WCSox

QUOTE(winninguglyin83 @ Jun 23, 2007 -> 12:53 PM) too late to downplay it. Ozzie was talking it up before the game. Said that if Erstad didn't go on the DL, that Jermaine would. That was not smart thing to say.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 23, 2007 -> 10:10 AM) At this point, you have to DL Dye. Perhaps not if you're trying to deal him. Better to downplay in the injury, IMO.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 21, 2007 -> 09:50 AM) What's been bad about his defense? If anything, his defense has been the biggest positive surprise so far. When did I ever say that his defense was "bad"? I merely said that it wasn't that spectacular. From what I've seen, his range is pretty average and, IIRC, he misplayed a hard-hit ball to him last weekend. He's decent there, but that's about it.

QUOTE(joeynach @ Jun 20, 2007 -> 04:42 PM) Fields still strikes out way too much and walks very little, but I would assume with the more AB's he gets the less pitchers just go right after the rookie and the more counts he will get to work. That's true. It's also possible that he's pressing. FWIW, Crede's K/BB ratio was also pretty high back in '01 and '02. I'm more concerned with Fields' decent-but-not-spectacular glove than anything else at this point.

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Jun 21, 2007 -> 08:57 AM) They decided instead to take a huge smelly dump on the field, and then charge admission for it.

QUOTE(Greg The Bull Luzinski @ Jun 20, 2007 -> 08:07 AM) For what it's worth, I would rather have Cleveland win the division and go to the playoffs than Detroit. Its not so much that I like Cleveland as that I dislike Detroit (since the Bulls v. Pistons days) that much more. After the mid/late '90s, I dislike the Indians WAY more than the Tigers.

QUOTE(BearSox @ Jun 20, 2007 -> 03:36 PM) yeah, I was about to say that. Fields is a very athletic person and can run. Outside of his defense at 3B, I've been pleasantly surprised by Fields.

QUOTE(knightni @ Jun 20, 2007 -> 02:51 PM) He's not a velocity-reliant pitcher. He's a location-reliant one. He's reliant on both. When Mark's fastball was topping off at 86 last summer, he got rocked.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Jun 20, 2007 -> 04:28 AM) If there wasn't the incentive to be here created by these groups, the problem would not exsist. I agree. Decapitate the source by fining the hell out of the businesses. Too bad neither party will do it.

QUOTE(Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 03:13 PM) One thing that cracks me up about your responses is that you paint this picture like illegal aliens are essentially in slavery and even though they get paid something they should be getting more. Their situations are NOT that bad. Well, some of their situations are pretty bad and are not that far removed from slavery. And I am more pissed at the Mexican government, our government, and the businesses who enable and support this crap than the illegals themselves. That said, they understand our laws and the consequences for breaking them. So if somebody (rightfully) decides to crack down on them, too bad.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 01:25 PM) If you are going to compete for a championship, you better have a decent bullpen, and relying on a bunch of guys used to losing is playing with fire. If you're going to compete for a championship, you'd better have very good starting pitching, a lineup that can drive in runs, good defense, and depth on your bench. The Sox had all four of those going into this season, and that's more than you can say for most other teams. While I agree to a certain extent that Kenny should've done more with the 'pen, it's not reasonable to ask that the Sox be absolutely stacked EVERYWHERE. And I seriously doubt that the '05 incarnations of Hermanson, Cotts, and Politte would matter much on a team whose lineup struggles to score three or four runs a game.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 11:45 AM) The entire bullpen is being paid $3.6 million this season. The White Sox payroll is $109 million which includes the money they are being given by other clubs. They have budgeted 3% of their payroll to the entire bullpen, and they wonder why they suck. I completely agree that they've skimped on the 'pen and that it's bitten them in the ass big-time, but I'd argue that their inability to score runs (or even get on base) has been the greater problem this year. And they're spending A LOT on Thome, Paulie, Dye, Crede, AJ, etc. KW spending money on veteran starters like Freddy and Jose got them a championship, which is more than I can say for the previous 88 years' worth of strategy. Of course, it didn't last, but it was well worth it in my mind. Plus, a strong starting rotation is the foundation of most championship teams. One can argue that Kenny spent TOO MUCH on the starters and not enough on the 'pen, but starting pitching should be the top priority for ANY team.

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 10:53 AM) How could Javy Vazquez's $11.5 million salary be reasonable on a team whose ceiling for the team is $96 million? He's a #5 #4 starter. Fixed Half of this team's payroll was devoted to its starting rotation last year. Is that unreasonable as well?

QUOTE(Kalapse @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 10:37 AM) The payroll is actually much closer to $96M than $106M. Just saying. Well, yes. My point was that we're pretty much at our ceiling right now.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 10:28 AM) I'm not saying they shouldn't have traded Garcia. Everyone on this site wanted him gone. However, I will never be convinced otherwise that they couldn't have received at least one major league ready prospect for him. We're lucky to have taken that $10 million off our payroll and gotten a solid prospect like Gio. Everybody who was paying attention knew that Freddy had arm issues last year and may have been damaged goods. One needs to also consider that our $106 million payroll probably kept us from acquiring somebody like Soriano. And it's not like JD, Paulie, and Thome sucked last season.

