sox-r-us

Yes right now....the Brewers have a team ERA less than the Cubs (they are around 0.380 .... look it up) Yes right now....the Pirates just shut out the vaunted St Louis line up for two straight days (what, no faith in Kip Wells ) Yes right now....the Reds are more than Griffey and Larkin....Dunn and Casey are very good too...yes their pitching is very suspect, but the Astros O sucks too Let's talk 15 days from today....I have a feeling the Astros will not go anywhere this year Petite is back, but he will take a while to get dominant if he ever does

If Crede can play catcher, that is the only way he makes that line up

Nuke Seriously, this year have you seen this O score against the great pitchers? We got shut out by Vasguez, Kevin Brown and Mulder this year....we have never hit Hudson, and you know this core of righties have no chance against Pedro or Schilling Lieber has been hit by us in interleague before, but when the playoffs spot light is on, pitchers always beat out the hitters Again, we do not have the line up that can score against the quality right handed pitchers and a lefty like Mulder.....we never have Hence, I would love to get Beltran and REALLY go for it.... You know against the Yanks we have no chance after the 7th with Flash and Rivera (hell Rivera pitches two innings most of the time) And you also know the Yanks will get better with some trade between now and the deadline (maybe Brett Boone at 2b or more relief or starting pitching)

If we trade out Rowand for Beltran I would go for this line up Willie Harris 2B Uribe 3B Frank DH Maggs RF Beltran CF C Lee LF Paulie 1B Jose Valentin SS Sandy/Burke/DOES IT REALLY MATTER?

Yeah but our division or the Nl East was not this tough as the NL Central The Astros would have a tough time beating the Pirates, Reds and Brewers right now, forget the Cubs and Cardinals When you have so many toug teams in your division, and you are chasing two quality teams, it is very difficult down the stretch

One more thing to remember folks, there is NO pitcher on the Sox who can shut out that Yanks line up in the playoffs (unless there are injuries to Giambi, Sheffield etc) Freddy is good, but he will give up between 2-4 runs to the Yanks line up (heck he could not pitch a shut out against them when their line up was not this scary when the Ms played the Yanks in 2000 playoffs and 2001 playoffs) No way Buerhle, ELo and Garland can shut them down either Hence, if we are really going for it, we need to score runs in the playoffs against that Yanks pitching or get Randy Freaking Johnson to shut them down I just do not have faith in our O core to score when it matters against the tough right handed pitchers like Kevin Brown, Mussina, Vasquez and Lieber If Brown and/or Lieber are not healthy for the playoffs, that is a different thing, but for now we have to plan for a way to beat them I hope Kenny at least makes the call to the Astros if they start slipping here

If they lose 8 or 9 of their next 12 (very possible), Sept will not matter Cubs have tons of games vs Brewers, and Cubs do not play Astros at all afte AS game, hence very little to no chance for the Stros to beat them head to head Also, Wood and Prior will be back and dealing....their O will be intact ....I can see the Astros selling after the AS break if they suck in the next 12 And one more thing, they just lost Jeff Kent to a hamstring....not sure how serious that is, but their O (which has been struggling mightily) will struggle more if this is a big deal

You think we can beat the Yankees Brown, Mussina, Vasquez, Lieber in the playoffs with this line up? I have seen this core of right handers choke every time there is a huge game (I remember the 4 for 30 crap from Frank, Maggs, Paul and C Lee against the Ms in the playoffs in 2000....and the Ms pitching was not even deadly enough as this healthy Yankees pitching quartet) Beltran would give us that left handed bat who can hit against a great right handed pitching and get us the playoff wins Remember if we do not get the WS this year, we gave up Olivo and Reed for nothing If we are going for it, we should really go for it

Folks Keep this in mind. If the Astros do not pick it up in the next 12 games and land up 10 out by the time they are done with this stretch, they may become sellers and put Beltran on the block. They already lost to the Cubs tonight (with Rusch starting). They play the following games up to June 20: 2 at the Cubs (with their top guns left to pitch now) 3 vs Rangers 3 at SD 4 at LA That is a very tough schedule with the only home games vs a very good Texas offense in that O friendly ballpark in Houston Would you be ok if we give up a Rauch and one out of Anderson, Rowand and Sweeney for Beltran? I think we still have better prospects to give up compared to Boston (the other Beltran contender), and I doubt more is needed for the rental for this coming year In my mind there are two deals that could absolutely put the fear of God into the Yankees and make us legit competition to them....one of them is the Beltran deal and the other one is the Randy Johnson deal. Given RJ's contract for next year and the fact that he has a no trade clause, I would love to still go after Beltran if he is back on the block. We are either going for it or not....if we are going for it, let's really gpo for it I say

One thing I am curious to see is whether anyone tries to steal a base on Zero given he throws 60 MPH many times.....it should be easy for the stealer Of course, that would require someone to get on base first But I can imagine someone trying it out since any lead off guy who gets on base in a one run game would rather be on 2nd to score

Backdoor slider to the lefties and low and in to the righties? You mean to the other way around right????????????

