clujer420

This would make no sense. Mark and Bartolo are going to be the only "veterans" on our staff (yes, Mark is only going to be in his 3rd full season, but he pitches like a guy who's been in the league 10 years). Why would you have a seasoned veteran like Sandy catching them? If anything, it will be the other way around. Having Miguel catch the veterans because they would be easier to work with, and Sandy catching the young guys to help them through tough situations in games.

I worded it weird, but if you read it carefully, what I said made sense. The .260 was his yearly average in the 2 years, along with 16 HR and 95 RBI (obviously combined). And those were his stats, not "if that even".

+ = the opposition's pitching coach and manager when their pitchers look for help from the mound while fireworks are lighting up the South Chicago sky. (this little guy is cute, by the way)

THAT I agree with. Nobody said it that way until you, and I'm glad you did. Frank does have a lot to prove, just like he did in 2000, and we all know what happened that year. But yes, if you are talking right this second, you'd have to go with Mags based off of last season's performances. But like you, I feel that Frank will definitely rebound and prove that he's one of the premier threats in the sport.

Profanity is a clear sign of a lack of intelligence. That's not talking s***, that's stating fact. And call me a "little b****" all you want -- I'm a well-informed fan who knows what he's talking about. The longer I'm here, the longer I will prove that. Back to the matter at hand...AGAIN, I'm not saying he should have been MVP. He couldn't get a clutch hit, but he wasn't the only one. The Sox had chances to win many games last season, and simply choked. We were horrible in 1-run games, and the Twins were great -- that's what the difference in the division was. .260 over the course of 2 years isn't a horrible average, buddy. Also, #9 hitters normally are sure outs -- that's how it is around baseball. Name me more than 2 or 3 #9 guys that strike fear into the opposition. There aren't many. Hell, he set an all-time Sox record for fielding percentage -- that's impressive. But that said, I too am glad he's gone.

Um...If Harris is at 2nd, and Jimenez is at SS, where does Jose go? Are you going to platoon one of our most important players (if you think he's not the catalyst to this offense, you haven't seen much Sox ball)? If so, the results will not be as good as they would be if he played a full-time position full-time. Having Jose at SS, Crede at 3rd, and Jimenez at 2B is going to be our best lineup. If you want Harris in the lineup, put him in CF in place of Aaron. Harris has more speed anyway, and like everyone's been saying, "all he has to do" is find his stroke in the majors, and we'll have a nice player on our hands.

With an argument like that, how can I argue? I'm begging for a half-way intelligent post that refutes what I've said so far about Clayton's stay with the Sox. One free of 10,000 .........'s, typos, and profanity. The presence of profanity further shows that you not only don't have anything important to say, but also that you're not very bright.

You're calling someone "Mr. Errors" after just 10 minutes ago saying the Sox would have been better off in 2001 and 2002 with Mike Caruso? LOL! Anyway, Jose might make a few too many errors, but what he brings to the team in his leadership and energy EASILY makes up for them. Plus, he's got a ton of pop in his bat. He's going to hit in front of Thomas, Mags, Paul, and Carlos, so he's going to see a ton of pitches that he can drive, and he's probably going to do just as well, if not better, than he's done that past 3 seasons. He's averaged 26 HR and 78 RBI since 2000 -- for a #2 hitter (and a SS), that's pretty darned good. 2B is a bit of a question mark, I agree. But, D'Angelo showed excellent patience last season, and if he can live up to some of his hype and potential that he was bombarded with when he was with the Yankees, he'll score a ton of runs for the '03 Sox.

I'm actually glad he's gone too. I think we're much better off with Valentin/Crede than we were last season with Valentin/Clayton, and Jose prefers SS to 3rd anyway. So he'll be happier, and Crede should provide much more offense than Royce did. But I'm not the one who brought his name up. When people stop trampling his name, my defense of him will stop, but not until then.

Did I say he was one of the top SS's in the game? No Did I say he was a model citizen or teammate? No What I did say is that he solidified the Sox up the middle, and that defense he provided saved many runs with diving stops and many good DP turns. And don't confuse "cocky" with "confident". He knew what he was capable of, and when the team stuck with him in 2001, he hit about .300 after the AS break, and may have done the same in 2002 if he hadn't been benched. And yes, it was well after the Sox were out of the race when it didn't matter anymore -- but that's not his fault. And also, I remember when he was benched. Wasn't that just days after Jerry announced that Clayton was going to remain the starting SS? I'd be pissed too if my boss did that to me.

Let's see... In Caruso's 2 years with the Sox, he hit about .280 with 7 HR and 90 RBI, struck out twice as much as he walked, and committed 59 errors. Compare that to Royce (.260, 16, 95, lots of K's, and 12 errors). Mike's average was higher, but when you factor in the errors, you definitely have to say Royce was better overall. Better off with Caruso? You've gotta be joking. oh geez us h rice......its a freakin joke.. what are you kla-ton in disguise ....give it a rest.. no one here likes the little asshole but cwsox so your preaching to the wrong choir...........lighten up ok............lol It doesn't matter to me if you dislike the guy -- but dislike him for the right reasons, not because he "cost the Sox the pennant", or something absurd like that. We weren't going to win in 2001 or 2002, even if he had hit .300.

I'm actually not a fan of his. But, I've seen him get ripped enough, and I'm sick of it. We didn't win in 2001 because we got decemated by injuries, and the guys who stepped in did not step up. We didn't win in 2002 because we were cocking coming into the season because we were "heathy", and when things started to go bad, Frank got bombarded by the media (largely his fault, yes), and then the chemistry of the team was killed. Keith fell out of favor with the team (something MUST have happened that we didn't hear about, because a closer of his caliber doesn't get benched for 2 or 3 bad games unless something else is going on), and by the time the team found it's stride, it was 3 months too late. Now that Royce is gone, he's the easy target, and it's unfortunate. Just say what happened - the whole team lost, and it wasn't because of 1 person. It's NEVER because of 1 person. We win as a team, and we lose as a team.

