caulfield12

It seems that the White Sox are going to get a further reputation for second half collapses if this plays out the way it's looking...Jones home run notwithstanding. We can't come back just to turn around and lose this game. Horrible.

Gee, thanks Jones.

It would be ONE thing is we were starting a pitcher we expected would hold the Tigers to 2-3 runs. But the way Garcia's going, to ask the White Sox to outscore the Tiggers with that offense, I don't think so. Stranger things have happened, but it just seems the bad stretch this team was due for is upon us. Or it could be just an omen when a building they're constructing here in Thailand at my old university just collapsed an hour or so ago and 30-40 workers are missing or presumed dead at the moment.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Aug 15, 2010 -> 01:27 AM) Caulfield, I was just going by the analysis of Hawk and Stoney who, even as homers, crucified AJ on the play. Said on ball four it was inexcusable to throw the ball. Stoney said AJ "knew" that ball was high. I love AJP, I'm just going by our announcers. Curious as to why you see this one differently from those two. Remember it was ball four. We should have a separate thread on Soxtalk's feelings about AJ. I sense some growing disgust with him this year. I still like him, just don't understand his batting stance sometimes. I think there was a similar play the day/game before...where the ball went into CF because nobody covered 2B, the infield was shifting for a pull hitter. At least that's my recollection. I think this was a different situation.

And Aaron Rowand. That would have killed us, having had Linebrink/Contreras/MacDougal was bad enough. Torii Hunter, I don't like guessing about his health the final years of that contract, but he's a born leader. I would have been "okay" with either Hunter and now Rios. You're overpaying for both, but not by huge amounts. Unfortunately, the Marlins were seduced by Miller and Cameron Maybin, or we would have ended up with Cabrera.

That ball that AJ threw into CF was 100% on Alexei Ramirez. There was a "Thome shift" on at the time and he didn't get over there to cover to communicate with Beckham about who would be taking it. Not AJ's fault.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Aug 14, 2010 -> 10:02 PM) "Having Marv Throneberry play for your team is like having Willie Sutton play for your bank." Marvelous Marv Thornberry NY Mets 1962 Ok now compare that line to one we can come up with for Jenks and Putz and have some fun Inviting Bobby Jenks to Crispy Kreme when they're hot out of the oven Putz your playoff chances into prayers for Santos (meaning Saint in Spanish). Sorry Greg.

Rogers signed with Minnesota for two million a season. Kenny confirmed he offered him one million before the Twins topped the Sox offer. (How often do you hear that?) Kenny wasn't comfortable making another offer and the rest is history. I found that actually doing a google search which ended up at a WSI thread, from Mark Liptak. I think Boras was also Rogers' agent at the time. FWIW.

Victor Martinez's bat would be great, IF IF he's healthy. The problem is that his bat belongs at 1B/DH, not catcher. I just don't think it's a wise move to spend $8-10 million on Martinez, then risk him being hurt...not to mention that he used to be about the only catcher in the AL who could throw out a lower percentage than AJ (to Pierzynski's credit, he's been much better since Contreras left and Danks started learning from Buehrle). With Edwin Jackson now in the projected payroll, where's that money for Martinez going to come from? That's already assuming AJ, Jenks and Konerko are gone, yes?

The problem is that AJ and Flowers don't seem to mix very well. So you'd basically just be keeping Tyler around and praying he could get his game together while banishing him away from the big league camp and any kind of discussion about him taking AJ's job. You'd have to bring in Castro and AJ on one-year deals, telling them the team is basically in a holding pattern for one more year and waiting to see who emerges from that 3 headed group to be the starter in 2012.

Leading to the now "almost infamous" KW offering arbitration and Orlando failing to accept it scenario...which would have precluded Alexei Ramirez from becoming the shortstop we all know and love, lol. I think Dick Allen wrote 350-500 posts about that situation, if I remember correctly.

When did we trade away Garland? (Too funny, I didn't even remember this trade, I was thinking of the trade we almost made for Erstad with the Angels). And 2003, we didn't have a fifth starter and every team in baseball could have picked Kenny Rogers off the scrap heap and the Twins were prescient enough to do so, even though the guy's a total jerk. That's three seasons where we could or should have been playoff-bound and KW made massive mistakes. I'll give him a bit of a pass for this year, because you don't expect to go to the playoffs when Peavy goes down, but we were in position to do so...and still theoretically are, unless we get swept by the Twins on the road next week.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Aug 14, 2010 -> 09:19 PM) Danks better not go anywhere except into Reinsdorf's office to sign an extension. Jackson is looking good ands if we have five solid starters I say keep them. Pitching wins games Hello, Ranger! Joking. Of course, it's not the offense to blame for any losses this season. We can simply blame it on Jenks and Putz and make them the convenient scapegoats, right?

