Dick Allen

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 10:44 PM) There are LOTS of White Sox fans out there like yourself "lying dormant" but who still care deeply and passionately about their favorite team and are upset/frustrated/bordering on furious with the current direction of things. Good post. Obviously there are some who will make the case that managers don't matter, hitting coaches, etc., they'll say look at the record of the the Brewers or the Marlins or whatever team that hasn't magically gone on a playoff run. To that, I'll just say why did the 2012 White Sox, with basically the same or lesser personnel as 2011 and with over 10 rookie pitchers (half of them nowhere near a MLB roster right now) play so well for 5 months, when the only difference was changing from Guillen to Ventura? Finally, how did the 2013 and 2014 and 2015 defense/s go from being one of the best in the AL in 2012 to the worst? Why did the 2012 defense play so much better? Why did all those guys like Viciedo, DeAza and Ramirez regress in the seasons since? In 2015, how can every single player on the entire roster be worse (in the case of Eaton and Alexei, the two best defenders last year...FAR WORSE) or regressing from a defensive standpoint? The only two decent defensive players right now are Beckham and Sanchez, and they're also in the biggest offensive slumps, and, at best, are limited offensively. “Whether they are trying too hard or not, maybe you try harder,” Ventura said. But White Sox manager Robin Ventura is positive it’s not for a lack of preparedness. “No, they’re ready,” Ventura said. “They’re ready. When they come in the game, they’re ready to go. You can sit there, bounce around, have them throw more pitches, they’re ready to go when they go in the game. It’s just a phenomenon that needs to stop. It was a fluke until we started leading the league in it. So something has to stop and we have to have guys get better when they get in there in the first inning.” “I don’t know if there is an answer to it,” Ventura said. “Obviously these guys don’t want to do that, but when they come in and any time pitchers ease into a game it’s a bit easier for the offense. First impressions are always hard to get away from. That first inning of setting the tone is there and you want to get away from that because it’s negative." I feel pretty confident the answers aren't there, but whatever. It comes down to "trying harder" and pitchers have to set the tone early (at home) so that the offense can relax a bit more. Nothing about fielding/baserunning/lack of execution/mental mistakes. www.csnchicago.com Is Robin saying something wrong here? Isn't the job having the pitchers ready for the 1st inning on Don Cooper? He is the one with them in the bullpen. He is the self proclaimed manager of the pitching staff.

QUOTE (Dunt @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 07:32 PM) Nothing says fire like Gentlemen Jim's demeanor. Did you see the interview with Mike Schmidt who was talking about when George Brett was the hitting coach in KC? He said George told him he quit because the players wouldn't work with him.

QUOTE (Mike F. @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 07:25 PM) I want Greg Walker back god dammit. I just think it is weird. The Sox don't hit now it is Robin's fault. When they didn't hit before Robin, it was never Ozzie's fault. I don't know if Steverson is any good or not, and I really haven't seen players comment, but you would think he would get some heat here. I don't think changing him would make the team suddenly hit, but if this offense comtinues, he may be the sacrificial lamb this offseason. KW used to love changing hitting coaches.

QUOTE (fathom @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 07:20 PM) 4 singles in 13 innings How come Steverson takes no heat here? It is a total change from anemic offense blames in the past.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 07:12 PM) 38 at-bats and a WHOPPING 668 OPS. Actually, he should be hitting clean-up. From 2012-2014 (a much more reliable sample size) 1st 796 OPS 2nd 658 OPS 3rd 743 OPS 4th 2.000 OPS 6th 687 OPS 7th 652 OPS 8th 804 OPS The irony is that he's never hit 9th that whole time, which is where he probably belongs but Flowers and Sanchez are even more abysmal. #funwithstatistics Even with your cherry pick stats you make a comment that makes no sense. If a guy has an .804 OPS batting 8th, why does he belong 9th?

