caulfield12

http://www.chicagonow.com/chicago-sports-m...s-from-twitter/ Cowley, always having to get the last word, took the time to mention how handsome he is, what life is like in first class, bashed Title IX, and told Sloane to “hottie up that pic.” In other words, he was far from the paragon of professionalism and virtue. And his relentless self-aggrandizement doesn’t reek of over-compensation for perceived insecurities. No, not at all. Not one bit. In short, it looks like the age of social media is about to self-inflict damage on the career of another journalist who’s going to be missing some work, and not by choice. And that Cowley has become that new extremely hated figure- replacing the now banished Jay Mariotti. Paul M. Banks is CEO of The Sports Bank.net, an official Google News site generating millions of unique visitors. He’s also a regular contributor to Chicago Now, Walter Football.com, Yardbarker, MSN and Fox Sports A Fulbright scholar and MBA, Banks has appeared on live radio all over the world; and he’s a member of the Football Writers Association of America, U.S. Basketball Writers Association, and Society of Professional Journalists. The President of the United States follows him on Twitter (@Paul_M_BanksTSB) You should too.

12 game hitting streak through Sunday's game. http://tribstar.com/sports/x1585735586/MIN...eaches-11-games 21/49 (.429), 3 doubles, 3B, 1 HR, 7 RBI's Last time he played and failed to record a hit was almost 3 weeks ago, on April 12th.

Kemp and Ethier combined had more homers (11 + 5=16) than 9 whole major league teams coming into Sunday's games. Kemp putting up softball league numbers. One could argue he's had the best non-PEDS derived April start in modern history.

They've "only" won 3 of the 5 games that Verlander has started, too. I think one of them was blown by Papa Grande, and they got the win in the bottom of the 9th or 10th. Another game, Justin fell apart after dominating going into the last inning. Then there was the 7-6 lose to the Yankees Last year, Verlander had 34 starts, the Tigers won 25 of them and lost 9 (Justin only 5 losses personally). So a .735 vs. .600 winning percentage for the first month, or a one game shift. So even with his 2011 version, they'd likely be only tied for first with CLE. The big differences to me: Peralta was a huge force last year, this year not so much. Loss of Victor Martinez's RBI bat. Avila hasn't been nearly as good (offensively) as he was last year. Bullpen...obviously nobody's going to go 49/49 two seasons in a row in save conversions, but their middle relief has been average at best. Loss of Fister, although Smyly has pitched well.

QUOTE (GoodAsGould @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:50 PM) I dont know how Phillips gives you a range to 50 sb especially when I said excluding his 2007 season. Okay, I over-exaggerated by a bit, but Saladino's not the type of prospect who's going to consistently put up 25, 30, 35 steals at the major league level. The one plus is he should walk a lot more than Morel, so there's that. Hopefully more XB hits than Brent has shown the ability to generate at the MLB level (I know some will argue the "real" Brent was the one we saw the last 6 weeks and that this version is an impostor).

How will they do in their next 10 consecutive games against Cleveland, then at DET and at CLE? The easy thing to do would be to predict 4-6 or 5-5, but with our road excellence carrying over from last year, I'll go with 6-4.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 06:57 PM) That was the worst thing about the small ball, Kotsay, Pierre plans of the last few seasons. It's a hitters park and you are trying to move runners along and score one run at a time. Even in 2005, when they supposedly played small ball, they were 5th in MLB with 200 home runs. Get out to early leads with Pods and Iguchi, pound away with the bombers, lockdown bullpen. Now, if you're playing small ball to add on runs to a 2/3/4 run lead, that can be effective, AT TIMES. But, once again, you're taking yourself out of lots of big innings, especially at a park more well-suited for homers.

Kenny Williams challenged Greg Walker to a fight last year but cooler heads prevailed. National headlines with that breaking TMZ-ish gossip. What legitimate or credible writer has a nickname for himself? Even that, he copied the concept from AJ Pierzynski's pro wrestling forays. This must have started when he saw how much national attention that JET BLUE flight attendant who initiated the emergency evacuation system and slid out of the plane got and decided it would be cool to emulate the anti-airlines bashing crowd.

QUOTE (South Side Fireworks Man @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:36 PM) After the way Lillibridge performed today, he should be starting in place of Beckham for a while. Heck, even Escobar showed today that he can give better ABs than Beckham has been giving this season. Maybe they can platoon Lillibridge with Escobar at 2B and use Beckham as a utility infielder for which he is most suited. If Morel continues to struggle they can alternate Beckham in at 3B every now and then. Either that or just send Beckham down to work on his swing and bring up a third catcher to free up Flowers and AJ to PH more. They're going to leave Phegley down there to play nearly everyday. Gimenez would be that catcher. I don't see any way they'll move Beckham back to 3B at the big league level this year. He's either in the minors playing everyday or at Charlotte IMO. Of course, that requires Morel pull out of his skid, too. If just one of those two continue tanking, we can overcome it. Not both.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:22 PM) The Red Sox have zero room to add salary this season if they want to stay under the luxury tax, which has been made quite a bit more painful this year for teams that get there, especially multiple years in a row. They are not paying Marlon Byrd's salary, because that would put them over the luxury tax. They gave up on their SS and replaced him with Aviles...to avoid paying the luxury tax. They don't have quite as many prospects left (Boston), but we could definitely play the Red Sox/Yankees/O's/Jays against each other. Montero would have been the hitter to get (from the Yanks), but too late for that. If we're willing to eat salary and/or the buyout, then we can get some great prospects back if Peavy keeps pitching like this. Every team in baseball would like to have him as their 3rd for a playoff rotation. The Yankees just gave up on F. Garcia in their rotation.

