southsideirish71

EAT s*** CALIFORNIA STYLE.

I tivo'd the game yesterday and after Viz gave up the dong he got the ball from the ump, turned around and faced centerfield and started to lick the ball. Almost like he was putting a spitter on it. Very wierd. He needs to start to spot the fastball a bit more and use it more. His slider should be his outpitch. Currently he is pitching backwards, using his slider to throw for strikes and then coming in with the fastball.

QUOTE(Steff @ May 21, 2005 -> 06:09 AM) That place was rocking yesterday... Sox fans were out in full force.. the "Pauly" chant could be heard loud and clear. We were sitting right by the Cubs pen and I kept saying.."Ya gonna close today LaToya..?" He got real pissed and at one point I thought I was going to get tossed from the game, LMAO. In the stands it was a repeat of "Monday night fights at the cell". I was amazed at all the fights we saw. One right next to us in section 10 about the 3rd row. Both fans kicked out.. and quickly. That was nice to see. Then there was one behind us in the first row of 108.. amazing to us it was over Old Style or Old Style Light being a better beer.. A bunch in the 200 sections down the 3rd base side which seemed to be because of Sox fans chanting "let's go white sox".. :rolly A lot of "Sox suck" shirts.. I just laughed and said "are you guys at .500 yet..?" One guy looked at me and said.. ".500...?". Jim just about peed his pants. Cub fans do crack me up. Today we are behind the Cubs pen.. I'm so looking forward to the game today even more than yesterday. Steff I was over in the 200 sections with my wife and son. It was loaded with sox fans. SOX PRIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just got back from the Urinal. Sox fans were out in force and were showing sox pride. They were pretty loud and they had some good chants going. One real good piece of info from the batting practice. Everyone, and I mean everyone was practicing hitting to right field before the game. I had my 11 month old son out all decked out in Sox gear. Some retarded cub fan told my wife oh thats child abuse having your son wear sox gear. She told him, "You and your boyfriend are just upset that you cant make babies of your own." SOX PRIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :fthecubs

I just got some released tickets from the flub website. I am now going, just told my boss calling in sick. I am going to root our boys on and boo the living s*** out of the cubs. SOX PRIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HELLL YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11111

EAT s*** CRAPTACULAR CUBS! Walk Derrick Lee and their offense is shut down, ala the Royals and Mike Sweeney. I cant wait to see our baserunners run wild on Barrett.

QUOTE(sox-r-us @ May 19, 2005 -> 12:51 AM) Konerko pulled each of his three hits. But he also hooked a few drives that landed foul. Should he try to hit to the opposite field more often? "I'm a pull hitter," Konerko said. "I've been a pull hitter since I was 5. That doesn't mean I can't hit some balls the other way. ================= I hope we do not sign this guy in the offseason. :banghead http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sp...-home-headlines Maybe my crazy rants about this guy going out of his way to pull everything weren't that crazy. Dear Mr. Konerko, If you tell everyone "I am a pull hitter" they will continue to paint the outside corner getting you to GIDP and pop up. You will have some impressive power numbers as they will have to come in at some point, however you will have Rob Deer numbers. Lots of dongs, tons of K, and a 214 BA. In my opinion his wife should be giving him a swift kick in the nuts over this. This approach and telling people in the paper what we already know is going to hurt him in his pocket book as this is his contract year.

NOW LETS BEAT SOME SILLY CUBBY ASS. :fthecubs :fthecubs :fthecubs :finger :finger MAKE THEM EAT s***!!!!!!

POG MO THOIN RANGERS!!!!!! We win IRISH STYLE. DRUNK AND DISORDERLY NICE BALL GAME Garland. Nice job top of the order.

QUOTE(elrockinMT @ May 17, 2005 -> 04:20 PM) I thought we were in first place? Patience is a virtue and we must be patient with our hitters. They will hit. Do not panic! Anderson and others need more seasoning at the AAA level. People said this about Crede last year and Valentin. I hope we arent sitting with Kong at 210 in August in a pennant race.

