nitetrain8601

QUOTE(Gregory Pratt @ Dec 23, 2006 -> 02:00 PM) If the goal is to acquire stud pitching prospects, which it clearly is, why was Garland more valuable than McCarthy -- why is Danks better than Hirsh? Can't say I quite like this trade -- leaves us with a huge fifth starter hole -- but, well, I never thought McCarthy was great. Wonder how he'll pitch in the August heat of Texas. Isn't Hirsh 24 or 25 already?

QUOTE(whitesox61382 @ Dec 16, 2006 -> 02:16 PM) For starters, when a new coach arrives at a program it changes the perspective of recruits. Gordon wasn't a huge fan of Davis and despite the fact that he was seriously interested in playing for homestate IU, decided that the UI was a better option AT THE TIME. I have little doubt that Gordon would have committed to IU originally if Sampson was the coach a few years back, so I don't consider it to be that bad. The fact is that Gordon wanted to go to IU, and when the circumstances changed(ie: a new coach that the player liked) I think Gordon had every right to reconsider his college choice. Remember, at no point does a verbal commitment constitute a written in stone agreement. I do think Gordon should have decommitted and gone about the process a little differently to be fair to the UI, but in the end he went to the college that he wanted to be at. Why don't UI fans be mature and take the high road for once and move on? Junior, you have no clue what goes on in the recruiting world do you? Let me toot my own horn for a second to help bring a little perspective. Coming out of high school, I was a little regarded football and baseball player who was looking to play at the next level. I was looking at mostly D-two schools because I wasn't that good, but I had a few low level D-one schools interested in me. I took a handful of recruiting visits, and on each one AT LEAST one NCAA recruiting violation was broken. A couple examples include, my recruiting host taking me to a party and pointing to a row of women and asking me which one I wanted. Or an alumni coming up to me a shaking my hand and putting an envelope in my pocket(with 500 dollars) as my host took me on a tour of the facilities(a separate incident at another school). And there are plenty of other examples, but the point is that I was a nobody recruit at a low level D-one schools(not going to mention any names) and they still broke recruiting rules to get me interested in their school. The point being that a few extra calls is like the jaywalking of recruiting violation. Yes, it is against the rules, but in the grand scheme of things it is very petty. That is not to say that two wrongs make a right or that just because other programs break recruiting rules does it make it ok for your program to do so, but I think you need a little perspective before you burn a guy at the stake or call him a worthless human being for making a few extra phone calls. You guys provide little/no examples of how he isn't respected. Saying that four coaches in the conference showed their displeasure with him is like me saying six coaches in the conference think he is a great guy. I am sure that if you polled all the coaches the majority of coaches in the college ranks would say that he is a very good coach and human being. UI fans and Weber need to change their tampax already. It has become clear that you are allowing one incident(that at the absolute worst was boarderline frowned upon) effective your opinion about a guy and compounding the issue by digging for any evidence to help support your weak argument. No need to take your frustrations over the fact that the UI is becoming a mediocre irrelevent program under Weber out on others. I disagree strongly. I'm not saying he's the most horrid human being on earth or close to it, but he's not considered widely around the NCAA as a great guy etc.

Scott Schoenweis sounds like a logical fit I'd honestly love to see Ray King.

Trade for Damian Miller dammit!

My question is what are we going to do with Uribe? Isn't he a FA at the end of the year? Also his agent is Scott Boras IIRC. How much do we overpay for him?

Sox aren't the team to reacquire players they didn't like originally. Therefore, you won't see a Kenny Lofton, Keith Foulke, or DeAngelo Jimenez ever coming back.

It's a great trade because it gives us that 10 mil and the young pitchers we wanted. Not much to complain about again.

I wanted him too, but there's not many fans of Mark Mulder on this board. Also, we'd have to trade Buehrle or someone else to make room for Mulder.

I don't understand people saying this trade makes us worse for next year or we're now no more than a 3rd place team, especially when those are the same people who think BMac belonged in the rotation. Now, they'll have BMac (the young stud as many of you put it) in the rotation and they'll be doing it cheaply. The rest of the positions are the same. Quite frankly, I felt if we kept last year's team, we'd still be one of the top, if not the top team in the majors. That's not being a homer, that's just being realistic. No one is doing anything over the top. We at the very least are making a lateral move with more trading chips/chips for the future.

GIO'S BACK!!! I honestly like this trade and I know I'm a minority. Garcia will do better in the NL, but we're setting ourselves up for the future really well with this trade. Floyd I think can at least turn into a great reliever still and Gio just makes my mouth drool. Thank God we got him back. Seriously guys, we weren't going to get much better than this.