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 07:04 PM) That version of Alexei Ramirez NO LONGER EXISTS, anymore than the "good" Melky Cabrera does. #factssuckbutwecantdenytheirimpactonreality He is hitting .289 in the 2 hole this year. LMAO

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 06:46 PM) Or you can say it all started with putting Alexei in the critical 2nd spot in the order where he can't bunt to advance runners or manage how to think a bit about the specific offensive situation and adjust his approach. Yet he has more than double the plate appearances in that spot than in any other spot in the order during his career and his numbers are better than if he bats 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, or 7th. #factssuckwhenyouwanttocomplaim

I don't think any ball hit Avi's way can be classified a can of corn.

QUOTE (fathom @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 03:04 PM) Listened to Bernstein and the Score legal expert. Can't believe people are actually pushing for a postseason ban for the Cardinals. That would be ridiculous, but a big fine and loss of several top draft picks seems to be a decent starting point. I don't know what is more stupid. Hacking into their system or getting caught.

QUOTE (Mike F. @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 03:07 PM) They could put Abreu at 3rd and LaRoche at 1st. As bad as Abreu has been at 1B lately, he would probably be beer league bad at 3B.

That Stanton for Correa and Springer plus was interesting. I guess it means trading Sale to Houston for a package that starts with Correa isn't going to happen. Obviously, this is a criminal investigation. It will be interesting to see who with STL is tied to this. Obviously, if proven to be true, someone or maybe a few will lose their jobs but that could be the least of their worries. I agree with the above. I think this was one team, and they were seeing what their ex employee was up to. I just wonder if they would have uncovered proof that he was using something they considered Cardinals property, how they would have gone about reporting it. It isn't like they could have said, well we hacked into their program and saw it with our very own eyes.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 12:40 PM) Gee, I've written of posts referring to both him and Jeremy Haber, but apparently you missed those. ONCE AGAIN, YOU'RE SAYING THAT KW IS PROFICIENT WITH ADVANCED METRICS. Where is this coming from? Because every team in baseball now has 2-3 guys in their front office who concentrate on that area...not to mention all the guys hired from Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus, fangraphs, etc.? As Balta has pointed out over and over and over again, the pitching isn't the problem over the last decade, it's the hitting. How is KW using advanced metrics to bring better hitters into the organization? KW has had the advanced stats guys there since day 1, you are the one insinuating he has had none, and that none of the things he did, which includes a World Championship team, use advanced numbers, which is total BS. Balta failed to mention that the years where the White Sox were terrible, which contributed to about 80 games below .500, their pitching was awful. When the won the WS, the thing everyone wants, they were a top pitching team, and middle of the road to below average overall offensively.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 12:36 PM) http://espn.go.com/mlb/stats/pitching/_/le...ric/order/false 29th out of 56 vs. 47th for John Danks. Okay. WHIP. Ventura 31st, Danks 54th out of 56. 4.68 ERA with supposedly the best defense in baseball behind him. Is he living up to his talent level? Where is the leadership?

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 12:28 PM) Examples? In the last 7-8 years (after the Quentin/Ramirez/Danks/Floyd acquisitions), there have been just a few excellent players added to the organization. There's Chris Sale, Abreu and Rodon kind of fell into their laps. If you can convince anyone that KW used advanced stats to identify either one of those players...well, I'll believe it when I see it. Earlier, you asked me how much time I've spent playing sports. How much time has Rick Hahn? I'm not the issue to be solved for the White Sox front office, it's talent identification and development that are on trial here. I don't know why he would need to prove he used advanced stats to sign Jose Abreu. He was the one that got him. Put here is a guy that has been with the Sox for 27 years who apparently you have never heard of. http://www.csnchicago.com/white-sox/white-...ball-operations

