caulfield12

Jesus....two hang "with 'ems" in a row. This just sucks. Rauch couldn't get out anyone with us, he goes 1-2-3 seemingly every time against us.

There goes our last, best chance. Foul by inches, story of our season. Just not quite good enough to be good, or bad enough to be horrible.

Does anyone have the feeling we're going to touch up Rauch? Intuition? Doesn't seem likely based on the box score and results so far in this game. Feels like 8 GB and we're blowing up the club again, 6 GB and we're printing playoff tix. (Yes, hyperbole, I know...)

The Dead Zone, isn't that a movie? Dead Calm, the Chicago White Sox Offense without Andruw Jones.

QUOTE (forrestg @ May 12, 2010 -> 11:31 AM) When US Cellular opened in 1991, the tigers managed a sweep over the sox . This prompted Sparky Anderson to say "I like that park." Didn't Rob Deer homer in that game?

Which is why signing Meche, Guillen, Ankiel, Pods, Bloomquist, Jacobs, etc., nobody knows what the heck someone trained by the vaunted Braves' FO is doing in Moore. I would say he's on VERY VERY thin ice right now. He might get 2011, but that's the absolute deadline for a competitive club. All those decisions have been pretty inexplicable.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ May 12, 2010 -> 10:31 AM) That's been there problem this whole century. Losing to the lesser teams always hurts. That 1-5 against CLE and 3-5 (with the two HORRIBLE losses this week) against Toronto are what stick out the most so far. That and the sweep of the anemic Mariners' club.

If Soria's hurt....their whole future is riding on Greinke, Moustakas, Hosmer, Hochevar, Billy Butler, but Butler, he's not even close to a superstar, he's more like DeJesus....solid, above average MLB player, but not much above that mean, especially when you consider the numbers put up at 1B/DH/LF.

http://www.kansascity.com/2010/05/11/19402...on-getting.html Not exactly the same result that we got out of Josh Fields. Wonder if they'll go the same direction with Dayan Viciedo (LF/RF) at some point...I just don't know about Dayan's height and being RHed at 1B, it seems he's better suited for a corner OF spot, his mobility is limited but he has a cannon for an arm.

Just catching up with game now.... What the heck's going on with Beckham? No change at all in his approach? This is not boding well for his season....well, hopefully he'll snap out of it somehow, he's simply too good not to.

QUOTE (southsidetony @ May 11, 2010 -> 05:57 PM) Upon questioning you on Katy Perry... BleedingDDawg: (6:41:40 PM) even if I knew who she was, I still wouldn't think she's hot Wow, prag. I'm not big on celeb gossip, magazines, TMZ, etc... but I do know who Katy Perry is. You are THAT out of touch with modern culture. And even if you know who she was you wouldn't think she's hot? Why? Because she's not black, or "big?: I reject your notion that skinny white blondes always win these things. Halle Berry won Maxim's #1 ranks at least once, Jennifer Lopez I think twice, Alba, Fox, Longoria, Johannson(sp?), have all won it once I believe. The only one of whom being a white blonde (ScarJo), is not rail thin by a long sight. I give you that Rihanna is quite... overrated; and that Rosario Dawson and Kerry Washington are imo, more attractive. I know you love black women, but most of those whom you listed on that list are not going to come close on most people's list... some of them I have never heard of. My top 10: 1) Emmanuelle Chriqui 2) Olivia Wilde 3) Kristin Bell 4) Linda Cardelini(sp) 5) Maria Menounous (sp?) 6) Olivia Munn 7) Natalie Portman 8) Sofia Vergara 9) Catherine Bell 10) Diane Lane I'm sure you know about 3 names from the list and find all but one disgusting. The fact that no one on this thread agrees with your assertions should be some indication of how far you have strayed from the pack. (Note: I will be as abrasive with Donald as I want as he has been my broseph since '01... regardless of how wrong he may be.) I met Sofia Vergara when I was in Baranquilla, Colombia, also home of the Renteria brothers. I can't remember the girl's name, but there is a porn star from Colombia who looks almost exactamente like her. Catherine Bell today, or 10-12 years ago? Linda Cardellini from ER?

