southsideirish71

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Aug 22, 2010 -> 03:21 PM) No doubt about it, my favorite is Frank & Hawk, though I think he would benefit from a 3 man booth with him, Hawk, and Wimpy. Edit: If not for the awkward hilarity of DJ & Farmer, I'd be all for bringing DJ back to the TV booth. He always got excited with Hawk. Frank Thomas is brutal. The only thing he has done so far, is a good job of parrotting Hawk which isnt a good thing. I would rather no Hawk, no Thomas and pair up Stone with a competant guy instead of the homer parade. So f***ing sick and tired of hearing stretch, get on back there. When the outfielder doesnt even have to move because its just a fly ball. The last good announcer we had was Rooney. Rooney + Stone would be pretty goodl. Rooney could do the play by play and Stone could provide the color and the analysis. That would be decent.

QUOTE (Friend of Nordhagen @ Aug 21, 2010 -> 09:58 PM) Haven't been on the board with you in awhile SSI71; you're still in great form, I see. Classic stuff. Regarding Hawk and AJ, in the brief parts of the game that I watched tonight, I did hear Hawk say that AJ doesn't know how good a hitter he can be. Hmm. AJ's 32 now. If he hasn't gotten it by now, I'm not sure when this Hawk-inspired bolt of lightning is going to strike. Its been a very busy summer, so I have been on here from time to time but not as much. AJ is Hawks boy. He has known him for a long time and Hawk thinks he is probably the smartest player on the planet.

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 21, 2010 -> 09:55 PM) SSI, did you hear the inning in which Frank and Hawk were saying how great Walker is at buying into his philosophy of hitting? I have given up on Walker or other ever being replaced. He is a permanent fixture on this team. Just like the Hawk and Ozzie. Walker is the least of our concerns. We are playing NL style baseball in a ballpark conducive to homers in the american league. This is like charging tanks with men on horses with swords and then getting confused when it didn't go that well.

QUOTE (Friend of Nordhagen @ Aug 21, 2010 -> 09:46 PM) Yes, Hawk is starting to say this when a Sox hitter gets to a full count. Hawk is Ron Santo with a better 100 yard dash time. 1.) The minute the ball goes into the air you are getting a stretch out of the Hawk. Like he is calling to the four corners of the earth to help him will the ball over the fence. 2.) He has started openly making comments for the other team to have a misplay. This is just stupid. This is no different that watching the uuber mom at the 12 year old Allstar game calling for some kid to drop the popup so that her kid can have some 10 seconds of glory. 3.) He needs to locate and then harp on some mythical reason that the sox lost. All umpires are openly trying to cause the sox to fail, the weather, a bounce, luck, the mascot farting. Anything but the game on the field and the players involved. 4.) Blame can never be placed on any person in a position of power with the sox. He will first locate whatever rookie he can, because its obviously their fault. Then latin players culminating to the last to be blamed AJ. His golden child. Then its back other mythical reasons that the play wasnt made. You get a robot, and a few MP3s of the Hawk and I can write a logic loop around it and you won't know that he wasnt there.

QUOTE (zenryan @ Aug 21, 2010 -> 09:36 PM) 50-53 now against AL teams. We're suppose to actually think this team can win an AL division?? Well in the encouraging side of things, Ozzie's NL style baseball would work in the NL. The fact that we are in the AL however is a bit of a worry.

My wife and I both keep track of the finances, she pays most of the monthly bills and I handle the mortgage, the taxes, and the savings. It plays to our individual strengths and allows our finances to be addressed very well. Splitting up responsibility also allows for the two of us to have a great handle on the entire financial picture so there is no communication gap.

QUOTE (Thunderbolt @ Aug 18, 2010 -> 10:46 PM) This series isn't on Ozzie. It's on our arms crapping the bed when we needed them the most. This is traditional crappy 2nd half sox baseball. When we pitch, we can't hit. When we hit, we can't pitch. If we come back, we give up a run and get walked off. People kick balls, and piddles down their pantlegs. No matter how tough a guy is, how much playoff baseball he has played. The minute he gets put into the spotlight against the twins, they just freak out. Danks pitched in game 163 and has playoff experience. He piddles down his leg. Floyd pitched in a playoff hunt. Piddle again.

