caulfield12

Between Baez, Contreras, Schwarber, Soler and possibly Russell, they can afford to deal at least two of those guys... If they continue struggling the rest of the series with lefties, there's going to be a temptation to overreact and try to find another RH hitting power bat. Of course, Soler is the obvious odd man out, but he won't bring back much at this point. A lot depends on whether Fowler returns. I'm not sure they want to pay him $17.2 million next year. They can move Heyward back to center, which gives them room for another power bat on the corner but weakens the defense a bit. Schwarber can't be traded until his value is back up and he returns to form from his injury.

Schwarber has nothing to do with their losing this year. It would be quite easy to argue that it gave Baez an opportunity to emerge, and Contreras as well. Not to mention they had Soler there in reserve as well. The odds are greater of a pitching going down next season, and that will have much more of an impact than removing one cog in that offense.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/what-hillary-cli...-193545234.html Would love to hear any Republican (and/or Greg) respond to what's being reported and what it is that you actually find so offensive...this actually sounds a lot like something John McCain, Mitt Romney or Jeb Bush would say. Pretty centrist. https://www.yahoo.com/news/inappropriate-an...-204047397.html Likewise, read the paragraph 3rd from the bottom. Do you really believe this, and you can maintain a straight face when nodding your head? It's called damage control. One thing's for sure, though, Ivanka's brand is selling well still. That might be the ONLY positive to come out of this entire election cycle for the Trump family.

And no J4L, either...Ron is at least maintaining some illusions of being more of a Sox fan while straddling the line with excitement about living in his Wrigleyville environs.

Plus, he's a free agent and it's doubtful the Dodgers are going to pay a fortune to bring him back. Maybe. 98 mph cutter there. 5-0. And 6-0. Can rest their big arm now. Further reinforcing the need for "lockdown" bullpen guys this offseason. That also means Nate Jones and David Robertson at least should get some nibbles. And a certain bar in Curacao will get a lot more business.

Now it makes the decision with going Maeda or Kershaw for Game 5 even more interesting...it feels like you have to go for the jugular with Kershaw, but the Cubs win that game and the Dodgers are back in trouble. That said, Hill is a nice back-up option to have behind Clayton. This also takes a ton of pressure off Urias, and puts it squarely on the Cubs' LH hitters in a nearly must-win Game 4.

This. That whole idea about finding the "next big thing" or a market niche to be exploited. The Royals created that idea of loading up the back of the bullpen. Everyone copied it and now 7th and 8th inning set-up guys (Giles/Miller/Herrera, etc.) are becoming just as valuable as the traditional 30/100 everyday players because of specialization. If Getz was presenting some type of "grand vision" for changing the way the organization does things, that would be one thing. Kapler came on board with a glittery press conference. I'm not sure anyone noticed the Getz hiring outside of insider baseball circles and the industry itself. Maybe Phil Rogers can be convinced to write an article, but even that's doubtful.

Uh, oh....now you're adding on to the current conspiracy theory by creating in Greg the belief system that not only is the media biased unfairly, but that we just call those who disagree with us names, burn down offices, spray graffiti and make a nuisance of ourselves with all "Trump/Ventura" supporters, lol. Thankfully, religion/God/Catholicism wasn't mixed up into that taunt.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 05:42 PM) Yeah, it is hard to call writing large checks a strategy. The Dodgers are like a MUCH larger budget version of the White Sox. It seems Friedman knows what he wants to do in terms of retooling the franchise, but he's also under pressure (hence, all the veteran pitching signings and reclamation projects) to get to the playoffs each and every year. At best, the idea that a GM who can be successful in a small market and instantly translate those same concepts on a bigger scale is a mixed bag so far...we'll see what happens when they've cleared all those guys he inherited like Ethier and Puig and it's almost all his own blueprint except for Kershaw. Their minor league system is in very good shape, Urias looks like a keeper and Seager a future MVP, Toles came up and made a big contribution, Ryu and Maeda were both promising international finds who weren't "top dollar" guys, but there have also been plenty of relatively big mistakes as well.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 03:35 PM) And if the White Sox had the development in their system that the Dodgers have had over the past 10-15 years, I probably wouldn't have questioned the hire. Or the amount of investment...where they just write off the Hector Oliveras of the world and go back to the drawing board.

