caulfield12

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Apr 23, 2011 -> 04:09 AM) I've always seen that he's generally regarded as a better defensive outfielder, especially in CF, and he's probably a bit better offensively too (though he seems to be a guy that, at least at one time and perhaps still today, was really overrated offensively). He developed that reputation with Indians early in his career and is still riding on those coat-tails, to some extent. Because he's one of those "Sox killer" guys, he tends to get overrated just a bit, but he's a legit starter on about 8-10 MLB teams.

I think they're going with Crisp because he's a better top-of-the-order "igniter" and has the veteran track record, but the dude's been injury prone for most of the last five years. Sweeney probably has about the same amount of speed (as Crisp) and is a pretty good athlete in his own right, but he's not the basestealer that Crisp is...and his career OPS is a rather pedestrian .728. Maybe, just maybe, that's good enough for CF, but not for one of the corners, at least in USCF. I guess now the argument is whether you see more upside down the road in a Sweeney, who has a fairly limited ceiling, as you acknowledged (albeit pretty consistent in his numbers) or someone like a Milledge or Viciedo. Many have seen Sweeney as the type of player who's just not quite good enough offensively for KW to believe in him, a little bit of the Aaron Rowand syndrome, where he had to prove himself year after year in order to become the starter. I always liked him more than Reed or Cunningham, but the jury's still out.

It actually changed quite a bit after a 1 for 8 performance the last couple of games. Poor Chris, it was only a one point difference between his career average and 2011 earlier when I check it this week. Career .636 2011 .621 So he's regressed a bit with the Royals, ha. So much for the Greg Walker ruins all hitters theory.

An NL GM (Sandy Alderson) who's not much of a believer in the bunt...we know this won't be Ozzie's next landing spot now Which brings us to Wednesday night’s game, when catcher Josh Thole bunted with none out and Jose Reyes aboard in the ninth. Alderson dislikes bunts. They waste the game’s most precious commodity: an out. Here, the Mets gave up two outs when Thole popped into a double play. “I think if you probably talk to Terry, he’ll tell you the same thing,” Alderson said. “That wasn’t necessarily a standard approach for him in that situation. Alderson did not feel it was necessary to talk to manager Terry Collins about the decision. He believes those under him deserve latitude. If an over-reliance on bunting occurred — i.e. a leadoff single regularly followed by a bunt from a position player — then he would intervene. One incident did not alarm him. “I try to not to express it in the context of a play that didn’t go well, immediately afterward,” Alderson said. R.A. Dickey sparked something resembling a brush fire Wednesday night, when he said that his team needed to stop grousing about how much talent they had and begin making changes. Alderson had no problem with that sentiment. “I think that was very candid and heartfelt,” Alderson said. “I was happy to hear it coming from a player.” www.nj.com/sports

Kila Ka'aihue will be available soon if he keeps hitting so poorly. Not that we need any more 1B/3B/DH types.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 08:39 PM) Has Coop done jack s*** with a reliever since Thornton? Santos? Sale?

QUOTE (DukeofChicago88 @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 08:37 PM) Yes leave Pena in Ozzie. Totally the right call no doubt. Who would you have brought it there? Crain? With a 3 or 4 run deficit? Really? Ohman?

Thanks for eliminating all doubts in this game, Pena. 87 MPH batting practice fastball. I think it's time for him to be released. Unfortunately, he's our only insurance for an injury in the starting rotation.

Quentin on fire. The rest of the White Sox offense torched by Verlander. Typical Buehrle the last 2-3 years. Brent Morel and Beckham sacrificed by Guillen to the baseball gods. Wow, the Royals just scored five against Derek Holland, highlighted by a Brayan Pena homer to tie it.

I think I'd rather see the Miller Genuine Draft commercial where the guy buys a round of bikinis for the girls...or is that only a radio ad?

Verlander is an absolute freak. He's still throwing 98-99 MPH in this weather after well over 100 pitches. Not sure how good that is for his career longevity, Leyland. Well, so much for ever being able to trade away Alex Rios.

Sox deciding to make it a game finally.

Trade Quentin now. Just kidding, sort of.

