Kenny Hates Prospects

QUOTE (DBAHO @ Feb 3, 2009 -> 09:38 AM) If the Angels chucked in a decent prospect along with Figgins, I would pull the trigger on that deal, if you could get Bobby for 1/8. I agree, but in this baseball economy I don't know if we'd get a whole lot given Dye's salary. It was below market value just several months ago, and now it would be looked at as an unaffordable contract by a lot of teams. Situations like this make me wish draft picks could be traded. I'd totally take Figgins + a 2nd round pick + a 3rd round pick for Dye.

Griffey gets better reads than Owens does, possibly Swisher as well. Swisher has a much stronger arm, and Griffey's arm even at his age is still better than Owens' arm. Owens has them in speed only, so I see no reason to believe Owens is a defensive upgrade even from the monster than ran out there last year. Besides, what is a realistic expectation of Owens' batting line? I think .280/.330/.340 is very optimistic. His minor league numbers are .291/.351/.358 which is mostly weighted by his very strong performance in Birmingham 4 years ago. Since 2005, his lines in Charlotte have been .260/.328/.344 in '06; .284/.361/.366 in '07; and .276/.346/.316 in '08. Owens' MLB line is .268/.321/.312. It's not like we're talking about Brent Lillibridge here, or some other multi-tool player who may all of the sudden figure it out and become a very good player. We're talking about a LF with no arm who outside of contact and speed has absolutely nothing at all that is valuable to a baseball team at any level above Single-A. Anderson's MLB numbers, by contrast, are .221/.277/.379, and his minor league numbers are .293/.364/.474. Now the question is if a .250/.300/.400 Anderson (which I think is a reasonable optimistic estimate) better than a .280/.330/.340 Jerry Owens when you factor in defense? Owens has the speed, but think about this: Let's say Jerry gets on 33% of the time. How many of those come in blowouts? How many of those come in situations where Ozzie will not run (because Jerry isn't all that great of a base stealer, he's just fast)? How many situations will Ozzie inexplicably lay down a bunt and give up an out to get Owens to 2B? Because I remember a situation in '07, I believe it was vs. Cleveland with Betancourt pitching and Martinez behind the plate, and Ozzie chose to use Fields to bunt instead of having Owens straight steal, even though Owens should have been successful in that situation. Ozzie will still pull that crap. So how many times will Owens get on base during a running situation, steal it without having Ozzie stupidly bunt, and how many times will that lead to a run? And of those few times where Owens would lead to a run that Anderson wouldn't have, are they more valuable in the long run than all those balls that will fall that Anderson would have caught? Or are those few Owens-created runs more valuable than all those times a runner would score from third or advance to third from second where Anderson's arm may have been a deterrent? There's of course the intangibles argument too, which is an argument I will make for better baseball players. How many times does Owens' speed allow him to put down a successful bunt against a tough pitcher who is dominating? How many time's does Owens' speed down the line lead to an error from the opposition that leads to a run? How many times does Owens' threat to steal on the bases mess with a young pitcher's mind enough to lose enough to throw a bad pitch? How many times does Owen's being on first force a pitcher to throw a fastball that a good fastball hitter connects with? But then after all that you still have to ask the defensive question. How much defense can we afford to lose? And again, don't just focus on balls failing to be caught, but also consider that any decent baserunner will be able to advance from 2B to 3B or from 3B to home from medium depth in CF. As I see it, this whole situation is ridiculous. It's a no-brainer. Anderson is clearly the tallest midget here and he has enough tools in his box to where there's at least a chance of a sudden growth spurt. If Owens starts in CF, not only will he be the worst CF in the entire American