AirScott

QUOTE(CanOfCorn @ Jul 23, 2007 -> 12:15 PM) Eggs-ACKTLY!!! If someone absolutely WOWED Kenny in a package for Garland...he'd be gone. Willy Taveras, Taylor Bucholz and Hirsh...or something like that?

QUOTE(nitetrain8601 @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 02:17 PM) Means a team like the Braves knows how to put its players in the best position to succeed. Or they at least do a much better job of that than the Sox do. I'm not going to say Willie is a world beater, but if managed correctly, he could be a useful guy. He was useful for us. He pinch-hit for a single and scored the winning run of Game 4 of the 2005 World Series, as well as a valuable pinch-runner/spot starter throughout the season.

QUOTE(nitetrain8601 @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 02:17 PM) Means a team like the Braves knows how to put its players in the best position to succeed. Or they at least do a much better job of that than the Sox do. I'm not going to say Willie is a world beater, but if managed correctly, he could be a useful guy. He was useful for us. He pinch-hit for a single and scored the winning run of Game 4 of the 2005 World Series, as well as a valuable pinch-runner/spot starter throughout the season.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 05:18 PM) Seriously, we need to find some way for Javy to start that game and for Vasquez to be called up and pitch. The box score would be priceless. I think it was 2005 when the Bluejays had David Bush and Brandon League come in back-to-back to pitch. It was on one of Tim Kurkjian's "crazy things that happened during the season" bits because the box score read something like this: Bush League

QUOTE(GreenSox @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 04:38 PM) The only managerial skill Ozzie Guillen has ever displayed is the ability to keep the team confident and playing to their abilities. Now he can't even do that. Otherwise, he's a clown manager. A shift on a .200 hitter - that's just cynical. His staff is ridiculously weak, the team can't execute fundamentals, the hitters are impatient, the use of personnel is nutty (cintron as a pinch hitter; killing our defense with Mack in CF last year; Erstad as a leadoff hitter), his pitching acumen is limited to lefty/righty, he throws young players under the bus and has expressed disinterest in working with young players, he has yet to develop a single hitter, et al et al et al. Thank goodness we won before Ozzie had worked his magic and turned the entire offense into a bunch of dink hitter swing at everything types that he loves. You do realize that Cintron has a reputation as a quality pinch-hitter, that he hit .304 as a pinch-hitter in 2005 with the Diamondbacks, right? And the other two moves were purely done out of necessity -- Mackowiak in center because Anderson stunk at the plate and Erstad as a leadoff hitter because Pods got hurt.

QUOTE(Heads22 @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 11:27 PM) I imagine the protests will begin soon? Eh, just making a big deal out of nothing. Anyone else hear on Baseball Tonight when Buster Olney basically said it was a coincidence that Molina and Posada are catching for the same team and grew up in towns 90 miles apart in Puerto Rico? I found this a little off, went on mapquest and found out, yes, they're just about on other sides of the country (territory? what is Puerto Rico?).

In the spirit of southsiderish bringing up Rowand getting bad jumps on balls in September (but not mentioning the number of times he'd ground into double plays), I'd also like to say people have tabbed Byrnes as a guy who gets poor jumps a lot of the time.

QUOTE(witesoxfan @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 10:41 AM) Yeah and Podsednik is not a good player. Whether I sound like that guy from Foxsports or not, Podsednik throughout his career has demonstrated that he is a below average all around hitter and that he could no longer steal bases effeciently after his hamstring and then groin injuries. And I'm being pretty nice. Jerry Owens can turn into a nice player, but Chuck Carr could have too and he was terrible aside from the fact that he could steal a base; at the same time, he could be Roger Cedeno who was a very good player for a little bit until injuries caught up to him and he was no longer a good player. I would guess he'll turn into a player somewhere in between those two just because it's safe to say it. Podsednik is a poor fielder and not an good all-around hitter, but when he's getting on base at a clip of .350 or more, he's pretty damn valuable (when he's healthy and stealing bases). Can we agree on that? So putting aside the stuff about making contact or bunting, what if Jerry Owens simply becomes a guy with an OBP of .350 and steals bases like he has been? Couldn't he be part of a successful team if he does that while playing left field, just like Pods in 2005?