Rumor is the Royals are seriously considering giving Kila another shot at 1B/DH. Depends (partially) on what happens with Guillen, if they can trade him. Butler really should never play in the field, he's worse than Teahen.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 11, 2010 -> 03:48 PM) I don't think it's incredibly likely that this team wins much of anything, unless the Twins come well back to earth. That being said, I do know that this roster is better than what they've shown and that several of these players are better than what they've shown. Does that mean they will go 77-53 to win 90 games? Most likely not. But from what I've seen thus far, can I say with any more certainty than I could on day 1 whether they would win 90 games? Not really, to be honest. Am I even worried about what the Twins are doing on a daily basis at this point? Absolutely not. I know that we need to start winning series, string a few 3 and 4 game streaks together, and avoid losing streaks ourselves. If we can do those things, I'll look up again at the All-Star break and take stock of what needs to be done then. You sound too pragmatic and measured, like Barack Obama (lol...I voted for him, by the way...made me think immediately of him, the way you wrote it, I would expect EXACTLY that to come from a press release if he was GM of the White Sox instead of KW, who's definitely more likely to blow a gasket or overturn the post-game spread than Barry).

QUOTE (Jenks Heat @ May 11, 2010 -> 01:30 PM) I would do the hottest 100,000 women in America in a heartbeat and I must tell you I get my fair share of the honies. Are you Wilt Chamberlain or Gene Simmons? Warren Beatty? LOL. I'll nominate my "ex" wife (well, we've been separated for 4 1/2 years), I always joked she was the Russian Jessica Alba. BTW, don't bother to e-mail her, she already has a fiance, lol. www.irina.s5.com If you want to see the hottest girl I've ever been with, just google "Davon Kim," she's one of my best friends, originally from Cebu City in the Philippines, she's most definitely not Korean. And no, you can't have her e-mail, lol....she's married and living at an undisclosed location in Europe. If you saw all the pictures from the Philippines, Thailand, China....you would wonder why I ever posted here or listened to White Sox games at all. The funniest, though, was when I met Dennis Rodman's dad hanging out in the Philippines. His name is Philander (literally) Rodman and he has at least 19 different kids in the world, although he said the real numbers are in the 30's or 40's range when I asked him if it was true. Crazy guy. I could understand, when he was famous, chicks like Madonna being after his son, but there's nothing really compelling about his father that would cause every woman to want to sleep with him. For the record, I'll trade all those girls for the one in Rock Raines' avatar, but he's never divulged that information. She's like Kristin Kreuk merged with Racheal Leigh Cooke WITH A SOX HAT, lol. But I really have to get one of the KTV girls here in China (the ones with five inch platform heels, those black stockings that should have a garter that the girls wear up to mid thigh, mini-skirt, XXXS blouse) to pose with my White Sox cap on so I can change my avatar. But I love El Gran Titan de Bronze too much!!!

I have the same feeling when I see Eva Green...can't figure her out.

Trading Jenks right now would have been like trading in your whole portfolio when the market was cratering for one or two days over freaking Greece debt issues. Simply illogical to sell as low as possible on him and panic. There's zero reason to force our hand to do so. Embree replacing Williams or backing up as LHR/loogy and pushing Thornton to closer is definitely NOT that reason to move Jenks, that much is for certain.

