caulfield12

This game is perfect evidence why baseball betting is crazy. Any logical person would have picked the Orioles with Sox on the road, after Monday's disappointing loss, the 2 hit last night...Detroit bearing down, Axelrod on the mound. The key apparently is LEW FORD NOT being in the line-up for Balt. That's 50 RBI's for Beckham now. Everyone in our regular/everyday line-up now at 50 or higher. Viciedo when he hits his next homer will give you 5 guys with 20 homers (Dunn, AJP, Konerko, Rios). Youk would be 6.

Incredible. A Sox catcher who hardly has played for 60-70% of the season gets a SAC bunt down. Tyler Flowers has opened some eyes recently...and got some new believers in his camp. Pretty amazing with AJP's overall season numbers that many are clamoring for Tyler to play more often. Good situation to have, though.

QUOTE (Caesar @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:39 PM) He was actually saying about how he cant believe the size of the crowds for the first 2 games of this series with Baltimore only 3 games behing NY and with the way they are playing. We are in first place, have been for awhile. The teams plays hard and can't sell out Sox park. They shouldnt even talk about crowd size. Apples and oranges. With dynamic pricing in the Sox ticket market, they're maximizing revenue but not crowd sizes. Sox overall attendance really isn't important, it's simply total revenue derived from those who do attend. They would rather maximize the experience of those "high net worth" and corporate clients rather than cater to the needs of "middle class" fans. They do have discount and half price nights, Family Days, etc., but the overall feeling for the Sox fans of the Veeck Era is that you're not quite as welcome as you once were. It is what it is....without keeping that 20% of the fanbase that attend 80% of the games happy, you wouldn't have the payroll numbers we've posted since 2006.

QUOTE (Caesar @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:35 PM) Im all for letting Axelrod into the rotation next year and getting rid of Floyd. Dylan's also going to have to have perfect command or he'll get blistered by opposing hitters. He's had these games like tonight or against the Red Sox where he's really manned up and thrown very well..and others where you think he's another Terry Doyle and organizational filler with his lack of stuff. We've also got Humber...it does seem that it would be better to part ways with Floyd. Castro and Molina will also figure into that equation for 2013, and possibly Rienzo.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:37 PM) Hawk and Stoney are in the dark ages when it comes to MLB attendance and revenues. Stone is one of the smartest guys at 35th and Shields. Don't let his casual attitude fool you.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:27 PM) Caufield you are Viciedo's biggest supporter, you have to be disappointed with the numbers he has put up the last 3 months. I'm not happy, he hasn't learned to consistently cut down his swing and drive fastballs up the middle and to RF (he'll do it for 2-3-4 games and then revert to old habits)...he's also made weak contact (same as Alexei's issues) and pulled balls to 3B and SS for easy outs or DP's. A lot of it is pitch selection and recognition, getting himself out, swinging at balls of the zone and expanding strike zone...being in-between on the fastball and offspeed stuff, like Dunn was for all of 2011. Still, when Dayan and Flowers do square up the ball, there's not 2 stronger hitters in the AL... And Hernandez did lead to Liriano, which might end up saving our season with Gavin and Danks out and Humber/Santiago not exactly trustworthy options.

Indians pulling off one of the all-time classic fades in the history of the game. Down 3-2 to the A's again. Seems they get swept nearly every series out. Bleak, bleak, bleak future there. And somehow the Rays have scored 6 already against the Rangers...hmmm. Getting Longoria back has revitalized that line-up, although they've struggled the last week overall.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:21 PM) When you factor in that Viciedo is a platoon player and the team is in a pennant race it's a deal I wish they had back. So was DeAza for much of his career...until he suddenly wasn't at age 28 in 2011.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:21 PM) When you factor in that Viciedo is a platoon player and the team is in a pennant race it's a deal I wish they had back. Then you live in a world where budgets don't matter and invariably you'd STILL be looking to replace Quentin now because he'd be injured. Both Viciedo and Quentin are extremely streaky hitters, and far from consistent. What did Carlos Quentin do at age 23 in the majors? I wish we hadn't signed John Danks for $65 million, I think that's a TAD bit more impactful than Quentin vs. Viciedo.

