Balta1701

Foo Fighters rickroll the westboro baptist church before one of their concerts

QUOTE (BigHurt3515 @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 09:40 PM) No, he needs to playing against everyone. We need to know what we have in him You will not know that based on the next 5 weeks.

:::applauds:::

Nice pitch. Cmon Carlos.

That was a helluva bunt.

Nicely done doubleT!!

I think about this like once a year. Seattle has the most offset-to-the-right center field camera in the bigs.

QUOTE (TheFutureIsNear @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 08:56 PM) I really don't want to trade Micah as much as most here. I'd much rather move him to LF and trade Avi if he really is a lost cause at 2B (although, i don't think he is) . Eaton and Micah at the top of the order should be a lethal combo for years to come. Avi + a young pitcher like Beck should be able to net us a useful piece that fits I assume. There is zero reason to think Micah is a lost cause at 2b and if Micah is a lost cause at 2b there's every reason to think his arm will make him a bigger failure in the OF given that he's already had a major surgery on a fairly weak throwing arm. If Micah Johnson can't be a 2b then it's extremely unlikely that Micah Johnson can be a big league regular.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 05:21 PM) I'm aware. What I've grown accustomed to doing when creating trade proposals is to try and evaluate the trade from the other team's (meaning not the White Sox) point of view in an effort to avoid being biased. I suppose, in this case, I was too unbiased. I agree, I wouldn't give up that kind of package for Arenado, but with the White Sox having so many "Decent but not great" infielders and the Rockies always needing pitching there might be a deal that could be done there. It does need both teams to do something they don't want to do - the White Sox giving up Q and the Rockies giving up their young stud, but both teams do have needs that could match up here. Q + Saladino? = Arenado might be the basics of something that makes sense to me. The Rockies give up their stud 3b but get back a stud starter, and the Rockies get a guy who can defensively handle 3b or SS and fill one of the infield spots they gave up? I'm note 100% sure I'd do that if I were the Rockies GM but I'd sure sit down and do the numbers on it.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 04:52 PM) Why would we expect his fastball to suddenly dissapear again? Clearly there was something wrong with him last year and right now everything suggests it was a one-time thing. However, he's still an unknown at the major league level and no doubt teams would be cautious about trading for him given his 2014 results. Our best bet is to give him a shot in 2016 and hope to turn him into a productive major league starting pitcher. He's definitely worth more to us than other clubs at the moment. Because I have absolutely no idea what it was last year so why should I assume it's a 1 time thing? I 100% agree with the solution though. Give him a shot in 2016 and see what he does. It's literally the only way we'll know.

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 04:24 PM) Personally, I think you find a way to get Johnson 7-8 starts at the big league level the rest of the way to see how his stuff looks this year. If he comes up and he's throwing 89-90 again, then you can't rely on him. And if he's throwing 93, does that mean you have 100% confidence he'll still have that fastball next year? Until he proves it, I wouldn't.

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 04:11 PM) If somehow Danks ( likely going nowhere) and Samardzija are still in the Sox plans for 2016, maybe the Sox look into trading Erik Johnson for a bat? Would allow the Sox to keep their youngest and most promising pitching prospects. With the volume of pitchers the White Sox have in the organization yes, I can definitely see them trading away more pitching to fill some of these roles...but here's the thing about EJ. Would you trade for him at full price based on this season? Would you trade for him and give up the value that you'd give up for a #2/#3 starter under team control for 5 years for him? I sure wouldn't. He's done good in AAA this year but his 2014 implosion still absolutely has to impact his trade value. If I'm trading for EJ, I'm trading for him because I think there's a good chance I'll get him at a bargain price. I'll give up the value of a back rotation starter for him, but I'm not giving you a king's ransom for him since I don't know that he'll succeed at the big league level given his struggles last year. If we want to turn EJ into a tradeable asset where you can get the full value for him, IMO, you've got to pitch him for a year at the big league level in 2016 and show that he's a big league pitcher. I wouldn't trade for him unless I knew he had established he was a big league pitcher. Or at least I wouldn't give up that much. He's a wild card at best in a trade, to me at least.

It was a while ago in this thread but I'm posting this LAT article here because it was posted here and someone specifically asked about the "don't these hunts support these populations in the wild" part of the Lion/Big Game hunting case. This is a really good article from the LA Times looking at the science behind these hunts. They strongly suggest that the areas where these hunts happen the most are the ones where the populations are the most endangered and that because the hunters want the biggest male lion as a trophy they're doing much more damage. This doesn't reflect things like the 60 minutes report about the hunting farms in Texas, but it makes a strong case that these hunts really are decimating the population.

QUOTE (jdupps @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 03:59 PM) Buehrle has a much better chance increasing his win total pitching for Toronto or St.Louis. Three more good years will get Mark close to 260 wins and a possible HOF induction. For personal reasons (Mark's dogs aren't allowed in Canada) I would be surprised if he signed there this offseason, but you're right, a competitor would be a really good spot for him. Like it or not, someone like the Yankees sounds like a good fit to me. He'll eat innings and they'll score. The Tigers could use a starting pitcher. The Red Sox, the Orioles, the Rangers - these teams that have had injuries in their rotation and could improve a lot by having 200 decent innings in the middle of the rotation - they'd be perfect fits and Mark darn well ought to get a couple years at $15 mil per year if he wants it.