QUOTE (Thunderbolt @ Aug 18, 2010 -> 10:45 PM) Hey, Chris Sale is going to be a pretty crucial piece when we land Carlos Lee next year. I figure Derrick Lee will be here as Ozzie tries to relive 2003. The only one off that team worth having is on the Tigers. So who was good back in 2003, is having a down year or years, and is willing to play for the league minimum. That pretty much is our blueprint. The diamond in the rough theory for building a winner.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Aug 18, 2010 -> 10:36 PM) Um, how about our two best pitchers soiling themselves when we REALLY needed them? And I don't know how you can be complaining about effort. We lost on a walk-off last night and another tough 1-run loss tonight. I've made my feelings about Ozzie pretty clear. But can't say much about him in this series. We're getting beat by a better team. If it wasn't for the NL cherry picking, we would of been long gone a while back. The first two months of doing nothing and our inability to beat our division and bad teams outside of the NL is why we are here. We basically have handed this over without a whimper or a fight.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Aug 18, 2010 -> 10:31 PM) The thing is, we will get back in this thing somehow. There are still a lot of baseball games to be played, and the Twins will falter a bit against other teams, and we will put some bizarre winning streak together against some good teams somehow. I just can't help but think this past week is going to be the week that we look back on and wonder where it all went wrong. I look to April and May when we were running around with our pants around our ankles screaming at random objects. If we played just decent baseball. Then again I also look at our record in the AL Central and our recent dump we took in Baltimore. But hey, Ozzies proud. We beat up the NL. Wow at least we can take that, and the BP Cup.

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 18, 2010 -> 10:30 PM) How so? It made Jenks tank? It caused Quentin to forget how to hit on the road? Well Hawk will locate some sort of phantom to blame. The Guillen clan is already working on their theories. of course he had a different opinion just an hour ago.

Looking for Ozzies new way of bringing NL style baseball to the AL next year. Pitchers get to hit. Sure the other team has a DH, but f*** it watching sweaty freddy leg out a single will be great. He can move Kotsay over to 1st and just rattle of the wins.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 18, 2010 -> 10:23 PM) I thought we were supposed to have better pitching than them. Well for years we supposedly had better talent as well. Then we walk out of Minny, bewildered trying to figure out why our anus feels like a train was run through it. .

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 11:45 PM) I don't know. These type of performances the Sox put out against the Twins haven't changed even when they had Manuel, Maggs and Frank. I guess the Twins save their best for the Sox and can't match in October. They only option that would work is put the Sox in NL. They don't have to face the Twins and would only have to face the AL East when it counts is in the WS or put the Twins in the NL. When we had Maggs and Frank we had a horses*** pitching staff and a horses*** defense. Moving to the NL for inferior baseball is a dumb. You want to beat the twins. 1.) Spend money on the draft and the international signing period. We spent less on bonus money this year than any other team. A team that has such a bad minor league system shouldnt worry about slot right now. Invest in the best talent possible to use for reinforcements or trade. 2.) Instruct players in the minors on how to play fundamental baseball. We promote flawed players all the time. See Jordan Danks. A player who's strikeout numbers in AA told a story that he needed some more time to cook. The twins instruct their players how to play fundamental aggressive baseball with the same message at all levels. 3.) Invest your money wisely. No 4 year deals for Linebrinks. No using your best trading chits for things that are short sided. Think with a single organizational philosophy. Sure I want to win the world series every year. But it isnt reality. 4.) You are in the American League. Make sure that the DH is actually someone who can hit. Your park plays for homers, make sure that you have guys who can do that. 5.) Ozzieproof the lineup, or ditch Ozzie. You cannot have crapy grindy players anywhere near this lineup. He will overuse them in the spirit of flexibility. 6.) Tell the players that sure its cold in April and May, but the meal money isnt as good in Charolette. So tanking the first two months of the season because your peter crawled up and hid doesnt work. Wear a jacket or a sweater. 7.) Try and prepare your players for the grind of the season. Having guys who piss down their leg year in and year out is sad. The twinks down piss down their leg. They bring kids up and they just plug in. We need to figure that out, and mimick it. The twins are a dangerous team right now. They have the minor league system and now a financial backing to build a dynasty. We need to rethink our approach. Because the slap a few retreads and pray on the futility of the division isnt going to work.