Dammit. That's the LAST thing we needed to do there. Sigh. Solo homers, fine. Walks, HBP, etc. Not fine.

The problem is that Quentin has been 779, 821 and 839 those three years. Missing 63, 31 and 44 games. So the overall stats for the White Sox at that position invariably are going to be lower because there's naturally going to be a dropoff to a Jordan Danks or Wise or Pierre type of player, usually. -0.8, 0.1, 2.3 and 1.7 for WAR 2009-2012. When you factor in his salary and injury history...and Dayan's age, potential and salary, it was really a no-brainer. Not to mention that Dayan is much better defensively and has a plus arm from the outfield, which has really helped us a number of times, when you consider the likes of Pods and Pierre throwing from LF over the last decade.

This is already an insta-classic. In my grill? Where did you come up with that? Have you been watching Keeping up with the Kardashians or Jersey Shore?

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:36 PM) What's the point, the Tigers salted away the division after game 10. That's classic, what next? Move Gordon Beckham or Lillibridge to SS and sell off Ramirez for nothing? Would you still do that TODAY? WALKS=DEATH to SOX

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:36 PM) What's the point, the Tigers salted away the division after game 10. The only thing KW did wrong this year was participate in the overreaction and miscommunication in the Sale "tender elbow" situation.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:35 PM) I'd rather have Quentin than Viciedo for the rest of this season. DUH. But the point is that 1) that's not an option, and 2) I could name 15 players at every position except for a couple (AJP, Rios, Dunn, Konerko, YOUK) that I'd rather have in the Sox line-up, but this is OUR team, right now, as is, as currently comprised. Would you rather have traded the prospects the Angels did and got a lot less performance from Greinke than Liriano, too? By all rights, 5 of 6 out of Liriano's starts should be victories, if not for Brett Myers' outing on Monday night. And the Angels? We could name 27 second basemen who would be better offensively than Beckham as well.

Guess we also can't trust Wise against LHP because he hit into a DP there. Waive him.

Maybe we should also trade Konerko, since he has the exact same number of RBI's as the "horrible" SS that we should (constantly and) supposedly trade. And he's been in a much better position to drive in runs all season long than Alexei, so maybe we should trade Paulie instead.

Some posters also have nothing new...nice to see Axelrod getting away with 87 MPH BP fastballs. The key is nursing him through this game and getting Santiago in there to bridge to the bullpen. It would be nice to see the monday at Boston Axelrod start, but we can't count on a shutout or one run game from him by any stretch of the imagination.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 29, 2012 -> 06:24 PM) That Quentin trade is looking pretty bad. So is drafting Gordon Beckham. If we didn't have Viciedo when Quentin was sitting on the bench in April and May, we wouldn't be in first place now. Danks isn't a full-time player. By the way, do you STILL want to trade Alexei Ramirez? You can't criticize both of them constantly, then not give credit to Ramirez for a huge, clutch two out RBI. AND, the key player in the trade for Liriano was Hernandez, who we also got for Quentin. So Liriano and Viciedo > injury prone Carlos Quentin at a MUCH higher salary

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Aug 28, 2012 -> 10:58 PM) Andy Wilkins keeps the Barons from being no-hit. And CoHawk (??) hit his 4th HR. He is just tearing up Kanny. So he can't be The Hawk because of Andre Dawson and the NBAer Connie Hawkins?

7-5 lead now for the Royals. Knew it was too good to last.

QUOTE (RZZZA @ Aug 28, 2012 -> 07:11 PM) Come on Robin, do a better job getting this team prepared to face crap teams please. Get angry, throw a cooler, make an inspiring speech. Uhmm....the Orioles are not a "crap" team this year, in case you haven't checked out the AL East standings recently. And they always play us tough...even when they have a down overall season, at least since 2008.

Oakland beating the Indians YET again.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 28, 2012 -> 07:08 PM) It has been awhile since Verlander had a winning decision. The only thing good about the Sox game is that a good outing didn't go to waste by anemic bats. They're winning a bit less than 60% of his starts now. Liriano would have been 5/6 if not for the Myers blow-up.

Another interesting tale of this season (recently) is how many key runs have scored against us with 2 outs. Sale already had 4 K's and had retired the first two batters when he blew up in the bottom of the 2nd.