NorthSideSox72

After a disappointing 2012, Leighton has been released by the Sox.

QUOTE (danman31 @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 01:55 PM) 17 White Sox releases on BA's minor league transactions. Jon Gilmore the biggest name, but Nick Ciolli, Leighton Pangilinan and a pair of foreign pitchers (Darwin Matos and Leopoldo Sanchez) were among the notable names. Mostly guys from rookie ball. We'll see more as the offseason continues. A little surprised on Ciolli, but the OF was awfully crowded in the minors. They released 6 outfielders (though Gilmore was more of a 3B until recently). Should help clear the lanes for the actual OF prospects in the system.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 10:26 AM) This would make sense if the administration didn't blame the video and falsely report a protest occurred before the attack. That's the problem - wouldn't you want to claim it's a terrorist attack before you contend it was just a reaction to a video? In either case you're reporting something before all the facts come in. That was my issue with it. They started off basically calling it a response attack when it reality it was a straight up terrorist attack. As to 4., the US embassy in Cairo basically made an apology for the video. The admn can deny there was ever approval to send it, but that's bulls***. That's a philosophy of this administration, starting from his first days in office when he went around the world apologizing for Bush. Yes, I agree with you, he has a different style than Bush, and in some ways I agree with the change. But any hint of apologizing for an American expressing his free speech rights is bulls***. So yes, condemn the attacks, but do that first. Don't qualify it with "yeah, we're sorry some Americans are douchebags. We understand." Well first, there was a protest - that turned out to be a diversion. So there it was. Also, I have no problem with the US apologizing for certain things. The way I see it, its as if that crazy uncle in your family (all of us have one of those I think) did something incredibly dumb to one of your neighbors. So you say to the neighbors, hey listen, sorry about moron over there. We can't control everything he does, and I realize it was less than ideal for him to piss all over your Christmas decorations last night. Our apologies. Notice how, nowhere in there, is anyone apologizing for THE FAMILY? They are apologizing for the moron. Just like in this case. No one apologized for free speech, or American principles... they apologized for the embarrassing behavior of their crazy uncle. I have no issue with that at all.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 10:25 AM) I guess we will find out if prices really did keep fans from the park or if they will find another excuse to not attend games. Well, there is one other factor that is going to be a big detriment to them next year: the Red Line construction. The 35th street station will be closed for some period of weeks or months during the summer next year.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 10:07 AM) They are being smart. The more season ticket packages they sell, the more single game tickets they will sell if the team is halfway successful. Hopefully, they will also step away from Dynamic Pricing. The more empty seats someone sees on television, the less likely they are to buy a ticket even if the team is playing well. Full-Season Ticket Packages: Outfield Reserved - Dropping 30% Bleachers - Dropping 32% Premium Upper Box - Dropping 17% Upper Box - Dropping 28% Upper Reserved - Dropping 17% The one thing to wonder is does this mean they are dropping payroll by the same percentage or higher? Are those official numbers? Where did you see that? And yeah, this probably means it is unlikely the team will increase payroll, or even keep it the same this year.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 08:47 AM) Go read the transcript of that speech man. He says "act of terror" 5 minutes into his speech and it's only a general reference like "these acts of terror won't stand." The point isn't that he did or did not say it was an act of terrorism with all the details that very morning. I get that, and Romney was dumb for pushing it. What's been lost here, and ignored by you, is the administration total political hackery that occurred over the next weeks, when they decided it was better foreign policy to blame a youtube video for inciting an attack than to just call it what it was from the rose garden speech forward. It's incredibly sad that you're holding onto this belief that it was definitive when his own press secretary couldn't say that it was a terrorist act the following day. Instead they made it seem like it was just some spontaneous reaction. 1. President Obama's leadership style is very different from W's - Obama actually prefers to get the facts and see the whole picture before shooting off about something important. I would say this is a good thing, not a bad thing. It isn't political hackery - if they had gone off the handle about their best guess right then and there, now that would be political hackery. 2. The idea that "all the details" were known by the next morning, only hours after the attacked, is ridiculous. That just isn't even possible. 3. No one is holding onto the belief that the "act of terror" line was "definitive". It was what it was - a general statement, which is exactly what was required in that situation. 4. Why do you keep touting this idea that the US foreign policy is bend over and apologize? It is completely unfounded in anything resembling fact.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 09:36 AM) jon greenberg ‏@espnchijon White Sox being more aggressive this year, with single-game tix in corners going for $20 and upper corners for $7. Parking down to $20. Is there a press conf going on or something? Why the sudden flood of info from the Sox on this? I wonder what they will do with season ticket prices.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 09:36 AM) jon greenberg ‏@espnchijon White Sox being more aggressive this year, with single-game tix in corners going for $20 and upper corners for $7. Parking down to $20. That's a start. Still think the parking should be available as part of packages for discounts. QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 09:37 AM) :lolhitting :lolhitting :lolhitting :lolhitting Not enough LOL icons in the world.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 08:56 AM) Honestly for two nights on Grant Park at a nice hotel, $280 isn't that bad. Hell I spent $280 a night to stay at the Hilton in Times Square this past spring (well my company did...). You managed a room at a Hilton in Times Square for only $280? That's incredibly cheap for that area at that level of hotel.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Oct 18, 2012 -> 09:02 AM) They're even dropping parking prices. Haha, check out the re-tweet from fake Kenny Williams... Churros will be only 8 dollars next season! Seriously though, this is the smart move.

