iamshack

How has Beckham looked the last few nights? Does he look like he might be getting his s*** together?

QUOTE (fathom @ May 21, 2011 -> 02:18 PM) If he and the team struggles the next few weeks, I wouldn't be so sure of that. This team doesn't appear to be struggling anymore. It's time to position ourselves for an extended run and get this team built for a run at the division. Juan may or may not be a part of that run, but his possible demotion isn't going to be because the team is struggling, but rather because the team is winning without him.

Yeah, I'd be all for giving Brent a shot at Juan's job at this point.

Damn, it would have been great to get that win last night...would've only been 3 back of .500 after today...

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 21, 2011 -> 03:13 PM) I don't think its bothering him any more, I think he came back too early from it and is still completely off kilter from it. I know you weren't saying it's bothering him anymore. I'm saying it shouldn't put him "off kilter" for an entire month. He's pressing and he's struggling, and I don't think it's attributable to the surgery and resulting layoff.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 21, 2011 -> 03:07 PM) I just don't get how a guy his age would lose everything after being out a couple weeks. I mean all the BP these guys take. I respect your point but don't buy it. Or at least it's confusing to me. I mean how long does it take? A full month of s***tiness and he'll be OK in June? I hope so. Or bat him eighth the rest of the year. Yeah, I agree. No way should missing a week or 10 days push the guy back a full month. Maybe it's the league adjustment, maybe it's just an abberation, but I am not buying the appendectomy excuse after a full freaking month.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 21, 2011 -> 03:46 AM) If they're not in the hunt, I can see several changes. Buehrle has been pitching exceptionally well lately, so he'll command at least two first-round pick type talents. The Sox still need protection in case he's dealt, so they'll need at least one top pitching prospect as Danks is 1 ½ years away from free agency. Think Mark G. has the Buehrle compensation a little exaggerated with the salary he's making. Don't imagine in my wildest dreams getting two first round pick talents back. For Danks, yes. from Mark Gonzalez mailbag www.chicagotribune.com/sports Yeah, he's on crack...I think Mark might bring back one high upside player that's in High A ball or something, but that is as high-ceiling as it's going to get IMHO.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 20, 2011 -> 08:53 PM) He wasnt. Hmm, I dunno about that....think about the teammates Magic had...

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 20, 2011 -> 09:23 PM) Really? Humbers a Dfa candidate until at least next year. No one is giving you anything based on 3 months I disagree with this emphatically...not saying he will net any kind of top prospect quite yet, but finding cheap, effective starting pitching around the deadline is kind of like finding the Lochness monster, isn't it?

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ May 19, 2011 -> 02:01 PM) You know what you should do? Cry about it. Fine, Milk. You go ahead and constantly b**** and moan whether we win or we lose. I could give a s*** if you want to make yourself miserable. In the meantime, I'm not going to feel any pity when you are constantly derided for your piss poor attitude.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 19, 2011 -> 12:03 PM) Do you need a valium? I'll say this ONE more time. I was responding to milk. I assumed he was quite pleased with Peavy's performance. As was I, though I didn't see it. But you're always going to be worried about him getting hurt again. I clearly said in so many words I wasn't going to worry about that right now and be positive. Edit: I see I used the word content. I guess that can be construed as still being negative. Which I wasn't trying to do. I'm very pleased with Jake right now. No, it's not that part at all...it's the "if his elbow pops then so be it..." part...even though it was a response to Milk, who of course had to bring up injury concerns like 8 minutes after the guy pitches a 3 hit shutout. Nothing wrong with you guys having your little pity parties all the time...but why do you need to go into the mainstream threads and post some evil s*** like that even when we have things going our way? When things are finally starting to look like they are turning around? You rip on them if they lose, you say blow up the team if they lose these games....so they go out and win the darn game and you guys are immediately in the thread spreading your doom and gloom there too. You guys are just thriving on the negativity at this point, it seems.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 18, 2011 -> 10:38 PM) I'll take it. If his elbow pops then so be it. For now, I'll be content. Seriously, wtf is this? You both have passed the point of being the "realistic" fans and entered the zone of actually cheering against good things happening to this team. Go ahead and do that, but I can't wait to see all the s*** you continue to catch for it.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:56 PM) I'm with you. If we throw in the towel, Sale should start and Morel/Viciedo/Beckham/JorDanks etc should all be playing everyday. Well if you want Sale to develop as starting pitcher, you probably want him to be in an environment where he can tinker with things a bit. That environment is not the major leagues. Whether the games matter or not, it's not good for someone's psyche to have hitters constantly kicking the s*** out of you while you work on pitches.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 18, 2011 -> 01:57 PM) It's never fun to have to do that because of one person. Well it's not like his signature says anything graphic or something. If he is that easily offended or concerned about what people at his workplace are going to think, this is the price he has to pay!