QUOTE(daa84 @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 09:55 AM) all that plus hes already 26, which makes him pretty old for a prospect Pods was 27 when he won the NL Rookie of the Year, 29 when he helped us to a World Series.

QUOTE(witesoxfan @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 01:06 AM) I'm just glad you are willing for that. I'm sure there are some who have completely written him off. I think a comparison to Halladay - though the numbers and past histories support it slightly - is way too far fetched to even have a possibility of happening. However, I would not be surprised to see Floyd turn into a back end of the rotation starter; if he can do that alone, then the Sox have won the deal in regards to major league production. Freddy didn't set the bar high, that's for sure.

QUOTE(witesoxfan @ Jul 22, 2007 -> 12:48 AM) Jerry Owens doesn't make nearly enough contact to warrant a comparison to Pierre. You are talking about a guy that makes contact in 19 of 20 (or 94.5%) of his plate appearances in the majors, as opposed to the 7 of 8 (or 87.5%) of his plate appearances in the minor leagues, which almost assuredly will get worse in the majors; thats a difference between a guy striking out 40 times in 725 plate apperances and 91 times in 725 plate apperances. Yeah, and he's also not that strong of a bunter...yet. Owens is far from a finished product, so there's no reason to think he won't improve. And how does Owens' contact rate compare to Podsednik's? Don't look now, but Pods stuck out 75 times in 129 games in 2005. At that rate, if he plays 154 games (like he had the previous two seasons), that's 90 punchouts. Look, it's too early to say Owens won't improve his ability to make contact, or he won't ever be able to hit for Juan Pierre/Scott Podsednik power. To write him off as a fourth outfielder already seems silly when developing into a Scott Podsednik/Juan Pierre type isn't that far-fetched. You saw the Sox's success with Pods in 2005, and I bet you remember the guy from FOXsports.com tabbing him as the most overrated player in the majors. Right now, you're that guy from FOXsports.com.

I guess the Wil Nieves era is over in New York...

QUOTE(DonnyDevito @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 05:52 PM) did any media people ask ozzie about this and what was his reaction? Doesn't look like it, at least from the articles written.

QUOTE(Heads22 @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 03:09 PM) Go deep, young Joshua. Nice looking hit.

If the rumor that KW has an interest in Wily Mo is true, I hope Kenny saw that play.

QUOTE(Gene Honda Civic @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 12:00 AM) Fact. I turned 28 on Thursday. Fact. Jerry Owens hasn't had an extra-base hit in 29 straight games. Fact. During my lifetime only two White Sox players have had more consecutive at-bats without an extra-base hit (Mike Caruso 110, and Scott Fletcher 123) than Jerry Owens, who currently is sporting a sweet .224/.276/.224 line over his last 107 at-bats. Fact. You have to go back to 1972, when the seldom used Jay Johnstone went extra-base hitless in 122 straight at-bats (over 3 months), to find a longer streak of punchlessness from a White Sox outfielder. Fact. The 2003 Marlins won the World Series when Juan Pierre posted a .373 slugging percentage and stole 65 bases. Fact. Juan Pierre had a .320 slugging percentage with a .310 batting average in 2000, when he played 51 games. I don't know why people write of Jerry Owens as a career fourth outfielder already. He's had all of 121 at bats at this level, and I see him developing into a Juan Pierre kind of player. Owens could be a valuable player in 2008, especially if he can be placed in left field.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 12:05 PM) Great bunt? It rolled into the outfield. That's like having a penalty kick in soccer with no goalie. Obviously I meant perfect for the situation...the definition of a perfect bunt changes when the shift is on, like how the perfect hit for a hit-and-run is a ground ball that would usually be a routine out by the second baseman.

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 10:31 AM) That's fine, but WHY did they keep the shift on after Hinske gave his hand away and bunted the first pitch foul. Hinske is awful, and that was a spot where they needed a baserunner to help roll the lineup over in good shape. To not shift the defense back to a conventional format after the first pitch failed bunt is mind numbingly stupid. And then of course there was the 8th inning.... Maybe I can defend this a little more... Eric Hinske isn't known as a great bunter. The bunt he put down was perfect...how many times out of 10 do you think he executes like he did?