Salt River 12, Peoria 9 Wilkins: 2-5, 2B, 2 K, RBI, R Tr Thompson: 1-4, BB, K, R Ta Thompson: 2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K Wilkins continues to do well down there. Taylor Thompson looking good so far too, 5 K vs 1 BB in 4 IP, and a GO/FO ratio of 4:1.

QUOTE (bmags @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 01:42 PM) I actually thought it was a good debate. You guys are just acting too cool. It was, albeit messy at times. But some people are so embittered (with good reason) at the current state of things, that they will call everything awful as a knee-jerk reaction. Happens in PHT on here too, with the Sox, fans see some bad things, all of a sudden everything is the end of the world.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 12:50 PM) I also preferred his private answer, which is probably a bunch of BS but would have been better than his actual response to the question: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-w...e6a4b_blog.html I like that answer better as well, and doesn't seem like B.S. to me. In fact it seems less B.S. than anything either candidate said on stage.

QUOTE (IlliniKrush @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 12:14 PM) Go look at a map of the Chicago area. You will find 35th and Shields pretty close to the middle. If you move the team to Orland Park or some such place... not centrally located anymore.

QUOTE (ewokpelts @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 11:33 AM) And for all the people that say "move the park to the burbs so i can go to more games"' i still call bulls***. You can easily go to a weekend game where there will be less traffic and no school or work the next day. And if you do a kids' day, you can get ur kids $1 LOWER DECK tix. The sox seem to do ok with corporate sales and young people on the weekday games. And families and groups on the weekends. I do love the fact that the tailgatin lots are always full on the weekends even when the attendance is low. Maybe those guys figured it out? Somoene suggested moving the team to the burbs? I must have missed that. That would be incredibly stupid. The park as it is now, is centrally located, near all kinds of transit, and a quick trip from downtown. If you move it to a suburb, you help people in a few suburbs, and hurt everyone else. That would cause a huge drop in attendance.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 09:26 AM) I reference you to my wife when we discussed future family plans and whether the Escape would be big enough for 2 car seats and our boston terrier. So what SUV did you buy? Maybe I need to follow your lead! Ford I guess has a European model (C-Max) they are bringing over soon that gets better gas mileage than the Pruis (47mpg), but again it's a hatcback thing. I'd get the Prius but I hate that Aztek look of the back of the car. The C-Max is a plug-in too, right? The Escape was a good car but really became an issue with 2 kids. I was sort of shocked how little leg room there was in the back, when we had to move the baby seat from the middle to the side, and have her face forward. We ended up getting a much bigger SUV, I am sort of embarrased to admit... Honda Pilot (Touring 4WD version). Great car and we love it, but boy does it suck down gas, especially after coming off the FEH. But tons of room and lots of other great stuff. Also looked at the Toyota Highlander and the Ford Explorer, but the Pilot was a clear winner for us in that group. Though like I said, since we wanted leg room but weren't sure we needed a giant SUV, we did also look at sedans like the Camry and Fusion, both of which had MORE LEG ROOM than the Escape, even though the Escape is an SUV. We just decided that, we end up using a lot of room for "stuff" trucking back and forth to the family in distant suburbs, we actually use it offroad occasionally (I am an outdoorsman), we live in Chicago where 4WD can be handy in winter, and with 2 kids we will now be driving instead of flying for most vacations. So we went big for the primary car, and I got a cheap 8 year old beater vehicle for our 2nd car (but big enough to get two kids into as necessary).

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 10:42 AM) Romney could have made the argument better. I do think it's important that instead of immediately calling this thing a planned terrorist attack by a terrorist group, the Obama Administration took the tactic of apologizing to the world for a stupid American's youtube video. That's a policy difference in the two campaigns. But Romney never got it out right during the debate. One could look at that argument to make, though I think it is not really true. Could work though. To me, if I'm Romney, I think the real failure here is a good example of an area where Obama has been a failure across the board - executive leadership. That means leading his agencies. He's been horrible in this area, wihch is amazing because it is one of the core parts of being President. His Fin Reg agencies, law enforcement agencies, lots of them have been bumbling around with even the most crucial of their tasks. And this was a perfect example. Guy on the ground asks for more security, meanwhile bureaucrat trying to not make waves says no, we need LESS security. This is a failure in leadership, which falls on both Clinton and Obama. That, to me, is where you can make a good argument about Obama's failings, that Romney just hasn't gone after (despite that he's got a very good personal record to reflect against that very skill set).

