witesoxfan

QUOTE (11and1 @ Aug 22, 2010 -> 09:51 PM) Isn't an annual second half fade a big part of Toronto fans' being glad to see Rios go (aside from the ridiculous contract)? Career 1st half - .290/.341/.466/.807 Career 2nd half - .272/.318/.422/.739

QUOTE (MattZakrowski @ Aug 22, 2010 -> 07:07 PM) Punto's not bad at baseball, he's bad at hitting a baseball. His defensive value is pretty high. And his defense translates to 3B, SS, and 2B too, which is a huge added bonus. Add in the occasional decent average and a good ability to get on base, and there are many players out there who are worse than Nick Punto.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 10:21 PM) I would say Rich Harden gets more credit than Darren O'Day. That's now 2 no-hitters in the past week that were lost after the starting pitcher exited. And the Twins were involved with both. Kind of funny that Mauer ended that no hit bid too, considering he did it to Floyd in 2008 as well in the exact same situation.

Bobby looked good. He was only hitting like 93 on the gun on the Twins radar, but I thought the gun was a bit slow in the later innings. The most important part of the outing, to me, was that he wasn't elevating any of his breaking stuff. He didn't throw much of it, but he had a couple of nice breaking pitches to end at bats. If he can do that, he'll be effective. If he keeps his fastball way up, and his breaking balls low, he'll be fine.

Even though the Rangers own the biggest divisional lead in the majors, I wouldn't write them into the postseason just yet. They still have 7 against both the Athletics and Angels, 7 against the Twins, 4 against the Blue Jays, and 3 against the Yankees, and have 23 games on the road versus 19 at home (they've been incredible at home, and slightly below .500 on the road). Not that I think that highly of either the Athletics or the Angels (Oakland still has a pretty difficult schedule, but LAA's is a bit easier), but I could definitely see that division race tightening up in the last 6 weeks.

Well, really, they can go 32-0 or 25-8 in their next 32 or 33 games, but then I'm wondering what his prediction is for the final 8 or 9 games.

QUOTE (MattZakrowski @ Aug 20, 2010 -> 12:16 PM) Pierre's defense has impressed me. He gets to a lot of stuff, and I don't feel quite so bad about having him next year anymore. As you can probably imagine, I agree too, and barring something catastrophic next season, he's going to be worth the $8.5 mill the Sox ended up paying him (considering he's almost been worth it this year alone).

Damon has a no-trade clause in his contract, so he's going to be tough to move or acquire. In regards to LaRoche, it is entirely possible that the DBacks just didn't want to move him, and that their asking price is still extraordinarily high. He does have a reasonable option for next year that the DBacks can pick up, but it becomes pricier for other teams to acquire him because the option becomes $2 mill more expensive. As to why other teams didn't pick him up...Atlanta is one of the few who I think could have, but they may have called into DiPoto in advance and asked about him, and then asked about Lee, and figured that Lee would be the easier target to acquire. Other than that, there aren't a whole lot of teams in contention that need help at 1B: San Diego, San Francisco, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, and now Atlanta all have 1B locked down, and Boston, New York, Tampa, and Minnesota. Maybe Texas, but they seem content with who they are running out there, and they've already made a ton of moves this year. The Sox seem like they're the only legitimate option to acquire him right now, and from the sounds of it, they have no interest in LaRoche. I would imagine it's largely because they're not sure if LaRoche is really an upgrade (and some guys do struggle adjusting to new leagues and new roles and they can't afford to go through an adjustment period right now with so little time left in the season, so there may be some legitimacy to that) and because Arizona is asking for too much simply because they are looking to hang on to him. I'd say it's Manny or bust at this point, although taking a flyer on Hawpe wouldn't be the worst idea in the world.

Juan Pierre - 1.7 WAR Scott Podsednik - 0.9 WAR I wondered why people weren't still upset about not bringing Podsednik back. Not that I've suddenly become attached to Juan Pierre or anything, but he's been a pretty valuable member of the Sox this year.

Eh, sort of. They're below .500 against them over the past 5 years though, and have about the same record against them as the Twins. The Sox have typically played New York better than Boston, which is the opposite of Minnesota.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Aug 20, 2010 -> 09:40 AM) insurance fraud anyone? YOU CAN PUT IT ON THE BOOOOOOOOOARD, YES!

That horse is priceless

This was a great game to watch amongst several Twins fans.

