Dick Allen

QUOTE(knightni @ Sep 22, 2005 -> 11:34 AM) Hafner hits all those homeruns because the ball flies away from screaming at his ugly face. My friend and I were commenting on the handsome Mr. Hafner last night. His scoreboard photo looks like Shrek.

It ain't cool bashing AJ's wife. I bet she would find these pictures interesting.

QUOTE(Flash Tizzle @ Sep 22, 2005 -> 01:20 PM) I have already charted a full scale EXCUSE-O-MATIC to explain our late season slide. Entire point is to make sure the persons held responsible aren't identified. I mean, don't teams blow 15 games lead every year? Excuse #1: "Guillen obviously was good enough to build a 15 game lead in this division." Ignore the collapse, mismanagement of in-game situations, and odd lineup shuffles. Excuse #2: "Offense has drastically underachieved." This, of course, is a possible prelude to suggesting "this offense is fine and can't be expected to be this terrible next season." We've seen the numbers (aside from HR's) over an entire season. Oh, it can and WILL be repeated. Excuse #3a: "Williams did all he could last offseason changing this team's philosophy; #3b: teams weren't willing to deal a the trading deadline; #3c: it's not his fault the offense didn't perform."All can be addressed with several suggestions. First, our 'philosophy' needs revision (ozzieball is bulls***). Second, the inactivity relating to other teams or their outrageous asking prices is irrelevant. Point is he failed to make a move and will be remembered for it. Finally, it's Williams duty to upgrade this offense. If he doesn't, UH OH--GOODBYE in 06'. Most likely the offseason of 06'; but regardless, next year is his ass on the line. Whether this club wins 91 or 97 I will not accept a lineup comprised of nearly the same people. Although possibly the biggest excuse may come from this man: You know DJ, it's just one of these things with baseball. One day you're on top, next day-- POOF, you're struggling to compete. That's why you play the games, and that's why I love this game. This post is nothing but the truth.

The play in KC where he's standing in foul territory waiting for the ball to come down in fair territory and it goes for a triple and error for a virtual inside the park home run on a play that is made in the Pony league sums it up for me. Carlos Lee wasn't very good defensively, but you are really stretching it if you say Pods is a defensive upgrade.

QUOTE(The Ginger Kid @ Sep 22, 2005 -> 12:20 PM) Disturbing: "This was disappointing because I didn't feel the energy," A.J. Pierzynski said of Wednesday night's game. "We can't have that right now. That's what was disappointing." No energy. Hm. That's great to hear. I mentioned this somewhere earlier. The team looked bored to tears last night. Between pitches they are all looking down, there was no look of intensity at all. How does that happen in a game as important as last night? If Manuel was still managing the lack of energy would be blamed on him.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Sep 22, 2005 -> 11:29 AM) Who else do we have that we can put in there? You can leave him in there, but he shouldn't be leading off. The Sox need someone leading off who may be able to produce runs. Go back to a couple of guys who did lead off last year a few times if necessary. Rowand or Uribe should lead off tonight. My preference would be Uribe. He's been taking pitches and might lay into one. It would be better if he had one more at bat than Pods tonight rather than the other way around.

QUOTE(The Ginger Kid @ Sep 22, 2005 -> 11:01 AM) Here's a thought on how to beat Santana: Pods bunts for a single. He steals second. Iguchi sacrifices him to third. Carl hits a sacrifice fly. Sox lead 1-0. Call me crazy, but if you want to beat Santana, you'd better start playing "ozzie" ball again. Pods is hurting. He is stretching his groin a lot when he's playing the field and has a little limp when he is jogging. I really can't see him stealing consistently, and if he's not, you must move him out of the lead off spot.

QUOTE(Wiredawg1 @ Sep 22, 2005 -> 10:41 AM) Let him try that s*** again, and Guerhle will be digging Pronk's foot out of his ass. Any way you slice it, that was a s***ty thing to do, and i'm fairly sure he knows what will happen to his happy ass if he tries it again. I can't believe people condone s*** like that in MLB. Calm down. It wasn't a fastball and it wasn't intentional. Hafner gets bean a lot because he's right on the plate. The pitcher has as much right to the plate as he does. God would Hafner look nice hitting 3rd in the Sox line-up.