QUOTE(TheDybber @ May 17, 2005 -> 02:38 PM) When is .262 not good? It's ok, but considering he was below .240 last year, that's a marked improvement. If he can keep it at .265 the rest of the year, I would call it a success. Walker can only get in their ears. He doesn't have the respect of a Charlie Lau, who was his hitting coach when he played. Charlie Lau wasn't about homers at all, he was about open stances, waiting on the back foot, and hitting line drives. And don't forget, nobody thinks this team has the big boppers like they had with Carlos, Maggs and Frank. So when Frank gets back, if he can hit like we all know he can, that will open up the lineup to some good ol' hitters pitches. Don't give up on Walker yet. Thomas will produce and that in itself will help. But its not like these guys have been aced time and time again. These guys are missing on fastballs down the middle of the plate. Your right, teams dont respect the power and they are going after Dye and Kong. Both of them as fastball hitters should be tearing it up. Thats the problem. If Greg is preaching it and they arent listening. Then its time to bench players. and worry about their fragile egos another time. We are trying to win a divsion here.

QUOTE(ptatc @ May 17, 2005 -> 01:45 PM) I agree the first three have been doing well. If we begin to get any production from the 3-4-5 we will be in business. Back to the walker discussion. "I wonder if the little guys" are more capable of following the opposite field thoery than the others for whatever reason? Its not just about hitting the ball the other way. Its about not forcing the issue. This is what these guys have been doing so far. Arow started a few weeks ago with some power strokes to right. People were pitching him away and he started hitting the ball to right center with power. He has a great power stroke to center/right center. Gooch what else can you say, he pulls the ball when its thrown in, and he goes with the pitch and hits it to right. Nice line drive swings. I have been very impressed with him. The 2 hole on this team is a very difficult position. You have to take a ton of pitches to let Pods get a jump. You have to give yourself up at the expense of your BA. Pods has been doing everything. He has been walking, bunting, hitting the ball up the middle. Doing what he can to get on. If the big guys did some of these things we wouldnt be talking about a slump right now with the offense. But our big guys are pulling the ball too much and making themselves easy targets. If you make yourself into a one dimensional hitter major leaguers are good enough to pitch to that and get you out more and more.

QUOTE(ptatc @ May 17, 2005 -> 01:21 PM) This is an interesting take on the situation. While your points are valid, everytime you hear walker talks he discusses going the opposite way and up the middle is the most important part of hitting. This brings up a few possible scenarios. Either he isn't teaching what he discussing, the hitters aren't listening or the hitters are truly just stuck in a slump and are guessing at pitches. None of these possiblities show well on Walker. One thing I have noticed is Walker keeps talking about his hitters did not walk enough last year and they worked on it in ST. I wonder if they are becoming too passive and wind up going after pitcher's pitches, which may explain the high rate of pop ups. Let's hope the professional experienced hitters can turn it around. In the Month of May 2005 the bad news first Our power guys Joe Crede who everyone is claiming is a Walker success is batting .191, he has a .268 OBP Kong is batting .149, Everett is batting .233 Dye is batting .239 Our swing players AJ is batting .243 Uribe is batting .245 Now for the good news Our little guys Arow is batting .340 with a .404 OBP Gooch is batting .283 with a .345 OBP Pods is .308 with a .429 OBP And now for the news of hope Our first three guys are doing their job, the rest of the guys needs to kick it in gear. If they hit at all this team will score some runs. Frank should be licking his chops looking at all the ducks that will be on the pond for him.