League - think about it, every other team in this league would have a better CF than Owens - but I believe he'll also be the worst regular position player in all of the AL given his defensive shortcomings. I can't believe that there are actually Sox fans who are upset about the defensive downgrade from Crede to Fields but are yet lukewarm to the terror that will be Jerry Owens in CF. Also, I'd take a healthy Ken Griffey, Jr. in CF over Owens any day of the week. In fact, I'd take an injured Junior out there over Owens as well. Owens shouldn't be on this team. Now that we have Lillibridge to pinch run, there's no reason to have him on the roster.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Feb 2, 2009 -> 01:07 PM) You do realize that this list was put together by Baseball Prospectus, not Baseball America? My apologies to BA then. And good, because I dislike Baseball Prospectus even more.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 2, 2009 -> 12:29 PM) Silverio being overhyped again. He's a 20 year old who struggled at short-season A ball and, by scouting reports we've seen here, was a butcher defensively. There are about 4 shortstops in the Sox system that I'd rather higher than Silverios (Beckham, Miranda, Kuhn, Escobar, in that order). +1 Even if the kid was 16/17 last year, he should have actually done something in rookie ball if he had any talent whatsoever. Didn't the Sox give him like $600K? Look at what Wilmer Flores did for the Mets last year, or what Carlos Triunfel did in his rookie season, or what Elvis Andrus did in his rookie season. All three of those guys were 16 or 17 year old shortstops signed out of Latin America and given big bonuses. When you get a bonus that size you're supposed to be able to hit f***ing rookie league pitching. s***, if you're organizational fodder drafted out of college meant to fill a roster, you're still expected to hit rookie league pitching to at least some degree. .228/.265/.321 means probably translates to about .250/.300/.350 in the DSL for f***'s sake. The "man-child" is really a man and hopefully the last mistake that prick asshole cocksucker Wilder made. BTW, this list f***ing sucks. How is Allen a 4-star prospect and Viciedo a 3? If Allen is a 4, then Viciedo is a 6. Allen should be a 3 and Viciedo should be a 5. A bat like that at 3B with supposedly great arm strength and average-to-above average defensive potential is a 5-star 'spect. I could *see* making Viciedo a 4-star prospect because the BA has never seen him, but if BA is only ranking people on what they've seen, then there's no way Shelby is listed as a CF, there's no way Allen is listed as a 4-star prospect, and there's no freaking way Silverio makes this list. And there's no way Poreda with his one pitch ranks at 4 stars based on ceiling while Richard with his 2 pitches and MLB readiness only ranks as a 2. If we're going based on ceiling, then Richard's ceiling as a #4/5 starter or above average lefty setup man is worth 3 stars. In short, BA = trash. Law and Callis' rankings are much, much more accurate, and say what you want about them, but at least these guys aren't making rankings based off organizational hype only from a year ago. Some douche at BA opened the White Sox file cabinet and pulled out a sheet of paper that had some scribbled Dave Wilder hype on it and then decided to use that as a base for a list. Garbage. I'm actually shocked Broadway didn't make this list as bad as it is.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Jan 31, 2009 -> 08:35 AM) Yeah, that was such a bad trade.....Trading a guy who you have no chance of re-signing in the future to not only obtain a speedy leadoff hitter you were in despeate need of, but to also free up money to sign a catcher, 2B, and SP, who were all key components of your team winning the World Series. Kenny definitely has made some head scratching trades, but Caballo for SPod should not be on that list. It worked out great and was a brilliant move overall, but we still got hosed on that deal talent-wise. Pods + Vizcaino never has been nor ever will be worth 2 full seasons of Carlos Lee at a below-market price. We should have gotten a good prospect there.