Saw Battleship here in China last week. Don't think they will ever allow THE HUNGER GAMES, especially with the political turmoil here over Bo Xilai and the activist who is at the US Embassy (Christian Bale tried to meet him when he was here promoting FLOWERS of WAR). Titanic-3D has actually done very well in China, selling out many shows and earning more money here than in the US. That's the ninth-biggest worldwide opening weekend of all-time, and the biggest for a movie that wasn't explicitly a sequel (semantics perhaps, but bare with me). No, I can't BEAR to see a film critic/writer bare anything, lol.

Except Saladino's never going to nab 30-50 bags. He doesn't have that type of speed and athleticism. He actually sounds like another version of Morel, lol. Doesn't really wow with any one skill (actually, Morel was known as a better defender)...not going to be project to anything more than maybe 12-15 homers, 18 tops, at the major league level.

Gavin Floyd now 7-0 career against the Red Sox. 60-58 cumulatively in the majors. Hello, Brian Cashman? If Bard is pushed back into the bullpen (right now things have stabilized with Aceves), then you could also see the Red Sox making a hard push for adding Jake Peavy down the stretch. 22,811. More there for a Sunday Bat Day than Saturday night, but the weather was pretty brutal last night.

QUOTE (jeffro2525 @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 04:08 PM) Well...if you would have told me we going into the series that the Sox were only going to muster 10 runs in 4 games against Boston, I would probably would have taken 1 win out of the 4. GAS!!!! 2 down! Gavin finally nutted up and Peavy continued to pitch extremely well. In the end, if we keep getting that type of starting pitching (hello Danks!) we'll be competitive. On to Chris Sale versus Ubaldo Jimenez Tuesday night for 1st place.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 04:05 PM) I've only started watching since the top of the 7th. Who was the Sox player who "lost" a homer due to the wind? Alex Rios.

First place CLE next Tue/Wed/Thur with much more comfortable temperatures. Then the struggling Tigers in DET, final road trip of the season to Cleveland, including the doubleheader/make-up game, I think on May 2nd. So 10 huge games in a row within the division. Still haven't seen the Twins or Royals, which is unfortunate with how they've both been scuffling out of the gate.

A week ago, Dayan was either striking out or pushing/flailing/lunging at balls and cueing them to the right side. Much more dangerous hitter now...especially if he can lay off the high fastball. Trying to be more patient wasn't working, only had resulted in one walk all season. Thornton for the save? Hmmm.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:54 PM) Team stats, bases loaded. Player, at bats, hits. Alexei got much of his clutch hitting out of the way in 2008, it seems. Although that double in the 14th against the A's was huge for about 10 minutes.

Atta boy, Dayan. Please call him out with threads more often!!! First RBI of the season not coming on a homer. Ramirez and Viciedo (.206) back up over 200 now at least.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:46 PM) 2/16 on the year coming into today, 6 runs scored. Good for 26th in the bigs. Seems like Rios has been up half of those times. Alexei back over the Mendoza Line with the infield single.

So much for AJ's hot streak. Well, it was nice while it lasted at least.

Maybe the first time in MLB history a .373 hitter was PH for, and replaced by a .147 hitter. Former Cub Rich Hill into the game, coming back from TJ surgery. Pedroia/Gonzalez/Ortiz/Ross in the 9th. YIKES! Dunn almost with yet another hit down the LF line against a LHP. Another walk for Dunn. Beckham or Morel to PR?

QUOTE (Capn12 @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:36 PM) Remind me again, why Addison Reed isn't our closer? For whatever reason, Ventura doesn't seem to be 100% confident in Reed yet. And, more than that, I think he likes having the flexibility of being able to use Reed anywhere in the 6th-8th inning. 4 of his 6 RBI's that season, and his only homer have come against the Sox this series. Still at .147 for McDonald despite Danks' best efforts. Think Axelrod gave up the homer.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 29, 2012 -> 03:34 PM) What are the Sox hitting with bases loaded this year? Or their conversion rate with a runner on 3rd and less than two outs and less than 2 outs. The average is around 55-60%, I would guess for the Sox since the start of the 2011 season it has to be closer to 40%.

Rios didn't even wait long enough to build any drama. Just another quiet, boring out. Hopefully Ventura as the season goes on will be more willing to use Konerko in a situation like that...