QUOTE (CQMVP @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 04:18 PM) They only play football games for around 25 weeks. The other seasons are all much longer, and very similiar in length(36-38 weeks), but baseball plays twice the number of games during that time. The games last around the same amount of time as well, with baseball games leaning towards 3 hours, and NBA/NHL more towards 2:30. Basically, there is twice as much baseball played as any other major sport... I honestly think that most sports have too long of a season, aside from football, but that is all revenue driven. I guess I'm the only one that thinks there are just way too many baseball games being played. Football is also a far more physically demanding sport, where you have to give 100% effort at all times you are on the field (unless you're Randy Moss). There's a reason the average running back's career is like 3 years and most players are done by the time they're 31. Baseball has also had 154 games and 162 games for over 100 years, and that's because it generally takes that many games (or more) to determine who are the best 4 teams within each league.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 03:03 PM) This board is beyond hope. Greg, it was a facetious comment made towards the poster whom he quoted, when he said along the lines of "I hope everyone who loves the Twins goes down on the plane with them when it inevitably crashes." It may have been a bit over the top, but the initial statement wasn't better and is arguably questioning the level of allegiance these fans have to the White Sox. Just because White Sox fans are critical of the team and are generally snarky and sarcastic and pissed off when the Sox lose doesn't mean they suddenly aren't fans of the team and are fans of the Twins.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 02:15 PM) The other way to look at it is..."If I stop Carlos Quentin/Joe Mauer/Josh Hamilton/Albert Pujols, I have a good chance to win this game...so now what can I do to stop those guys." White Sox team splits in wins - .300/.359/.501/.860 White Sox team splits in losses - .221/.292/.333/.625 if that isn't enough MLB team splits in wins - .295/.367/.482/.848 MLB team splits in losses - .222/.286/.328/.613 You can argue the cause and effect if you want, but generally when teams hit, they win, and when they don't, they lose.

That's a spitball at its finest

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 01:32 PM) The closest is the 2001 team, and that squad was competing for the very first time and suffered through numerous second half injuries. Nobody expected them to beat the Indians, as that was their first appearance at the top of the division in almost a decade. About the only thing you can say is that it would suck even worse to be a Tigers' fan, because they were chased down twice by the Twins from behind in the last days, whereas we gave it up in 2006, 2009 and 2010 much earlier from a "fan pain" standpoint. Then they botched the World Series and went into America's worst economic slide. That 2001 team was hurt by Tom Kelly's stubbornness. LaTroy Hawkins was brutal all season, and he remained the closer pretty much all season. That team's pitching staff was pretty terrible overall, and then they traded Matt Lawton, who was having a great year, for Rick Reed. Reed was surprisingly good for them the next season, but you don't trade outfielders who have that kind of production for 36 year old starting pitchers. They tanked hard in the second half.

Yeah, that's a pretty common phenomenon. Players usually perform better when they're winning, and perform worse when they're losing. It's not rocket science.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 01:08 PM) That's the worst part. The offense is scoring runs, both members of the awful DH platoon hit big homers (yes, I realize who hit the biggest one Tuesday), but it hasn't been enough. I hope MB can turn it up today, I have a feeling Sox don't get more than 3 vs. the porn stache, hope I'm wrong. I actually thought about predicting an 8-3 loss, but it didn't feel right.

Then he farted. His dog ran out of the room after smelling the stench and he yelled, "GAS, HE GONE"

He tried to do it again, but realized he was down to his last bullet.

Two gut wrenching losses in a row. They've scored 6 runs the last two nights, and they lost both games by 1 run. It's probably time they try to score 8 runs instead of 6. This game feels like the final game against Detroit in that 4 game series, except that this time it's the Sox who are fighting for their season. Stone said the Sox wanted to win that game, but Detroit needed it. Well, the Twins want to win this game, but the Sox need to win this game. They need to come out strong, and fast, and they need to beat the ever loving s*** out of the Twins.

I don't know why any team would want AJ Pierzynski. Among catchers qualified for the batting title (there are only 10), he has the second worst OPS of the group, ahead of only Jason Kendall. There are a few who are splitting duties that have been worse than him, but really, does any team want a player who has put up a .631 OPS this year, regardless of what position he plays?

QUOTE (PlaySumFnJurny @ Aug 19, 2010 -> 09:42 AM) True, 5 back in mid-August is nothing; especially with 4 still left against them. Hell, the Twins gained the 5 games in less than one week (one really, really bad, s***ty week). Its the difference in current momentum that makes things feel worse than they objectively are. In '08, the Sox went 3-9 over a 12 game stretch beginning September 15th (including the infamous 3 game sweep in the Dome) and still won the division. We can definitely still win it. It's hard for me to classify that as the Sox winning it as opposed to the Twins losing it. The Sox lost 2 of 3 against the Indians at home. All the Twins had to do to clinch the division was beat KC in 2 out of 3 in the Dome when they had all the momentum in the world. Instead, it seems as though they celebrated their division title early, and they choked. It's like the only time in the last 9 years when I can think of the Twins choking down the stretch. Game 163 was still sweet as hell.