caulfield12

Danks simply cannot HIT or LAY OFF a high fastball to save his life. Last night, he couldn't even make contact with 87-89 MPH fastballs right over the heart of the plate. He has always had a slider-speed bat and poor pitch recognition. If you will recall, there was one at-bat where Danks just was overmatched by below-average stuff and then Chris Sale, the skinniest player in the majors, took a couple of nice cuts resulting in foul balls and then hit a hard grounder right up the middle which seemed it could even get through for a hit but the defense was positioned right there.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 09:00 AM) OMG, the HBO standup special I was obsessed with is on YouTube. Still one of the funniest performances I've ever seen. wow...i started playing it earlier this morning, then was going to come back to it and now it's being blocked by HBO/copyright battle

QUOTE (ptatc @ Aug 13, 2014 -> 06:30 AM) I've seen it twice this year and probably a dozen times in the races if been to over the years and that's a small fraction of all the races around the country. I've seen it at the Indy 500 and those cars do not turn like these sprint cars. He couldn't turn, it's impossible to turn on a dirt track without skidding out of control and injuring or killing more bystanders than a Final Destination movie. Or so they say.

QUOTE (LDF @ Aug 13, 2014 -> 05:16 AM) I am a little confuse here. Caulfield, earlier when I mention about the should invest in certain players, Melky as an example, you mention that he was on the wrong side of 30 and not worth the investment. now you are advocating on the Willingham who is 35. I am confuse with your logic. no offense is intended, just lost. I'm not sure where in this post I'm advocating anything, exactly. Just saying buyer beware, or caveat emptor. That said, I would rather gamble of the equivalent of 3-4 Willingham's (players coming off down years but solid rebound candidates) than buying a Melky Cabrera at the height of his value (not to mention the PEDS background, which further complicates things). We're not the type of franchise that can afford to have more than just a couple of bad long-term contracts at any one time (Dunn/Danks now). Realistically, the only guy out there on the free agent market who's under 30 and fits in that "buy low" category is Colby Rasmus. In the end, I firmly believe we DO NEED to have 2-3 experienced veterans who have playoff time on our roster to take that next step forward. It can't be automatically "he's older than 30, he can't be part of the long-term plan, etc." You simply can't find cost-controlled All-Star level players that are 26-29 without trading away every single prospect for a guy like Giancarlo Stanton. So my concerns with Cabrera are less about his specific age and more about buying him coming off a career season and then the PEDs suspension. http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-leag...-025840860.html Jarrod Dyson's flip after catching the final out in Monday's game as the Royals took over 1st place in the ALCD

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/a...s-fatal-accide/ Criminal charges still possible for Stewart, experts say

QUOTE (shysocks @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 09:30 PM) Good, that takes care of any qualifying offer concerns now that he changed teams. His path to the Sox is clear. I'll roll out the red carpet for ya Josh. The problem is that Willingham's a terrible defensive outfielder coming off a down season and in the declining period of his career. It's a gamble. If KW was good at one aspect of his job, it was identifying these "buy low" bargain acquisitions of veterans.

http://www.soxtalk.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=93013 This is just part of the story. Most would posit the viewpoint that there's a 3-4 game shift with a league average or slightly above average bullpen, from top to bottom. Or if Addison Reed had been the closer all season long, and the Davidson deal had never been made...which would have left Putnam, Petricka and Belisario in their more customary/comfortable set-up roles. That would put them around 6-8 games over .500 (of course, a big assumption, and one that can never be proven one way or the other). Fwiw, Royals are 10 games over, Detroit and Seattle are tied for the wild card lead at 9 over .500 currently. OTOH, we have a -54 run differential (a lot of that was due to three huge beatings in the last week or so) and are currently tied with the Mets and Padres for the 9th worst record in baseball. As far as the future, Daniel Webb's a huge question mark. Nate Jones is out for 2015 and might not be re-signed even. Do we bring back Lindstrom, and to what purpose, just to try to flip him again in July or August, 2014? Wouldn't it be better to choose Petricka (for example) and give him a chance to learn and grow as closer and stick around into our competitive window? It seems pretty clear Hahn's not going to forfeit a first round draft pick on bringing in a closer like Koji Uehara, David Robertson, K-Rod (leading the NL and maybe all of baseball in saves), Casey Janssen or Rafael Soriano. That's why you'll see the huge back-and-forth argument about the benefits of finishing with a bottom 10 MLB record, which would protect that pick if we signed a top FA. The Mariners, for example, signed Fernando Rodney for $14 million over 2 years and that was a huge bargain, so far (when you look at our spending on Downs, Belisario and Paulino, comparatively). But can Hahn pick the right guy from that list of five and not have it blow up in his face like Keppinger or Downs? We'll find out. Our three best arms in the minors are Rodon, Montas and Adams, and it's unlikely any of them would be converted to closer with the dearth of rotation depth at the major league level. Fwiw, I might switch Erik Johnson into a bullpen role to see if he can contribute anything or figure out a way to get more juice on his pitches in shorter stints. But closer, no way....just an experiment.