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 12:21 PM) A minute ago you said only talent counted. The only thing that matters is what Ventura does the 30-32 times per season he takes the mound. Put all the links on here from the fluff kc.com for everyone to read. You were the one that mentioned the Royals, as you do daily. I could give you the links to numerous articles, but you've already made up your mind so there's no point in even trying because I'm sure you wouldn't read them and would continue to make this about the Royals and not the White Sox...which is yet another distraction from the real issue. I said performance, it's spelled a little differently and has a different definition but ....And so far Ventura has performed a lot more like John Danks than a talented guy who supposedly has all these terrific leaders doing a great job showing him the way.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 12:17 PM) If there's this continuous process of improvement on the part of KW and Rick Hahn...then why hasn't ANYTHING been done about 2B or the catching position? About John Danks? If he wouldn't have wasted all that "small change" money on Keppinger, Downs and Bonifacio, we could just eat that contract and move on. KW once said that he dreamed of going out and winning another World Series...of taking the city away from the Cubs, etc. I'm not sure where you get the idea he's working harder than ever, because some of the complacency (and hubris) that affected Ozzie as manager has got into the bloodstream of Williams as well. He's gotten stale and the game has passed him by, the whole revolution of advanced data and analysis just isn't his thing. I don't like KW, but you again are writing fiction. You may actually want to do some research. KW has been using advanced stats well before you started using the ESPN.com numbers as gospel.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 12:09 PM) Gee, no, I've never played sports before, lmao. Many White Sox insiders have noted time and time again that the team was never quite the same after the losses of Rowand, Everett and eventually Juan Uribe and Mark Buehrle. Yes, we've heard time and time as well that the 1970's Yankees players hated most of their teammates but they came together and won because they had the most talent, blah blah blah. Well, the fact of the matter is that there's a TON of parity in MLB today...and when the margin of talent differentiation is lowered, leadership becomes a more important factor in a team's success. Explain the Royals' treasure trove of leaders' terrific job with Yordano Ventura.

QUOTE (DashFan @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 11:30 AM) Dick, you make some valid points but I also think that pointing to the argument with Eaton and one earlier in the season with Sale is really cherry picking. You could just as easily pick moments that I identified that represented a lack of urgency. I don't think that's what we are looking for. Eaton being upset over playing time is one thing. I want to see guys a little more upset over the season going down the tubes. I want Eaton to say that playing time has to be earned. If everybody on this team wants to play so bad I want the coaching staff to remind them they need to earn that playing time a little more often too. I was kind of bothered that Eaton was so outspoken and whiny about being benched. This thread is about veteran leadership, and it is ripping the White Sox and praising the Royals. Yet there is Ventura on the Royals, he of the multiple ejections, a suspension, John Danks' stats, why is that good leadership? People got mad at Sale and Samardjiza for their roles in the fight, so damned if you do, damned if you don't. I just think a lot of people are taking liberties with Robin Ventura's personality, and believing they know exactly what goes down in the clubhouse, and with meetings with Hahn and KW. KW is still there, like him or hate him, one thing he isn't and wouldn't tolerate is being "lax". The White Sox are just playing lousy baseball. Sometimes the reason a team sucks is as simple as that.

QUOTE (DashFan @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 10:57 AM) We don't get to see everything that goes on behind the scenes. We get glimpses through comments in the media and a brief view into the personalities of the players and how they behave in the dugout. The lack of urgency and overall malaise this team has matches the personalities and even some of the comments the players have made to the media. Dick, you don't think performance is tied to intangibles, and it's your right to believe that. I would argue that it does and it's visible not just with the Royals but with other teams throughout the league who are doing well. I don't think that difference in overall energy starts with performance, I think it starts with the mentality of the team and it may be too late to change that this season with this particular cast of characters. Sure there are some, but one thing is we don't know what goes on behind the scenes. When you want to believe Robin is totally lax, you ignore the shouting matches reported with Sale. You ignore the dust up Parent had with Eaton just the other day. The team is deflated. There is no question about that. Tampa was a disaster. Last night was a disaster. Before that, they seemed to be coming around a bit. Of course this has happened several times before. The lax part just isn't true. The Royals were losing more games than they were winning. Again, I think leaders are leaders. If the exact same dynamic was occurring in the clubhouse if the Sox were 10 games over as is occurring now, these guys would be considered great leaders. We don't know what goes on in any clubhouse, and the snippets we do get suggest it is far from the lax country club atmosphere apparently someone wants to make basing it on a W-L record and a manager that doesn't scream at players in the dugout.

