witesoxfan

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 10:58 PM) I recall that we had a series in NY in 2005 where an outfielder on the Sox completely stole the show. Eh? Eh? He also had a batting stance where he crouched down but held the bat straight up. Also, funny looking goatees.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 08:42 PM) So Grady Sizemore looks to have regained some of his magic. Always thought a team should have tried to trade for him when he was hurt and go with high risk/high reward player. Doesn't seem like the Indians to trade a player that talented while his value is that low. Maybe the Yankees (found a replacement) or the Marlins (way too expensive), but not the Indians. They seem to do whatever they can to capitalize on any and all value they can get out of a player.

QUOTE (Harry Chappas @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 09:17 PM) They still need to hit he f'ing ball. They didn't score many runs, but I will gladly take 10 hits. Yet another sign of progress. This was easily the best win of the year. Great pitching performance from Floyd, clutch hitting, and the defense actually making a few plays behind the relievers opposed to messing up easy outs. If ever there was a game that was going to start something, it was this one. (I've also never seen Quentin show as much emotion as he did in the dugout after Konerko's homer...that was sweet)

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 04:29 PM) That one that came out within the last few years, I think it was Mr. Brooks, wasn't that bad. But anything that involves Dane Cook being killed is alright in my book. I'm sure I'll get s*** for saying this, but Bull Durham wasn't even that great. It was a love story with the backdrop of a baseball movie, and all it's really done is provide douchey "baseball" quotes that will never go away. Major League was far superior to Bull Durham, even if it had a sorta similar plot

Yes, seriously, that guy. I wish Ozzie would play Castro a bit more often to keep Pierzynski atleast a little fresher while getting Castro's bat into the lineup. I sorta think that Castro is the best catcher in the White Sox system, but maybe that's just me.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 03:34 PM) Floyd's curve when it is on, is just devistating. Humber seems to have a "good" curve when it is on. As our 6th starter, I am not complaining at all. I'm not either. And from a baseball standpoint, I think Floyd's changeup is his best pitch when all 3 are working well. That curveball is really pretty and bends like a SOB, but the change is completely unhittable.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 02:24 PM) Kevin Costner deserves to have his ass kicked for many other movies, not just Waterworld. For the love of the game. FOR THE LOVE OF MY VOMIT

QUOTE (Harry Chappas @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 02:32 PM) His talent looks on par with Floyd and he appears to maybe have a better head on his shoulders. He is doing the job and keeping the Sox in games. Floyd's fastball is harder, his curveball bites more, and his change dives more. Floyd is a far superior talent.

QUOTE (False Alarm @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 10:19 AM) sure, i know. doesn't mean it's impossible (it's certainly happened since then), and doesn't negate the fact that there's been a good amount of smoke about silverio's age. i mean, the guy played 2009 in the DR after playing 2008 over here, and it was because of an age discrepancy in his papers. that's from buddy bell's mouth. that right there is a good reason to wonder about his age, and it's not the only reason. so i think i'm being fair. what's not fair is to say we have no reason to believe he's not 20. i mean, i don't mind someone taking the optimistic route and just trusting that he's 20, but neither can i blame someone for acknowledging the weird circumstances around silverio and thus not trusting the listed age. I'm not going to stop you. I'm skeptical too, and I was mainly referring to the point SS2k made about the difficulty in forging age now a days. Perhaps he is 22 or 23 and this is stuff he should be doing...if it is, we will find out once his body stops developing and he stops performing at each successive level. If he is 20, he is going to continue to develop for a while and could turn into a very legitimate offensive threat a few years down the road. All anybody can really say at this point in time is that we'll see.

If he is actually 20, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, then he could turn himself into a very legitimate prospect this year. The results are very encouraging so far. Small sample size of course, but he's drawing a walk here and there, his K rate isn't terrible yet, and he's hit for a bit of power.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 09:08 AM) If Peavy is ready to start, and Humber is as good as he has been in his four starts, he would be huge for that pen. Humber would give the Sox a middle/set up guy that they could count on, besides Crain. We have no idea what Peavy would be like out of the pen. For that matter, we don't know what Humber is like either, but he wouldn't be counted on to get outs late in the game. Beyond that, it would be a complete financial waste to have Peavy in the pen. I think this is something you consider in like August or September, not April.

