caulfield12

Today, James Shields can become the second starter in #MLB history to allow at least 7 R in 5 IP or less in four straight starts. #whitesox Looking at those early starts though, he actually produced like the workhorse who had made at least 30 starts and pitched at least 200 innings every season since 2007. Where that guy has gone and how he'll get it back are the main concerns now of the White Sox, and they need answers fast. Not only to help stop the bleeding in the standings, but to justify paying him $27 million of the $58 million he's owed over the next two seasons. Every direction you turn, this trade looks a lot uglier for general manager Rick Hahn, but all he can do is hope for the best. http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-leag...-000932589.html http://sports.yahoo.com/news/mlb-fantasy-s...-041901671.html

1st category: Erik Johnson, Semien, Thompson, Micah, Montas, Saladino, Carlos Sanchez all belong in the first category. Coats, now. The second: Conor Gillaspie, Gordon Beckham, Dayan Viciedo, Tyler Flowers, Alexei, DeAza, Avi Garcia

It's pretty obvious after watching all of these AL Central teams that the Indians have the best overall team, in terms of starting pitching and offense. I believe you'll see the Indians win the AL Central, and the Royals take one of the two wild card spots. Both teams will end up with between 88-93 wins. It's also quite obvious the AL East and AL West have a lot more balance and parity 1-5 in their divisions. Right now, you could see Boston, Baltimore or Toronto winning (toss up), and NY's not far behind and will have the resources (should they choose to) to add at the All-Star break instead of standing pat. In the AL West, you've got the Rangers way out in front, then the Mariners/Astros (rapidly nearing .500 after a terrible start) and MAYBE even the Angels if Lincecum can inspire that team. At any rate, it's a near certainty that Indians and probably the Royals will start to blow away the three remaining Central teams (Tigers/Sox/Twins) and start getting some significant separation. The battle for the other wild card spot comes down to Balt/Boston/Tor/NY and Seattle/Houston. Those six teams are clearly head and shoulder above the Tigers and White Sox at the moment. As the "Blow it Up" thread notes...the White Sox would be best served taking advantage of the Yankees not selling Miller/Chapman to the highest bidder and the Astros getting back into it, so that further narrows the list of teams looking to sell off bullpen parts. You trade Robertson, listen hard on Nate Jones, trade Todd Frazier back to the NL, trade Cabrera, trade Brett Lawrie and hope that Austin Jackson comes back and proves he's healthy before the trade deadline so you can possibly get something back for him as well. Listen on Gonzalez, although offers probably will be few and far between that will get you anything useful. Anyone willing to give up ANYTHING for Duke/Jennings/Albers/Putnam, you listen long and hard. Avisail Garcia, HE GONE as well. Navarro and/or Avila are gone if you can get anything in return as well. You build you team for 2017 around Eaton, Anderson, Abreu, Saladino (back starting, this time at 2B), Q, Sale, Rodon, Fulmer and the recent draft picks. The ONLY area that's a pretty tough decision is what to do with Todd Frazier, because you don't have any 3B prospects ready to take his place (Trey/Davidson/Delmonico just won't get it done there yet)...and the lowball offers will be discouraging, unless the Mets are REALLY willing to overpay and give you something significant for the future (surely it won't be the equivalent of Michael Fulmer for Cespedes). If you can't get what you want for Frazier, you almost have to hope for him to rebound in 2017. Ranaudo and Turner (why not?) get the opportunity to pitch more in the 2nd half. Same with the likes of Kahnle and Michael Ynoa, Matt Purke as well. You use these final 100 or so games to have tryouts from those players like Hayes, Coats and Delmonico to see if they can hit major league pitching, and improve your June first round draft pick to the 7-10 spot. You also let Kevan Smith and maybe even Narvaez getting some playing time, because...well, why not? Avila and Navarro are definitely not going to be part of the 2017 team. Meanwhile, one of the players you trade hopefully nets you a better catching prospect than you already have. And you HOPE that Zack Collins is the real deal, because he will be pushed up to the big leagues incredibly fast. Same with Burdi.

Tigers had to use Andrew Romine tonight in KC, and he actually pitched much better than Hardy and Lowe, whose ERA ballooned up to 10.91. Boyd will be out of the rotation and back to AAA, so that leaves three options: Go back to Anibal Sanchez, Joe Jimenez (AAA) and Daniel Norris. Tigers are going to struggle to stay in the race with only three legit starters (no matter how well Verlander and Fulmer have been going) because of that bullpen and the loss of JD Martinez in the OF.