QUOTE (sin city sox fan @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 10:54 PM) After seeing the reaction of White Sox fans over the last week and a half, I hate to say it......but we don't deserve a World Series title. Good fans support their team through thick and than. Good fans have confidence in their teams at all times. Good fans convey that confidence onto the team and inspire them to achieve positive results. The White Sox fan base is just the opposite of this at this point in the season. Tonite, the Twins blew a four run lead and than blew a one run lead. If we did that in a game, a high majority of our fan base would give up on the game. Compare this to what Minnesota fans did tonite. They went into the bottom of the 10th confident that their team would come back from the first deficit of the game and the team accomplished the task. Every team is going to have some bad losses during the season. Every team is going to blow some games during the season. Get real people...there are 162 games in the season and no team has ever come close to going 162-0. It's how we react to a bad AB, a bad inning, a bad game, or a bad week that makes this team winners or losers. And if you don't think the fan base plays a part in that reaction, you are definitely mistaken. The negativity of this fan base has to end if we are to ever win another World Series....not just in this season, but anytime in the foreseeable future. Also if someone comes with their hairy friends and wants to get into the park, for the love of god let them in.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 11:25 PM) Greg is actually being pretty logical in my opinion. And I hate to say it, but I can't stop thinking about Rongey telling us that the pitching would be the thing that would ultimately sink us if we lost. Kotsay has actually been very good during these last few weeks. It has been the pitching which has done us in. We managed to win games in spite of Kotsay earlier, and maybe it's partially his fault that the staff is worn down, due to pitching in so many high-leverage innings, but since we were 1.5 games up on Minnesota to 4 games down suddenly has very little to do with our DH situation. Right now we can do anything right. We pitched pretty well in Baltimore, but couldnt hit and lost 3 games. When we hit, we cant pitch. When we scratch out a run late, we give it up right away in walk off fashion. Its a toliet bowl s*** storm. They need to right this ship quick before it gets completely away. That series in Baltimore destroyed our cushion.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 11:20 PM) BTW, what were the options in FA for acquiring another DH? Vlad, pure and simple. Hitting .297 with a .839 OPS. That was my pick, and the one I wanted the most.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 11:18 PM) He also had a great game tonight and isn't the reason we lost. We couldn't hold a lead ... again. Great, take a picture of this great game and put it with the rest of his single game awesome events. This is what bench players do. They have a good game here and there. But over the course of a season they get exposed.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 11:13 PM) I dislike Kotsay as much as anybody but I find it hilarious he continues to get buried on here on a night he goes 3-for-5 with two ribbies and two runs scored. What am I missing here? So every game we lose he gets ripped no matter what he does. I find that friggin HILARIOUS. Because one game a season does make. He is a fine pinch hitter or role player as a primary DH he is terrible.

They can't get rid of Guillen....the factory that makes his assistant coaching contraption might go out of business.

QUOTE (kjshoe04 @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 11:01 PM) I expected him to strike out. Everybody here should remember when half the board was whining about him striking out every time in the late innings last year. Well congrats, you have a nice guy who makes contact all the way to the 2nd baseman in his place.

QUOTE (J.Reedfan8 @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 10:59 PM) I agree with you except this part which is false. Other than Badger, few of the posters were surprised that Thornton was back out there for that inning in the game thread. Not saying I didn't agree with it or did (other than Matt's low velocity I thought they still would have pitched Thome better and BTW we have poorly scouted Jim whom we should know his weaknesses that game) but just throwing that out there. High fastball, Thome doesn't touch. Low fastball, Thome touches. Simple. Up and in, he swings a lot at and he cant do anything with it. You go low and away with sweeping s*** in the dirt. We had a guy who has an explosive fastball who ran out of gas. It was a formula for disaster.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 10:47 PM) Maybe Danks shouldn't have gave up those runs in the 1st. The pen sucks and it's the worst time for it. Where's the "Coop will fix em"? The Twins have the Sox number. There's no logic at all. Put guys like Pujols, Sabathia and a few more great players, the Twins would still win. Part of it is luck on the Twins side. It just one of those anomalies in the balck hole of professional sports I have come to accept. If the Sox had 80 wins and the Twins 30, they would still beat the Sox. That's just the way it is. Bulls***. You know how you beat the twins. Don't kick the ball, don't give up outs, don't make mistakes. You play a sound fundamental game and you can win. Our problem is our team tinkles down their leg the minute the pressure builds.

QUOTE (Princess Dye @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 10:49 PM) Lets not let KW off the hook. He was on The Club spewing nonsense about HRs not mattering as much anymore in this supposed new baseball landscape. It wasnt just Ozzie forcing his hand on this. KW had opportunities to get Thome....Branyan, Cust etc. He got Pierre and bought into this no power/no walks nonsense as well. Kenny is just as guilty. He let the inmates run the asylum. NL style baseball in the AL, sure looks like a winner. Keep lefty grindy crapy hitters away from Guillen.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Aug 17, 2010 -> 10:43 PM) It WAS a good call. What are the f***ing chances that Matt Thornton doesn't get Thome out. Lord, the overreaction is ridiculous. You swing as hard as you can at everything, you'll run into one. This has just been our luck lately. Fresh out of the pen and throwin 98, Thornton hands down. A few innings in, velocity down. The matchup is more evenly matched.