Here's my best shot at defending this... The shift made sense initially because Hinske really doesn't go the other way -- look at his hit chart on MLB.com, at Fenway he doesn't hit anything down the third base line. When he tried to bunt it down that way...maybe Ozzie was thinking Hinske was just trying to scare him into going back to a normal defense. But here's the thing: the man is a .198 hitter, just humor him. He's more likely to bunt for a hit like he did than actually get a hit. So my defense is, it made sense before the failed bunt. QUOTE(TLAK @ Jul 21, 2007 -> 08:04 AM) Look at Hinske's Fenway hitting chart for GB and Singles. On the season he has hit one ground ball and one single to the left side. It wasn't dumb, it just didn't work this time. Look at the location of the one single...think back to last night now...do you have it yet? That's his bunt single.

QUOTE(Steff @ Jul 20, 2007 -> 09:43 AM) Really?? I hated it from the start, and even moreso when I saw it in March. I just had a bad feeling. A "gut feeling" But then it seemed fine in April, which might be the worst thing that happened. Maybe something could have been done if they sucked from the start, but when we played the Yankees and Cubs in May, it was written off as a poor stretch. And then that stretch continued until...now. Back to 2005, Shingo sucked right from the start, so Hermy was brought in early enough that the team didn't miss a beat. But even still, what could KW have done in April? Nobody was available anyways...I guess it was just doomed to end up as a failed experiment. Lesson learned. QUOTE(Steff @ Jul 20, 2007 -> 09:45 AM) Oh, he definitely thought it would be fine and blew the comments & questions off every time they were brought up at Soxfest and in Arizona. I believe the phrase he used was "force to be reckoned with."

QUOTE(CWSGuy406 @ Jul 19, 2007 -> 09:40 PM) He's 25, has never been given a full year of at-bats but still has a career slugging percentage of .468. Tough to get into a groove when you're playing twice a week. But he sure does total strikeouts like an everyday player. Call it making up for lost time. What'd they say last night, 13 K's in his last 19 ABs heading into the game?

QUOTE(santo=dorf @ Jul 19, 2007 -> 10:07 PM) He doesn't earn his PT and it shouldn't just be given to him. He is a complete hack and liability in the OF. The Reds didn't have a DH spot and Ortiz is doing just fine as the DH for the Blow Sox. Another good point. The reason the Reds never made him an everyday player to give him a chance to "get in a groove."

QUOTE(BigSqwert @ Jul 20, 2007 -> 09:31 AM) Speak for yourself. I thought it was too 1 dimensional. But I'm typically wrong in my predictions. I kind of was speaking for myself, but obviously there are two sides to every issue. I'm obviously not speaking for everyone, but I think I was kind of speaking for KW, too, but only in the lightest sense.

QUOTE(Steff @ Jul 20, 2007 -> 09:16 AM) In defense, no one had seen much from them and never would have guessed the s*** would have hit the fan so hard, much less ripped it from the ceiling. I didn't reallize how bad things really were until I saw it for myself in March. The idea of an all-flamethrowers pen sounded like a good idea, and looked OK in April. Nobody likes facing guys who come into the 6th inning throwing pitches at 96 mph. Like I said before, our hitters looked uncomfortable when Andy Sisco pitched against us, but they'd knock him around a bit. The first time I saw Sisco was early on in 2005...he was a 6-10 lefty throwing 93 with a low ERA at the time. the hitters looked bad but fared well, and if you look at his 2005 game log, he blew three saves in his first four appearances against the Sox and the Royals lost all four games. but he also struck out six Sox batters in those three innings.

QUOTE(greg775 @ Jul 20, 2007 -> 12:50 AM) And don't forget MacDougal. He was not beloved in Kansas City because of his wildness. It was truly foolish. We need a reliable veteran like Hermy was. MacD was the hope; but he is truly truly hopeless. that's why, shortly after the Cubs series, I threw David Weathers' name out there as a guy we should pursue if he were made available. Hermy has a 4.21 career ERA; Weathers' career mark is 4.33. not spectacular, but you know what you're getting, and that in itself is valuable. the bullpen we went into the season with had the potential to be great, but also to suck bad. they sucked bad, and there really wasn't a guy outside of Jenks you could point at and say he could be counted on.