QUOTE (nitetrain8601 @ Jan 31, 2009 -> 08:51 AM) Hendry was like 4th tier and I can't say I don't disagree with their reason why. He's a guy who mostly looks decent because of resources, but with those resources, no reason he and guys like Omar Minaya have lost more games than they should have. Ricky Nolasco, Segio Mitre, Renyel Pinto, Jose Ceda, Dontrelle Willis, Ryan Jorgensen, Jose Cueto and Julian Tavarez for Juan Pierre, Matt Clement, Antonio Alfonseca, and Kevin Gregg. At least Clement helped them. Bad contracts to Fukudome, Soriano, Wood, and Marquis. The only credit he deserves is for stealing Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez, and Kenny Lofton in salary dumps and turning Todd Hundley, another bad contract, into Eric Karros and Grudz. With Hendry it's going to be either a brainfart or a wishful thinking Cubs fan on the Score PS3 move.

QUOTE (Pants Rowland @ Jan 31, 2009 -> 08:46 AM) To tell you the truth, out of all his trades, only Wells/Fogg for Ritchie made me scratch my head raw. Young for Vazquez is debatable but the decision is very split on that one. In some ways, I like that Williams is not afraid to make a trade like a Lee for Pods. Sometimes he does not let a perceived inequity distract him from executing his overall plan. Maybe he could have gotten another prospect or two there, but he did not waste a lot of time negotiating too much and miss the rest of the market. Second tier after a top five is not bad anyway. I don't even think the Young-for-Vazquez trade is debatable anymore. We got 3 solid but frustrating seasons out of a prime Javy and then dealt him away for a very strong package. The only reason there was backlash about Young is because a lot of people thought he was going to be a very special player. I remember a lot of Cameron comparisons and a lot of people saying he'd be even better than that. But for what Young has done so far, if I had him now I'd still deal him to Atlanta for Flowers, Lillibridge, Gilmore, and Rodriguez. The only real worry for me was if Young ended up a 30/30 guy with a solid average and some plate discipline, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen. In fact, right now that trade may be a steal. And more than Young, I think the biggest kick we took in that deal was dealing away Luis Vizcaino. Our pen was horrid in '06 and even though Luis has never been a world-beater, he did have a good 2006 season and is a solid UT pitcher, and it would have been a huge improvement to have him take some of those innings away from the likes of Jeff Nelson, Cliff Politte, Neal Cotts, Brandon McCarthy, Sean Tracey, etc.

QUOTE (zenryan @ Jan 30, 2009 -> 07:02 AM) see StrikeForce. Strikeforce is the only MMA promotion in the states that has a TV deal and has gone about it the right way. PFC looks pretty good too because they stream their shows through Sherdog (although I've never watched them because I tried and it was choppy as hell). It seems like most fans always expect Affliction, EXC, Bodog, etc. to be the ones to stick around and make their marks. I'd bet on Strikeforce, the PFC, or any one of those shows up in Canada to do it well before I'd bet on the money pissers.

My picks: Georges St. Pierre vs. B.J. Penn - this one is really hard to pick, damn... head says GSP round 4 TKO, heart says BJ round 2 TKO... but I think there's a finish here either way Lyoto Machida vs. Thiago Silva - Machida, GNP TKO, round 2, KOOTN Karo Parisyan vs. Dong Hyun Kim - Dong via elbows, round 2 TKO Nathan Diaz vs. Clay Guida - Diaz via triangle choke, round 3 + FOTN + SOTN Stephan Bonnar vs. Jon Jones - Bonnar, RNC round 2 Jon Fitch vs. Akihiro Gono - Fitch, UD + darkhorse FOTN Jake O'Brien vs. Christian Wellisch - O'Brien, UD Chris Wilson vs. John Howard - Wilson, UD Manny Gamburyan vs. Thiago Tavares - Thiago, UD Matt Arroyo vs. Dan Cramer - don't know or care

