caulfield12

QUOTE (fathom @ May 31, 2012 -> 08:17 PM) Edinson Volquez is someone I could see KW and Cooper liking FWIW, was watching a spring training game and the announcers said that Volquez was the most frustrating starting pitcher that the Rangers ever worked with. All the ability and talent in the world, but they described him as Exhibit A in the headcase dictionary definition. At one point, they made a list of rules specifically for him in an effort to control his emotions and antics. Which clearly marks him as a target for Cooper and KW, haha.

QUOTE (Swingandalongonetoleft @ May 31, 2012 -> 08:18 PM) All they need to do is destroy every calendar he has access to and then lie to him that it's mid-September and the Sox have been eliminated from playoff contention. If he starts catching on just laugh at him and tell him that he's crazy. Good Bye, Lenin!

QUOTE (Marty34 @ May 31, 2012 -> 08:05 PM) I can live with the offense. The question for me is will there be a starting pitcher available who could replace Humber in the rotation (for remainder of year) and be a top 3 post-season starter who the Sox could trade for with their 30th ranked farm system? But what team has that kind of a pitcher than they're not going to hold out for a bundle? Someone like a Wandy Rodriguez (just an example) on a team in the bottom 5-10 that's more expensive. But they're not going to want Gavin Floyd back, obviously. The only two players we could possibly survive trading are probably Thornton and maybe Crain, but we don't want to hurt our bullpen when it seems to be jelling. And bottom tier teams aren't going to want veteran/expensive relievers anyway. So that leaves the likes of Mitchell, Quintana, Castro, Santiago, Thompson, Saladino... We're going to be trading away a LOT of our future for a dubious return, because the odds of a #3 starter CLEARLY being better than Floyd is dubious (depending on which Gavin shows up on a given day). I just don't see the surefire candidate that doesn't cripple the major league roster or our minor leagues.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ May 31, 2012 -> 11:22 AM) I love it. I hope there are posts proving me wrong for years. By the same token, I'm curious as to why I get no props for being the first one on here to say the Sox should contend. Posters on here had the Sox losing 90+ games in Jan/Feb. I think it's being twisted from "would contend" to "should contend" based on the fact that there was no reason they weren't "all in" again despite trimming $25 million in payroll and trading Santos because: 1) KW was still around 2) Danks had been re-signed 3) Dunn/Rios/Peavy/Ramirez/AJ/Konerko/Floyd/Danks/Thornton, a veteran cast, comprised the heart of the roster 4) AJ, Peavy and Floyd would all probably be gone after 2012, not to mention Thornton 5) There were doubts as to whether Sale, Morel, Viciedo, Reed, Beckham, DeAza, Molina, Flowers, etc., could be the heart of the rebuilding process going forward, and if they failed, KW should be fired. That this was their best chance to contend in any given year in the foreseeable future. I don't think there are a plethora of posts where you predicted they'd win 85-95 games. Probably zero. There are a plethora, though, where you claimed that KW should be fired if they weren't in contention or attendance nosedived, which is which pretty much the opposite of your argument now, lol. So, because the team's playing well and contending, KW is therefore doing his job well again? You were right about Santos, but very wrong about them trading Ramirez and/or Viciedo.

http://www.freep.com/usatoday/article/7042...atref=sportsmod Aroldis Chapman's problems with hotel break-in, speeding, assimilation... Interesting, Viciedo's the age roughly, and yet no problems (knock on wood) with him so far. And yet when we read all the scouting reports about Viciedo back when he was 16-17-18 and playing professionally in Cuba, he definitely had lots of red flags and concerns about his character, worth ethic, attitude, etc. With the exceptions of Swisher, Cabrera and Javy, we've been pretty lucky over the last decade plus.

QUOTE (danman31 @ May 30, 2012 -> 04:58 PM) You could make that argument. Probably the weakest the top prospect in the system has been in a long time, whoever it is. It would have to be Mitchell, right? Saladino and Thompson have both gone backwards a bit. Molina's stock has to be down a bit, as well. Castro? He's probably the pitcher with the most upside at this exact moment in time, at least. Phegley's definitely opened up some eyes to put him on the radar screen for 2013. Axelrod and Doyle both have climbed, although opinions would vary on their ultimate upsides. Soptic is someone we're all watching to be the next Nathan Jones. Between Veal and Hernandez, we've really got a ton of depth in the LHP department. Rienzo's still on the radar. Carlos Sanchez has to be fighting to be in the 7-10 spot. Ravelo's opened some eyes, minus the power numbers not being there yet. But our draft pick next week automatically shoots to #1 with a bullet.

