fathom

If Cano really is back for the series tonight, we're going to be facing the best lineup in all of baseball. If our pitchers can't make big pitches in clutch situations, we're going to see more 5 and 6 run starts by our starters.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 01:13 PM) Reading the morning paper it looks like Buerhle finally has figured out what is causing him to struggle. Its not lights in a scoreboard helping hitters, its not the catcher, its not the high change-ups or the meatball 84 mph fastballs right down the middle of the plate, it turns out its QuesTec's fault. Thank God thats figured out. Don Cooper was just on the Mike North show, and he blamed QuesTec also. My question is that if we're going to whine about our pitchers not getting the corners, then we might as well get rid of Buehrle, and try to bring in someone who can get a strikeout.

QUOTE(Texsox @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 12:18 PM) Amazingly, this team is still one of the top 5 or 6 in all of baseball and would be a favorite in the first round of the playoffs. How so? Against quality teams, can we really expect 3 good starts by our starters?

QUOTE(Jordan4life_2006 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 05:52 AM) And then people would diss Ozzie for overworking the bullpen. This team is built on starting pitching. Hell, nearly half this team's damn payroll is tied up in the starting rotation. If they don't perform, there's really not much Ozzie can do. And it's not like we've got the Angels' bullpen, either. I've been saying all year that we need our 5 starters to step up and lead this team. However, that's not happening, and it seems like the only person who hasn't realized yet that these pitchers continue to give up late runs is Ozzie Guillen (and the PFB). Right now, the offense is what is our best asset, followed by our relievers, followed by our starting pitching. To say Ozzie can't do anything to help the starting pitching though is ridiculous. There's no need for them to start the 7th inning nearly every game, especially when they're fatigued. Wasn't McCarthy supposed to be on the roster to prevent the exact crap that we're seeing this year?

QUOTE(greg775 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 05:48 AM) No I wouldn't take Kelly over Ozzie. Ozzie is the chicago White Sox like Ditka is the Bears. GO OZ. Go SOX. Probably a bad idea to compare Ozzie to Ditka. Wasn't it all downhill for Ditka with the Bears after the Super Bowl year? Is Sean Tracey his Jim Harbaugh?

QUOTE(greg775 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 05:47 AM) I hope Oz is our manager for the next 20 years. It ain't easy to repeat folks. It ain't his fault our bullpen is average to bad and our starters' arms are falling off after last year's excellence. Our bullpen right now has no one over a 4 ERA. If Ozzie had as much confidence in them as he does our starters, maybe we'd be able to win some of these close games before a one run deficit becomes a 3 run deficit.

QUOTE(greg775 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 05:47 AM) I love Oz but I hope the Alomar experiment is over. AJ shoulda been playing tonight. Mark B can pitch to anybody. Alomar is no savior of Mark and AJ woulda been a nice lefty bat in there. I hope Oz is our manager for the next 20 years. It ain't easy to repeat folks. It ain't his fault our bullpen is average to bad and our starters' arms are falling off after last year's excellence. I know they were trying to have Alomar resurrect Buehrle, but now what happens is that AJP has to face the tough lefty in Johnson this week instead of playing tonight against Escobar.

QUOTE(DBAH0 @ Aug 7, 2006 -> 04:44 AM) If the Sox really wanted to risk it, they could go with a Haeger or Phillips for a couple of starts, send B-Mac back down to AAA to let him start, or even keep him in the bullpen to let him keep doing what he's doing basically. The idea still has merit when you look at how Freddy has pitched lately. Freddy has his work cut out for him his next 3 starts. If he does poorly in all of them, there's going to be a lot of talk about him getting replaced by McCarthy and then traded in the offseason.

QUOTE(shoota @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 05:41 AM) Ozzie is partly to blame for the performance of the starting rotation because of the way he used it. There is a lot of truth in this. It's amazing how many times our starters are giving up like 2 runs in the 7th inning, and that's really blowing up their ERAs. I would love to know what the team ERA is by inning. QUOTE(Jordan4life_2006 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 05:44 AM) He hasn't used them any differently than last year. They haven't performed. Period. And when your guys are underachieving/fatigued, it might be best to pull them sooner, rather than later. I know this stat has been brought up a million times tonight, but our relievers have thrown the fewest innings in the AL this season.

http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sp...-home-headlines At least Buehrle's not trying to make excuses.

QUOTE(DABearSoX @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 04:46 AM) By your logic, if he would have brought in Neal or BMAC or whoever and they gave up the runs it would still be his fault. He stuck with the guy too long, he brought in the wrong guy.....it doesn't matter you will always use him as a scapegoat.....HE IS NOT THE ONE ON THE PITCHERS MOUND.....that kind of situation was almost always automatic for MB....Ozzie did something that NO OTHER WHITE SOX MANAGER DID IN 88 YEARS......if he is such a bad manager and couldn't use a bullpen how the hell did we win 99 games last year, and and by the way A RING TOO.... PITCHING and DEFENSE WIN CHAMPIONSHIPS....something this team can't seem to grasp anymore...... Yep, and our starting pitchers continue to implode. They look absolutely fatigued out there...but we keep trying to get as many outs as possible out of them. This isn't 2005 anymore...these starters aren't going 7 innings and then turning it over to Politte/Cotts/Jenks or Hermanson.

I RARELY say anything nice about Ozzie, but I have more confidence in him than I did Manuel that he'll be able to push a button that makes this team get going.