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ Jan 30, 2009 -> 01:25 PM) The odd thing and difficult thing with Zuffa's success is their insanely loyal fanbase. Look at the numbers they get from TUF, the countdown shows, and Fight Nights, they are not crazy high numbers. The thing UFC has going for them is an insanely large percentage of their core viewing audience buys the PPVs and their key demo is the most coveted Look at TNA or even WWE. TNA is on Spike to and get similar if not better ratings than the UFC, but get significantly less PPV buys. Same as WWE, they'll pull double the UFC ratings but, except for their major shows, get less than half of UFCs buy-rate. I have to review some of the meltzer numbers, but usually a good UFC PPV does about 400k, give or take 100k, while a great card does around 900k, again give or take. Actually, if GSP/St. Pierre II does around 900k that will be 3 out of 4 ppvs that do a mega level (Lesnar/Couture, Big Nog/Mir and 94). Both with ticket sales and PPV buys the UFC has yet to be really touched by the economic downturn. With all that said, it's going to be extremely difficult for any promotion to make a significant dent in the UFC empire. For better or for worse, the UFC = MMA in the U.S. so there's not a lot of casual fans to grab. PRIDE attempted to do it with shows in Vegas and a weekly show on FSN, ELITE XC tried a gimmick fighter and a show on CBS and now Affliction is trying by running shows at a loss. If anyone challenges UFC in the future it will take a regular show on TV, such as ESPN or the like, with quarerly big cards on CBS, HBO or Showtime. I heard CBS was still interested in MMA so there's a possibility someone can grab them. Even with that there has to be some luck mixed in, UFCs huge break came in that the first season of TUF did good ratings then the Griffin/Bonner fight was off the charts exciting, even having the weird phenomenon of ratings increasing during the 15 minute fight. Let's say the stars allign for Affliction or another promotion and they get a CBS show, if most of the fights are lay and pray borefests it could cripple them. I agree that to ever really challenge the UFC another promotion would have to have a strong TV deal, but the most important part is growing a fanbase. You're exactly right about the UFC's loyal fanbase which is why no one can just jump in and hemorrhage money until things start to turn around. IMO, a territory kind of system where one company ran several smaller but solvent promotions would be ideal because you could grow your brand locally and kind of attach yourself to the underground scene and carve out your own niche that way. Then as it grows, over time, you take small steps here and there. You'd be developing young fighters along in the process, and those young fighters would inevitably go on to find success in the bigger UFC, but you'd also accumulate a fight library of those fighters, so you'd be able to sell DVD's and lease out fight footage to other promotions and so on. Like, first you run the small shows and rely heavily on cheap internet ads, word of mouth advertising, and flyers. Then you begin to release DVD's on a website or something and in special stores, and simple promotional merchandise like t-shirts and so on, all the way up to a television deal which IMO should always be one of the last steps. Companies should only go for TV deals once they KNOW they have an audience and once they KNOW they can run a solvent promotion without them. Otherwise they end up panicking when the ratings don't come in, and then they spend more money looking to boost those rantings, and then they end up having to borrow money and having to fork over creative control and/or even majority control over the business, ala EXC. Everyone is going to fail going about it the way EXC, Affliction, Bodog, and the WFA have. No one wants to wait. No one wants to respect the sport enough to realize that it needs to be nurtured and developed locally first, despite all the claims these promoters make. They all play like they're the good guys going up against the big, bad Zuffa empire, when in reality they're just a bunch of greedy morons who can't learn from the mistakes of those others before them. When the UFC started out they had the edge because there was no industry around to combat them, but of course they had to battle legislators, stigmas, and athletic commissions, both in the early days under SEG and still to this day under Zuffa. Still though, they didn't have competition here trying to take them down. But if you look at what happens with other businesses, what has always happened is you have some small business that produces a good product and expands slowly until they're big enough to expand further and eventually become a major force. McDonalds didn't become what it is today just overnight, and the same thing has to apply to every other business out there. McDonalds, like Quiznos and I believe Subway too among others, had a brilliant franchising model that, in conjuction with a popular product, found them success, and MMA could do that too. Imagine if Strikeforce took their model and bought out other local promotions and basically franchised Strikeforce. And using the wrestling example, WCW didn't just pop up, it was the NWA which had been around forever, and even TNA went with the NWA name at first and used NWA indie wrestlers along with guys that ECW, WCW, and WWF at the time had promoted. And with pro wrestling, when Vince bought up ECW and WCW both companies were still drawing and had huge fanbases, so naturally Jarret & co. knew they'd have people who wanted a WWE alternative. But with MMA, there's no reason for ANYONE to believe that MMA fans in North America want a UFC alternative, in fact even thinking that is assinine, considering this all started growing off the shoulders of TUF 1 which only freaking premiered 4 years ago this month. Most MMA fans on this continent are post-TUF 1 fans who've been educated by the UFC only. So anyway, I'm ranting again, and the rumors of Affliction going under were said to be bogus, but I still believe them. Affliction will run one more show tops and then they're going down. Their business plan was a massive failure from the beginning. It is not wise to jump in and blow wads of cash just hoping that eventually you'll hit a break-even point. And, it's never worked in this market in MMA history either. When popular undercard fighters like Clay Guida, Akihiro Gono, and even young, relatively unknown (to the casual fan) champions like Rashad Evans become as well known nationally as their MLB, NFL, and NBA counterparts are, then that is when a company will be able to jump in and waste loads of money looking for an audience. They'll probably fail then too, but they'll have a much, much better shot of having some kind of success.

