Balta1701

QUOTE (StRoostifer @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 05:16 PM) You were saying... If a guy puts up a .380 OBP at Birmingham and a .312 OBP at a higher level, the assumption that his full year's numbers are meaningful is absolutely laughable. The only way a person could write that is if they have no understanding of the fact that AAA ball is higher than AA ball.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 05:11 PM) I see his overall OBP as .353, is that incorrect? No. However, you don't understand how baseball works. You see, there are different levels in baseball. There is such a thing known as "minor leagues" where a combination of young players and guys who aren't good enough to play in the big leagues play baseball games during the year. A typical baseball organization will have 6-7 different levels including 1 big league team and 5-6 "minor league teams". These minor league teams are given different names based on their skill levels. The lowest level teams are Rookie ball and "A" ball. At higher levels are AA and AAA ball. Guys who perform well at one level will often move up to a more difficult level. Thus, if you see a guy like Andy Wilkins who puts up a .380+ OBP at AA ball and .312 at AAA during the same season...those numbers should be broken apart because the 2nd number was performed against higher level talent. You should attempt to familiarize yourself with how minor league systems are structured before commenting. Very few people who are at AA ball and perform worse during their first visit to AAA ball will immediately start playing better in the big leagues than they did at AAA ball. Major league baseball talent is much, much better than AAA level talent and MUCH MUCH better than AA level talent. Therefore you should not project that a guy who put up a .312 OBP at AAA will put up a .350 OBP at a big league level until he takes a step forward at AAA.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 05:09 PM) Wilkins is 24 y.o. whether he was on the OD day roster or is brought up in July, it's immaterial to his development. You have truly reached a new low.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 05:03 PM) Pillars, no, but you don't think this team has room for a 24 y.o. left-handed hitter that put up a .350 obp last year? Andy Wilkins's OBP at Charlotte was .312.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 05:04 PM) Wilkins has more value to this team going forward than Dunn does. Which is why he should be playing every day at Charlotte to see if his value going forward can be turned into something non-zero. And any situation that has a 1b jumping from putting up a .735 OPS at Charlotte to starting at the big leagues is a bald-faced attempt to screw up the team and the player long-term.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 04:36 PM) I hear ya, but his fate has been sealed for a bit now it seems. I get the Konerko re-signing, but this roster a week before the opener is a mess for a team that is rebuilding. Guys like Danks and Wilkins are guys they should be finding AB's for. Instead they want to keep Dunn in an attempt to save an insignificant amount of dollars. Andy Wilkins reached Charlotte last year for the first time and put up a .735 OPS in 234 PA's. There should have been no foreseeable circumstance through which Andy Wilkins should have been able to hit his way into a big league roster position during spring training in 2014. The only reason a guy like him should wind up on any big league roster is multiple injuries at a single position amongst both the starter and backup options, neither of which happened for the White Sox. If he had a good spring it could be a positive sign and perhaps he will be able to earn himself a shot at the bigs during the first half. Wilkins at Charlotte starting at 1b is right where he belongs and there is simply no rational person who could say otherwise.

QUOTE (sammy esposito @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 02:56 PM) Seems like a decent catcher and leadoff hitter are 2 highly prized commodities in MLB. Now that we have Eaton DeAza and DeAza's below average play at the #1 spot and lack of defensive prowess has made him expendable. A leadoff hitter is not all that common. He may very well do well with a different role on a different team he could be a lh off the benchf for a national league team. Maybe they have a catcher we could use. Look, we're not going to be a major league quality catcher for De Aza unless we target guys at the low/mid A-ball level that are multiple years away. We're just not going to. Apparently they're willing to run him out there as a backup, I would not have been, but they've made their call. I'd personally have taken "best available offer" eitehr right before training camp started or right now.

Actor in a whole lot of things, most recently "Homeland", James Rebhorn has died.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 02:44 PM) Watch the debris end up being flotsam and debris from the Japanese earthquake/tsunami (Virtually impossible in this area, fwiw. If you'd gone the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami however...)

QUOTE (buhbuhburrrrlz @ Mar 23, 2014 -> 02:03 PM) haven't they been spotting debris for a couple of days. still nothing to show for it. By the time debris is "spotted" by a satellite, the images are downlinked, processed, and then recognized and released, the currents have had the chance to move material by 10's of kilometers, and then there's still no guarantee that large floating objects arent' just something broken off of or discarded from a boat in that ocean. Then it takes hours to plan a flight to the area, several hours to get there, and then this area off the coast of Australia is so far out that the planes can only search for a couple hours before they have to turn around.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Mar 22, 2014 -> 10:00 PM) New reports that debris has been spotted closer to Australia. If that's where they find the plane, crazy that they didn't even think to look the for the first week. Apparently the fact that it's been nearly 2 weeks is enough such that floating debris in this area could have been moved several hundred kilometers by the ocean currents. There is also a potential tropical storm forming on the edge of these possible areas.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 22, 2014 -> 12:23 AM) Yes, I know all of that. We've been saying it about Trayce Thompson for 2-3 years and he's never really turned the corner to get to the other side. He could "make" the major leagues somehow...eventually...in the same way that Jared Mitchell might end up getting AB's if we lose or trade Jordan Danks, but not as anything resembling a real or true impact player. Trayce still only just turned 23 a week ago. We've been talking about him forever but he's still not "old" for AA/AAA.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 22, 2014 -> 01:25 PM) That's not a good solution. They would have been better off with Dee Gordon. They went after a guy they thought was a better fielder at the position.