Young.

Sign Ray King!

A couple of things: Why do people view Crawford as a leadoff hitter? I thought he did bad there whenever he's had the chance to play there. Also, why do they view him as a CF? He's a nice LF, but I don't think he's a CF unless need be. I love Joe Crede more than anyone, and I've been a big Freddy Garcia fan, but people around here are seriously overrating them. While I do not think that package is enough to net them Joe Crede and Freddy Garcia(both major league veterans who would help the Angels win now), I think it's somewhat close. Throw in a prospect and you have a deal. And no, I don't mean a Saunders, Weaver, or anything crazy like that.

QUOTE(Gregory Pratt @ Nov 26, 2006 -> 06:32 PM) Iguchi was experimenting with his swing in spring training. I'm not sure if it was because of the change in the lineup, but I think he said he was just trying out some things, they didn't work, and so he went back to swinging like he always did right as the season started. I don't know that he'd start to falter if put into the leadoff spot just because it be a change in the order. Um no, he was allowed to "free-swing" which means take whatever pitch he likes and swing away. He couldn't do that. He wasn't experimenting with anything.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Nov 20, 2006 -> 10:35 AM) It was a KW trade. Schueler was employed as an advisor. He advised against sending Fogg with Wells. It really was a bad trade. You sure because someone had a sig with a link to the article stating it was Schueler's and that Schueler knew he didn't have to send both Fogg and Wells, but did so anyway.

QUOTE(hitlesswonder @ Nov 20, 2006 -> 09:34 AM) That's crazy. In 2003 Wells had a 3.28 ERA in the NL in about 200 innings. If you figure it would be a full run higher in the AL (which is crazy, 0.25 runs would be much more realistic), then he's at 4.28. That's about the same level as Buehrle pitched that season. And it would have been a hell of a lot better than the 6+ ERA Dan Wright (the 5th starter) posted. By 2004, Wells was already pretty clearly injured, and I don't think he would have done much better than a 5 ERA in the AL. Pathetically, that still would have a been a god-send as the 5th starters on that team were beyond terrible. Look, I think Williams is a very good GM. In 6 years as GM, he's made 2 trades that I think hurt the team. That's a great record. But it's silly to pretend that he's never made a mistake. Wells trade wasn't his IIRC. It was Schueler.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Nov 16, 2006 -> 11:30 PM) What's so hard to understand? You said Uribe's CAREER obp was below Gonzalez's. My mistake. I was under the impression he did have a lower one. Don't get your panties twisted.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Nov 16, 2006 -> 11:16 PM) Or not. .297. But an excellent point. Uribe's OBP for the year: .257 Gonzalez = .299 Gonzalez has only had 2 as bad years as Uribe did this year in terms of his OBP. His rookie year and the other happened 7 years ago. He also isn't a mental midget in terms of bringing his offensive problems over to the defensive side.

QUOTE(CWSGuy406 @ Nov 16, 2006 -> 11:10 PM) Yup, so lets sign Alex Gonzalez of the career .292 OBP variety to 3/$15. How's that sound? f*** boppers -- let's get guys who have the amazing ability of not being able to get on base nor hit for power. Woohoo! Still higher than Uribe's. Also, Uribe has shown a tendency to have his head in his ass on the defensive side of the ball when he's doing bad offensively and he seems unmotivated at times. I don't think that would be a problem with Alex.

I'm with SSI and would sign Alex Gonzalez in a quickie over Juan "overrated" Uribe. I don't care about his homers. We have boppers. We need to get guys on base. And since when has Uribe ever won a GG?

I bet alot of teams have interest in Garland. Don't mean they're getting him.

I used to love Aardsma, but he's worse than Cotts. At least Cotts was a lefty and showed he could be a very good bullpen arm. David has yet to show that. KW must've been drunken via Jim Hendry.

Zook is getting the job done. They should get him to recruit Mayo.

QUOTE(thedoctor @ Nov 9, 2006 -> 07:29 AM) yeah, that story was interesting. i don't think there's a chance in hell that he chooses us, but frankly i wish they'd called earlier. i realize he comes with baggage, but he's the top player in the nation, plays a position illinois desperately needs, and has listed illinois from the beginning. again, a super, super long shot, but you gotta at least take a shot. Especially after the Gordon and Rose fiasco's. I've always felt he was the #1 player regardless of baggage. He's like Dwayne Wade with a 3 point shot and just overall better.