Then you have the Gomes/Coelho/Silverio (or is it Coehlo and I'm confusing him with the author) disasters (w/ Wilder), the complete debacle in the Dominican (Jesus Pena anyone?) How the f--- can we have Ozzie Guillen and Omar Vizquel in our organization and the only result we have to show for that is Cleveland Santeliz??? Takatsu and Iguchi? I think we acquired a Korean from the Red Sox, Onan Masaoka, and then Pu Yin whatever from Taiwan or Korea that we gave a pretty significant sum of signing bonus money to and he never came close to denting BIRM or CHARLOTTE, think he went down with injuries and never got his stuff over 90 MPH if I remember correctly.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ May 11, 2010 -> 03:56 PM) The Sox will be in serious trouble if the team collapses. You guys should know that. We haven't dedicated enough money to the farm system and don't have a lot of tradeable assets to the contracts in place and the fact that most of our tradeable assets are guys we don't want to trade (Floyd/Danks) as they would be key building blocks. So Peavy/Konerko/Buehrle are all key guys that we could move, but wouldn't get a lot for due to there contracts. Paulie might be the exception on this because he's putting up massive numbers and only has this year remaining on his deal. But his pending FA will reduce his value a bit. Danks/Floyd/Quentin/Beckham/Ramirez are all guys that are potential building blocks that we probably wouldn't move because we'd have to trade for prospects and push everything back a few years. Quentin/Ramirez might be guys we'd look into trading, but there production hasn't been as good recently and because of that I don't know how beneficial a trade would be. Andruw Jones would be a good piece to sell come July if we aren't in it and he is still hitting. His contract is a steal and plenty of teams could use a player like him at his price. Jenks - most likely to get non-tendered Thornton - s***loads of value with 1 year remaining. If we were going to go into a rebuilding mode, we'd probably have to move him cause there is little value holding him due to the fact we would be a few years away. But the thing that is the most scary, is that if we were to go through a complete rebuilding due to salary restrictions, we just don't have the prospects at hand to even be close to being competitive. It would take years to get to that point, imo, since we don't have the trade chips necessary to help restock the system. We'd basically be completely reliant on the draft in the upcoming years to rebuild the system (outside of Viciedo, Flowers, Huddy, Morel and a few other guys). That is where Kenny's lack of setting aside enough resources towards our minor league player development and acquisitions has really killed the squad. I don't things are quite so bleak. Let's go back to the end of 2007. Our minor league system was even looking more brutal, agreed? The only glimmer of hope was Owens/Fields/Wasserman and the fact that we hadn't dealt Buehrle/Dye, etc. With the additions of Floyd/Danks/Ramirez/Quentin to that ballclub, we went from 72 to 89 wins, a 17 game differential. There's absolutely no reason that can't happen again. 2005, coming off that mysterious 2004 offseason, we caught lightning in a bottle and never looked back. Yes, 100%, KW'd need to make the "RIGHT" moves in the prospects acquired department....if it was 2002 all over again with our returns (the only decent one we got back was Frank Francisco), then I'd tend to agree with you. Things would look a lot different to me if Mitchell was raking now at Winston-Salem or even BIRM, and looking 1 1/2 years away instead of 2 1/2 to 3 years out.... Yes, I do agree trading out of that most valuable core (Thornton, Danks, Peavy, Floyd, Rios) is riverboat gambling at its best and Jonestown suicidal at its worst, but I have zero belief that KW won't do at least SOMETHING and sit back on his hands while Rome is burning. Numerous times, they both said they won't tolerate and sit idly through another 2007, yes? We do need a lot of things to break right with Flowers, Morel, Viciedo, Danks II, Shelby (possibly), Santeliz, CJ Retherford...but I don't think we can say we're any worse off now than in 2007, with the possible exception of the Twins looking like a "dynasty" and spending more money than us on payroll. OTOH, look how good the Tigers and Indians (and White Sox in 05/06 and 08) have looked at different points and how each team "collapsed" and fell back to earth, only to be resurrected like a phoenix out of the ashes. It's always possible in this division, it's just that the margin of error is razor thin with Mauer signed until forever (then again, he goes down due to injury and their franchise is seriously imperiled, with 20% of payroll soaked up by ONE player, that almost never works, see A-Rod) and the Twins being finally able to compete on a level playing field with us and DET.

Including the last two games that were blown in the series against TOR, we've blown and gone on to lose 7 "late" leads ALREADY at this early point in the season. (Some of the Twins' teams, like 2006, might have done this 2-3-4 times all season long, something like that...) Can that trend continue without Jenks as the closer? Probably not, the numbers will even out. LET'S just argue that they had held onto 4 out of 7 of those leads, not entirely unreasonable, agreed? They'd be 17-15 or maybe 16-16 and right in the thick of it heading into Minnesota. "Close" games we've lost out of 19 (not to mention many games were leading early and were passed....we haven't been BLOWN out more than 5-6 times all season where the game was "hopeless") APR 7th 3-3 tie in 7th against CLE, LOSS APR 8th 3-2 lead into the 8th against CLE, LOSS APR 9th 3-2 lead into the 7th against MINN, LOSS APR 10th 1-0 lead into the 8th before Garcia walks Thome, Kubel goes yard MINN, LOSS THESE FOUR GAMES, to me, were the turning point in this season's momentum being stalled/killed from the get-go. APRIL 16th trailing 3-2 in the 6th against CLE, LOSS APRIL 17th, 2-1 lead into the 8th, CLE, LOSS APRIL 23rd, 3-2 deficit into the 6th, TEX, LOSS (think it was against CJ Wilson) APRIL 30th, 4-4 tie into the 7th against NYY (Thornton gave up those runs, yes?) LOSS MAY 4th, 2-1 deficit into 7th against KC, I think Teahen error here opens the floodgates, LOSS May 7th, 3-2 lead in the 8th against TOR, LOSS plus 2/4 games the last series against TOR, BLOWN SAVES That's 12 out of the 19 losses that were either blown and lost late or one run deficits/tie games that got away from the Sox. In fact, I'd guess out of those "OTHER" 7 losses, 3-4 of them were games we had early leads in and the starting pitched just cratered (Peavy/Floyd). Turn around those 7 blown leads late into a 4-3 record or 3-4 record, we're not having this conversation at all. Of course, someone will say (and rightly so) that baseball "evens" out, that we've had 3-4-5 "comeback" wins (Mariners' series, Teahen in TOR) that we absolutely didn't deserve...so the naysayers will argue we're exactly where we deserve to be. Certainly, Pythagoras would agree we're a below average, so-so team, just not as terrible as things would appear on the surface.