Anything more than 5/80 is out of the question, IMO.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 10:13 AM) Maybe they should have thought about this before trading Garcia for non-major league ready talent and doing nothing to really significantly improve a team that sucked during the 2nd half of last year. LOL, since when was Freddy and his 87 mph fastball worth major-league-ready talent? They should be happy that Philly's front office was willing to eat the $10 million left on his contract and didn't bother to give him a physical.

QUOTE(fathom @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 09:59 AM) I've always said you offer 5/75 by the end of June, and if he says no, then you trade him. If the Sox are planning on going with a payroll in the 80 to 90 million range over the next few years, they're going to be a bad team. Let's face it....an 80 million dollar payroll isn't the same as it was a few years ago, as medicore pitchers are getting 10 million easily these days. If the Sox keep losing, they're not going to be able to support anything over $80-90 million because they'll lose about 750,000 ticket sales.

QUOTE(Steff @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 09:43 AM) The problem is that in this market Mark is going to get offered more than 5 years/75 million. The Sox can NOT cripple themselves and be allowed to be raped by the market. Are the fans going to be so forgiving when it's Mark and 8 A ball players taking the field next season, and possibly the next 3 after that? And holy hell if, God forbid, something happens to his arm. Agreed. Although 5/75 may be reasonable, that's where negotiations will BEGIN. You know that the Cardinals, Mets, Yankees, and Red Sox will push that price up significantly this winter. And as Balta pointed out last week, the track record of teams offering marquee pitchers 5+ year deals and getting anywhere NEAR that value out of them is not good. The fact that Kenny traded for two left-handed starters this winter (Danks and Gio) speaks volumes. QUOTE(iamshack @ Jun 19, 2007 -> 09:47 AM) Oh? So if the Sox suck in 2010 because Pauly is (even) slower and old, and Mark is pitching like 2006 again because his arm is tired, fans will still come out to the park because KW and JR were nice enough to re-sign Mark for the fans? BS. This team draws well for one reason, and that's winning. DING, DING, DING! Anybody who has followed this team for any substantial period of time knows this.

QUOTE(spiderman @ Jun 18, 2007 -> 01:55 PM) Yeah, I see the Sox signing Zambrano to 5-7 year deal worth 18 million a season. Have another I'd have to have A LOT of if Zambrano were in a Sox uniform next season.

QUOTE(Wedge @ Jun 18, 2007 -> 08:46 AM) Teams that could use an Ace level starting pitcher: Yankees How do you think King George would like to go after the Red Sox down the stretch with a rotation of Pettitte, Mark, Clemens, Wang, and Mussina?

Opie? LOL!

QUOTE(LVSoxFan @ Jun 18, 2007 -> 08:33 AM) But "rebuilding" does not encourage me with current management. When you cannot even get to the playoffs with your WS team (finishing third) and you are going to tie for dead last the year after that and white-flag it with most of that core team intact.... do you really think there's any glory in the future after it took us 88 years to get to the big one? When Kenny has gotten us into the playoffs, what, once? Our last phase of "rebuilding" ran from 1997-1999, KW took over about a year and a half later, and the Sox won it all four years after that. History suggests that the Sox may not suck for the next 88 years.

QUOTE(Rowand44 @ Jun 17, 2007 -> 08:03 PM) There's less than a 0 percent chance that David Wright is traded, no need to even bring his name up. Yep, apparently the Jack Daniels has gotten to me. That's typically the way that it goes. Then again, given obnoxiously-high price tag for quality veteran pitching, I can envision a senario where we could get a halfway decent ML-ready player for Mark. If, say, the Yankees crep to within a few games of the Red Sox in the last week of July and Clemens went down with more groin problems, I could see Steinbrenner offering a good-but-not-great player like Cano for Mark and Tad (and maybe a middle reliever). The only thing that George hates as much as not winning RIGHT NOW is watching the Red Sox win. That said, a scenario like that could only work if the right elements were present. And I'd probably rather have two or three high-tier prospects than somebody like Cano anyway.

QUOTE(dasox24 @ Jun 17, 2007 -> 07:47 PM) Man, if we could get David Wright in a Buehrle trade, I don't even know what I'd do. But, before I go any further, there's no way in hell the Mets would give up Wright for Buehrle even if they got Fields back. Trading away a key position player like Wright kinda defeats the purpose of adding a pitcher like Mark to make a run at the World Series. I agree that it would be extremely tough to pull off. Then again, Minaya was desperate enough for pitching that he gave an aging, injury-prone Pedro 4 years/$53 million a year and a half ago. Given that Pedro's injury arguably cost them the NLCS last year, he might be under enough pressure to swing for the fences again. I know it won't happen, but it's always nice to dream.