Boone Logan has put together a decent career with the Yankees. It would have been nice to get him straightened out so we would never have to witness the Williams Era. It's funny, with Richard, Garland, Hudson, Ely and Haeger, you could theoretically have a competitive NL West rotation, well...maybe not Charlie. Perhaps that hypothetical team would try to use Poreda instead. Right now, you can definitely make a compelling argument that the money from Jenks and Linebrink would have given us plenty of money to give us a competitive offense, enough to hold off the Twins. Just keeping Thome and Minnesota not having him should have been enough to get it done, without someone like Damon or Vladimir Guerrero or Aubrey Huff. And it would be nice to have Juan Uribe's clutch-ness around, the guy has 3 walk-off hits this year and always seems to come through in the clutch. Vizquel's been great, but it's a shame that Juan kind of grew stale and didn't continue to improve after his first couple of seasons in Chicago.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 14, 2010 -> 09:21 PM) You can't go 3 deep at every position, especially at catcher with a rookie. You'd have to bring in a backup plan. So who would you rather have as the starter in 2011, AJ, Castro or Flowers?

But is it possible to turn over one of the best pitching staffs in baseball to Tyler Flowers? I don't know. If they could get Castro into better shape, it might be better to bring him back as the starter, but how long until he broke down catching full-time? If you traded Flowers and Castro was hurt, then you're left with who exactly? The problem with our pitching staff is the affordability issue. I don't see how we can fit all those guys into the rotation without playing Viciedo, Flowers and possibly Jordan Danks next year. Which means a TON of growing pains offensively...and the offense was bad enough as it was. I guess the only positive is that having to watch young hitters struggling is more compelling than watching Kotsay, AJ, Teahen and Andruw Jones flail away.

Wow, A-Rod just hit his 3rd homer of the night. I don't like the guy, but that won't happen too often in the post-steroids era. Amusing that Rodriguez is the one to pull it off.

The problem with Jackson is you only have him for 2011, so then you're really in rebuilding mode if you're trading Danks two seasons before he's a free agent, unless you're lucky enough to make the kind of trades the Tigers did getting Austin Jackson/Scherzer types who were major league ready...and who actually pan out and don't go bust (like the Johan Santana deal for the Twins). KW is in a heckuva pickle with the decisions on AJ and Konerko this offseason. It will be interesting to see if AJ would be willing to sign a one-year deal. Trading Danks? I hope that KW's scouts find the right players, because that will be the one move he can make that will bring in 2-3 top prospects. He's not going to trade Ramirez or Beckham. Well, welcome to the closer's job Santos/Thornton/Sale!

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 14, 2010 -> 09:03 PM) Twins are 23-11 since Morneau got injured, and they're batting .300 during that time. You have to tip your cap to them for overcoming a huge injury to a top 5 player in the AL. And that's with their best player (for the first half) in Young looking like Alex Rios the last month. Probably the key to this season might end up being the insertion of Duensing into the rotation, the guy's 6-1 with a 2.00 ERA. You continue to get that level of pitching from him, with Pavano and Liriano, Baker and Slowey suddenly look pretty darned solid at the back end of the rotation.

We had our chance to build a bit of a cushion playing the Orioles and the Twins at home. That's gone, and now we're really looking to be in bad shape because we can't match up with teams like the Yankees and Red Sox offensively, unless we get shut-outs every time out.

This game might go down as the beginning of the end. Unless they can take 2/3 of Minnesota, it's going to get away from the Sox.

Great job by Thornton pitching out of trouble. Let's hope Putz can get it done. Boesch seems to have the same exact weak spot now as Viciedo after looking like the Rookie of the Year the first 3 months of the season.

Pierre terribly misplayed that ball. Turned the wrong way, drifted instead of going back to the wall and then finding it again.

I don't know what's going on, the crowd's basically a sellout, Jackson's pitching a great (albeit laborious) game, but it's just not really that exciting for some reason. Twins up 2-0 in the bottom of the 8th, what else is new? Thornton in instead of Sale.

The problem with Eat, Pray, Love is simply that there's very little conflict in the story. Unless you define conflict as Liz Gilbert's "inner unhappiness" and lack of contentment. I also think it's close to impossible to express mystical/spirital experiences (the Indian ashram part) without seeming hokey cinematically. A co-worker kept on talking so much about this book that I basically agreed to read it in order to get her to stop raving about it...it wasn't horrible, but the middle section (maybe because I'm just not into meditating at all, although I am going to Mount Everest in two months if that counts) was so boring I skipped over it entirely. If you enjoy travelling, it's probably watchable, but more of a DVD/netflix movie and not worth the ticket price, unless you absolutely miss seeing Julia Roberts leading a movie after so long.