Look at this realistically. You hold onto Q, Sale, Eaton, Abreu and Rodon, what do you have left that provides any value for the organization? Frazier and Cabrera have some decent value, but not a ton to where you can build up the rest of the line-up around that core. Can you convince other GM's that Frazier will automatically return back to his first half 2015 version in the NL? Same case with David Robertson, but you're not getting to get blown out of the water for a semi-elite closer making elite closer money. Maybe if the Yankees pull Miller/Chapman off the market, Robertson becomes more valuable....and maybe the Astros' bullpen stays intact with them getting back into the WC race. You'll get a collection of nice pieces that will populate the 6-10 spot on our new Top Ten list and give it some real depth again, but if you're making trades for MLB-ready players, they're more like the equivalent of Avi Garcia or Lawrie. After that, who are you willing to trade? Nate Jones? Our catchers and bench have no value, and Saladino has more value to the Sox than to other teams, but the only real solution is to start selling from those five players who have the most value or you're just changing deck chairs on the periphery.

Abreu's back close to being back again as a good hitter, but what would he fetch in the trade market right now, compared to after the 2014 season? He is a liability defensively, so his main value would be in the AL as a DH. That has value, but not as much as some would think. And, for a one-dimension player, his contract value because of the arbitration years starting will erode that value further. Jose Quintana. We can't even score more than 1 run for Q, so, even if he merits consideration for the Cy Young at the moment DESPITE having 7 consecutive losses, he's also not going to get back the return the Braves got with Shelby Miller in all likelihood. Eaton has been the one win, that's basically it. Santiago was worth more last season, arguably, but Eaton has become one of the most valuable players in baseball. At least untll the grind of playing meaningless games gets to him in the 2nd half. And I notice we're not even listing Rodon as a "positive" anymore.

http://www.southsidesox.com/2016/6/18/1197...spirals-further Worth it for the hilarious Lawrie GIF. That one and the Quintana HOF plaque are the only thing helping me to maintain my sanity. Going to have to try to track down the Navarro error, supposedly that one is priceless as well.

QUOTE (Joshua Strong @ Jun 18, 2016 -> 02:23 AM) Saw Neon Demon today and its fantastic, maybe my favorite movie of the year. I thought it was going to be impossible to top Only God Forgives but Refn did it. Drive was better than that, if only for the soundtrack. Could not have gotten Bangkok more wrong in Only God Forgives. I don't think you're going to find more than a handful that enjoyed that particular movie around here. I'll put the over/under at 2 that agree with you. WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT was pretty good (Tina Fey/Martin Freeman/Margot Robbie)...about foreign war correspondents in Afghanistan after 9/11.

Conjuring 2 Agree with earlier comments, solid sequel, not quite the "gotcha" moments as the original one (I swear to God, when I came to Indonesia in 2013, that movie was already in its 3rd or 4th month of a never ending run in theatres...incredibly successful in the Asian markets). Anabelle wasn't close to the equivalent of Conjuring 2. Patrick Wilson has had a strange career after movies like Hard Candy and Phantom of the Opera, but has really seemed to find his niche in the horror movie genre. Now You See Me 2...hate it as much I liked the first one, and the substitution for Isla Fisher really just didn't work Eye in the Sky....must-see movie, whether rental or in the theatres, deals with the ethics and does a very solid job of not taking a strong position on either side, politically, so more nuanced that we're used to seeing in this type of movie or even Homeland The Nice Guys....excellent movie, can't understand why it didn't do better in the box office, but that's Hollywood today, when remaking Warcraft (and the inevitable sequel) in order to mine the Chinese box office is being prioritized over making good movies, period

It's also much easier to make excuses for management and blame the fans...because if you take away belief in the front office, as a fan, there's nothing left to hang your hat on. Some here prefer to believe if the White Sox fans were more loyal, the White Sox SURELY would have made the playoffs in 2010 and 2012 and even this season, but the fans have handcuffed Hahn and forced him to make bargain/value deals for the likes of Jackson, Navarro, Avila, Gonzalez, Latos, Rollins, Shields, etc. Of course, conveniently overlooking the fact that signing Alex Gordon OR Justin Upton this offseason would have been completely disastrous for the franchise as well. And even Cespedes wouldn't be enough to cover up all the other holes on this team, fwiw. That would have left no money available for any more moves.

