Jim Fainter

ERA's are somewhat inflated artificially because official scorers are so reluctant to score an error, so the pitchers' ERA's go up.

I forgot to add. The best sliders I have seen are Maury Wills, Low Brock, Willy Mays, and Joe Dimaggio. All feet first, pop up sliders.

Now that Derek Jeter's injury is a few days old, I keep thinking about what I said in another post right after the injury, and that is that head first slides are dangerous and unnecessay. Players think they are hustling, so their intentions are noble, but ill-advised just the same. Pete Rose started doing it in the 1960's and players are emulating him. A feet first pop up slide gets you there faster without exposure to injury, ala Jeter. So just yesterday on ESPN's Baseball Tonight they show Eric Young sliding into second, not head first, but face first. No serious injury, but a lousy slide nevertheless. Lots of times sliders hit the ground on their thighs first, and then come to a stop a foot or two short of the bag. Lots of hand injuries result, also. Sliding head first into either home or first is Stupid. We have had some similar sliding injuries, too. Remember that outfielder we eventually traded to Toronto in the Wells deal. The year before he won the centerfield job in ST, then hurt his hand in a head first slide into second. Now he's out of baseball. Last year a Dodger infielder (Cora) almost broke his neck sliding head first into second. I wish the Sox would make it a team policy to forego head first slides, period. Now the Cubs or the Twinkies............that is another matter. So this morning, on ESPN's Sports Reporters, Bob Ryan said the same thing. Pete Rose and all. You heard it here on SoxNet first.

That's what Hawk said.

A lot of injuries would be eliminated if players would just slide feet first.

Well, he got a couple of cheap hits today, and that is often what it takes to come out of slump. His last at bat he hit a hard smash to third, and it looked like a good swing. I think he'll be back to normal soon.

I hate to see all the parks continually reducing dimensions. It just cheapens everything. I wish Detroit had left Comerica alone. The idiot owners are afraid that they cannot attract free agent sluggers if they have a big park. Remember the stink Juan G made at Detroit? They don't understand that a big park might attract some pitchers. Also , if you have a big park, you just tailor your team to it. You get a bunch of fast guys/gap hitters in the outfield and leave guys like Greg Vaughn, Carlos Lee, et al to other teams. Like anything else in life, you just have to sell it.

During the telecast of Saturday's game, Hawk Harrellson mentioned a pitcher in our minor league system named Chris Palmer. Hawk said he is a really promising pitcher, 20 year old righthander. I don't know anything about him and did not see him on the rosters of our teams. Does anybody know what or who Hawk was talking about?? Maybe I got his name wrong.

Two wins in a row for the Knights, and in both games Miles was the DH. I wonder if this will be a permanent gig for him ( DH )?

Hey Rex, how did Yofu look? Also, are you going to make daily contributions about the Barons' games? Hope so.

A lefty is going against us. Valentine or Graffy? I bet it won't be long before Daubach gets a start at first, but not today. I remember last year Konerko went through a 3-5 game spell where he looked awful, couldn't hit a lick, and then hit a homer and went off on an absolute tear.

"Razor Shines" is a Hall of fame name.

Borchard, Brumbaugh, and Morgan all had three hits. Adkins and Ginter pitched well, Munoz almost blew it in the ninth. Miles was DH.

Ben Petrick is now an outfielder, and a pretty good one. He can play all three positions, good arm, good speed. He failed as a catcher. Too many passed balls among other things. He just had trouble holding major league pitchers. Solid outfielder who can hit. I don't know what the Rockies are going to do with him this year, other than sticking him in AAA. They have three guys with big time contracts who are going to play. I wish we could have gotten him instead of Gload.

They all want to get the big hit. No patience. It's called pressing.

Gload came to life last year in Colorado Springs, and was brought up but didn't play much. He had no chance to make the Rockies this year. No chance. It's questionable if he would have started at AAA this year, because the Rockies have some prospects who need to play, just like we do. It's too bad that, when they made this trade, they didn't get another one of their spare AAA outfielders, named Bet Petrick, instead of Gload. This kid can hit, he's younger, and plays pretty good defense. I have probably watched him more that the White Sox scouts have, but nobody asked me.

It blows my mind how major league managers fall into a rut and do certain things that turn victory into defeat. JM is not the only guy. The latest was the Colorado-Houston game last night. The Rockettes had a 7-3 lead going into the Houston ninth inning. Rockette manager Clint Hurdle ( who I like(d) ) brings in his closer, Jose Jiminez. Now last year Jiminez did save 41 games, but he also showed a tendency to be really awful on occasion. Well, he did it again. Before you could say jerrymanuelsucks, Jiminez gives up six hits and one walk. Game over. He did get one out (sacrifice) after four straight hits. This is not the same thing as blowing a one run lead. This was a four run lead. Obviously Jiminez did not have it, but Manager Hurdle steadfastly leaves him in to the bitter end. I think if he had a twenty run lead he would have left him in to lose it. He was NOT going to take Jiminez out, no matter what. Is there a rule that I never heard about?: "Do not remove your closer when he is losing the game for you." The Rockettes have 12, count 'em, twelve 'big league' pitchers on the roster. If it is obvious that your main man just doesn't have it, take him out. Managers can't think anymore. Didn't JM have the same thing happen to him last year?

Terrible idea. Horrible idea. JR would never pay his price, I hope.

Whose picture is that on the other page -- the big right-hander?

Bring in Wally Backman to manage.

If we start out 0-3, then JM is on the hot seat. This is not being negative, just realistic. oh for two and overdue.

During the course of ST, I probably made 4-5 posts about White -- all negative. I saw him throw too many line drives last year. Even though he somehow made the team, and I don't know how, other than the fact that he is guaranteed a mill or so, he is still the 11th man on a ten man staff, so why do we bring him in with the game on the line? It's one thing to have him around for mop up duty, but to bring him in in the clutch is, is, is .....I'm looking for a word here.

LDF. Thanks for that report. Schnurstein is one of our most interesting prospects. I did not know that he converted from second base. Seems like he would have a better chance there to move quickly up the ladder. Do you know when the Rookie League (Bristol) season starts?

In the past they have generated good overall stats by breaking out and scoring 10-15 runs in a single game once a week or so. they'll be due tomarrow.

Why does Ibanez hit so well against us? He always has.