Typical Friday night Sox never in it game thread. Under 10 pages. Ugly as the weather. Not unexpected though, when Verlander is going good.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 04:49 PM) I lol'd at this $14.29 trillion or ZERO in the case of a default. Maybe we can split the difference and value Danksie at $7.1 trillion.

QUOTE (High Mileage @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 05:47 PM) Yep, right around the time John Schuerholz left to take over the Braves, "leading" them to a 94-68 record and an NL pennant a year after they went 65-97. You're pretty much dead on. Kauffman brought baseball back to KC (after the A's moved to Oakland) and was very big in the community/region. Glass and family are rarely seen at Royals games, and they don't even keep a home in the area (well, in Arkansas they do). Glass either couldn't or wouldn't spend his first few years of ownership. The best thing he's done for the organization was hiring Dayton Moore and staying out of actual baseball decisions. Obviously the results have been limited on the field, but he has funded our Draft (we've spent more than anybody since '06) and International Scouting (we've spent more than everybody except the Pirates since '06, IIRC) as well as front office expansion. Out of sight, out of mind. Just keep writing the checks, Old Man... I'll give Glass credit for trying to establish some "legitimacy" in the FA market by going after Meche. And give Meche credit for retiring when he could have just continued to collect a paycheck. But the last couple of years, blending in the Guillens and Ankiels and Podsedniks, it just hasn't worked. On the other hand, they had to throw some journeymen out there to protect the youngsters from being overexposed before they were ready for the major league team. Even spending on Willie Bloomquist, Juan Cruz and Kyle Farnsworth....those are the kind of players who are complementary on a playoff contending team, but a waste of payroll for the Royals. I still remember how enthusiastic Posnanski tried to be when they brought in Hillman from Japan. Well, maybe they'll get it straightened out eventually.

Wonder if Beckham's going to move down permanently to 8th or 7th now? When Vizquel returns to the bench, does Ramirez stay up at #2? LOL at Ozzie bringing back Morel from the bench to face Verlander in the worst weather possible after his "mental health break", but resting Ramirez. In all fairness, Alexei hasn't done much against Verlander, but you might as well leave Teahen in there one more game and hope he catches fire. Morel's going to be completely overmatched by Verlander. Six losses in a row to the Tigers. Well, we'd beaten the Angels 7 games consectively and that didn't turn out so well.

Chris Getz is a consistent .636/.637 OPS no matter where he plays. Fields and Anderson? Don't think so. Ryan Sweeney finally ended up losing his starting job in Oakland for a lot of the same reasons he wasn't believed to project as more than a 4th OF in Chicago. Chris Young and Greg Walker don't have anything in common. Even C. Carter has turned out to be a big bust (based on early returns), and the verdict's a bit discouraging on B. Allen. We all know about Jeremy Reed and Michael Morse. Basically, we've simply sucked at developing position prospects since Durham, Ordonez, C-Lee, Crede and Rowand.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 05:32 PM) KC used to have the highest payroll in baseball back around 1990. They have been bad for so long after really being a model franchise. Which had everything to do with Ewing Kauffman dying and his eventually being replaced by Mr. Wal-Mart. While he might have been a good businessman, the Royals fans have never come close to the same feelings of affection and adulation. Of course, a lot of that has to do with the decades of the 70's and 80's for Royals' baseball. But Glass is believed to be the anti-Kauffman by most.