QUOTE (Jerksticks @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 12:58 PM) Thank God for FoxNews and now some of these internet news streams. I lean liberal on some things and conservative on others but I'm not stupid- i acknowledge the huge bias and agenda in mainstream media. Everybody sees it. Everyday I read CNN, MSNBC, FoxNews etc...all sides. It's incredible the smear against Trump and the sweep-under-the-rug for Hillary. And most people notice it too. The only ones that don't are ignoring it for their own personal reasons, or they roll on a sound bite. It's just sickening. If that guy who went undercover and exposed the violence-creating at trump rallies by the DNC Offshoots is telling the truth, and CNN won't even cover it or page-10s it, I'm done forever. What's everyone make of it? Pretty effed up if true Trump is the worst candidate in modern history, by far. Nobody is even close, except Goldwater in 1964. You don't see Dems complaining that McGovern, Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Gore and Kerrey got hosed (except for the Supreme Court and State of Florida in 2000). Just like the Republicans ran some pretty flawed candidates against Clinton and Obama. Republicans have always been able to outspend Dems by a 3/2 advantage, and Citizens United gave them yet another opening but they've failed to modernize and embrace the changing demographics in America. Before Obama, their use of databases/voter information was twice as good as the Dems as well. Hence 28/40 years with Republican presidents and numerous Congresses since 1994.

CSPAN has some excellent programs as well....

People also want to see the Cubs lose, just like the Yankees and Red Sox. More of a rooting interest on both sides of the ledger.

2000 and 1960 are the only elections in modern history that are really up for debate, unless you want to go for Dewey vs. Truman as another liberal conspiracy.

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/adidas-encour...-152512206.html Adidas dooms Cubs by pushing reverse the curse signage...

QUOTE (Joshua Strong @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 09:58 AM) Kaper does have previous managerial experience, both in the minors and WBC. A lot of top teams in baseball have hired young people to run departments in their baseball ops. Like the Rangers with Daniels and Preller, Oakland and the Dodgers with guys like Zaidi, Kapler and Forst, and the Astros with guys like Goldstein and Elias to name a few. Experience is not a guarantee of success. That's a whole different situation than working directly with minor leaguers players instructionally on a daily basis...requiring an even more specialized skillset and background intellectually.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 08:46 AM) Gabe Kapler retired in 2012. he coached one year in the WBC for Team Israel. 1 year later he became the Director of Player Development for the Dodgers without any experience. He's super into analytics and nutrition and converted all of the prospect meals into gluten free stuff. Maybe Chris Getz is similar to Kapler where he has an actual "player development plan" that delves into nutrition, analytics and other factors. We have no idea. But assuming it's a s***ty hire because it's the White Sox is incredibly short-sighted and it's honestly b****ing just to b****. Everyone in baseball was talking about grooming him as a future manager. His name even came up here occasionally as a Ventura replacement. Assuming Getz has the same amount of respect and leadership qualities as Kapler is a bit far-fetched. Thankfully, it can all be settled quite easily with a FutureSox in-depth interview. http://kaplifestyle.com The Kapler situation is one where he has soent his entire adult life studying areas of nutrition/diet, fitness, weight lifting and advanced analytics for all aspects. He's more like a life coach and motivational speaker. He's a brand in the same way Jessica Alba's $1.4 billion valuated Honest Company is...and he wanted to use that LA market to his advantage in terms of marketing and career opportunities. http://www.latimes.com/sports/dodgers/la-s...1024-story.html Kapler story...

Surely the White Sox should have learned something from the Ventura debacle...in terms of hiring someone with absolutely zero professional experience as a coach/manager. Likely the Tigers wouldn't have hired Ausmus with a do-over, and Mike Matheny's not exactly on firm ground in St. Louis, either. The bigger question is why do winning MLB organizations or Top Ten minor league organizations always hire someone with vast/extensive experience for the Dir. of Player Development positions with their organizations if it doesn't matter?

Five years ago...or four, the White Sox were actually fielding competitive teams, at least in 2010 and 2012. Even then, though, there was concern about position player development with Beckham backsliding and Viciedo bouncing from position to position. The Sox were lucky Sale and then Quintana in 2012 covered up for much of the mess in that aspect of operations, but there were plenty upset Bell had such influence to bring in Teahen and then push for an unwarranted extension. Bell still has ties to the Royals, and it would be shocking if either Hostetler (ties to Dayton Moore/Atlanta) or Bell weren't the driving force behind this, along with Hahn. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Capra Let's compare Capra's resume before assuming that position and Chris Getz's scant resume. The common theme is everyone I've looked at had at least eight years of experience in either scouting, minor league managing or as a bench coach/roving or infield instructor.