QUOTE (Princess Dye @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:48 PM) Reeeeally tired of having "SHES 18 NOW!!!" visible to others at my workplace Speaking of age limits though - would be nice to have one for this board Disable the signatures in your controls.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:45 PM) And we've gained, what, a game? It will most definitely take an "insane" run to overtake the Indians. So what do you suggest the Indians' record will ultimately be? 111-51?

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:20 PM) True. But Oakland doesn't have anybody outside of Green that would interest me. I don't think they'd part with him. Given up on Taylor already?

QUOTE (flavum @ May 18, 2011 -> 01:18 PM) They don't have to have a certain record or they're out, but it's going to be that much harder in August and September when they're playing all division games. When they have 12 games against the Tigers and 13 games against the Indians after the break, how many games are you expecting the Sox to win? The more thery cut the lead between now and the break, the less they have to crush the Indians and Tigers later on. We've fared pretty well against both recently. I expect us to win plenty.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:10 PM) Remember though, there's another ticking clock...revenues. If the Sox start gaining 1 game a week, that means they're 5 games below .500 on Memorial day and maybe closing in on .500 by July 1. Last year, KW was trying to move people at the beginning of June. Only reason he hadn't done so when the hot streak erupted was that he didn't yet have takers. We may not be so fortunate this year if we bounce around below .500 for the entire month of June. From the track record KW has, do you really think if this team is sitting at .500 he is going to blow it up?

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ May 18, 2011 -> 11:59 AM) Not to mention, I simply can't enjoy the game I love, thinking that every single game is a must win. So what I do, is sit back and hope to see the club play good baseball and I know that if they play good baseball, they'll be just fine. If they don't, they don't, and they have no one to blame but themselves and we'll see significant changes made. Either way, I'm not going to go crazy and say if we lose game X that the season is over (unless game X is game 162, haha, or any playoff elimination game). Exactly. As the season progresses, obviously the games get more and more important, just from a mathematical standpoint. And that is not to say these games are unimportant. But from a sheer probability standpoint, there are just too many variables open to know much more than we need to continue taking series' and avoid losing streaks.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 18, 2011 -> 11:56 AM) I'm watching the games because I don't think the season is a total lost cause yet. But it's really annoying when some fans can pass off two games at home against the team you trail by 10 games as not 'that' important. As if this franchise in the Ozzie era has any history whatsoever of playing well in the second half and overcoming large deficits, ala the Rockies in '07, '09 and almost last year. Agreed...but you have to be patient. There are 119 games left! I'm not arguing with you that any game isn't big at this point...but you have to accept that we probably aren't going to win 25 out of 30 games and find ourselves tied for the division lead in a month...therefore, we are going to lose games. We just have to start winning more games than we are losing at a fairly decent clip. We are doing that lately. Not much else to say.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ May 18, 2011 -> 11:55 AM) There is no doubt in my mind that the Heat are going to trying and beat up Rose tonight. I think it's difficult for them to assume that strategy given that their entire payroll is going to three players, one of which is fairly soft.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:46 PM) Once this team hit double digits in games back then they forced me to be on the ledge every game. There's really no margin for error. We're not going on some 1993 Braves second-half blitz. If we don't seriously cut into this deficit soon, the last 3 months or so will be moot. That's your own personal choice. I'm not saying I want to be 12 games back in July. But it's May 18th. We're starting to win series. You can't sit here and explain to us all over and over that we aren't going to go on some huge run this year, but then be on the damn ledge for every game. There is not really any other solution for competing, other than to gradually make it back over .500 and into this race, if what you say is correct. So not really sure why you are even watching the games at this point if that is what you truly believe...

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ May 18, 2011 -> 12:30 PM) Do we have to fall behind 20 games for people to realize that EVERY game from this point on is crucial? No, but you're going to lose baseball games. This isn't the NFL or the NBA. We have 120 of these left. We're going to lose at least 9 of them (I kid). Certainly you want to win every single game, but you cannot be on a ledge every day saying "if we don't win this one, we've got to blow it all up." There are just far too many different things that can happen over the course of the next 4.5 months to start calling out must wins. The key is to keep improving and gradually climbing out of the hole we dug ourselves throughout April and early May. We're doing that. That's all you can ask for at this point.

QUOTE (flavum @ May 18, 2011 -> 11:39 AM) 34-14 might be a stretch, but giving the Indians two more wins right now would really force the Sox to go on a big run. I've always said the Sox need to be 50-43 at the break, so I'll stick with that. 32-18 from here to the break. I am with Jason here...where on earth are you coming up with this crazy idea that we need to have an exact record to have a chance? No one here, not even the Indians themselves, knows just how good they are. To have some belief that we need to be 7 games over .500 at the break versus 3 games over .500, or exactly at .500, is just very difficult for me to understand, and I have no clue how it can be justified. The key at this point is to continue to win series'. Continue to play good baseball. Get the bats going. Get Gordon/Dunn/Quentin going. Worry about games back once we reach July or August at least.