Jake

I sure don't get this one. It's like a reward just for pitching all those miserable mop-up end of game innings in spring training.

Out of curiosity, do the Sox have long-ish term control over Bruce Rondon or is he treated like a typical MLB free agent on a 1-year deal?

Well folks I think people may have been a little quick to anoint Renteria as an amazing manager.

I'm honestly not overly alarmed by this kind of outing from Fulmer. It's obviously not good but I knew he was going to fight his command a lot and that's what this was. I'm encouraged because his stuff looked good and they struggled to square him up. I'm prepared for much of his season to be filled with this kind of inconsistency.

There's really very little doubt that he's going to be a competent hitter. The real question is how good will it get? His propensity to strike out means there's some risk he's going to be more of a .750-.800 OPS type, but I don't see much downside below that.

Really excited about Lopez. I'm not going to lose sleep over the offense at this point given there aren't specific guys who really worry me as of yet.

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 04:20 PM) Honestly, Fulmer didn't look good either. Sox just couldn't capitalize on his mistakes. We had a chance to get to him, but his stuff looked great. Right when you start to think you can hit that running heater at 95, he mixes in a changeup or cutter to throw you off.

QUOTE (Scoots @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 04:12 PM) I disagree. Let him work through the jam. He makes the double play earlier, the inning is over. He almost threw more balls than strikes, never had any rhythm, and hit the first two batters of the inning. The best thing we could do is have the start end without him giving up any more runs than he had to. There was no value in having him continue to pitch the way he did today.

Shouldn't have had him in there with a rested bullpen

QUOTE (soxfan49 @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 03:47 PM) He’s throwing 91 mph You say that, but it's not like the Tigers hitting him has really been the problem in this game at all. It's his command and to a lesser extent the defense. Hard to blame the stuff for the runs in this outing

Giolito is very concerned about his speed to home so I can only assume that each stolen base will further contribute to his inconsistency

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 03:18 PM) Yet looked good in the dome I think part of the reason he looks like he's half-assing it is it's just the way he bats. Just looks like he's teeing off every swing. It obviously has worked for him

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 03:16 PM) Giolito, Abreu and Castillo look like they're in slow motion Castillo in particular has looked half-there most of the season thus far for me.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 03:10 PM) Davidson great eye this year I think that's the big thing to watch from him in terms of early indicators that he's a different guy from last year.

I do like the run on Giolito's fastball today.

Giolito falling apart out of the stretch also reminiscent of Gavin Floyd, his alter ego

QUOTE (mac9001 @ Apr 7, 2018 -> 02:30 PM) Giolito's fastball velocity has been very underwhelming so far, he's down probably another 2 MPH over even last year. Tricky thing with this can be when he's throwing the cutter that can look a lot like a slow fastball to the naked eye.

Yoan has basically zero track record of being a bad hitter. I'm not going to worry about him too much.

QUOTE (bmags @ Apr 5, 2018 -> 07:55 PM) I’d mark this one down as a game where Ricky’s guys kinda quit (and Ricky too). I'm not sure how I see that one. We rolled with our best end of game bullpen configuration with a 4 run lead and gave up the lead anyway.

Infante was basically minimum MLB competence last year but he has looked...not even up to that low bar this year.

The way I see it, he should be the last guy on the bench. He could have helped his stock by picking up the ability to play OF, but that's obviously easier said than done. He's a better defensive replacement than Leury in the infield, but given what we saw last year Leury is the better bat and offers OF defense as well. The main concern with keeping Saladino around is whether Renteria can resist giving him too much playing time.

Big story of the night for me is Fulmer's stuff, which looked premium. Good velo on the fastball, lots of run. Cutter gave lefties a hard time, used the change as well. Didn't always stay on top of his curve but when he did it looked good. Still fought his command, which he's going to do for a while (if not for his entire career) but he looked like a different guy out there.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 4, 2018 -> 08:17 PM) Easily best he's ever looked, regardless of results Even with uneven command, he's showed the first round round stuff tonight so far.

I won't compare him to Hawk, who I love, because there won't be another Hawk and if someone was going for that it would probably be bad. That said, I like Jason. He knows what he's doing, he knows baseball, and his fondness for the Sox is obvious. It's endearing that Hawk loves the Sox, but Benetti is a lifer. He was a Sox guy before they paid him money. The jokey stuff can get old but to me that's mostly a Stone issue. Jason will goad Steve into it or play along but it's Steve's actual jokes that are hard to understand or not funny. It's not that everything Jason says is funny, but the whole bad humor schtick is emanating from the super deadpan way Steve does it. QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Apr 4, 2018 -> 01:58 PM) I haven't noticed this at much this season, but it is really annoying when the broadcasts become a glorified Q & A session with Stone. There's a difference between deferring and acting like this is the first time you've ever watched a baseball game. Yeah, Jason knows a lot about baseball but sometimes seems like he's afraid to give analysis because that's not his job. With Hawk he was so self-confident that you never had that weird dynamic of one guy who can't make any subjective claim without running it past the other. I'd like to see Jason at least get more confident about making simple evaluations about what's going on — pitcher made a mistake there, that was a bad decision by somebody, etc.

The most noteworthy thing for me is the White Sox were smart enough not to do a rebuild that was predicated on losing. The dumbest game you can play in MLB is jumping through hoops to get the highest draft pick possible. If you're trading your veteran assets for good young talent, you won't be picking late in the first round. But the marginal value of a few spots is rarely going to be worth jerking your players and fans around. QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 11:50 AM) Infield and Catcher are much more scary. I am not sure if we have another guy in the system that actually projects to be a starting catcher defensively, with any real chance to hit at the major league level. I know your comment mentioned defense specifically, but I think we have a pretty deep system at catcher. On the MLB club you have Narvaez who is a solid MLB regular and under control for a long time. Then in the minors you have Smith, who is more of a backup MLB type who we may never use much because he's rather old at this point. Moving on through the minors you have Collins and Zavala, both promising bats but as you say there are questions about defense. Of course, you don't typically find too many catcher prospects who play good defense and hit.