Owens has no business in Major League Baseball and Wise, although better than Owens, is a 4th OF at best. Newsflash to Ozzie: neither Owens or Wise will get on base. Anderson won't either but he is on your f***ing team and he's at least capable of providing excellent D with some pop. It is better to have no lead-off man at all than to have Jerry Owens or Dewayne Wise starting anywhere on this team. Damn it to hell Ozzie, cut the s*** and admit you have no idea what the f*** you are doing when it comes to making out a lineup and implementing a philosophy. You talk about OBP being important out of the 1 slot yet you favor the two worst guys on the team for that role. You say you want pitching and defense, yet in order to fit your s***ty speed players in CF you have to sacrifice defense up the middle which only makes the pitching staff have to work harder. Ozzie Guillen's obsession with lead-off men who can't lead-off is positively disturbing. It's like a video game or something where the computer will formulate some BS roster for the opposition and somehow Kevin Millar is playing SS, and when you see it you don't even want to play the game anymore because you just can't get over how unrealistic it is. But that's Ozzie. Sure, let's put Owens in CF! That'll work! In real life Jerry Owens does not make 25-man rosters, let alone start for a large market team. Please, please, please KW... your offseason so far has sucked ass and the least you can do to make amends is clear out this trash. Waive Owens, waive Broadway, get this s*** off the roster already. I'm sick of Ozzie complimenting it.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ Jan 25, 2009 -> 12:29 PM) WEC on Vs tonight. If you're new to MMA you should watch, usually those cards are very entertaining. http://www.mmaweekly.com/absolutenm/templa...7&zoneid=14 They are also running a show in Chicago in April, I believe it's at the UIC Pavillion Miguel Torres will be on that card fighting Brian Bowles in what may be the fight of the year. I second your comment that new fans should watch the WEC shows. Miguel Torres has become one of my favorite fighters in any weight class in any promotion in the world. The guy is f***ing amazing. And the fact that his fights are on basic cable for most is such a great deal. Mostly people talk about Anderson, BJ, GSP, Fedor, etc. but the WEC has Torres and Faber who are right up there as two of the best P4P fighters in the world, and those guys don't cost any extra money to watch. The WEC is kind of like a little secret still, so get in on it now because as soon as people start to figure out how awesome the feather and batamweights are it's going to get expensive to watch.

