caulfield12

It's not really a surprise loss to anyone, you almost expect it when Jenks and Minnesota come together. That we didn't get a single out that inning was the only shocker....usually Jenks can sort of make it interesting when he implodes.

Great. Complete meltdown. We might as well give them their 3rd walkoff win of the season without them getting a single out in the inning.

That just sucks. To go from 3 1/2 game lead to 1 1/2 in ten minutes. You had a feeling it was coming when Pierre didn't get the 7th run in.

Praying for double ball ball here.

Everyone saw this one coming....just hope we can get out of the inning with a tie.

Jenks can never have an easy save in Minnesota. I think Guillen will be very tempted to pull Bobby if he gives up another baserunner.

Apparently Scott Baker had to get a cortisone shot in his elbow. Just hope the Indians can keep up their hot play of late in Minnesota, Laffey versus Baker tomorrow night. Let's go Jenks, these 3 run leads make you nervous, it's almost a given he will bring the tying run to the plate.

I wouldn't mind a run or two here and Putz staying in the game.

Putz has been almost as good as Politte/Hermanson in 2005. That's something like 24 appearances in a row without giving up a run.

Pierre is just a terrible hitter with RISP. It seems he has more AB's than any hitter in that situation this year....he's done "okay" the last couple of months but it's just not a situation where he's very comfortable or confident, for whatever reason. Somehow, you know that 7th run will end up being important, at least that's how it used to be in Minnesota. We'll see.

Quentin hurt his hand on that slide? Wow...talk about a guy constantly battling injuries over the last two years. At least it's not his knee again... Now they can't get Beckham out. Typical Twins' hit there by Gordon. First four hit game of his career, 9 hits in the series.

The other thing is that our prospects, unlike Robin Ventura, haven't been allowed to develop in low-pressure situations. All those guys in the late 80's, they weren't expected to do anything or win...it was just developmental/transition time for the ballclub. If nothing else, that has really hampered the development of players like Borchard, Fields, Getz, Owens, Anderson, etc. They simply cannot afford for Dayan to learn how to play 3B "on the job" when every game could be the difference between making the playoffs or not. Some will argue those guys might never have become big leaguers, since they also failed with other organizations or are in the process of failing.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Jul 16, 2010 -> 03:38 PM) From FanGraphs. Interesting... Well, if Morel and Flowers are B prospects, it will take that and Santos I would guess.

Theoretically, if Morel can put up a 700-725 OPS, they can live with that. But they've got to be getting a lot of offensive output from Viciedo, Flowers/AJ, Beckham, Ramirez, Quentin, Rios, etc. The easiest solution is Teahen at 1B, Viciedo at DH and Morel at 3B (for the future), but that puts a tremendous amount of pressure on the rest of the offense because you expect to get a lot more pop from those two corner spots. You also would like to give Viciedo time to at least try to develop into an adequate 1B, we all know he has a very strong arm (but his height, not being LH, his ability to dig balls out of the dirt or athleticism in leaping for the ball, there are quite a few question marks)...ultimately, they might decide LF is the final destination, that he needs to be playing the field everyday to stay focused on the game, I'm not sure. Obviously, we seem to have Pierre as our leadoff man into 2011, but things have a way of changing quickly in baseball (as we've seen the last 2 months).

On the subject of Beckham, he shouldn't get a free pass defensively. The guy's on a pace for 20+ errors at 2B, that's not very good. Yes, he has the potential to be an above-average MLB second baseman, but he's not there yet. If we're going to rip Viciedo, the guy hasn't even played that position much this season, he played more 1B. Undoubtedly, he would be better as a DH, but so would Teahen, and Vizquel clearly isn't the long-term solution. And I have a feeling Morel will be the Ryan Sweeney of 3B. Another error. Just not our night. Floyd has never been good at fielding his position...not quite Clayton Richard-esque, but pretty bad.

There's our error. Three run bomb and the game's tied again.

QUOTE (fathom @ Jul 16, 2010 -> 08:28 PM) Defense hasn't helped them out, but we couldn't really count on them continuing their historic starting pitching performance. Gavin should have been out of this inning with an easy double play. Viciedo cannot keep playing 3rd base. The problem is that Teahen isn't the answer, either. It's no coincidence we started to take off without him in the infield defensively. That leaves a 43 year old who has a 625 OPS (overachieving) who will probably wear down in the next 2-3 months of Chicago heat. And you can't move Beckham back.

The White Sox have responded throughout this streak to being down and not out. This will be a big test of that theory. At least CLE isn't lying down and dying tonight. Seems like we were playing with fire with Viciedo at 3B and it came back to bite us, Gavin couldn't pitch out if it, but it's not exactly like he was knocked all over the ballpark.