QUOTE (flavum @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 03:11 PM) Of course on a day Davidson faced a future good major league pitcher, he goes 0-4 with 3 ks. Not sure what it means, but Viciedo is hitting .316 with Charlotte. Single and walk today. He should be good enough to hit great at AAA and his poor performance in the minors earlier this year was surprisng to me, so him hitting well at AAA doesn't tell me all that much. He's a guy with a .722 career OPS in the big leagues who is still not extremely old. You'd expect him to be a >.850 OPS hitter in the minors at this point.

QUOTE (Lip Man 1 @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 03:49 PM) No I'm talking about the offense overall being putrid. As other have posted anything you get offensively out of Sanchez is a bonus. he's in the starting lineup because of his defense which is also a real need for the team but you can't go with more than one of those type players unless you somehow get three or more more quality hitters for the lineup who can fill the blavk holes at DH, catcher, 3rd base for example. Those are historically power / RBI positions. Mark I don't think there's anything wrong with having a strong defender at 2b, but we need to acknowledge where the weaknesses is, and you're right, it's DH, 3rd base, and RF. I disagree with you with including "Catcher" as a black hole or as a historically power/RBI position. Catcher is an extremely weak position around baseball. Right now, the average OPS of catchers in baseball is .681. Shortstops are .678, 2nd basemen is .701. Catcher is, right now, the 2nd weakest hitting position in baseball. I genuinely don't care if we're below average at catcher, but we absolutely need better performance from RF, 3b, and DH. I think fixing this problem is a long term problem that won't happen over 1 year. I can't tell yet if Avi is part of the solution or part of the problem. For the last month he is genuinely showing some signs he's hitting better, but that could just be another fluke. I want to see him for another year in RF. 3b...I don't know if we have a solution in the organization. Michalczewski is showing promise but he's years away, we can't wait until 2020 to fill that spot with an above average hitter. I think that spot we genuinely need to look at the trade or FA situation, but I don't think we can do that yet. Todd Frazier could be a target but I don't trade for Todd Frazier while I'm still playing Avi in RF - it makes no sense to trade for near-FA sure things while playing Avi and Sanchez/Johnson at other positions, that was our mistake this year. I think with 3b the right solution is to find someone cheap who can just play the position for a season and then play for time to see what can become available, because I don't see a better option.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 03:31 PM) MJ wins $8.9 million jury award from Dominick's parent company. Will donate it to Chicago charities. All of it? That's nice. It was a pretty obvious case he'd win so I'm glad about the 2nd part.

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 03:22 PM) Really like your train of thought here and certainly agree with it. Always better to have multiple options. Micah and Montas could be a good trade combo to get an MLB 3B. I'd be ok with The roster showing Micah, Sanchez, Saladino, LaRoche, and a FA/traded 3b holding down the infield and the DH slot next year, throwing the 3 youngins to the wolves, and seeing what happens. 3b slot just do something to fill the role and add some depth unless we find a really good looking trade? Anyway, this is not what I expect the franchise to do. I expect them to bring Alexei back and keep Saladino at 3b, and I'm not sure what they'll do at SS. They'll have to do that to "compete" next year again just like this year. I would 100% not trade Montas yet. Every time someone expresses how they don't think his arm will last or will play and he responds by throwing more innings my brain flashes back to Max Scherzer. But that's me.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 02:52 PM) I mean they have teenagers working there checking the customers. The end result is going to be that they'll establish procedures for this and maybe even bring in equipment. Because if a company does this step and then a shooting does happen they've probably created a legal liability for themselves, so their insurance companies will force them to do so correctly.

QUOTE (Mike F. @ Aug 22, 2015 -> 11:10 AM) Who's ahead of him? Keuchel, Gray, and Price? Those 3 might be have a better shot than him now, but he's right behind them IMO. The ESPN predictor has Sale 7th. The list in front of him is kinda neat: Dallas Keuchel Sonny Gray Zach Britton Luke Gregerson Mark Buehrle Chris Archer Chris Sale

My fun hope for a solution? Play Saladino at SS next year. He hits slightly better than this year, puts up a .725-ish OPS or something like that, and combined with his defense we're talking about a young 3-4 WAR player. If Anderson still looks like a star at AAA next year...then suddenly we get to pick which trade asset we want to part with. Either the guy in the top 25 or the 2nd year player who just dropped a 3-4 WAR season as a solid SS. Either way, whatever guy we want to move could be the key to bringing in enough power to fill the 3b slot and really make over this lineup.

Chris Sale says F*** that S*** you're not scoring. That last pitch was mean.

Damn that was just terrible in every possible way.

Ok, Chris versus Felix. This is at least fascinating on paper.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Aug 21, 2015 -> 05:43 PM) How would you replace two starters from this rotation? Over how long of a time period? Because in the next ~1 season I've got Erik Johnson, Carson Fulmer, and Francellis Montas. That probably doesn't give me a strong 2016 rotation. But it could give me a dynamite 2017-2019 rotation.