QUOTE (Papa Tru @ May 30, 2012 -> 09:04 PM) Im going to have to say Hudson, Holmberg, and Edwin Jackson for Zach Stewart pretty much is the worst cumulative deal KW has ever done. And Jaye, and Webb. And Teahen's salary was available to pay Floyd/Crain/Thornton instead of having to trade one of them.

In the end, Gavin Floyd, Quentin and Alexei Ramirez turned out to be HUGE acquisitions for the 2008 team. Just as important, if not moreso, than the Danks/McCarthy move in Dec. 2006. All of them were pretty much under the radar, in terms of expectations. I guess if you want to categorize every GM's moves (blockbuster, mid-level, under the radar/last page of newspaper transactions list, like Quintana)...well, that's ONE way to judge a GM, but not exactly a comprehensive look at the bigger picture.

And they shouldn't try to pitch to Cabrera, lol. At least they walked Fielder to face Young. Red Sox do have the lead back again. They desperately need Middlebrooks' bat, but he already made one rookie mistake at 3rd, which allowed Miguel Cabrera to score. Then again, he hit a homer. So they're crossing their fingers on Middlebrooks at 3rd and Gonzalez, who has no range or arm, in RF.

QUOTE (Papa Tru @ May 30, 2012 -> 07:38 PM) cmon man, did you really miss the point? Hes saying not to worry about Gio because the Royals arent worrying about Humber, or the Marlins arent worrying about De Aza. Neither of them showed anything with those teams and were let go. We take legit prospects (Young, Hudson, Gonzalez) and trade them away in stupid deals that end up being worthless. Im so sick of KW and his Stanford educated ego trip. Hes constantly made poor decisions in trading, for YEARS. Yeah he can get some projects and turn them into decent lighting, but god damn when are we going to come out of a trade on the EVEN end. Edwin Jackson trade, terrible. Carlos Quentin trade, terrible. Sergio Santos trade, terrible. Daniel Hudson trade, terrible since we just gave Edwin Jackson away for free anyway. you get the point, but then again I know you love KW. How can you have any idea what Hernandez and Castro will do for us? The Padres have a $7 million dollar injury-prone RFer they no longer need, soaking up a huge amount of payroll on clearly rebuilding team. Maybe Quentin will get on a hot streak and they'll get lucky to get a better return than what we got...but, remember, there's no Dayan Viciedo developing if Quentin's still here, or Quentin's coming back and Viciedo's being benched/blocked again. We gave Jackson away for free to save money from Teahen's deal and we have a serviceable reliever. Not a net win, but maybe those savings allowed us to hold onto Floyd, Thornton and Crain for all we know, instead of having to deal them, too. And where would we be right now with Sergio Santos on our team? Clearly better than with Addison Reed as the closer? They dealt Santos for a reason, and part of that reason is DL'ed.

QUOTE (VAfan @ May 30, 2012 -> 08:26 PM) It's not as if I'm having sleepless nights or anything. And I wouldn't give it more than a passing thought if this team hadn't turned into contenders overnight. Start of the season, I thought the Tigers would dominate the division. I thought there were too many things that had to go right for us to contend. But after this stretch, where nearly everything that needed to go right has, I think the team is very well positioned to fight for the division crown. But if we make the playoffs, will we have much chance? Possibly. With only Texas dominant, we'd have a chance. It's just that if we had one more dominant pitcher like Gonzalez .... I'd think we could beat Texas and make the World Series. Whatever. As I said, I just wanted to get this off my chest so I could move on. We actually could beat anyone. It will just take a few more things going right. But it's the same for every team...imagine how good the Marlins could be had they kept Cabrera? Where are Cameron Maybin and Andrew Miller now? Not in Miami. Or the Johan Santana deal. He was the best LH starter of his generation, and none of the players acquired are with the Twins right now. One of them, Humber, is playing for one of their biggest rivals. That's just the nature of baseball. Had we not been in the pennant race in the middle of 2010, we could have been a lot more patient with both Hudson and Sale (he could have been developing as a starter instead of relieving in the heat of a pennant race). All we can do is say that he put together a better team, spent $25 million less than last year to do, and that's all that matters. In the end, the coaching staff's changes and the steadying presence of Ventura might end up being the most important move of all...as you saw in AZ last year with the DBacks.