Ultimately, that's the argument. That fans should support their favorite team NO MATTER WHAT. That the Sox are a "public good/service" provided for the benefit of the community (notwithstanding the huge profits being extracted upon sale of the team and yearly profits/taxpayer subsidies) and that the community "owes" their support. Essentially no acceptable excuses for not supporting them, no matter how reasonable they may seem to be. That's not going to be a winning argument...because with how inefficient Hahn and KW have been spending money and identifying talent over the last 10-15 years, the addition of $25 million (or whatever number you want to throw out there) wouldn't have put any of those White Sox teams in first place or the playoffs, arguably. In order to get to an increase of $25 million, they'd have to draw an additional 500-750,000 fans, roughly. Other than the Cubs, Red Sox, Dodgers, Cardinals...there just aren't many franchises in MLB that have attendance of 2.3-2.5 million with EIGHT CONSECUTIVE PLAYOFF-LESS SEASONS. Obviously, those franchises don't often go for that long. The best example, obviously, is the Cubs. But even that wasn't 8 years.

If Shields was damaged goods, wouldn't it have been incumbent on Hahn and the medical staff to look very closely over his last MRI or request a new one? Especially when he's in his mid 30's and has already pitched 9 consecutive years with 200+ innings. What's the limit of days with "no take backs"? As soon as you let him pitch in a game, he's yours? We saw a perhaps similar situation with Sirotka/David Wells before 2001, if that's what turns out to be the case.

Look at some of the recent winners around baseball (even tonight). Junior Guerra was in our system and let go. Anyone could have had Dustin McGowan. Feldman with the Astros. Yovanni Gallardo. Lincecum. Edinson Volquez. Colby Lewis. The only pitcher that might have been a WORSE decision than Shields was/is arguably Ubaldo Jimenez. Even the O's announcers really detest him. Statistically, it's almost impossible for scouts and a GM to be so wrong so often.

The NRA needs a good villain like Charleston Heston again in charge.

Look at some of the recent winners around baseball (even tonight). Junior Guerra was in our system and let go. Anyone could have had Dustin McGowan. Feldman with the Astros. Yovanni Gallardo. Lincecum. Edinson Volquez. Colby Lewis. The only pitcher that might have been a WORSE decision than Shields was arguably Ubaldo Jimenez. Even the O's announcers really detest him.

9 consecutive years with over 200 innings pitched, there has to be something physically wrong...maybe not a tear, but a fraying, so to speak.

Better to do it Monday...because having him eat it for Shields if James gets tattooed around again Thursday in Boston is going to seem ridiculous. Then it will seem like this whole situation is more on Hahn than Ventura.

QUOTE (flavum @ Jun 18, 2016 -> 07:11 PM) Lost 25 of 35 4-13 vs Cle and KC Did you leave DET out on purpose, lol? 6-14 + 6-0 vs. MN=12-14

QUOTE (jasonxctf @ Jun 18, 2016 -> 07:03 PM) Maybe like most millennials, this team has ADD. That doesn't explain Dunn, LaRoche and Frazier. Maybe it does explain it, otoh...since LaRoche doesn't believe in the value of school. Is that a millennial value?

But we're only 1 game behind the Tigers after tonight!!!

The storyline of Ranaudo coming back to face his former team at Fenway will be a good one. A distraction at least. We're only 1 game away from being ahead of only the Twins and A's in the balanced AL. Very quietly, the Rays and especially the Astros have crept up.

It's too bad Ynoa couldn't stick as a starter. He has some nice looking pitches. You can see why the A's gave him the biggest bonus for a kid coming out of the Dominican at the time.

Yeah, you really can't embarrass Shields and the organization anymore by having him face the Red Sox and Porcello on Thursday. That's just a recipe for disaster, MLB's best offense at home. You have to put him on the DL and bring up Ranaudo...unless their goal is simply to get him to retire and save themselves that $27 million. That might be the best strategy for the organization, but it would be terrible to watch and wouldn't be long forgotten by free agents when they look at the stream of bodies coming out of Chicago these days. OR, unless Shields absolutely forces the issue and says he wants to make the start regardless. That would be masochistic, almost.

Security company used to be called Wackenhut, fwiw. Blame the media, or whatever, but the overriding story emerging out of Orlando hasn't been another ISIS strike in the US, similar to Paris or Belgium.

He has to work slowly with runners on base because if he gives up one run, he's done. No margin for error, how can you blame him for pitching so carefully in those situations when every game starts with a razor-thin margin for success?