QUOTE (Vance Law @ Aug 13, 2014 -> 01:28 AM) Pretty dumb move by Robin putting Adam effing Dunn in right field. He can't play outfield. Ridiculous. It's a good thing Dunn basically won the game with his 2 run homer, but still, it's dumb because Robin did it and he loses all of our games for us. Probably part of showcasing him that he can "semi-adequately" play another position besides DH and 1B. He actually has more experience in the outfield than at first, but not recently. Plus, Viciedo has been pretty cold recently (except for hitting a few homers).

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 11:45 PM) That scares Sox fans of having to put up another year of Beckham. Not as scary as another year of this terrible bullpen.

QUOTE (oldsox @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 07:34 PM) Ravelo didn't really emerge this year. He's been a pretty good hitter ever since we drafted him. Well, since a lot of lists (outside of here) aren't even promoting him to the Top 10-20, it's hard to say he's really emerged outside of hardcore prospect sites.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 07:26 PM) Publically. What are they going to say, "yeah, Tony tried to go at him." There's another liable law suit. They can't have this type of black eye in the sport.It wouldn't have happened if Ward hadn't walked on the track. It also wouldn't have happened if Stewart didn't happen to be in such a high line. As I've said it's pretty odd that out of all the times in the past that racers have done this, not a single one has ever been hit. Stewart must be an awful driver. Or "unlucky" and the victim of the worst coincidence possible. So Occam's Razor would tell you what?...as usually the simplest explanation is the correct one.

QUOTE (scs787 @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 04:33 PM) I see your on the tanking train now eh greg? It's a very quiet .271 though. His career slugging% against is just .365. Here's a fun pointless fact, Matt Lindstrom has given up 22 HRs in 405 innings....Addison Reed has 23 in 181. Career saves converted percentages?

You would think with Johnson they would have preferred to DL him if there was ANY reason to believe there was something wrong physically. Like Davidson and Semien to a lesser extent, he's gone from a tradeable asset to a huge question mark we have no choice but to hold onto and see if he can turn things around. (Joining the likes of Mitchell, Walker and Trayce in that category.) Thompson's disappeared from the conversation completely, not unlike Miguel Gonzalez or Saladino a couple of years ago.

Matt Guerrier at the beginning of his career would be another comp. Seems that the kid really is consumed with studying opposing hitters and learning the art of pitching. He's always asking their video guys and advanced scouting people for more information than they have, and that's pretty exhaustive information compared to 20 or even 10 years ago with the advances in tech.

Next year's going to be simply huge for Hawkins, Anderson, Montas and Danish at Birmingham. AA is what really starts to separate the pretenders and contenders. Hopefully May or Barnum can emerge in the same way that Ravelo has this season.

Uehara's a free agent and nearing age 40, but will probably get a two year offer with year 3 being a club option or one where he'd have to meet a number of incentives for it to kick in. http://bostonherald.com/sports/red_sox_mlb...a_in_for_1_more Can't imagine they'd have any interest in Papelbon, unless taking on his contract could protect some of the prospects being inquired about by other teams in Hamels discussions.

Call them cheesy, but Mrs. Doubtfire and The Birdcage are my two favorites, along with Good Will Hunting, Dead Poets Society and Good Morning, Vietnam! Don't know why I confused Autofocus with One Hour Photo...was thinking of photography themes, I guess. And he was excellent playing Teddy Roosevelt in the first Night at the Museum, too.

Hard to believe he's going to miss just one start and get his velocity back. We'll see. Royals down 3-0 early against Lester. Seems the end of their string is coming tonight, barring a miracle comeback and Jeremy Guthrie to return to his form when he was first acquired by KC.

Alcantara has already been slumping after a nice start. Baez with 13 K's in 33 AB's, although a bit of an improvement over 10/23. OTOH, their young pitcher Hendricks is doing a pretty good impression of Greg Maddux Lite. Or Dylan Axelrod?

