CaliSoxFanViaSWside

Doubtful. He's not the kind of player who normally wins ROY. Too early anyway. If he has good stats at the end of the season we'll see if he's a contender.

I said moderate because it makes no sense to expect dramatic improvement. Twins fan were probably thinking the same way . There's potential for dramatic improvement. There's also potential for disaster.

Or an aneurysm.

I did say in another post that I wasn't up to date on what Shane Smith has been working on. Again for all those who crucify Milwaukee in hindsight you do the Sox coaches a great disservice by thinking it's a just a Milwaukee screw up. There are a lot guys with good arms. One new learned pitch, one new grip can change your whole arsenal or improve your command , spin rate, sequencing. A sinker is a bit different than a splitter. Maybe some coaches use the words to mean the same pitch. Hard to know unless you really get a good explanation. I'd put it on my list of things to talk to Bannister about . I do remember reading that somewhere.It just hadn't " sunk" in yet. 😋 It's like when you study. For it to stick in your memory banks you either have to make a mental note of it, take notes to reread later, or just the fact that you write it down reinforces the memory . Where did you get that from ?

Thanks. At the beginning it's interesting to hear him talk about the splitter and how all the best Japanese pitchers throw it. I haven't noticed too many Sox pitchers throwing a splitter. Maybe one will master it .

You really think so ? I listed some of the good things in my next post. It was quite lengthy based on listening to Bannister. I'm not smart enough to psychologically abuse anyone to change their perceptions. I deal in facts. But 🫵🪨!

If MLB ends up punishing the Sox for having the ROY I give up . My current thinking is only those eligible as top 100 guys get the extra draft pick sort of as compensation for losing the year of eligibility. But I'll admit that's my shot in the dark guess at making sense of those things.

I guess I look at and see a lot of data points for good and I see a lot of the bad ones too. A lot of them are just minor things that will be forgotten about in time as nothing burgers but molehills made into mountains now. I think the difference is I do not profess to know very much. I repeat what I see and hear and give links to those things. My opinions weren't formed because of one horrible season or even 3 in a row. They were formed because Reinsdorf has been the owner so long and I've witnessed every year of his ownership. The reality is Getz was not the best hire in the world because it was JR doing the hiring. JR hired LaRussa. JR let the teams infrastructure disintegrate or just didn't believe in development of youth and keeping up with the latest tech and modern thinking. I see a lot of small things going right. I can see some immediate results with defense and defensive positioning. That may be a McKinven influence. It's all early he was just hired along with the new hitting guy from the O's. The new manager is way better at least optically than old manager. Bannister is an amazing guy and one of the sharpest pitching minds out there. They've come a long way since Don Cooper. New guy handling international and building a new complex in the Dominican. Hitters get to see what the new Trajekt pitching machine is all about because it can simulate very accurately how an upcoming pitcher pitches while using softer balls so hitters aren't injuring themselves with foul balls off their legs hitting against that machine. There's been a lot going on that we forget about because it's not staring us in the face every day like players are. And let's face it. Every guy Getz acquired this off season was from the scrap heap. Rule 5 guys are scrap heap guys. I saw a graphic during the broadcast last game that show some Rule 5 pitchers stats from this year. Sox had the 2 best in Shane Smith and Mike Vasil. I'm not convinced that 9 innings of 0 earned run will hold up over a full season but damn good start. Shane Smith is looking like the real deal. Again small sample, don't want to get carried away. Sucks that a lot of young arms are getting TJ surgery but Bannister said nearly 2 out of every 5 arms now need TJ surgery at some point and he thinks it's unavoidable. The game is focused on power. Power pitchers and power hitters. All these pitching labs try to maximize spin and velocity. That's part of modern day pitching and along with that comes arm injuries. Unfortunately that's a price pitchers pay now for there being so much knowledge out there now that can raise a pitchers developmental floor and ceiling. That's why you see more out of nowhere pitching success stories than you do hitting success stories. A pitcher can just find a new pitch that redefines his whole arsenal like the kick change for Davis Martin or the cutter for Crochet. Shane Smith saw a jump in his velocity also. I can't recall what else Smith's been working on .

You yourself said there's only 2 left so seems to me there's a lot more thickness on your side of the fence. Hell there's one of your bunch who is non stop s%*# posting. Maybe you'd prefer the Woe is Us poor White Sox fans pity party to be unanimous so we could all hold hands and sing Kumbaya ?

Why so angry that people try to be fair. Good things are happening despite that horrific season . There's more than 2 people who recognize that. Why can't we recognize the good things too ? There's plenty of you around to point out his fault because he has faults and has made mistakes. No ones ever said he's perfect. He got a lot of quality to join the organization and doing their best to modernize. Rome wasn't built in a day. Relax , I see you starting "And That's a White Sox Winner" thread. You aren't all doom and gloom.

Send JR your resume !!

Get well soon and good luck !

There's plenty of credit to go around .There's no need to be stingy with credit. The player, the coaches and executives all play a part in good and bad things. Pretty simple stuff actually. Hardly controversial.

