle injury. It is like, hey we f***ed up your arm, now you can't do your job, and we're going to prevent you from trying to do a different job. KW should have been fired over this issue. How did the Sox screw up his arm?

QUOTE (Elgin Slim @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 03:16 PM) I guess it is just sad to see a guy who was once an ace get shelled most starts. Especially when you are a fan of said player. I really think that the rushing back from injury ruined Peavy's arm. They should have kept him shut down in 2009 after they traded for him. I really think you could be talking about an ace on the Sox if that didn't happen. The 2009 season was lost at that point, there was no sense in rushing him back. I blame KW and the Sox staff at the time for rushing him back and ruining his arm. I actually think that Peavy could bring more in a trade as a successful bullpen pitcher than a mediocre to bad starter, which is what he is at this time. Either way, the Sox would have to pick up $$ to trade him. If the Sox refuse to send him to the bullpen, then I think that KW owes it to him to let him find a bullpen spot because of the horrible mismanagement of his ankle injury, which led to the altered mechanics and thus the detached lat.(Peavy himself said this is the causation of that injury last spring in an interview w/Rongey) We saw last year that he can still bring it in short spurts, but cannot do it over 6-7 innings. I could be wrong about Peavy, and he may be back. but this is JMO. Kenny Williams owes Jake Peavy nothing.

QUOTE (Elgin Slim @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 02:50 PM) If this is what Peavy is doing in spring training against minor league hitters, then they need to either a) consider moving him to the bullpen, or b) just say goodbye now. They have to pay him anyway, why not use that spot on a developing pitcher like Molina, Castro, Axelrod or Stewart. I have always been a Peavy fan, and have held out hope that he could regain his old stuff back even after the injury, but it seems like you can just put a fork in his starting career. What a major disappointment. I was elated when KW traded for him, too bad that he couldn't stay healthy. He is now a shell of his former self. I don't blame KW for the trade, I blame him for rushing Peavy back from the ankle injury, which basically destroyed Peavy's starting career. JP's only chance is in the 'pen now. Why put more stock in this start than his previous two?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 02:09 PM) He's never had the chance to get AAA hitters out. You don't develop #4-5 starters, you find them. If Stewart is the best option for a long-reliever, it's better off he's in the pen than the Knights starting rotation.

86. If not, major overhaul will be needed.

I don't see how people think the Sox are going to finish behind the Indians.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 27, 2012 -> 09:57 AM) Then you have to ask the question what the goal is for this season and what the downside is. If you think there's a 95% chance Stewart is going to wind up in the bullpen anyway, then you just put him there. Personally I don't, but that's because I have always really liked the idea of putting guys with 2 seamers on the mound in the Cell as a way to get outs and eat up innings, and I really thought Stewart showcased some good off-speed stuff in his outings last year. If you think it's 50/50 on whether or not Stewart would remain a starter, then you have to ask what your goal is for this year. If the team is "All in" at the major league level, you put him in the bullpen if you think he'll help you win 1 game. If instead, you have lost some of your older talent, cut back on salary, and are trying to develop kids, then you might well go with the lesser prospect in your bullpen in order to keep Stewart as a starter, and risk having it cost you a game or two early in the season. Personally, I think we're in the latter scenario this year, which is why I would prefer Stewart starting at AAA and either Stults or Axelrod in the pen, and deciding from there based on how things go...but that's why I'm not the GM. Stewart has to prove he can get MLB hitters out whether it be in the pen or as a starter. He doesn't project to be more than a 4-5 starter for this team long-term behind Danks, Sale, Molina, Humber. If he can get outs from the bullpen this year it doesn't preclude him from being a candidate for the rotation in 2013.