When times are tough isn't that the time true leaders shine and not go crying to reporters about being booed even though "he" has 91 wins? Why is it that in his mind he is only responsible for the wins and not this horrible play down the stretch? Pressure makes you show your true colors, and its become apparent Ozzie's aren't pretty. Obviously the job was a lot easier for him last year when he had a team with nothing to play for in September. My advice to him is go manage a little league team in Miami and leave managing in the big leagues to guys who have stones.

2 of the best modern day managers will be available this off season in Piniella and Leyland. If the Sox won the World Series and Ozzie walked away it would be like winning back to back lotteries to me.

The key to the deal was the money it freed up for Iguchi and AJ. CLee for Pods and Vizcaino is clearly a winner for Milwaukee. CLee for Iguchi, AJ, Pods and Vizcaino is not a bad deal for the Sox. If money were no object they would be far better to have signed Iguchi and AJ while keeping Lee, but that wasn't an option.

Cleveland's #9 hitter has the same amount of home runs and is only hitting .006 lower than the Sox #3 hitter. That's pathetic. Hey Hawk, where would he play?

Put Crede 8th, bat Pods 9th and have Uribe lead off tonight.

QUOTE(witesoxfan @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 11:31 PM) I hope you're right, but history says differently... In Johan Santana's last 7 starts against Chicago, dating back to last year: 6-1 1.03 ERA, 0.71 WHIP, 6.6 K/BB, 11.4 K/9, a HR/9 of 0.51, a BB/9 of 1.91 in 52.3 IP A bit of overkill on my part...but I think you get the picture. Isn't the guy responsible for hanging the lone loss on him playing in Milwaukee right now?

Maybe you do have to include Iguchi, but if you looked at what the guys at Baseball Prospectus and some other sources had him pegged at was .280 with 12-15 homers and about 15 steals. Almost exactly where he's at. KW probably had him pegged here as well or he wouldn't have given him the contract he gave him.

Ozzie's problem is when he takes out a starter its often 1 batter too late, or next weekend when the Sox will have no part of Hafner and walk him every time like you suggest, it will be 1 series too late. Of course, last night the Sox didn't score so even if Hafner doesn't homer twice, its still a loss, although you never know how Cleveland would have used their bullpen and how their pitchers and Sox hitters would have reacted in a closer game. A key play to me last night was Sizemore scoring on that wild pitch. AJ took a while to react to the ball, and also seemed to hesitate with a poor toss to Garland, or the game is still 1-0 and who knows what happens next.

The White Sox will win tonight. I am saying this while being sotally tober.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 11:19 PM) Underachieved. ARow; already mentionned. Uribe; already mentionned. Man we were spoiled with his first 2 months last season. Crede: this dude should be hitting with a higher average. When he gets going, he can hit .350 for a month. If he could just hit .250 when he gets cold, instead of 1 for 20, he'd be hitting nearly .300 on the year. Everett; was fine until this last month or so where his average has plummetted. And aside from ARow, the person who has most disappointed me with the bat is: AJ Pierzynski. I would rather have the .300 hitter version of AJ with 10 home runs than the .255 version of AJ with 19 home runs. Man, what happened to that obnoxious guy from Minnesota who just piled up the hits? These guys may have underachieved according to Sox fans and Sox management's projections, but you really can't say they underachieved when looking at their entire careers. Rowand had a big offensive season last year. For whatever reason he is hitting like the Aaron Rowand before 2004. Uribe is having a career average year. He had a big offensive season last year, but career wise he is exactly where you could expect him. Crede is having a typical Joe Crede season. He may have ability to be greater, but expecting and counting on that would probably make a baseball executive a former baseball executive. AJ is down on average, but the homers up. Everett is really about where you could expect him, except he may actually have more homers than you could have thought using his career numbers, age, injuries etc. Like I mentioned before, I really don't think there is anyone offensively who you could say is playing anything but a hair below what you could expect, as there is no one really having a career-type year. Fathom pointed out the pitching with about 5 or 6 guys maybe overachieving, and I couldn't agree with him more. Its the difference between this White Sox team and the others the past several seasons. Put the pitching performance of 2001-2004 with the Sox 2005 line-up and you have a team battling Detroit for 3rd in the AL Central.