QUOTE(DonkeyKongerko @ May 17, 2005 -> 12:24 PM) It's so easy to just blame the hitting coach. How many hitting coaches did we go through under Manuel? And how often did it a result in a noticeable improvement? Jermaine Dye was a risk when we brought him on. His decline has been well documented over the past 3 years. Konerko is a streaky hitter. How many good half seasons has he had in the past 3 years? It's a struggle with him for consistency. Joe Crede's swing was a bit quicker coming into this season. Honestly I think he has already done more this year than any of us expected. I keep hearing references to people saying this would be "Crede's year" but I think for most of us, this was always just a pipe dream. We've been lucky to have some pretty darn good hitters here with guys like Maggs, Frank, and Carlos around. Podsednik doesn't need to hit .270 to succeed, just look at his on-base percentage. Try to keep some of these things in mind before thinking that ANY hitting coach could raise a team's batting average by 30 points or anywhere close to that. What is the purpose of the hitting coach then besides to be a cheerleader. If its not that important and it really doesnt matter why not just eliminate it all together.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ May 17, 2005 -> 11:50 AM) At the All-star break last year, I was calling Greg Walker one of the better (if not best) hitting coaches in the league. Last year, Juan Uribe came to the Sox, and his bat absolutely went wild the first half. On top of that, Paul Konerko managed to turn around his terrible 2003 season and was on fire in 2004. Thomas was hitting hard until he got hurt, and so was Ordonez, although I doubt Walker spent much time with them. Carlos Lee had a nearly 30 game hitting streak. Aaron Rowand suddenly found the bat everyone was saying he had. And even guys like Gload were hitting .300 off the bench. Last year I was ready to bow down and worship the job Greg Walker was doing as White Sox hitting coach. When guys turn around their entire career with a new hitting coach, I felt that was saying something. This year, my confidence in Walker is rapidly turning into concern, and I want to hear other opinions on it. This year, we started very hot with some of our key bats. Crede was hitting over .300 for a while. Konerko was on Fire. Everett came back from a terrible 2004 and was driving in runs left and right. Podsednik was improving from his dismal .240 average last year. But that only lasted a few weeks. Now what do we see? We see Jermaine Dye mired in a month and a half long slump that he can't seem to find his way out of, despite receiving help from Walker. We've seen the surge from Konerko completely disappear, and both his and Dye's averages have dropped below .200. We've seen Crede lose about 40 points from his batting average with a slump of his own. We've seen Aaron Rowand start off another season slowly, even though it seems he may be hitting his stride this week. We've seen Uribe have his own difficulties, and his average has dropped below .270. And Podsednik has been both up and down - his average was in the .250's a week ago. Not to say there haven't been successes this year. Tadahito Iguchi is clearly one, although I doubt Walker has much input there given the language barrier. My question then is this; how long does this go on before if nothing else, we start considering whether a new hitting coach might get through to these guys better? In 2003, we dumped our hitting coach after a few months of our hitters playing like they are now. I had a lot of confidence in the job Greg Walker was doing after last year. But this year, I'm really starting to wonder. With guys like Dye and Konerko seemingly unable to pull themselves out of slumps, and quite a few comment-writers here saying they have seen decent flaws in their hitting technique, how long should we let this continue before we start wondering what Walker is doing? Walker is a complex subject. Everytime I have heard him talk he states on preaching his hitting to all fields. Yet I see nothing from this team over the years to back this up. Last year anyone and I mean anyone who was a soft tosser who could spot the fastball on the outside corner would shut this team down. Why is this. Well look at our players hitting stances and styles. Hands high up, standing away from the plate. If a pitch is inside they murder it foul. On the outside corner they still try to pull that slow pitch and either pop up or roll their wrists over for a weak ground out. Its hard to square up a ball when our hitters are putting hitches and archs in their swings. How many hitters over the last 3 years have had BA's that sit around the .200 level. I have never seen this on a major league team. Yes one player can slump, but groups of our hitters slump at the same time. Konerko is completely lost now. The minute you start changing your stance every single time you go up to the plate you are going to K. He doesnt even have pitch selection right now to go with. This is a mirror of where Crede was last year. Always 0-2. Kong has been a good fastball hitter, however is getting beat this year on 89 mph fastballs down the middle. This is exactly what Crede did last year. Crede would come up with the big home run late in games last year because pitchers would get 0-2 on him and would throw a 12-6 pitch down and in. When you have a hitch in your swing a curve that plays into your upper cut swing is the best remedy. Now Kong is doing the bat resting on the shoulder routine. This is a Walker thing. He had Miggy doing it, Crede and now Kong. The hitting coach should be able to use video of good swings to help a hitter find his swing again. When our hitters get lost they are completely lost and for like 3 or more months at a time. What Walker should be doing is to try and get Konerko's back elbow up a bit. This would stop the upper cut swing and allow him to square up a ball or to for a hit. Watch Arow, his back elbow is up again( which is not where he started the year off with). His hitting is more mechanical than others but very effective. He has great oppo power. Gooch has a goofy open stance, but watch his hands through the hitting zone. Its a line drive swing. This is what I would expect Walker to be teaching the guys. Line drive swings. Line drive swings are less likely to get into slumps. Yes they dont hit the monsterous moon shots, but the BA comes up and the homers will come. Our team has been remade into a smartball team. Its time for them to start to hit like that. Smallball teams dont have a group of hitters hitting below 200. Rob Deer, Jose Valentin teams are the ones with the 200 averages and the upper cut swings. And before we state that Walker helped Carlos get into the 28 game hitting streak lets look to the tinkering he did to get him out of that approach. Walker helped Carlos Lee change his stance and extend his arms at the end of that hitting streak so he could hit for more power. Before Walkers tinkering Carlos had a very tight compact swing with opposite field power. After Walker helped him change his swing, a longer swing that allows Carlos to pull the ball. A month later we are all upset watching Carlos swing for the fences and trying to pull the outside pitch. This is cause an effect. Remember the press was hounding Carlos about the power numbers. Well guess what he changed his swing, told the press he would hit 30 and did. At the expense of situational hitting during a strech in August. Remember when Kenny made the comment about "If I ever see another guy swing for the fences when we need a basehit I will puke."

