Princess Dye

We need a lefthanded bat, and options aren't exactly brimming over at this point The only thing that worries me if any permutation of this roster finalizing will involve some Viciedo time at 3b If we ...have to, I actually would be fine with leaving pitching/defense where it is......going forward with what we have....and then seeing midway through the year if once again we can make bigger improvements once other teams have their outlook change (which netted us Youk, Liriano)

Contreras' being fixed had the biggest impact, but it might be argued that Loaiza and Thornton were actually the more impressive reclamation projects since El Titan was legendary as far as past success

America's Favorite New Game Show...Willlllll Coop Fix 'Em! Daniel Cabrera, thanks for playing our game John Van Benschoten, we have some lovely parting gifts for you

Adding A-Rod and Keppinger for 3b/2b is an undeniable upgrade over the total worth we got from 3b/2b last year. So while this is all just in theory and assuming ok to decent health -- yes, of course.

To be clean as apple pie strikes me as odd

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Jan 22, 2013 -> 02:37 PM) There are a few people who would want to be there, but Wrigleyville isnt really any sort of tourist destination. Its basically a s***ty version of State Street or any other college campus main drinking area. Far more prefer to be groped by the d-bags who hang out at, say, Carol's in uptown than the ones who hang out in Wrigleyville

QUOTE (floridafan @ Jan 18, 2013 -> 03:39 PM) I am not sure what you are trying to say. But if it is a problem with folks that I update my sons progress and/or setbacks I will stop. I don't want to make any waves for anyone, especially my son. We have an "Adopt-a-Prospect" section of the message board, where any poster who wants to 'adopts' a prospect and just tracks their progress. and I just thought it'd be funny if the actual father of a prospect ACTUALLY adopted the prospect in that part of the forum. That's all. No malice intended(and it is really cool we have you here, keep participating!)

There'd be something very "meta" about floridafan were he to go and participate in the "Adopt-a-Prospect" forum. Or shall we say, it'd be redundant were he to do so

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 18, 2013 -> 10:25 AM) Just disregard the guy the Sox got for him helped them win a WS. Can't posters find something legitimate to complain about? That wasn't my point at all. The only point there was that we can develop someone (which sadly some--maybe not you--tend to not believe). The trade with SEA was great, we'd all do it 100x over.

Mike Morse. Former White Sox prospect, who was busy here developing at the same time the organization was taking Brian Anderson and, as some here would insist, were ruining him. Because they're so bad at developing people.

that little angry near-fetus on the youtube's gonna be thrice pissed now

FICKEL IS EINHORN

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 9, 2013 -> 02:32 PM) Biggio got about 70% this year. Do people really think that Frank will have less first ballot support than Craig Biggio? The only guy who dominated that era more than Frank is Griffey, and I think Griffey will be a guy who is famous for being up around 99% of the vote. The argument can also be made that Biggio being left out HURTS Frank's chances... in that it shows how serious they are about getting a message sent about the entire era. A pal of mine was just saying that the Biggio thing terrifies him about Frank's prospects (b/c Craig is not some predictable roider name that should have been punished). And if you want to keep it to sluggers, also consider Piazza. Greatest hitting catcher ever? Not a first balloter. This happened sans proof. Frank is also a sans-proof guy. Meanwhile Frank has his years of DHing (likely not an issue on its own) and now an era's stigma to battle.

Since Detroit is better than the Sox, I think it's perfectly natural to expect bounces to go their way. If they don't then that will be the surprise. And we'll welcome it.

We're waiting while others set the market It's a way to get deals, and in the MLB you have to make savvy deals (even if you are a big spender) It's not cheapness, it's what puts you over the top. To manage your resources the best way possible. We can look at the teams that made huge fast moves and played 0 postseason games. It's time to be smart

By this metric, Marko Jaric is on permanent NBAJam fire mode despite being out of the league

Kubel definitely has a role here. Platoon with Viciedo as well as insurance for what is now to-be-expected PK time off

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Dec 29, 2012 -> 05:06 PM) I still don't get why people think we are so far away from the Tigers. We outscored them by 22 runs last year, while only allowing 6 more runs. We were pretty much even with them last year in terms of production. Honestly, if Thornton doesn't blow 10+ games and Ventura doesn't make some major rookie mistakes, we could have won the division. And IMO the only guys who really overachieved last year were A.J., Rios, & Quintana. Dunn & Konerko sucked in the 2nd half, Ramirez had a bad year, and we didn't get much from Viciedo and Beckham. Sure, Peavy & Sale gave us excellent years, but they're both very talented pitchers. They could break down this year, but so could Verlander and the rest of the Tigers' pitching staff. I just think the two teams are a lot closer than most people think. The Sox need their Dunn/Rios bounceback years to hold. We're 10 months removed from relentlessly ripping these guys 24/7 here. Sox need Konerko's age to not be a problem. They added a guy in Kepp who needs his career year to repeat, just to match what Youk gave us. Lets also not forget Peavy can't be guaranteed to be that same rock as last year, nor are we sure what we'll get from John Danks. As far off years that could return to the mean, we basically have Alexei and that's it. There are plenty of reasons to feel big change is still needed. Last year's team can't play for us next year.

QUOTE (soxfan49 @ Dec 28, 2012 -> 12:11 PM) I don't know if it's been mentioned in this thread, but how about Berkman as a LH bat? He might be a bit costly, but he could DH and play 1B with a very slim chance of playing some RF. It should be interesting to see what he costs. Every year there are a few guys at the end of free agency that for whatever reason slipped into a lower than value contract. Hm. One would think that for what he costs, he'd be going to a team that can play him DH/1B every day.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Dec 28, 2012 -> 11:24 AM) Even less so... Well the thing with internet versus thrown-at-you media..... there's just more of everything. That includes the irrelevant as well as the relevant. So here the tradeoff is we have MORE expert statistical analysis, more attention to farm system, etc. than the radio can provide. But we also have MORE utter foolishness, crap, etc. And there's no gatekeeper here to hang up on a caller (though we can edit/block each other some)

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Dec 28, 2012 -> 10:27 AM) Scandalous. Sports radio must really be dying if they have to spend time talking about girlfriends on the team plane. One more thought: you post on a sports message board. If sports radio is mired in the irrelevant, we're all here are wading in it right next to 'em.

I do respect what AJ did on the field. But like with anyone else, it's just the amount of respect his overall play deserves and nothing more. You really put your pitcher in a bind when you are not a threat to throw people out at second. Last year has to be called an aberration in this regard, since we have a large sample size to go off. And Flowers might not be the answer for that either, but it's time to solidify that spot defensively. It's very rough to constantly have a catcher that is inflating his BA by swinging at everything, and then NOT having the defensive component either. Because we love AJ the player, we tend to like him more than we should. Again, last year has to be seen as an aberration or we are fooling ourselves. The guy we know is a guy who swings a ton (to just get to, say, .280 avg), lets walks be damned, and thus lets opposing pitchers extend their stay in games.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Dec 28, 2012 -> 10:27 AM) Scandalous. Sports radio must really be dying if they have to spend time talking about girlfriends on the team plane. The importance of the story very obviously is not up for debate. This is a story I enjoy, and I thank them for it.

Just got an email from a pal who listened. His synopsis: Last season Robin allowed girlfriends to fly on the charter jet on road trip. Apparently wives were only allowed with Ozzie. All season long, AJ openly complained about this, sometimes in front of said gf's. This pissed a lot of the single Sox off big time.

I'm hoping someone will. I had to turn off my audio and am going to catch the podcast whenever it comes up