Phoenix 3, Salt River 3 (F/11) C Sanchez: 0-3, 2 BB, SB, CS (currently 4-for-5 in SB attempts, also sporting a .409 OBP) Tr Thompson: 0-5, 2 K (now at a slash line of .077/.294/.077/.371, 5 K in 13 AB, but also 4 BB) S Rodriguez: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K (finally a scoreless outing for Santos, taking his ERA down to 10.13) S Sanchez: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K (so far in 3 games: 3 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 2 K)

1. Obama won, almost as handily as Romney won the first one. 2. Candy Crowley was clearly in the bag for Obama and Romney did in fact get screwed by the moderator multiple times. Although really, Obama would have won anyway. 3. This town hall format is obviously much better for Obama than Romney. 4. For all the general perception that Romney is a results-oriented business guy and Obama is a big talker... Obama provided a heck of a lot more specifics for policy in the debate than Romney has. Mitt needs to add a lot more details to his plans if he plans to make a better case. 5. Neither candidate provided a real or useful answer to the questions about Benghazi. Obama got angry at the end, for good reason I suppose, but that didn't answer the original question whatsoever. Obama didn't answer to the failure in the agency's decision making, and Romney did nothing more than try to make it seem like Obama didn't care. Those are both loser arguments.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 08:49 AM) So the wifey and I are starting to look into buying a second car. We have a 2010 Ford Escape which is good for the baby and trips and whatnot, but we need a better commuter car for her to get to work. Probably 25-30 miles a day in mostly city or packed highway driving. And with enough space in the backseat to put a car seat. I'd like to get a hybrid, but looking at the options it seems like you're stuck with a crappy look (Prius) or a hatchback. I'm not really into either one. In terms of a sedan, it looks like one of the best options is the Toyota Camry. Anyone read up on cars as a hobby? Any suggestions? Its kinda funny, you and I are on almost the same path, you are just a couple years behind me. We had a 2008 Ford Escape (Hybrid in our case), as our one car, eventually had the one kid... then moved to the suburbs, had a 2nd kid, and then caved in to get a 2nd car. If you are thinking hybrids, check out lists on this site to see what is out there (will show you traditional hybrids, electrics, plug-ins, etc. I personally am a fan of the plug-in hybrids, sort of a best of both worlds thing, but every has different needs of course (and there are only a few models availabel now: Prius PH, Chevy Volt). As for traditional hybrid sedans, you've got the hybrid versions of lots of sedans (Prius, Honda Civic, Ford Fusion, Hyundai Sonata, Kia Optima). For us, we almost bought the Camry Hybrid. Very reliable cars, great mileage, etc. We ended up getting an SUV instead (not a hybrid), for various reasons, but if we had gone sedan, the Camry Hybrid would definitely have won out. As for other sedans in that size range, the Ford Fusion is just a bit smaller and worth looking at... and Honda will have a hybrid Accord soon, I think for 2013 maybe.

QUOTE (IlliniKrush @ Oct 17, 2012 -> 12:38 AM) A huge problem with the upper deck is that you can't go downstairs at all. How many teams have this policy? I know they claim it's for safety and code and whatever, but we all knows it's BS, as it started after the incident on the field and all the fights that would happen in the UD. They said hey, let's keep the idiots upstairs. Going to the game with your kids and not being able to go downstairs and watch BP, etc. is going to make a difference. The food upstairs is also much different than downstairs. They've slowly brought stuff upstairs, but it's not on the same level. If you have season tickets in hand (whether or not they are yours), you can access the LD.