They said that Boyer and the marketing people were having to come in early these days to deal with new season/split season ticket package requests and walk-up sales. That was inevitable with an 8 game winning streak (12 of 13), first place, offensive fireworks galore. High 20's (27,000-30,000) is definitely realistic if their level of play continues. You'd never expect to consistently start bringing in 30,000+ until the season after a World Series or deep playoff run (and lag/bandwagon effect), but I sincerely doubt Reinsdorf is going to hold back the reigns this season....knowing that it probably will be our best shot at it for the next 2-3 seasons. Certainly, that window is closing again after 2013, with Konerko's contract expiring, and Dunn's the following season. But it always comes back to starting pitching (cue cliche track).

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 30, 2012 -> 06:27 PM) I might like that more if e wasn't a lefty. My word, 4 lefties in a bullpen? Im not sure if I would care how good they are. But Quintana's actually much more effective against right-handed hitters. Isn't having the right balance there more important than right or left-handedness?

Yeah, Gio and Hudson both hurt. But, if we can keep on replacing them with similar production out of unheralded guys like Humber or Quintana, it doesn't really matter. (Or Jenks and Santos in the bullpen, for another example). There's no GM in baseball who hasn't made his share of moves which later look bone-headed. Do you think the Marlins' fans are all going crazy because DeAza has played well for us? Royals'/Twins' fans are upset about losing Humber? Or look at the money the Yankees invest in their starting pitching...even to the point of bringing back veteran Andy Pettite. Are they up in arms they "lost" Quintana or that we seemingly stole him right out from under their noses, or still upset we not only took Contreras, we also got a subsidy back to pay for his salary? And, of course, there's no way to empirically prove they both would have pitched as well in Chicago, or at USCF. Maybe Gio needed the confidence of pitching with a huge park and foul territory to become the pitcher he is...in Chicago, his control issues early in his career and his penchant for surrendering long balls/fly balls might have derailed his career in its early infancy. If anything, the success of Hudson, Gio, Brandon McCarthy or Clayton Richard makes our farm system's productivity look better and makes other teams more willing to trade with us.

With Fister, he was fine his first start and then it started getting progressively worse and worse. Lost his velocity, movement and command, team was getting concerned about him changing his arm angle to lessen the stress on his oblique. Will probably be out another 4-6 weeks. Best available RH bat the Tigers now have is Gerald Laird. Raburn experiment over, down to AAA. In the market for hitting/2B. Right now, Danny Worth also likely to be receiving more playing time.

QUOTE (flavum @ May 30, 2012 -> 06:14 PM) I don't actually think they should do this, but the thought came to me that maybe they should shut Sale down now until after the break. Keep Quintana going through interleague and the rest of the first half. If he's good, then maybe you feel comfortable trading Floyd. Then Sale gets 15 starts/100 innings in the second half. That would put him at 155-160 innings going into the postseason. ptac seemed encouraged about his mechanics. It almost would seem more likely if you just shut him down and limited his side work that he might end up being more likely to get injured when he came back and then felt too strong...I don't think what's the science behind that view, but whatever the eventual strategy turns out to be, it's going to be second-guessed. Cooper's already getting annoyed with the "rear seat driver" criticism.

When is the last time a major league team sent down on any pitcher who had two starts with under a 2.00 ERA (combined) and had held right-handed batters to a 1/24 clip (0.042)? When someone is THAT effective against RHP, that's arguably more valuable than holding onto Ohman/Santiago. There's no reason not to let Santiago get some more work in the minors and get a better feel for his offspeed stuff and then bring him back up when/if Stewart and/or Quintana falter. And they're not just going to eat Ohman's salary. Even though it isn't a huge one. Robin was about to use him in the 8th inning in a key situation against Carlos Pena. He's not getting released/waived.

Reed is universally AdmiREED.

4 sweeps this season. Get well, Alejandro. Don't want to see Fukudome or Lillibridge out there with the way our same starting line-up has been going day after day after day.

12-1.... Didn't think Reed would be able to hold that save, but for someone who's a rookie there's just a sense of calm compared to anyone else closing.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ May 30, 2012 -> 02:56 PM) Old Q has 2 HR today. He is hitting .545 with 3 HR and 6 RBI in 2 1/2 games this season. That'll work. And then they'll trade him. He's something like 12-13% of their total payroll.

I don't think I can stomach another Zobrist walkoff. That one was off Matt Thornton, I'm pretty sure. Also remember a Carl Crawford walkoff against someone.... There was one horrific blown save by Billy Koch on the 4th of July, if memory serves me correctly.

Crap. Rios has been more locked in than any hitter recently with the exception of Viciedo.

Konerko has been cursed by not having his own personal bats make the trip from Chicago.

Dunn with 4 K's, 7 LOB LOL.