Let's see... In Caruso's 2 years with the Sox, he hit about .280 with 7 HR and 90 RBI, struck out twice as much as he walked, and committed 59 errors. Compare that to Royce (.260, 16, 95, lots of K's, and 12 errors). Mike's average was higher, but when you factor in the errors, you definitely have to say Royce was better overall. Better off with Caruso? You've gotta be joking.

I didn't know intelligence was a pre-requisite for an athlete. He's got baseball smarts, and that's all that counts out there on the field. I wouldn't want him tutoring me in Calculus, but if I need someone to show me the fundamentals of playing shortstop, he'd be high on my list.

Worried about SS? Why? Jose's gonna do just fine. The positions we need to worry about are CF (Aaron needs to step-up and put up decent numbers), 3rd (Joe's first full season, and he won't be facing some of the September call-up scrubby pitchers that he faced last seasn), and our #5 starter (we're either going to have a rookie in Rauch or a veteran on their last legs in Loaiza or Heredia).

Poor Royce. He's gotten so much flack for his performance while he was with the Sox, and it's really unfortunate IMO. His average in 2 years with the Sox was .260, with 16 HR and 90 RBI (in the #9 hole, keep in mind). He had a fielding percentage of almost 99%, and saved many runs with plays that shortstops before him wouldn't have made (like Mike Caruso, ugh). Sure, he struck out a bit much (135 in those 2 seasons), but he wasn't nearly as bad as some people make him sound. Compare his K's (in 2001 and 2002 combined) to Magglio (147), Frank (127 in a little more than 1 season), Paulie (161), and Carlos (158). Hell, Ray struck out almost that much every year. Sure, Royce was no A-Rod or Jeter (or even Tejada or Nomar), but he did what he was brought in for -- to solidify us defensively up the middle. The Sox did poorly in 2001 and 2002, but it wasn't because of Royce Clayton, as much as some of you would like to make him the scapegoat.

Snippy? Me? Heh, if you think that was snippy, you're gonna have to get to know me a little better. Anyway, someone said it was "unfortunate" that a rookie catcher with power, average, speed, and good defense -- granted, at the AA level, but you can't hold that against him -- is going to be contending for the starting role. You've gotta start sometime, and it seems like the Sox feel he's ready to be in the bigs full-time this year. As far as Sandy goes...I would agree that he should be the starting catcher if he wasn't so injury-prone. It seemed last year that he couldn't catch more than 2 or 3 games in a row without needing to sit down and rest. That is unacceptable in today's game. And with either Olivo or Paul, they are going to need regular work in order to get into a rhythm. Playing sparingly doesn't bode well with youngsters (in most cases -- see Jeff Leifer if you need evidence of that). I say send Paul down to AAA (or trade him, I don't care much for him anyway), and keep Olivo and Sandy on the team. Have Sandy "mentor" Miguel, as planned, and give 75-80% of the starts to Miguel. Of course, if Miguel is hitting .220 with 4 HR and 13 RBI at the end of May, then you're obviously going to have to re-evaluate things.

On January 23rd, ESPN.com had an article previewing the Sox, and it listed their opening day payroll of '03 at $57.1M -- I assume that's current and up-to-date, but it may not include the contract we gave Koch.

It looks good now, but will look even better if there's a picture like that in ST of 2004. Assuming all goes well in 2003, Reinsdorf needs to open his piggy bank and sign both Colon and Buehrle to multi-year contracts. Our payroll is somewhere around $60M (I think) for this season, compared to about $150M for the Yankees. Now, it's absurd to spend THAT much, but if the Sox would just spend half that, we'd be playing late in October every season.

f***, why does it f***ing matter what f***ing color the f***ing chairs and f***ing wall is? I mean, f***.

Someone ate too many burgers and fries, and then worked out for the first time in a while (likely), pushed himself too far, and died -- what the hell are you talking about "greater plans" for?

If this stuff is as "deadly" as you're saying, then the people taking it have to be responsible and either stop taking it, or deal with the consequences of taking it. Early on, this was not possible because it wasn't as obvious that it's dangerous (and I don't know if it is or not, nor do we know if he was even taking the stuff, but I'm saying it is and that he did for the sake of this discussion). But now there is awareness, and people need to take notice of it. The person I feel bad for is his wife and yet-born child. He was a 23 year old guy -- plenty old to be able to make the right decision. It's unfortunate that he had to take something to make him lose weight -- a little discipline is all a person needs to stay in good shape (unless they "have a thyroid problem").

Unfortunately, yes. What's your problem with Miguel? Unless you've seen him play in the minors and know something that the rest of us know, I think making a comment like that is absurd. His stats last season were really good, and it sounds like he's got a legitimate chance at being a solid player. He's got speed, and supposedly he's very good defensively. Not only that, he hits for average and he's got pop in his swing. When did all those things become "unfortunate"?

Kenny was sucking it up after his excellent start, and Ray was in the last year of his contract, and would not have been re-signed by the Sox (the Giants are paying him way more than the Sox could afford). So basically, we've got Aaron Rowand and Bartolo Colon (we're paying him with the money Ray WOULD have got with us) instead of an old Kenny Lofton and Ray Durham. I like where we are MUCH better.

Believe me, I hope both have great seasons. In order for the Sox to be successful, they're going to have to. Maybe they'll get co-MVP's. I wonder if that's ever happened with teammates?