Vaughn actually has had several very hot streaks surrounded by equally very cold streaks. But more to the point it would happen more maybe if you were able to just sign non tendered guys. Schwarber was non tendered by the Cubs and he hit a massive amount of bombs since. Sox don't even have the resources to sign anyone for over $5M. They do hit on pitching. Fedde was a good signing. Rodon was a great $3M signing until he ran out of gas. Perez so far has been great. Crochet went from a relief pitcher recovering from injury to elite starting pitcher when almost no one, including me , thought he could stay healthy enough or pitch enough innings to achieve what he did. Crochet put in the off season work. They monitored him liked what they saw ,changed their plan for him and according to Bannister, Getz gave the thumbs up for Crochet to start. After that they worked on a few changes to his 2 seamer, introduced the cutter as opposed to his sweeper. Crochet kept pushing through every barrier. There's hope for Shane Smith and Vasil also.

His salary is MLB guaranteed no matter where he plays this year but keeping him batting cleanup is just overkill with coddling players. It's no great shame to being sent down . You need to be held accountable for your lack of production. I know they hate bringing up players who aren't already on the 40 but Drury might be coming back in a couple of weeks and Rojas too. Benintendi could be back in a few days. There's going to be plenty of guys who can play 1st base .

You do everyone in the Sox organization a great disservice if you are trying to say Crochet alone is responsible for his success. I'd like to recommend all people interested in the process of developing Crochet in the off season leading up to his breakout as a starting pitcher in 2024 go here I'd recommend listening to the whole thing but they don't get into talking about Crochet until the podcast is half over. Just listening to Bannister talk about elite training year round for pitchers, Trajeckt Machines, Tommy John surgery etc. is a must for anyone who wants to really know how developing Crochet was a true team effort. There is also so much more out there from Crochet too crediting the people in the organization . Might be an interview with Crochet too somewhere in the Baseball Isn't Boring Podcast episodes. I think anyone interested in being fair has to acknowledge the Sox had a strong role in getting Crochet to where he is right now.

None of those other guys had almost a 5 fWAR as recently as 2023. However that was the only season he played more than 100 games. He does however still run like the wind and field his position very well. IF he starts hitting the WAR starts piling up. The problem with him now is trying to adjust to the fact they aren't going to throw him a lot of strikes so he's laying off more pitches and thus getting more walks than he ever has . The problem that goes along with that is the timing where he's not swinging because he's looking at it a micro second longer is also causing him to be late on his swings. I would recommend a lighter bat so when he does swing maybe the bat gets through the zone that fraction of a second faster that he's losing on his swing decisions.

If Hawk announcing he would've said about Vargas routine flyout to left field, " He just missed it", and actually he did. He was all over the pitch but the difference between a good hitter and a bad hitter is that good hitters get hits on mistake pitches a lot more often. He one of those guys where his process is pretty good but the results between his brain and swing don't add up to quality squaring up or barreling the ball. It's like he's always either late or the swing is just .50 inch off from where it should be to get some good exit velo. It's like a good combination of eyesight with pitch recognition. Some hitter try to pick up the way its coming out of a pitchers hand since each has a different grip . That's why pitchers hide the ball as long as they can so the hitter might focus on the release point. But you only have a fraction of a second to recognize things and react or not react. There's very few hitters that just react as they see the ball. A lot of times you really have to guess whats coming and think like a pitcher depending on count, with your swing tendencies vs his pitch sequencing and whats working for him that day which can change inning by inning. It's easy to understand why some hitters just swing out of the zone so much. It looks like its coming right down the middle 1/4 or more of the way towards the plate then the sucker breaks down or down and away from you or in on you and at various speeds. To square it up you have to pinpoint speed, pitch type and location and swing and hit the ball not too soon and not too late but just right and there's still a bunch of fielders out there to take hits away from you even if you do all that stuff right.

There was one place for the hitter to truly shorten up and that was with Palacios up with men on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out. Just had a stolen base of 2nd to stay out of the DP. Contact likely ties the game. He K'd instead. Any chance the WSox had of winning vanished unless the guy behind him got a hit and Vargas did not after battling for 10 pitches.

Getz isn't the manager and so what if he did no hit the Sox. They're a bad hitting team .A loss is a loss .

They're mad he broke up the no no.

Lol it's ok. I assume you're a Sox fan since you've been here a long time. You can root for your bad team to win in a tight game. I do it every game. I don't think it hurts when they are likely to have 2 losses for every win anyway.

It would be sweet . Smith pitched great. Ran out of steam in the 6th. Certainly not expecting it.

Mistakes are made every day in every game. Bad hops are called errors, pitches groove pitches all the time, winds push slicing balls even farther away from OFs. Jones hasn't played 1 inning in this park. He might have not caught it either. Plus you're running out of space at the wall. Meidroth breaks it up !

I'm just saying it doesn't really matter. If you're so concerned about winning in a rebuild over getting Baldwin more experience as a multipostional utility guy it's micro not macro thinking. He just had a game winning hit yesterday and a great catch coming in on a ball. Playing RF on a windy day on a ball hit bry a RH hitter slicing away from him is going to be trouble even for experienced OFs . It's not exacting like Palacios has played a lot of RF with the e the Sox in Chicago .1 game if I'm not mistaken. Benintendi, Slater, Tauchman all hurt right ? It just sounds like complaining for no reason expecting perfection for the defense wanting to give up zero runs so they have a shot at winning when this game was always going to be hard towin with this weak hitting team against Crochet.