I know what will happen next but I will not tell you

Read my post again dude....what I said was when Maggs comes back KENNY (not me) has to decide whether he wants one out of Uribe, Wilie, Crede, Jose to be on the bench on any given day or does he believe every one of them that stays with the Sox needs to start and not be on the bench I am fine with platooning between Uribe, Willie, Rowand and Crede and keeping Jose at SS with an occasional day off But Kenny needs to answer the questions what he believes about Uribe, Crede, Rowand and Willie? Doe she believe in Uribe, Willie and Rowand's better than expected #s in the first haf of the season and/or does he believe in Crede's ability to rebound nicely in the second half? Once he answers those questions, it will be easy for him to decide what to do about Jose. I would like to keep Jose definitely....but remember we will most likely lose him at end of year (and let Uribe play next year at SS) .... maybe Kenny prefers to get someone for Jose

Folks Some of you need to read what Kenny says ....he said it one month back that he is not trading him this season, and he said it again today.....I believe him, he is not trading Maggs away....we may get Andruw jones by trading someone else but not Maggs "I have not had one conversation with regards to Mags with [Atlanta GM] John Schuerholz," Williams said. "And I have spoken with him." http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sp...-home-headlines

Remember folks, if Rowand keeps playing well, he has to play CF once Maggs comes back...which means Uribe has to play SS if Willie has to play 2B and Crede 3rd B, which leaves out Jose To me, the most critical decision Kenny has to make between now and the trade deadline is does he have faith in Willie Harris to be >0.285 kind of guy (since he has slipped from his >0.300 status now) throughout the season, does he have faith that Rowand will be around 0.300 thorughout the season and does he have fait that Crede will rebound with a stellar second half like always? If the answers to the above three questions are yes, then he has to trade Valentin since Uribe has to play.....or trade Rowand Unless he feels Uribe wasa fluke and will never be the same as he has been in the first half

witesoxfan I will take this challenge....no way Olivo becomes someone you build a team around...no way.....if anything, now playing in Seattle his batting #s are going to get worse Let's see who gets the "I told you so".....for my part, I will stick around this board to see how this plays out

Screw the prospect s***....Sandy is fine for the off season....for next year, we will worry about it in the off season

Olivo is not f***ing Pudge....he can be replaced Reed is a prospect....no one knows how much he will hit when he gets to the majors I am tired of next year....I WANT SOME POST SEASON EXCITEMENT Do you guys realize we gave up Chad Bradford for freaking Randy Johnson (since RJ was dealt mainly for Freddy G) Come on guys....quit your heart felt crying about Olivo because he did not speak to the media on his way out Big deal...this is a freaking business, and when you have not won for 90 years, YOU NEED TO TAKE SOME RISKS We had no #1 (Buerhle sucks as a #1), and now we have one.....now go out and support this team by selling out the place...that way, we will re-sign Freddy By getting Freddy we stopped the Yanks from getting him...if the Yanks had gotten him, we had ZERO NIL NADA chance at beating this this year I swear I would be a millionaire today if I had collected a penny for every freaking time someone here said how Olivio sucks against right handed pitching Guess who we will meet in the playoffs? Schiling, Pedro, Vasquez, Brown, Hudson, Lowe, maybe Colon, Escobar etc etc (except for Zito and Mulder all RHs)

The deal set in for me immediately as soon as it happened I can live without Olivo...it is all about pitching If you want to beat the Yankees you need pitching (see Florida Marlins last year)

I actually love this off day....clearly our boys need it after the intense Cubs series Let them relax, rest and get focused on Minny, our real threat I want to sweep them in that place of theirs....then go to Wrigley and just have fun

Brandofan Stop talking out of your ass....I live in Portland and have followed the Ms on radio and TV all year. They had NO Intention of making trades at that time ....they wanted to still make a run at the division, because they felt people like Olerud, Boobe, Martinez would get back to form Facts are only last week the decision was made that they are done for the year Given there is NO other pitcher that is on the market to be traded, the Ms had all of the leverage. Ms wanted Crede and Olivo....there is no way we could live with that since that would affect our chances of making a run this year We have many more OFers in our system, and if this move wins us the pennant, I bet we make enough money down the stretch to get us to re-sign Maggs (which makes Reed expendable) This team had to make this move ....for the sake of it's fans The fans better show up now and sell the darn place out from now until the end of the year

Jeckle Just chill dude....can we wait for, I dunno, another 40 games and then see howt his trade worked out? You do understand we are in a neck to neck race with the Twins We need to pull ahead and then figure out how to beat the Yanks/Bo Sox etc I love a short 5 game series with Freddy, Buerhle, Elo and Garland against the Yanks or Bo Sox now Get us one more solid reliever (right handed) to take over Mike Jackson, and we put in Scho in the pen for the playoffs to support Marte from the left side Pen for the playoffs: Marte, Shingo, Politte, Traded solid reliever, Cotts, Adkins, Schoenewise Nice....very nice

I would rather keep Maggs here this year....his bat will be huge down the stretch And with the money we save (~14M) by letting Mags walk, we can use ~10M per year to extend Garcia and use the remaining ~4M per year to get us a veteran catcher and reliever in the off season Borchard will be RF for next year to start with, Willie for 2B, Rowand for CF, Uribe for SS

I love this trade...yes it hurts to lose MO, but come on guys MO does not hit right handed pitching well .... everyone here knows it In Seattle, his pwer #s will suffer even more in that ball park. I am willing to bet with anyone here that MO will not be an all star ever He will hit 0.250-0.275....I prefer Garcia...that is a stud that can shut down teh darn twinkies and get us to compete against the As and the Yanks And would you rather lose Crede or Reed...yes, Crede has struggled here, but we have many more OFers in our system than 3rd basemen....and Crede will get his act in the second half....we have seen it before

I love this trade....you have to give up someone to get quality.....let's go for it I want one stud bull pen guy now to make me feel real good down the stretch Maybe just someone solid that means the end for Mike Jackson I can live with one out of Rauch of Diaz going into the BP as long relief/take over Adkins role, and Adkins becomes a set up guy for the 6th, 7th and 8th innings Also, in the playoffs we can put Scho now in the pen for some needed left handd pitching to help out Marte Awesome trade....get one solid righty reliever, get Maggs back and we are set for a run here