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2009/1/29/74036...liction-is-done Rumors are that Affliction's next card will be their last, if they even can afford to put it on. This of course could be seen coming a thousand miles away. Affliction's model was even worse than EliteXC's model. I thought EXC's main f*** ups were wasteful spending and failure to develop the local organizations they acquired like ICON and Cage Rage as well as the decision to promote Kimbo. But Affliction's model was even worse, in fact far worse. They should have gone with small shows first and looked to create a niche, or should have offered to purchase Strikeforce, ICON, and Cage Rage when all three were on the market. Affliction's plan was so bad because they had to spend a ton of money on fighter contracts as well as foot the bill for everything else, including the arenas, production costs, staffing, etc. The reason the UFC can pay their fighters much less in contracts is because they have such a powerful promotional vehicle that they can get sponsors to make up most of the income for the fighters. Affliction had to promote their own events which could never rival Zuffa's promotional machine PLUS they had to cover production costs PLUS they had to pay base salaries AND cover sponsorship fees because sponsors aren't going to offer Zuffa fighter-type sponsorships to Affliction fighters with much less visibility. It was just a failed idea from the getgo. Had they started off small they could have puchased already successful local promotions with infrastructures already in place, worked out a deal with HDNet or something, put all their organizations under one umbrella to allow their fighters to go back and forth between promotions, and so on. IMO, the best way to tackle Zuffa if you really want to is the old territory style of pro-wrestling. Back before McMahon began swallowing up all the territories you had wrestlers who would go from promotion to promotion and in the old NWA system there were even common titles. With these local promotions out there for sale and not turning a huge profit or anything, a company with the backing of Affliction could easily jump in and immediately dig into a local market where local promoters are packing the house. Add a TV deal to that and it would be golden. If Affliction did something like that, especially with HDNet around wanting to run MMA programming but not being granted footage from Zuffa, Affliction could have captured enough of the small show scene to strong-arm HDNet into give them favorable coverage over anything else. They could have had their own titles under a system like that as well and wouldn't have had to use WAMMA, plus they wouldn't appear to be quite as threatening to Zuffa that way which would have prevented Zuffa from spending money to counter them every time they wanted to put a show on. I'm ranting, but the model was just bad. Piss poor. It's like they didn't think any of this through at all. I knew they'd go under as soon as they announced their plans. Now their only hopes are that the Zuffa doesn't continue to disallow Affliction brands during Zuffa events. If Zuffa continues to shut them out then in this economy Affliction is going to have to make major headway in another non-MMA market or they'll go down completely. Affliction's just not going to be able to recoup their losses off more T-shirts if Zuffa continues to allow other brands the spotlight. The whole thing was just a terrible move all the way around by Affliction. Their only saving grace is that Attencio has been around a while and has worked hard not to badmouth the UFC, so maybe enough of a relationship exists to where Affliction can get back into the Octagon. Supposedly the UFC now wants a stake in Affliction to make that happen. No surprise there. Just smart business by the UFC, although I believe they have a stake in TapouT as well, so I'm not sure how that would work out.

QUOTE (Cubano @ Jan 29, 2009 -> 10:07 AM) One thing I do not like about USA baseball is the following. This is the year for Fields because he has been in the organization for a while. The White Sox has invested money and time on him. Therefore, it is time for some return in their investment. Having said this, Fields will be given the first shot at 3B and Cora is already echoing this. Viciedo just came into the organization this year and the White Sox have time to send him down. I hope he makes the team even though he is not a starter. If both have similar ST, Fields will be the starter. I don't. I hope Fields has a great year and Dayan goes down to get regular playing time. Expecting him to just all of the sudden get used to MLB pitching like the much more experienced Alexei did is basically praying for him to fail. I hope Dayan tears up the minors and if someone goes down he comes up and performs, otherwise I hope he allows the Sox to deal a veteran midseason or something and fill a need in another area with Dayan coming up. Or if neither of those things happen, I hope he has a great year in the minors and a spot is cleared for him next year. Also, Fields impressed a lot of people with what he did here in 2007, and he wasn't healthy then either. A fully healthy Josh Fields is not the kind of talent that you just piss away. Putting a kid who is ready now on the backburner in order to take a stab with a 19 year old who has a lot of adjusting to do is just plain idiotic organizational management. Don't worry, Cubano. The Sox if anything are generally criticized for rushing young players, not holding them back. Dayan won't be another Kendry Morales, and if he proves himself in the minors he'll be up this year.