QUOTE (LVSoxFan @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 07:29 AM) Am I the only one who's reminded of former Cub Moises Alou when I see Rios' batting stance? Maybe the stance, but Alou had a very fluid swinging motion and a lightning quick bat. Rios is ridiculously mechanical.

As I mentioned elsewhere - I think the game thread, which has been archived - Santos threw 28.2 IP in the minors in 2009. It's a small amount of innings, but for s***s and gigs, I looked up his first 28.2 from last year. 1.88 ERA, 1.40 WHIP, 4.7 BB/9, 10 K/9, .234/.341/.290/.631 against, .329 BABIP That is not including his next outing in Minnesota, where he got a blown save and went 0+ IP. His final 23 innings, including the Minnesota fiasco... 4.30 ERA, 1.70 WHIP, 4.3 BB/9, 9.4 K/9, .292/.364/.396/.760 against, .371 BABIP He had already been getting pretty unlucky on balls in play during the first portion of that, but it went to a monumental new height afterwards. .371 is entirely unsustainable and with any luck at all, his line looks a bit better. So, if that holds true, Santos should be pretty good this year until about September, but hopefully at that point his body is conditioned enough that it will be able to handle an extra 10-20 innings. He's definitely a keeper.

QUOTE (DBAHO @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 03:55 AM) We can all dream. I just see him as an ideal "buy low" type of player. He's got TO issues and needs to improve his jump shot, but those are things that are coachable and definitely fixable. All depends on what Kahn wants for him though. If I had to take a completely wild speculative guess, I would say he wants a power foward type.

It is amazing to consider that Santos is really getting by on talent alone at this point. He threw 28.2 innings in the minors in 2009 (and was pretty terrible), 51.2 last year and has now thrown 11 this year. That's 90.1 IP in his entire professional career - you don't have a great understanding of how to pitch with that little experience on the mound. It should get better as he gains more experience too, and I think his arm will hold up better this year as well now that he has a few more innings on it overall. I do hope that he begins to mix his pitches up a little better in the future though. I mentioned it in the winner thread, but he's pretty easy to predict right now. If the count is even or worse, he's coming with a fastball (the only pitch I didn't see that was Teixeira, on like a 1-0 count...he went with a pitch that looked like it had 2-seam movement on it, but came in at like 87, so I'm not sure what it was...may have been his changeup - EDIT: looking on TexasLeaguers, it was most definitely his changeup). If he is ahead in the count or it's at 2-2, he's coming with the slider, which, for the most part, is a pretty unhittable pitch because he rarely seems to elevate it. It also seems that it's rarely a strike, so if the hitters can lay off, they can work the count full pretty quickly. What I'd like to see him do is use the slider just a little more early in the count just to get the hitter guessing a bit more and then using his fastball later in the count to blow hitters away. He's not Tony Pena with a 92 MPH fastball - he's got legitimate heat that hitters won't be able to catch up with. For the time being, he is absolutely the best choice to close ballgames.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 12:20 AM) Eek, we've heard that before. They are signs that it's atleast starting to turn around. If anything, Dunn looking better at the plate alone makes the offense quite a bit more dangerous on its own, and the bullpen has been roughly one million times better than it was through the first 10 or 11 games of the season. The starting pitching, for the most part, will be there, so it's a matter of getting the rest of the offense back on track. My two biggest concerns going forward in the lineup are Rios and Pierzynski. Rios has shown in the past that he can sustain this sort of ineptitude for pretty much the entirety of a season, so until he starts producing a bit more, I'm going to worry about him. And Pierzynski scares me because he didn't show anything until like the final 8 weeks of the year last year, and he has a ton of mileage. It just doesn't seem like he hits any balls hard anymore. I also worry a little bit about Pierre mainly because teams are playing their LF so far in against him that some of those shots he hits to LF are staying up just long enough that whoever is out there can get to it and because they are playing so shallow, no runner on earth has a chance to score when he does get one to LF.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 12:59 AM) Does nobody get on in front of Bautista? The guy has 7 home runs but only 10 RBI. Yunel Escobar, Rajai Davis, and Corey Patterson have hit in the 1 and 2 spots 36 times for the Blue Jays this season. Their OBP's Escobar - .346 Patterson - .245 Davis - .156 Escobar has gotten on the second most for the Jays this season (not counting Nix, who only has 54 plate appearances). I'd go with Nix if I were them in the 2 hole to atleast try and get someone on base, but that offense hasn't quite gotten going yet either. Team OBP of .317 and Bautista is at .506, and mind you, these numbers are from before tonight's game.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 12:17 AM) Thankfully someone has finally stepped in as the closer. He has to do it a few more times to prove it, but it's nice to know he can get it done. Humber, what can you say? The guy has been way more than we should have ever reasonably expected. Is there any chance he can put together an entire season worth of good starts? There's as good a chance of that as there is for Peavy