QUOTE(CWSGuy406 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 04:17 AM) Oh come on, Fathom. As a person who has MLB Extra Innings and gets to see LOTS of baseball daily, you're really overexaggerating things. -I don't see how you can blame the baserunning problems on Ozzie. Half the lineup (Konerko/Thome/Pierzynski/Crede) is slow as hell. Our fastest guy doesn't seem very smart on the basepaths. Other than that, you have some average or slightly above/below guys. As far as taking the extra base, those things are on the players, IMO. It's on the guy on first base to see were to see if the RFer is guarding the line or shading the gap, etc etc. -Again, defensively, I don't think you can complain about our guys this year. They're in the top third in DER this season, and were first last season. How many times do we see fielders nearly collide? I don't recall this happening too many times, other than the Iguchi/Dye play, and again -- I don't know how Ozzie factors into that one. -Bunting? Well, I don't think that's for a lack of effort. I believe Hawk when he says the Sox have worked on their bunting this year more than last. Again, IMO, that's something that's on the players... I'm not saying Ozzie is perfect. His handling of Buehrle tonight was awful. His handling staff of the starters this year, for the most part, has been awful. His playing Mackowiak in centerfield so often has been awful. But there's also a lot of overexaggeration in this thread, IMO. As I said, watching a lot of baseball games every day, and seeing others fans' thoughts on their own managers; well, let's just say I'm okay with Ozzie. I don't think there are fans of any team in baseball who never complain about their own. It's just unfortunate that our manager's decisions hold so much more weight this year because our f***ing starters suck... About once every series, you will see two Sox fielders not communicate well and almost knock each other over. Our base running is awful. How many times will our guys get in a run-down going home with less than 2 outs? Also, our 3rd base coach is awful! Lately, he's been more aggressive when we're down 3 runs than he's been when the game is close. Do you honestly believe we're a fundamentall sound team? I'm not blaming Ozzie specifically for this being a poorly coached team. The only coach earning his paycheck this season is Walker (the whipping boy in previous years). The pitch-calling this season has been puzzling, to say the least. You bring up a good point about our team speed. I think some changes might have to be made to add more speed if possible. SS could be a position where we could upgrade our speed for next season.

Baj comes in for Arizona, and allows 2 homers, 3 hits, against his first 4 batters. Funny enough, the one guy he gets out is Bonds.

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 03:10 AM) I wonder what it will take to get him fired this offseason. I am convinced if we had a halfway decent field tactician we could get a few more wins than we have now. This not pulling your pitchers when they are done is getting old. His big mouth. This team is very poorly coached. They're terrible at running the bases, they don't communicate well (how many times do we see the fielders nearly collide, the balk tonight was another example too), and can't execute bunts at all.

QUOTE(Milkman delivers @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 02:58 AM) I just have no faith in our starters this year, even Contreras. I would take about 15 pitchers in baseball to start a big game for us right now over any of our starters. Their miraculous turnaround just might not be coming, and there's a very realistic chance we don't even make the playoffs. And this team really doesn't have the fire it had last year. We might not want to admit it, but we've become the pre-2005 teams. All offense, no pitching, no emotion. It seems that losing has become acceptable. Until they can prove otherwise, last year was one of those dream seasons where you get career years from numerous guys, avoid major injury issues, and you have the ball bounce your way.

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 02:57 AM) PFB, the reason for Buerhles problems are confidence problems. Yep, that was his stance on the whole issue. I love the caller that mentioned "does Escobar and Burnett now have a lack of confidence because their manager pulled them before the trouble started". According to the PFB, Buehrle needs a boost in confidence more than those guys. Maybe the PFB should do some research and see that Burnett had gotten shelled in his last two starts, and he has a ton of pressure on him to live up to his contract right now.

I had the chance to listen to the PFB take calls on the post game show. Is baseball knowledge not a requirement for his job? The guy keeps repeating stuff that is not only inaccurate, but just stupid. Every single caller disagreed with the way Ozzie handled Buehrle tonight, but the PFB kept repeating the same tired line: "just think how high Buehrle's confidence would be if he got out of that inning". Will someone please ask the PFB how Buehrle's confidence is shot again due to being left out on the mound to implode again?

QUOTE(My Dixie Normus @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 01:57 AM) Why the hell wasn't MB kicking the crap out of some water cooler in the dugout? He got s***ty calls in his last inning but he should have left the game with only three earned runs. It didn't even seem to phase him that he got fricked over half a dozen times in that last inning. Instead he balks. The guy has no passion. In fact this whole team seems to have lost its fight. They better shake that crap or they will not see the post season. Mark Buehrle has no passion? He might suck right now, but I wouldn't say he has no passion. Come on, he's the greatest lefty closer in World Series history. Anyways, he would have thrown a baseball at the water cooler, but that wouldn't have done any damage at 80 mph.

QUOTE(CWSGuy406 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 01:57 AM) No but seriously, I think this was the most frustrating game of the year. Damnit why the f*** did he not take Buehrle out... You know expectations are high on here when almost every game has someone say how it was the most frustrating game of the year.

Tomorrow will be a tough game for the Sox. Wang has his sinker going now, and it's going to be difficult for us to hit a lot of homers. We're not going to win if we have to get 3 hits in an inning to score a single run.

QUOTE(CWSOX45 @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 01:52 AM) We are 0-1 on this 11 game homestand. We have to show up the next two series, or it could be season over... Good...I honestly want this team to have this challenged. If they can't start beating good teams, then they might as well start planning their golf trips this offseason.

This team needs someone at the top of the order that can give them a spark. Our 3-4-5 is awesome...but far too often they're having to produce the offense for this entire team all by themselves.

Somehow, we're still tied for the Wild Card lead. For the next two weeks, it's now or never for this team. Everyone has got to pick their games up, from the head man to the 25th guy on the roster.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 01:48 AM) The Sox were outmanaged tonight. Ozzie has to give his team the best chance to win the game. Its time to quit screwing around, and watch what is going on. The starters are getting lit up, bring in the bullpen. It's the number 1 job of the manager. Well said!