Joe Borchard works his ass off, he had desire and he has talent. He however cannot hit the round ball with regularity. That is why statements like this drive me nuts. Does Walker actually spend time watching the hitters hit. When we watch Dye I dont think anyone is amazed at his talent. Trib story on sox hitting woes

QUOTE(Jabroni @ May 17, 2005 -> 12:40 AM) Cruddy has been getting a hit lately? Could've fooled me. I thought he was 1 for 17 on this homestand. I never figured out the resting the bat on your shoulder bit. Olivo did it and it drove me crazy. Nothing like putting a hitch in your swing on purpose.

QUOTE(Jabroni @ May 17, 2005 -> 12:35 AM) "Free-Agent Busts" http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/multimedi.../content.1.html Adrian Beltre Edgar Renteria Magglio Ordonez Eric Milton Steve Finley Christian Guzman Jared Wright Armando Benitez Al Leiter Jermaine Dye Part of the Pull Baseball Duo. They should seriously put on one of those crazy shifts where they put 3 infielders to the left side of the field. Both he and Konerko would be hitting a collective .050 if that ever happened.

QUOTE(Jabroni @ May 16, 2005 -> 11:33 PM) I'm pretty sure Paulie has always done that lean back thing. I hate the bat on the shoulder move because it reminds me of that slug Cruddy. That must be a walker thing. He had Olivo doing it, then cruddy and now Konerko.

QUOTE(YASNY @ May 17, 2005 -> 12:20 AM) Paulie needs to stop pulling the damn ball. He pulls everything. He's hitting hard, but it's either foul or right at the 3rdbaseman. He is approaching the plate like Rob Deer did for the tigers. He hit some moon shots, but never batted that much over 200.

I wonder what the lineup will be tonight. If Timo is out there, he has some photos or something to lord over Ozzie.

The problems with Marte can be summed up by watching his delivery. His problems started towards the end of 2003. He stopped following through on his fastball. Now if you watch he short arms it instead of bending over and following through on the pitch. When you short arm pitches(ala Cotts) the ball has a propensity to sail. You never quite get on top of the pitch and it just takes off. Thats what happens when Marte pops it. He can throw his breaking pitch over for a strike like crazy. But he gets to into that and hitters lay off of it. He then drops the velocity a bit to get a strike over and then whammo. To be successful as a reliever you must pitch ahead and stay ahead. He has the stuff, he just needs to locate it more. When he throws strike one he K's hitters at a good clip. When he gets to 2-0 and 3-0 the conga line starts. The ability to throw strike one and be aggressive is what seperates Hermy and Polite from Cotts and Marte and Shingo.

We better get it in gear. Drese, Maddux, Zambrano and Prior await after tonights cupcake.

Mods can we pin my first game thread. Maybe the luck of the Irish can break this mini-losing streak. MAKE THEM EAT s*** JON.

El Duque is an idiot. He just was interviewed on TV. I threw the ball good, location no location the batters just had a good swing on the ball. Its just a bad day. You threw the ball good? You nibbled like a squirrel on nuts and got hurt.