QUOTE (jphat007 @ May 11, 2010 -> 01:42 PM) 8 games out in mid May is pretty close to out of the race already. Not very many teams come back from deficits like that. A very very small number of exceptions have, but that number is super small. The 2001 team started 14-29 and got all the way back to 8 games over .500. 1983, 16-24 to winning the division by almost 30 games and 100 victories. It's never, ever good for the White Sox to lose, because it crushes our attendance and depresses our payroll going forward historically.

QUOTE (fathom @ May 11, 2010 -> 11:59 AM) From someone that I trust, Jenks is not throwing the curve anymore because of the stress it puts on his elbow. He doesn't want to get injured prior to his free agency contract. Sadly, he's losing money by the day not being able to throw his best pitch. Reminiscent of Crede shutting it down because of his recurring back problems in late 2008, this situation also really got onto Ozzie's nerves (perhaps the only time he was ever frustrated with Joe) and it ended up with the band-aid of Juan Pierre at 3B, which might have saved the season. Maybe something good will come out of Jenks falling apart so early, just like Takatsu in 2005 (not saying we have a WS run in us, far from it).

QUOTE (whitesoxfan101 @ May 11, 2010 -> 02:12 PM) Well when you consider the question what is it good for (absolutely nothing), I can't take such a fact seriously. He's still having a great season so far though. Okay, Jackie Chan!

2011 Contract Issues: Chicago White Sox (mlbtraderumors.com) By Tim Dierkes [May 11 at 8:17am CST] The White Sox face two contractual options after the season: Reliever Matt Thornton has a $3MM club option with a $250K buyout. This is a good bet to be exercised. Backup catcher Ramon Castro has a $1.2MM club option with a $200K buyout. He's missed most of the season with a heel injury. The team's other free agents are earning $26.125MM this year, led by Paul Konerko and A.J. Pierzynski. If they also let Castro go and we add in buyouts paid to Jermaine Dye and Mike MacDougal, the Sox have nearly $29MM coming off the books. Increases to players under contract total $11.3MM, with Alex Rios, Juan Pierre, Mark Teahen, and Gavin Floyd getting bumps of at least $2MM. There are also arbitration cases to consider: Alexei Ramirez goes for the first time, John Danks, Carlos Quentin, and Tony Pena a second, and Bobby Jenks a third. Technically Ramirez is already under contract for '11, but perhaps he's allowed to choose arbitration if he prefers. I think Jenks will be non-tendered, meaning another $7.5MM off the books. Using the above scenarios I think the White Sox would have approximately $15MM to work with if they hold payroll steady. Keep in mind that's before re-signing any free agents, including 2010 offensive standouts Konerko and Andruw Jones. My first thought....I think that you have to start out with the assumption that $10-15 million would have to be chopped off right away from payroll due to decreased payroll and revenue generation. So let's say we brought back Konerko for 2011, that would be it in terms of the moves we could make, unless we slashed even more deeply: Linebrink Teahen Pierre Peavy Buehrle Rios Danks Quentin, Beckham and Ramirez aren't going anywhere. And we might have to DH Flowers/Viciedo, that could be scary! Some might wish for a return to DH at-bats for TMK, Vizquel and Juan Pierre in that scenario....well, at least it'll be more entertaining, right? Kotsay, Vizquel and probably Castro would come off the books as well, unless KW (maybe I missed it) already signed those guys to multi-year extensions in the middle of the night like he did with Teahen.

I can't take two whole days without a game. It's like the ASB almost. Whatever happens, happens, at this point.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ May 11, 2010 -> 10:21 AM) I don't like the idea of trading for prospects because that's what they are. I don't trust the Sox farm system either to further develop those prospects. The problem is losing teams always makes those trades. Those trades are made out of weakness. What do you propose? Holding on to players like Jenks, Crede, Dotel, Linebrink, Thome and Dye one or two seasons too long, you have ZERO to show for it in the end....(yes, Thome would have been impossible to deal without sending cash the other direction). Orlando Cabrera will end up netting us more than those four combined, ironically. We are in a position of major weakness both at the major and minor league levels. We have one strength.....Buehrle, Floyd, Danks and Peavy, as well as our individual collection of bullpen arms, their potential, moreso than their actual results when it's crunch time.