Looks like Danks is as available as Frank Thomas was in his prime.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 25, 2012 -> 05:29 PM) I think there's a big difference between convincing yourself, with help, in October, that you can have your heart in something, and then staring at 6 months of criticism, hotel rooms, media, random firestorms, and losses to deal with. I think he'll be fine with all of the above. He's a levelheaded guy who understands the manager is going to get blamed. To me, spring training is the worst part of the manager's job. Interviews, meeting sponsors, daily meetings on personnel, added to the fact teams are probably ready to break camp right now, but still have another 10 days to go. Undoubtedly every manager thinks this time in spring training is a pain.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Mar 20, 2012 -> 05:37 PM) Why would JR give KW this season only when KW told him they would have to rebuild? JR has to know that this is a multi year rebuild with the state that the team is in, and unless this is just a training year for Rick Hahn behind the scenes then KW will be here for at least 2 seasons imo. In my view, Kenny Williams job rests in the performances of Beckham, Danks, Viciedo, Sale, and Reed. If they play the way they have been touted to play by Kenny Williams and others in the organization, I think the Sox will contend. If they don't the Sox have a huge problem because there isn't anyone else to build around and we're looking at a 3-5 year process. Kenny should not be the guy to rebuild this team if that young core doesn't produce this year.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Mar 20, 2012 -> 05:02 PM) Marty, that doesn't matter, he probably didn't deserve to come back this year. But that doesn't matter because JR wanted him back, and as long as JR wants him in that role than KW will be here. There's no denying this. Jerry Krause was let go so there is a limit to Chairman Reinsdorf's loyalty I don't get where the idea that Kenny has two or three more years to rebuild this team came from. I don't believe he has if this season is as bad or worse than last year's.

If the Sox are bad again this year it's because of Kenny Williams. He won't deserve more time.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 19, 2012 -> 12:11 PM) When polled at the end of September more favored keeping Kenny than Ozzie. You believe Kenny's job approval rating among Sox fans is decent then, huh?

QUOTE (Jake @ Mar 19, 2012 -> 11:58 AM) It would probably be like Presidential approval where there are many silent favorable folks. Seriously doubt it. What would people be approving, 1 postseason win in 6 years, the worst farm system in MLB??

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 18, 2012 -> 07:11 PM) Nobody would care about the farm system if the major league team would have won at least one more division title, say, in 2010. That has never been Williams' style. By the way, who was in charge of the farm system in 1999-2000-2001 when it was ranked among the top five (one year, it was #1) in baseball? Kenny Williams. How many playoffs did that get the previous GM's? Just 1993 and 2000. or 3 in 18 years. Williams' 2/11 and one World Series championship and the overall winning percentage of the White Sox from 2001-2011 compares favorably with all the other GM's we had, unless you want to go back to the 1950's, 1900's or 1910's. And we've got about 7-8 players on our current team from that same system in the last 3 years. It's not like it has been completely unproductive, quite the contrary. I take it you think Williams will have gotten an unfair shake if he is let go after this season?

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 18, 2012 -> 06:53 PM) There are many reasons to be against Kenny Williams. Because he hired someone he trusted, an executive who was thought highly enough of that one of the 3 most iconic franchises in baseball considered hiring him to be in charge of their team, this same person who also happened to be African-American, who happened to be leveraged up to the hilt in debt due to the speculative ownership of about 10 Phoenix area homes and Club Burn, a controversial gay bar, THAT is not the main reason to hang Williams out to dry. It's definitely not a point in his favor.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 18, 2012 -> 05:40 PM) Based on what? It's like telling someone to fix the U.S. financial problems in 2009, but you only have one year to do it. It's not realistic. If you're not committed to seeing the rebuilding effort through with one person, then Williams should have been fired last season. The Sox are not rebuilding, but if they were GM's who preside over farm systems ranked dead last do not get the opportunity to rebuild. The fan base wanted Williams gone with Guillen.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 18, 2012 -> 01:43 PM) While KW didn't bring Wilder into the White Sox organization, he's definitely responsible for what happened on his watch. I pay for my season tickets and Williams hired Wilder in 2003.