What if Ozzie got hurt, lol? Is he covered by insurance? If he goes crazy like Zambrano and has to attend more classes....? Joking... Greg, I'm not sure why you are giving up on Peavy so quickly. He's a competitor, he's not going to see his baseball (and pitching career) end unless there's simply no way to deal with pain or injury, like what happened with Brad Radke at the end. Yes, it's a rare injury, but who's to say he won't be even better when he comes back and is throwing pain free? And we still don't even know if the White Sox are getting some of that $37.5 million back in insurance settlement payments....maybe.

How many of you guys have seen DUEL, the first Spielberg movie? What a great first movie...so much intensity and drama out of a singular situation.

Would echo the sentiments about INCEPTION. Saw it here in Thailand already, will go for 2nd time tonight to catch up on a few plot points I missed or overlooked on first viewing. One of the main criticisms, perhaps, is that the film doesn't change your life, it doesn't stay with you or linger on....but I prefer to think that's kind of the point, that dreams are the same way, they're ephemeral and don't often stick in your subconscious. People look for deeper philosophical meaning in movies like 2001 or Blade Runner or Brazil or what have you...I really enjoyed it, yes, sometimes Leo DiCaprio feels like he's playing the same role over and over again (after Shutter Island), but this was an excellent film. I'm not even a huge film of the French actress, M. Cotillard or whatever her name is (Mal, which means evil in Spanish) in real life, but she was good in this one. It was nice to see Tom Berenger again, he was something of a big thing in the 80's and kind of disappeared. Obviously Nolan likes to work with Michael Caine and Cillian Murphy...Juno (Ellen Page) added a female touch, and Joseph Gordon Levitt has been one of my favorites since 28 Days of Summer. They even had the Indian scientist from 2012 as part of the team, interesting cast that worked together well. Eames (Tom Hardy) was my favorite character, THE FORGER, he's something of a cross between Daniel Craig, Sean Bean and Jason Statham.

Guillen called for four hit-and-runs — and all of them worked. • The White Sox produced three sacrifice flies in the first two innings. • Gordon Beckham(notes) hit a home run at Target (no easy task) and has been heating up since Guillen almost, but didn't quite, banish him. • Guillen stuck with left-hander John Danks(notes) through a maddening six-run second inning for the Twins, and he got them to the seventh. • Guillen switched relievers at the right moments; Bobby Jenks(notes) struck out Orlando Hudson(notes) with the bases loaded in the eighth and got Jim Thome(notes) looking in the ninth. And so, for the ninth straight game, and for the 26th time in 31 games, the White Sox won. Via the Chicago Tribune: "(This) was a big win because they wanted to come out and send a message. We wanted to keep doing what we're doing," said A.J. Pierzynski(notes), whose RBI double in the fifth gave the Sox the lead for good at 7-6. www.yahoo.com/sports (Duk, Big League Stew)

(Adrian) Gonzalez, 28, saves his words for before and after games. As Black’s clubhouse liaison and peacemaker, he approaches teammates with a certain delicacy – Gonzalez looked sheepish for taking Nick Hundley’s(notes) money in a recent World Cup side bet – and offers little pearls of wisdom, short and sweet enough to end up on Twitter. He spoke to Hundley this spring, his advice almost a haiku: “Let the ball get deeper when you swing. Don’t go and get it. Be calm.” When Gonzalez approached pitcher Wade LeBlanc(notes), he suggested LeBlanc follow another successful control-and-command left-hander: “Look at Mark Buehrle. He never shakes off his catchers because all he has to do is execute the pitch. Execute, and it will work.” yahoo.com/sports (passan)

QUOTE (Stan Bahnsen @ Jul 15, 2010 -> 10:10 PM) I'll bet that the Twins' players who've been around a few years are thinking that the '10 Sox are reminiscent of their own team in '06 - bad in April and May, got it going big-time in interleague, and then never let off the gas. Except that year, the Twins completely dominated the second half.....passing the Sox and the Tigers the final weekend. To me, the main difference is they had two legitimate "aces" in Santana and Liriano. With Peavy down, we have two "2's" (assuming Floyd keeps it up) and a 2/3 in Buehrle.

It would be awesome to take 3/4 in Minnesota, but I would be satisfied with a split. Still, this is really the time to knock them out of contention for the moment, with their starting rotation falling apart and Morneau's concussion status very uncertain after the setback in workouts today. The Tigers get CLE on the road, then come back home and face the Rangers (I think) and then the Blue Jays. Have to double-check.