QUOTE (hi8is @ Apr 26, 2011 -> 12:10 AM) I can't believe that people on this board are still pointing to negitives after a preformance like that. Give me a break. Eat some crow - or in this case, some Humber-Pie. There are always things that can be improved, just as there are always things that go well. In this game, as a player or a fan or anything in between, you never want to get too high nor too low.

QUOTE (3E8 @ Apr 25, 2011 -> 11:25 PM) re: Jose Bautista's extension I had another post where I explained exactly why Bautista's emergence came out of nowhere, but I cannot find it. Currently leading baseball in HR and OPS. He just kills everything. He is just absurdly good. You wanna see crazy? Jose Bautista is due $8 million this year. His production through 18 games has been worth $8.5 mill. So, theoretically, he could get hurt and he still would have done enough to justify his contract. Oh, and I can't think of any one player in the entire AL that I would rather have up at the plate right now.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Apr 25, 2011 -> 11:06 PM) Why couldnt Ozzie have put in Crain instead of Santos to face Jones? (Thornton for 1 batter was if Crain failed, I thought a lefty was up next but now im not sure if Granderson was 2 batters) Oh he absolutely could have, and I would have had no problem with it. I really don't like that he let Santos go multiple innings simply because he has to sit on the bench for a while and go back out and pitch again afterwards, which can be a little extra taxing on the arm. As a reliever, you need your A+ stuff every single outing because you usually don't have something else you can rely on, and if the Sox need a save tomorrow, it wouldn't be a huge surprise if Santos is just a little bit off.

Spartacus Workout is f'ing ridiculous. Only got through 2 of the 3 sets.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Apr 25, 2011 -> 09:11 PM) Jones v. Sale or when Jones gets pinch hit, bring in crain, then he brings in Chavez, bring in Thornton for 1 batter, bring in Santos to close. I mean there are a million ways to get 1 out. Not sure if this is covered, but a pitcher has to either face atleast one batter or record atleast one out (which can be done with a man on base where he picks said guy off). So once Ozzie brings in Santos, Santos HAS to face Chavez. And I absolutely want nothing to do with a lefty facing Andruw Jones, he has become a very, very good hitter against left handed pitching.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ Apr 25, 2011 -> 10:34 PM) haha, yeah, hopefully me ignoring them won't come back to haunt me, but some of those stats the Indians pitching was putting up was almost as good as the Sox offensive stats have been bad, meaning it can't sustain. I like both teams young talent a lot, this year though, I will still look at Twins and Indians. I think the standings will turn upside down by the end of the year. Both the Indians and Royals are starting to lose it to some extent, and I think the Royals young talent will prove superior to the Indians in the end. I think the Sox are the most talented team in the division and that will become evident while the Tigers having a second half swoon and the Twins just don't play as well as they have in recent years.

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Apr 24, 2011 -> 03:58 PM) I love Blanke and to me is the best catching prospect in the system, and I'm biased toward Black because I knew him a bit in Purdue and want him to succeed badly here. I want to see a report on how Blanke is defensively, but he is a guy that excites me.