Didn't Eaton get into it with Parent the other day? Yeah, totally lax.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 10:35 AM) Once again, obfuscation. Obfuscation. Obfuscation. Why don't you address the question, then...which is that there APPEARS to be a lack of immediacy or sense of urgency from this team. How do you explain this team getting absolutely hammered by opponents in the early innings? If it's not leadership, it's not preparation, it's not coaching...then what is it? All the White Sox players are "mentally weak" and the front office doesn't know how to put together a cohesive and proverbial "sum of all the parts is greater than the individual numbers" team? With Ventura, I should also add Mark Guthrie...who always serves as his "unofficial" translator for post-game interviews. How do you know there is a lack of urgency? Did you read it on a message board? The fact is, your favorite team and model organization hasn't been all that great the last couple of months. I guess their leadership or coaching or something must be lacking. The leadership crap is just like the chemistry argument. Konerko was a great leader in 2005. When the team is bad in 2013, where is the leadership. You can have great leaders, that doesn't mean you will win more games than you lose. Have you ever even played a baseball game or any game for that matter? Does the team with the best coach usually win? Or is it the team with the best leaders? Or is it the team with the best players? Or is it the team with the best performers? I'll go with the last one.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 10:18 AM) I think the reason it's working pretty well (despite the loss of James Shields) for the Royals is that you do have a pretty much perfect mixture of youth and veterans. Obviously, Infante's not playing very well (probably the worst overall 2B in the AL), but each clique of players has a ringleader, like we saw in 2005. With the Latin players, it's Salvador Perez and now Kendrys Morales policing Escobar and especially Yordano Ventura. As much as Hosmer and Moustakas are hated by many, there's the steadying presence of Alex Gordon who arrived as a regular 2-3 years earlier and gets respect as the "veteran" of the group, the vanguard of that first wave of prospects. Gordon, from all reports, work as hard as Juan Pierre on his game, always the first to arrive and the last to leave and never satisfied with all the elements of his game. Then you have Lorenzo Cain doing his own thing and bringing a certain amount of swagger and confidence (just like Torii Hunter in his prime years with the Twins, but even this season again) to the entire organization with his bold style of play. So just in their starting line-up, they have four really strong leaders, and that's not even counting Hosmer and Moustakas, who have big and arrogant/confident personalities as well. What players in our starting line-up match that? Eaton? Abreu is about as bland as Ventura. Expecting Alexei to be a leader? We might as well watch paint dry. Avi kind of has that playful, big teddy bear personality, is a jokester and prankster, but there just aren't enough position players who can be counted on right now. Catcher is perhaps the most important position on the field and we have Tyler Flowers...who is having a hard enough time for the last two years holding his position to be considered a leader. Beckham has a personality, but he's failed so many times offensively he can't be the leader except in granting interview requests, and Conor is even more boring and vanilla than both Ventura and Abreu somehow. Last year it was cute, this year it's symptomatic of the overall team malaise. Then there's the growing disappointment with Samardzija's performance as well as his leadership abilities (so far). Very little out of LaRoche and Cabrera's almost non-existent. This is all a bunch of BS. You don't know the leadership structure of either the White Sox or Royals. Abreu bland, Kendrys Morales policing everyone? LMAO. Get real.

QUOTE (shipps @ Jun 15, 2015 -> 05:25 PM) I am sure its already been discussed in here but how the hell is it that all the Royals are leading these ASG votes? I didn't realize there was a massive Royal nation out there. I would guess someone created some automated program. If they were smart, they would also be voting for all Phillies.

QUOTE (flavum @ Jun 15, 2015 -> 02:53 PM) Did you hesitate a little before you hit "add reply"? No.

QUOTE (Baron @ Jun 15, 2015 -> 02:43 PM) So the Padres have no issue firing their manager when s*** goes bad. But we have to sit here and keep the status quo because that's been working out so well. I dont get it. You want to send some sort of message that's a good start. The Sox had a different manager the last 3 games. Didn't seem to help.