QUOTE (Stan Bahnsen @ Jan 29, 2009 -> 12:38 PM) I also wonder if the weather was a factor in Alexei's slow start. Going from tropical Cuba to April in Chicago could have been a bit of an adjustment. I can't remember if he was asked/said anything about it. Anyway, Dayan's got the extra layer that should keep him warm, so I'm not worried if he starts in Chi, Bama or NC, but I can't wait to see him. I might have to head down to Zona in a few weeks. There are a lot of things. Adjusting to a new organization with new teammates in a new country that speaks a different language while playing in a new park with a different hitting backdrop and going to new parks and facing new pitchers for the first time. And I'm sure there are hundreds more. I've always been a believer in hitting backdrops affecting even typical US hitters who move to different organizations. Even if they've played there a few times a year, unless it is a divisional rival or something, it has to take a while to get used to the playing surface and that backdrop after spending years in a different situation. I always expect new hitters in somewhat unfamiliar surroundings to struggle a bit at first, but then you take a guy like Alexei, and you end up magnifying something like that 1000X.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 29, 2009 -> 12:49 PM) What the other teams view a person's trade value to be is not necessarily indicative of his value to the team holding him. For a team to have the same type of value of Owens as we might, they'd have to have an outfield hole and really need to inject some speed in to their lineup. And given Owens's age, they'd probably be a team that would be looking to compete this year, not rebuilding like the Pirates or Royals or anyone like that. There aren't many competitive teams with OF openings who need speed right now. And I doubt there are teams looking for speedy guys who can't take a walk, hit for power, or play one of the 8 most important defensive positions. Willy Taveras was nontendered; no one traded for him. Felix Pie went for garbage. Taveras is twice the player Owens is because he can play defense in CF and Pie still has the kind of potential that a team like the O's would want to gamble on, plus he also can play CF. Baldelli and Kotsay both signed to be 4th/5th OFers and they are also worlds better than Owens. f***ing Andruw Jones lost weight and is available for the league minimum and yet no one wants him. Basically, I doubt there's a single team in baseball that would want Owens except for this one. Even as a pinch runner it's nice to have a guy with more versatility than Jerry. In fact we've already got a super versatile UT guy with great speed in Lillibridge and an actual CF'er in Anderson, yet here we are moving closer and closer to ST and Jerry Owens is the man to "beat" once again.

QUOTE (scenario @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 11:57 PM) Offensively, Shelby was ready to move up to AA at mid-season, but the Sox kept him in Winston-Salem to work on his defense. The organization decided going into '08 that he was going to stick in the outfield rather than 2B. He's not a butcher in left by any means but he's still relatively new to the outfield and needs work on his technique and routes. It'll be really interesting to see how he does in Birmingham this year. Birmingham is going to awesome this year, at least by traditional Sox standards. Allen, Beckham, Flowers, and Shelby should all make AA out of ST, plus Anthony Carter, CJ Retherford, John Ely, and Jake Rasner among others provide something else to watch, Retherford in particular.

QUOTE (scenario @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 11:47 PM) The point was and still is that Shelby and Figgins are not even remotely similar ballplayers. Shelby has speed and power. He's more of a Soriano-lite not a Figgins-lite. Ah, I see, and agree. Soriano-lite might not be a bad comparison actually. I thought about that one before making the Lorenzo Cain comparison but I've never heard anything about Shelby being so bad in the outfield. But yeah, Soriano with better defense, a lesser arm, and not as much power. Also, from the little I've seen of Shelby he appears to be more of the smarter, "baseball player" type than Soriano.

It's probably something really f***ing lame and insulting which the board will go crazy over and treat as something special, like a pre-taped message from the new president talking about how he's looking forward to the season. In fact I'd be surprised if they don't do something lame and hokey like that.