QUOTE(Rally Crede!! @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 09:59 PM) Hriniak got through to 2 of our players in the mid 90s, and the rest of the lineup didn't ever seem to clinch on to his teachings. Its that way with any hitting coach. As a MLB hitter, you aren't going to easily change your swing mechanics after years of self-training. I do think way too much blame gets put at the feet of the hitting coaches. Moreso, I just want Walk to get the right gameplan to our hitters with respect to the pitcher they are facing THAT NIGHT. That's the thing. I really have no feeling on Walker one way or the other either. But it would be nice if they took a different approach at Santana tomorrow night. Taking all his fastballs and swinging aimlessly at his change gets you shutout, and possibly no hit.

QUOTE(Sox Hustler @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 09:48 PM) Well you are right, you can only blame the coaches for so much but when Uribe has to go outside of the team for Hriniak to improve his swing, isn't that saying something? Frank went to Hriniak a few years ago as well. To add more to the irony, Hriniak was fired by the White Sox. Obviously different coaches get through to different players, especially hitting coaches. There may be no reason for it. The thing that looks bad with this particular case is Uribe was pretty much struggling for most of the season, spends a couple hours with Hriniak and suddenly he starts looking more and more like Tejada.

QUOTE(Rally Crede!! @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 09:43 PM) Funny how that works sometimes huh. I hate putting all teh blame on a coach, think its teh easy way out. But seriously, would it have taken THAT much effort as teh hitting instructor to let these guys know Elarton is an 86-89 MPH fastbal lguy who leaves it up ALOT...look for it. You make Elarton get the ball down and its batting practice. The Sox were swinging at fastballs up all night and popping up. I haven't seen so many pop ups since the 2000 playoffs.

QUOTE(greg775 @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 09:36 PM) I'll tell you who I've seen enough of and who surely will be back -- Everett. I'm not blaming him for the collapse, I've just seen enough of him. Give me Carlos Lee! Do not give me Carl Everett. Sox #3 hitter .249 23 homers Indians #9 hitter .243 23 homers You are right about Everett, although he was pretty good the first 2 months filling in for Thomas. Imagine if the Sox had a guy like Hafner hitting 3rd. It is imperative KW finds offense, big offense this winter.

QUOTE(JimH @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 09:29 PM) Every manager makes mistakes, but I would venture to say he has one heck of a lot more game knowledge than anybody on this board ... me, you, whomever. Anyone who thinks otherwise overestimates themselves. Luck has nothing to do with this. I would suggest many of these players have been underachieving all year, not overachieving. Pick out just about any player and for long stretches this year they have underachieved. This is not all about the last 7 weeks, but their underachieving has been magnified because Cleveland is playing so well. Remember, there were also people dismissing Cleveland thru much of this year, saying many in their offense had career years last year, and their pitching wouldn't hold up. I was not one who ever doubted their offense could and would perform as they are, and the difference is not hitting coaches but better hitters. Cleveland took off hitting when they sacked Eddie Murray, who probably has more hitting knowledge than 99% of the people playing or coaching professional baseball.

QUOTE(JimH @ Sep 21, 2005 -> 09:21 PM) Well that's your opinion and you're more than entitled to it. My opinion is the players have stopped performing well. The same players who were performing better earlier in the year. Last I checked, the game is played in between the lines and to me, that's where most of the credit/blame lies. I agree you blame the players, but this is the team Ozzie wanted, and the team Kenny assembled. If its not good enough, and they still have the edge for a playoff spot, then someone's opinion on what is good enough to win is wrong isn't it? I really don't see anyone on the roster seriously underperforming from what could be expected. Personally, I really doubt either one of them is in any way, shape or form in trouble even if the Sox lost all their remaining games. I do think if the Sox fail to reach the post season, each of them should be shown the door, as I think if the Sox don't make the post season some lesser position will take a bullet. Maybe Walker. Maybe move Harold into another position and bring in a bench coach with managerial experience.

The thing that concerns me with this team is there appears to be a lack of fire right now. Think about it, a huge win last night, a sellout crowd, your biggest winner on the mound against the opponents #5 starter. I was at the game and if you looked at the White Sox players between innings, between pitches, there was no look of intensity. To a man, this team looked absolutely bored. Tomorrow doesn't look good, but maybe something crazy will happen. Maybe they will try a different approach against Santana, and hopefully, they'll try something different against Haffner next weekend.