QUOTE (Stan Bahnsen @ Mar 22, 2014 -> 11:03 AM) I wonder if they'll continue to start Leesman, or just prepare him for the inevitable LOOGY role. May depend on their desire to see someone else get starts in Charlotte. Beck, most likely if they choose to be aggressive. Looks like Webb could be there too, if Cleto is given an MLB shot. If he has to switch to throwing 5 pitches, can he pick up a few extra mph?

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Mar 19, 2014 -> 10:39 AM) Have I just not really noticed in past years, or are the Bears busier than usual this year? They had to be. They simply had more needs this year than last

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Mar 20, 2014 -> 03:08 PM) On this board, it works both ways. You have guys like SS2k5 that belittle each and every one of their prospects, but you also have the fathoms who think every schmuck they acquire will be the next big thing that'll propel the Cubs to multiple titles and tear the Sox asunder. Some of those guys are going to be good, but the way to really turn it into success is to identify the guys who won't be and use them as trade chips before they're exposed. That simply hasn't happened so far...and we've gotten to watch a couple of their guys seemingly have their value drop significantly in the bigs already. Maybe they'll recover that value this year, but they've already put themselves in a bind. They've got guys like Castro and Rizzo signed, filling positions, and coming off down years. They can't move them easily to fill holes now because they already committed to them...but then they have other guys coming up who could be most valuable at the same positions. And on top of that...they simply don't have a "full roster" on their way up. They could have 4 of these guys turn into all stars and still wind up at the bottom of the NL Central because their pitching is that weak. They're relying on finding it elsewhere as of now, and that may not happen unless they trade someone. Personally if I were in Theo's position, I would have picked the guy from their system I thought the least likely to succeed and put him on the table for either Price or Scherzer right now in order to get that pitcher signed and extended long term. It's a gamble but it would guarantee me getting the top of my rotation covered.

QUOTE (Baron @ Mar 19, 2014 -> 08:22 PM) http://m.mlb.com/video/v31589055/laacws-ab...ry=Jose%2BAbreu Jose Abreu's HR Man this guys balance at the plate is a thing of beauty. I want to see his swing from the side.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Mar 15, 2014 -> 08:25 PM) NFL contracts are never what they seem. Only 7.5 million of that is guaranteed. He will only count 3.5 million against the Packers salary cap. So it's basically a one year deal. Of course, he'll then count $2 million against their cap the next 2 years or so too.

QUOTE (The Ultimate Champion @ Mar 15, 2014 -> 08:12 PM) That would be a terrible gamble my friend. Dunn as a FA right now is lucky to get $2M. Hell, he'd be lucky to even get a guaranteed MLB contract. Check Thome, Jim for a recent example of a better hitter with a better career coming off a better season & still no one wants him. And what's Thome now anyway? 40 or so? Jim Thome still is a better hitter than Adam Dunn, no bulls***, I'd absolutely f***ing bet on it. And Thome's a better leader too and actually gets it. Baseball brain vs. donkey brain. Dump Adam & make the DH spot the Paulie & Jimmy farewell tour instead. Which reminds me of how we needed to get lazy Jim Thome off the roster for the fact that he never changed up how he approached things at the plate and instead we needed a gamer like Mark Kotsay on the roster.

QUOTE (Brian @ Mar 15, 2014 -> 06:24 PM) I don't want to be an asshole but that baggage is something I'm not sure I could deal with. Now I feel like an asshole because her daughter is cute and didn't do anything wrong. I'm a softy. I figured you meant she was married.

QUOTE (SCCWS @ Mar 15, 2014 -> 06:50 PM) SS can also be overrated. The Red Sox have won 3 World Series since 2004. In those 10 years, they have started 9 different shortstops. Of course, a notable counterpoint is the Yankees having won 5 world series since 1995 and in those years they started 1 shortstop.

QUOTE (flavum @ Mar 15, 2014 -> 02:05 PM) I'm not high on Cervelli for Beckham straight up, but I'd like to see Beckham moved before opening day. Let Semien start, and see how it goes while Sanchez and Johnson are playing in the minors. Hopefully by July, everyone is playing well enough, and they can trade Alexei and move Semien to SS. I continue to think that the idea Marcus is ready and would benefit from a starting role in the majors in April is dubious at best, and I really dislike the concept of starting him at 2b, keeping him at 2b full time for half a season, and then moving him to a much tougher position.

Just had someone yell the N-word out the window of their car at me while I was biking home tonight. Stay classy Knoxville.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Mar 14, 2014 -> 06:13 PM) Its possible. IMO Flowers is worthless to this franchise but hey, what do I know. I'd be surprised if even a solid spring is enough to put Phegley starting in the bigs after how he ended last year, but if he hits at Charlotte like he did last year he will be back soon.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Mar 14, 2014 -> 05:43 PM) I fully believe Gilespie is the starting3B opening day and Phegley will end up as the starter at some point. However Davidson will replace Connor eventually. This all makes sense to me. With Flowers, Beckham, Gillaspie, De Aza, the sox have a bunch of guys they might clear out from the lineup in the near future don't they?