First of all, attendance isn't as huge an issue as you'd think. They are still outdrawing what they did from the strike until 2005, and doing it in the midst (or back end) of the worst economic recession since the 30's. The team itself hasn't been to the post-season since 2008, and was a huge disappointment for 3 straight years before this one. Access isn't an issue either, I don't know where people are getting that. You have 2 El lines within 4 blocks, a major expressway right there, a Metra station right there, CTA buses, and shuttlle buses to various suburbs. Then there is parking, which there is plenty of, way more and closer than the other park in town has. Boyer and the Sox have done a fantastic job of making some key improvements over the past decade or so. Look around the park - making the UD much more pleasant, adding a bunch of kid-specific stuff (which IMO is going to pay huge future dividends), better concessions, special sections, all kinds of stuff. The Cubs' attendance has been going downhill for a few years too, by the way. They are not invincible. -- So, what's the bad news? Why isn't attendance better? There is no one reason, or one fix. Here are the big reasons as I see them (some of which the team can control, some they can't): 1. The economy still sucks. People have less disposable income as a whole. There is no way around this. 2. Sox ticket prices, while cheaper generally than the Cubs, are still among the most expensive in baseball. That is a potential problem. 3. The neighborhood around the park still has no distinctive draw to it. Having the Rober Taylor homes razed helped things, people feel a little safer in the area, but there is still nothing to DO near the park, before and after games. Or very little. 4. The team had three straight seasons (2009-2011) of not only not making the playoffs, but of falling well below expectations. 5. The 2012 team was forecasted to be bad, and season ticket base fell as a result, before the season even started. 6. The 2012 team never built up that huge lead that finally told the always-paranoid Sox fan base that, yeah, we're here to stay. 7. Stub Hub integration. Great tool for season ticket holders, where they can easily send their tickets to StubHub right over the web, list them, and sell them for cashey money. But this is horrible for the club trying to sell individual tickets - it floods the market with available seats that were a lot harder to sell before. More of these people would have bought new/seperate tickets before. Those were all significant negative effects on attendance, in my view. So what can the club do? What would I do? Here you go... 1. Keep season ticket prices identical- don't raise them. 2. Scrap the dynamic pricing nonsense that punished people for buying in advance - just have fairly cheap tickets available regularly, and throw in the occasional deal 3. Target families - this is where you make some bucks just because of the numbers of people involved, and getting the kids into it. This can be done via a few small shifts: --A. Offer discounted parking for buying 4 or more tickets - this encourages ride-sharing, encorages more people to come, and makes it cheaper for families to go to games. It also recognizes the extra money larger groups and families are spending. --B. Offer more cheap tickets on WEEKENDS - when families with younger kids can actually go. They aren't selling out most weekend games anyway, so why not? --C. Something they already do but could market better... offer package deals of tickets and food/drinks, not just for specific games, but all the time. --D. Work with the players to do more autograph time for the kids hovering near the field - this has diminished a lot over the years, and there is no doubt that having that moment with a player for a kid makes a HUGE impression, and gives you dedicated fans later. 4. Create a reward-points system like airlines have - a Sox membership card, if you will. You get points for buying tickets, spending money at concessions, anything in the park at all. The points can be used for merchandise or tickets. This will encourage people to go to more games. You can also partner with other retailers outside The Cell to offer discounts to card holders. 5. Work with the city and the neighborhood to see what sort of zoning variances are possible near the park, and invest in developing nearby restaurants, bars and entertainment. There has to be some places near the park to do this. And with property cheap and interest rates low, now is the time to make that sort of investment. Adding more reason to come to the park would be a huge asset. 6. Make sure to CONTINUE doing the following, that are huge advantages that the Sox currently have over their cross-town rivals: kids play areas (Fundamentals, etc.), fireworks games, parking spaces available, half price Mondays. 7. I hate to say this being a season ticket holder myself, but... work out a deal with Stub Hub where they increase the fee % to list tickets direct from Sox season ticket holders (electronic), and keep the added fee with the Sox. Don't advertise it, just bury it in the fee. Helps offset the loss of revenue from re-sold tickets. 8. Finally, and this is the hardest one to implement... give the team the money it needs to compete. A playoff appearance is a huge boost. This team could be better than last year with just a relatively small increase in player payroll - make the extra $15M investment now for returns later. There's my take on what's wrong, and what I'd do. I'll be impressed if anyone read the whole thing.

QUOTE (PuertoRicanSoxFan @ Oct 15, 2012 -> 08:36 PM) Get Felix Hernandez for Viciedo, Molina and some prospects. Keep Rios, trade Dunn. Sign a SP and a bat. Re-sing AJ. Re-sing Peavy to a friendly contract, if he won't sing it, let him walk and sing another one like Haren. This team could still be competitive withouth spending a lot of money. Go Sox! Welcome to SoxTalk! I don't think a package around Viciedo and Molina is going to cut it to get King Felix though. And if you trade Viciedo and Dunn, that's a big power hole to fill. And I'm not sure about Peavy's singing voice.

Salt River 4, Phoenix 2 (in 10) C Sanchez: 1-4, 2 K, SAC, SB Wilkins: 0-2, 2 BB, RBI(SF), R, SB In the 10th, Sanchez bunted the lead runner over from second to third, Wilkins was intentionally walked and then stole second, and the lead runner and Wilkins went on to score the 2 runs for that inning to win the game.

QUOTE (IowanSoxFan @ Oct 15, 2012 -> 04:41 PM) Will MLB.com have the stats from these games? Stats are already up for the leagues underway. No live game feeds though, just boxes and compiled stats after, as far as I can tell.