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 12:56 PM) Surprisingly, most people that I've talked to agree with me that the kid shouldn't have been on the track and that Stewart isn't culpable. Maybe I just don't associate with idiots. If the NASCAR equivalent of Thome/Konerko/Dye was driving, it would be a non-issue, he'd get the benefit of the doubt and everyone would be be feeling sorrier for the driver and his family. Because Tony Stewart is more or less AJ Pierzynski/Bryce Harper/Yasiel Puig rolled into one, it's not so cut-and-dried for many.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 10:09 AM) Am I mistaking a year, but weren't those games against the Mariners mainly during the day in the shadows where it was extremely difficult to hit? I don't recall the Mariners scoring a bunch of runs against us. I do remember losing one of the games on an infield hit or something like that and Edgar had a homer or two. I remember Mark Johnson not being on the roster (it was Josh Paul instead), Chad Bradford being in the bullpen...and I think it was a Carlos Guillen suicide squeeze that ended it if I'm not mistaken. As far as Butler goes, he was 800+ OPS-wise in June, slumped to .689 in July but has been on fire in August, coinciding with the winning streak and taking over 1st place. 991 so far through today. http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/gamelog/_/id/6396/billy-butler You take Butler 100 times over Dunn, IMO. Even looking at Dunn coldly, from a purely statistical point of view the last three seasons...you can't override the bad taste of 2011, no matter what you do. One of the few things fans will remember about this season out of Adam is "Dallas Buyers Club" winning Academy Awards and his pitching performance (lower 80's).

QUOTE (chw42 @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 01:04 PM) They must have hated Fister to trade him for what they got. https://www.numberfire.com/mlb/news/1474/wh...-never-heard-of Fister actually had a higher WAR than David Price from 2011-2013...according to this. At any rate, it seems the Tigers were unable to trust Fister to stay healthy (last year), that's one theory.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 08:58 AM) Good thing the Tigers traded for Price, huh? They'd be so screwed right now if they hadn't. Yes, but...they've traded away Fister and Smyly now, so any benefit of having traded FOR Price is offset by being yet another pitcher short in the rotation now that Sanchez is also out. Scherzer Price Porcello Robbie Ray (part of the trade with the Nationals for Fister) Buck Farmer (great name, see below) Robbie Ray was Tuesday night’s scheduled starter. Right-hander Buck Farmer, with only two starts higher than the Single A West Michigan level under his belt, will start against the Pirates on Wednesday night at Comerica Park – followed by Max Scherzer, Rick Porcello and David Price. Because of Verlander’s situation, though – and what he described as “the spider web of things that could happen following the results,” the Tigers don’t know what their rotation plans will be beyond Saturday. Of Farmer, Tigers president and general manager Dave Dombrowski said, “Ideally you have more development time, but our guys like him. “We moved him to Double A because we were concerned that if we needed extra pitching down the road, it would give him exposure (at a higher level). “I think he has a chance to come here and pitch well.” But a rotation without Sanchez and Verlander forces the Tigers to improvise. “We have to get our feet back on the ground right now,” said Dombrowski. “We’re bringing guys up, moving them around. “We’ll see what happens.” From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2014081...7#ixzz3ACNcY787

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 12, 2014 -> 08:24 AM) Right, and they also don't mention how difficult it is for these things to stop. They're cruising and they're built to move very, very fast around corners. They aren't meant for leisurely drives around the park on a Sunday. You have the average Joe the Taxi Driver calling in to sports radio shows claiming Stewart's a murderer because he wouldn't hit someone in his taxi (in supposedly the same situation), having no idea the difference between a dirt and asphalt track, windshield visibility, inferior lighting conditions, difficult seeing someone wearing a dark-colored racesuit, etc. I've been listening on and off for the last three nights (body clock is still on China time) and it's almost exactly evenly split 50/50 down the middle for and against Stewart. It will pick up again this weekend if he races (or grow and grown until the first time he does race)...he's definitely not racing in the sprint cars this weekend, that's already out there. Someone compared it to Days of Thunder/Tom Cruise movie and said he was going to be a danger to all of the other drivers...because, Rowdy Gaines/Michael Rooker. Or Tom Cruise after Goose dies in Top Gun.

http://www.kansascity.com/sports/spt-colum...cle1200245.html Long but very fun and engaging read about the healthy doses of optimism tempered with perpetual pessimism about the Royals for the past 28 years. It's titled "THE THRILLED CONFUSION AND HONEST HESITATION AROUND THE ROYALS" aka September, 2012 for White Sox fans The Royals will make room for Josh Willingham by getting rid of Scott Downs. There will be much snark on Twitter about Downs.