chitownsportsfan

Well how can you be that confident after only 45 games! Maybe you should join the WS scouting crew! I'm just fucking with you dude; we all have a tendency to enjoy the smoke we blow up our own asses including myself. We should all be more humble in our predictions about the Sox and their players.

Ray I'm going to ask you again to never, ever respond to me. 99.9% of your posts in reply to me are ad hominem attacks in which you insert absurd cut outs of my post history and put words into my mouth. I have you on ignore but sometimes it glitches and shows when you respond to me. Just stop, just put me on ignore and we'll never have to cross paths. Thank you. And for the record, go through my posts and you will find the vast majority made since this season started, the vast majority, have no personal attacks and debate the substance of arguments about players and the Sox. I'm actively working on bettering myself, but when you respond to me with your absurdities it doesn't make it easy not to just rip the fuck out of you. So please, don't give me the temptation.

Worry about this if they make the playoffs. Until then order doesn't really matter. I don't think Kopech is going to be throwing 100 pitches (or even 90) anytime before August, that just seems like the program they have for him and that's fine given that the rotation looks like a solid unit even without him right now.

You've done the same thing endlessly projecting Madrigal as the 2nd coming of Nellie Fox. That's what makes it fun you know, the debate. Jesus Christ enjoy the process of talking with Sox fans on a message board!

I'm hardly any taller than Nick but I'm not in a profession where height and size and the power that usually comes with that matters. So it's fair to point out his weakness when it comes to athletic performance imo. Some of the other height stuff is just good natured ribbing and maybe the other bit is mean spirited. I really haven't seen too much of the latter here. Nick certainly needs to get on a weight training program and transform his body over the next couple years. He's never going to be Aaron Judge, but he can certainly be Altuve size. If it takes some vitamins to get there, well fucking get them. Most other guys are.

Twinkie Town's dislike of Colome is hilarious. Not like Henricks has been lights out but moving on from Alex looks smart early.

Wouldn't be a very fun message board if we had to wait until it was "acceptable" to talk about a player's performance. What you think we should aim for before we can discuss a player's performance? Maybe 5 years, hell, maybe retirement? Then we will really have the full picture.

As Tango's numbers show it's a trifling penalty over a regular out. Largely because you can't hit into a double play when you strikeout. Strikeouts simply are not much worse than a regular out and Tango's work shows that quite clearly, imo of course.

Nice, we'll take it.

Yes they are. Quite good in fact. About 3x as valuable as a single.

I'm not foolish enough to make bold predictions about how good he will be in the future, things can change. What I will say is that so far he is nothing as advertised and you can use the eye test or metrics or both to say that with quite a bit of confidence. And to answer your prior question of COURSE that is what we were sold by scouting reports, the White Sox FO and the media. Like, he wasn't advertised as a toolsy freak like TA boom or bust type. He was a low ceiling high floor pick.

Well we've been over this but when you are sold a bill of goods and the bill of goods turns out to be entirely different than what you ordered people will get upset with the seller. We were sold a high floor, "once a lifetime" baseball IQ and a rock solid defense. None of those things to this point have been fulfilled. His hitting is as advertised, everything else isn't even close.

A good reminder of how much base running matters, or at least how much it matters for a player on the margins of being useful.

As @Tony and I were saying last night that's a pretty cool man management decision from TLR and something I don't think the previous two "players' managers" would have made. He has enough clout to do that and then mention it to the media, which I think is helped by his "player managers" he has. I wonder if Jose talked to Yermin and then Tony and they made the decision after some deliberation. Yea he should have caught the ball but his 2B also shouldn't have aimed it at his big toe. Just take the rest of the day off and go get'em tmr might not have been the worst idea there.

The farce is making the manager wear a mask in what is one of the most rigorously tested environments in the world. But we have turned masks in outside settings into a dogma and not anything about safety. One could argue it reduces risk sure, but then again so would cancelling the entire season and sitting in a locked room. We are at the point where we have to recalibrate risk in vaccinated and controlled environments and it doesn't seem like some people can quite grasp the appropriate level of caution, including on outdoor mask usage.

.2 fWAR in 47 games. That's awful and it is because he is literally one of the worst 2B in baseball over that period with the glove. We see that on a near daily basis play out for the pitching staff. He needs to figure it out or he's a 1 WAR player, aka a career backup.

You and the Thanksgiving turkey have a lot of faith in the past. Too much. Improbable events happen all the time, and we should prepare for them. Doesn't make them likely, in fact it doesn't even mean they will happen, but it sure as shit doesn't make people that point out the possibility wrong. I am indeed a thinker my friend, and I'm humbled in my middle age to know that I could be wrong 99 times out of 100 on Jose and still have been right to consider the possibility that he will one day be like the fat and thriving Thanksgiving Turkey in Nassim's allegory turned into a pile of stuffing right as he reached his physical peak. I sought out Jose's autograph his rookie year because as a thinker, I saw his Cuban stats and his swing and his quiet charm and thought this guy can be a star. My signed ball is worth maybe 50-75 dollars now, but it means more to me as a symbol of time and the ebb and flow of fortune to ever sell or part with. I hope one day that ball is worth a million or more, and you know what? I hope he proves me dead wrong on his decline, not only for the ball's worth, but to prove sometimes time doesn't make a fool of us all.

Great post and I agree, a total mixed bag but some stuff matters more than others and just keeping guys on an even keel and letting their talent show is going to mean much more than just some tactical mistakes with the bullpen or lineup over the course of the year. Always appreciate your insights.

You should read up on Nassim Taleb's thanksgiving turkey. Mofo just gets fatter and fatter, in fact it seems like his growth can't ever be stopped -- they just keep feeding him, good times are rolling, and then one fucking day *boom*, poor sod is all chopped up and down to zero pounds. What this means of course is that inductive reasoning, or more simply, basing the future based on the past, is inherently flawed. But hey, dunk on us thinkers.

That's really interesting. It's the sorta move that not only would I think most of us not be any sort of privy to it's the sort of move you'd expect from the previous manager but not from the "emotionally unavailable" drunk old guy. It's fascinating to me. I'm one who ripped the move at the time, but now in context with his comments I'm inclined to trust the old man's move. If nothing else, TLR is a guy that gets what it means to be a pro ball player. I'm really not sure our two previous managers had any fucking clue. Ozzie did, at least for awhile.

Alright going to play some frisbee on a glorious night in the PNW, enjoy the game guys go Sox!

Robinson Cano mode activated! God I love that swing.

Hey fellas, if I wanted to watch a Dodgers game I'd watch a Dodgers game.

To be fair Nick is still used to the 60 foot T Ball basepaths he only stopped playing last year.

Nick Madrigal isn't a MLB 2B, I think that's obvious. That's absolutely horrific.