QUOTE (High Mileage @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 04:12 PM) All very valid points. I think with most casual fans, they look at it as another Jermaine Dye-for-Neifi Perez or Johnny Damon-for-Angel Berroa. Trading a star player for somebody they've never heard of. With diehard fans, I think most of them feel the way that I do, that it sucks to lose a guy like Zack, but at the same time it had to be done because of his words and actions, obviously the jury is still out on that deal and will be for years. They knew they weren't going to be able to keep (afford) Sweeney, Dye, and Damon. Keeping all three was going to be a huge risk, as the farm system and the rest of the big league roster was pretty bare anyways. We also didn't have an actual owner at the time either. As far as Sweeney, the Royals were just bit by bad luck. The man had just made 3 consecutive All-Star Games and had hit .340/.417/.563, and it's hard to fault a guy for injuries. And I also hadn't thought about the weather, it's been cold, raining a lot (and very, very windy) here... I blame it all on not keeping Rey Sanchez and Jose Rosado going down with injuries!!! Long live Dos Carlos (Febles and Beltran)!!! In actuality, White Sox and Royals fans are very similar. They pretty much refuse to support below average baseball...with the fact that KC probably still gets more "casual" fans even with atrocious teams for weekend games than the White Sox because of the difference in pricing points. With the White Sox having the fourth most expensive ticket price/parking, they simply HAVE to put a good product on the field. Too many Royals fans started to believe (that was the motto, if I remember, from Tony Pena) in that team and then it quickly fell apart after the All Star break and yet more hearts that had been suffering for 15 years were torn out. The other thing that really hurt was Buck and Teahen not panning out with the Royals. Of course, Buck's gone on to a huge contract since and luckily our GM took Mark Teahen off your hands. For that, you have Chris Getz's consistent .636/.637 OPS, Podsednik, Josh Fields and Brian Anderson. And we'll even throw in Wilson Betemit, who managed to kill the White Sox last year, of course. Him and that darned Callaspo. And Aviles.

Wonder what the weather's like for Cleveland at Minnesota? Somehow, it's in the 70's or low 80's in southern Illinois/Kentucky. Who designs these schedules?

http://espn.go.com/mlb/attendance/_/sort/allAvg For the sake of JR's "All In", this trend can't continue simply because the White Sox are last in all of MLB in terms of "average" attendance, counting home and road games. Of course, a big factor in that is our playing in Cleveland for 3 games and TB for 4, but it's still a bit surprising that we're dead last. OVERALL MLB Attendance, average of home and road games 2005 13th 2006 10th (year after World Series win) 2007 13th 2008 18th 2009 15th (after playoff appearance) 2010 21st 2011 30th (VERY SMALL SAMPLE SIZE) Also, the "holdover" effects of a World Series victory are generally predicted by sports marketing experts to extend out to five years.

Or Tyler Flowers. At least living with a lack of offense is much easier at that position. The problem with Tyler is the rest of his game...pitch calling, managing a staff, framing pitches, strategy/gamesmanship, etc.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 22, 2011 -> 03:30 PM) I firmly believe Ozzie would be a great manager in the NL or for a team like Seattle. As illustrated by his comments about the bunt yesterday, his philosophy of bunting on a team with 2 future 500 home run players (possibly) is skewed. The only question is why he's so stubborn to hold onto this managerial theory that flies in the face of the homers hit in 2005/2006 and even in 2008 with Quentin/Ramirez/Dye/Konerko/Thome, etc. 1) Maybe because that's what worked for him personally, and the "dead ball" White Sox playing in Old Comiskey needed to score just a run at a time? Or weren't capable of scoring in bunches. 2) His time coaching and playing in the NL at the end of his career with ATL/Cox and the Marlins. 3) The fact that it worked so well with Iguchi and Pods for 3-4 months in 2005...but hasn't since? 4) His general inability to admit he's wrong since the World Series and adapt to the roster as much as expecting players who aren't capable of bunting or playing fundamental baseball to change for Ozzie? I'm thinking here of players like BA and Josh Fields, to name a couple. As Fathom mentioned, this mindset just doesn't work well in the AL East or AL Central. It certainly does have its place in baseball, with a low payroll team like the Padres or one that's limited offensively, such as the Mariners or A's.

You're right. I guess a lot of it is the disappointment with losing the 2009 Cy Young version of Greinke. That was easily worth another 7500-12500 fans per night. The "Roy Halladay Effect" that you also saw in Toronto. Those same fans had already lost Mike Sweeney as their idol due to injuries and aging (they chose the wrong player to hold onto, and for too long), and DeJesus was more of an enigma than the second coming of Johnny Damon with KC fans. Maybe the 3rd factor is that the formerly overhyped and "new face" of the franchise, Alex Gordon, was in danger of finding himself on another team heading into this spring. And then the Chiefs are back as a contending team again, so that might be yet another factor.