The Cubs' fans have gone dormant... Hill, Urias, Kershaw the next three games.

Greg, I think I've prefaced every single post about Hillary Clinton with words expressing exactly that same sentiment. I haven't seen one Democrat claiming "I just LOVE Hillary Clinton so much!!!" 75-85% of the reason why most are voting in this election is 1) to STOP TRUMP FROM BECOMING PRESIDENT, 2) the SUPREME COURT and 3) PROGRESSIVE POLICIES/INCREMENTAL TRIANGULATION IN THEIR PREFERRED POLITICAL DIRECTION. As opposed to all out nuclear armageddon and international embarrassment/global catastrophe...and undoing most if not all of the "good" that the US has done for the rest of the world since 1776.

The hire, at the very least, should have been a more exhaustive process with at least 3-5 outside candidates along with 2-3 internal ones. As Balta said, we can draw the conclusion that they did at least go through an exhaustive search process before settling on Getz, who's the most inexperienced at his particular position (Director of Player Development) in the major leagues, or we can just as easily assume they half-assed it and went with the comfortable candidate who wouldn't make waves or rock the boat, someone who could easily be controlled or spied on/spy on others, depending on the latest version of who you believe is winning the soap opera-ish battle for control of the Sox front office. The fact of the matter is that we heard for four plus years that Robin Ventura was capable of being a Hall of Fame manager when/if he was presented a talented team to manage, and that his name could rank up with Torre/LaRussa/Leyland/Cox. At any rate, let's follow the career/s of Ventura and Chris Getz and see if they still have jobs in baseball five or ten years from now. If they don't, it's pretty easy to reach the conclusion that their services were not greatly in demand across MLB. We shall see.

As far as measuring failure and success in black and white terms, that's virtually impossible, since 65-70% of it is drafting talented players with major league ability. Simply going by the win-loss percentage of the big league club in 2018-2020 would be one indicator, but probably not the fairest one...

Suggested interview questions for Getz: 1) How did this big jump in your coaching career come about? What it a case where you contacted the White Sox about a possible opening (when Capra was moved to the big league staff) or did they contact you initially? 2) What was the interview process (if any) like? Who conducted it? 3) What have you learned in your two years in the Royals' organization that has helped prepare you for this huge jump in responsibility? What did being part of that organization when they won a World Series in 2015 teach you, and how can it be applied to the Sox minor league system? 4) What is your perspective on analytics? 5) What do you feel is your strength as a coach? One area you would like to improve? 6) How does your background as a "gritty" player who got the most out of his talent complement the drafting and development process put in place by Nick Hostetler? Are you familiar with Nick and his focus on high "baseball IQ" players with elevated OBP's and translatable baseball skills? 7) Will you report to Buddy Bell as your direct superior? 8) What are some things that worked well for the Royals' in their developmental process that you could bring over with your own unique stamp and incorporate? What are some of your core beliefs about teaching fundamentals, fielding and baserunning? 9) Where do you see yourself in 5 or 10 years in the White Sox organizational structure? 10) Many other major league directors have a strong background in scouting as well as minor league managerial experience...how will you make up for this lack of experience and "get up to speed" since you're on such a steep learning curve? What do you think the White Sox saw in you that made you an especially attractive candidate for the position?

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Oct 17, 2016 -> 03:58 PM) And until I mentioned him, you have never heard of him. How many of their draft picks are on their roster? How come you never mentioned Capra? They are both cogs in a machine, one effective (the Cubs), the other badly in need of a replacement or complete overhaul. There's simply no need (to waste time) to pick on Capra or Steverson when JR, KW, Hahn and Bell all need to go. It's like Wells Fargo firing all their marketing people and bank cashiers to protect the three top leaders who are most responsible. Finally, the majority of minor league columns tend to be puff pieces (milb.com, etc.), so it's really hard to determine what's going on because those types of problems will never be pointed out to someone from outside the "family" in a meaningful way, at least not until that person has already left the organization, and even then, it's more intimations and hints and reading tea leaves to sort through and divine.