QUOTE (scenario @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 11:32 PM) In his only two full minor league season, Shelby has over a .500 SLG percentage... 35 doubles, 9 triples, and 16 homeruns in 2007... mid 800's OPS (488 at-bats) 37 doubles, 7 triples, and 15 homeruns in 2008... mid 800's OPS again (447 at-bats). That's minor league pitching though. He's a talented guy and one of our best offensive prospects, but it would be asking a hell of a lot for him to SLG .500 in the bigs. Also keep in mind that those numbers came in A ball after spending three years in college.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jan 28, 2009 -> 10:50 PM) Well, what are the options for RF and replacing Dye? A trade. Or moving Quentin and replacing the LFer. In our organization, we're pretty limited. Viciedo, maybe...although 1B/DH is more likely the target destination...depends on his mobility and reads. Then you go down to someone like Shelby, who's far from being anything but a 4th OF/utility infielder (Chone Figgins Lite). Jordan Danks has to be a CFer because it's his natural position and he has limited power at this stage, seemingly precluding corner outfield play. We have a lot more depth at 1B. We have Konerko, Thome (theoretically), Fields, Viciedo and Brandon Allen, not to mention Tyler Flowers possibly profiles for that position as well if catching doesn't work out well enough on the defensive side. Shelby is nothing like Figgins. If Shelby makes it then I think he is a guy who might put up 15-20 HR's, K 100 times per season, and walk enough to keep his OBP around .330 or so. He's more of a future .270-.2800/.320-.330/.440-.470 guy as a corner OF IMO. He'll steal some bases too, but he's not going to lead the league or anything. An .800 OPS might work for him and keep him as a starter, but it'll have to be in the OF because I imagine that if there was any way for the Sox to keep him at 2B he'd have never moved. Shelby seems kind of like Brewers prospect Lorenzo Cain except Shelby is about a level behind. Figgins OTOH is one of the very few true lead-off men around baseball. Edit: I also disagree on the amount of depth at 1B organizationally. To me it looks like there is zero depth at that position. Flowers is going to stay behind the plate apparently. Allen, isn't he more of a DH candidate than a 1B candidate? If Fields bombs this year then he's out of the organization; if he does well but not well enough he's trade bait IMO; if he does very well then Viciedo goes to RF. Viciedo won't go to 1B any time soon if he can play an OF corner or 3B. Teams generally don't move guys with arms like that to 1B unless they are so committed to not getting in shape that they pretty much have to, ala Miguel Cabrera.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jan 21, 2009 -> 03:38 PM) Not a ton of high upside guys? Everyone is raving about Gordon Beckham, Jordan Danks's ceiling isn't limitless, but everything I've ever read suggests near Grady Sizemore like tools, Dayan Viciedo tore up Cuba as a 17 year old, Tyler Flowers is thought to have 30 homers power, Aaron Poreda has an absolute dynamite arm who needs to refine his secondary pitches, and the Sox actually have pitching prospects in the middle and lower levels of the minors to go along with Poreda who have considerable upside. If you want to be very extreme and say they have no high upside guys like in the form of a Hanley Ramirez or Nick Markakis or even John Danks, that's entirely possible, but I wouldn't rule anything out at this point. It's not the best system in the game, but there's some resemblance of good players in the system for the first time in a long time. I agree with this, and there seem to be quite a few guys who can climb up the ladder quite a bit this year. Jose Martinez comes back from surgery. Dexter Carter, Shirek, and Hudson could all start in W-S. Plus there is Morel who could shoot up the prospect charts if his late-season power is for real. Anthony Carter, Ely, Retherford and Shelby will all be in Birmingham. Then there's Gilmore and Rodriguez from the Javy deal who the Sox seem to be quite optimistic about. Then there are some guys like Harrell, Santeliz, Rasner, etc. that aren't really on anyone's radar but could make cases for themselves. And of course you have Jordan Danks on top of that, plus Beckham, Poreda, Flowers, Brandon Allen, and Viciedo. Out of all those players, if the big 6 (when was the last time we had 6 impact-type prospects all projected to end the season in AA or higher?) move along as expected, and if we get a couple great showings out of the rest, when you then add that to the 2009 draft which will at least net us a first rounder and a supplemental pick if not two picks, the Sox will be very close to a top-10 system, if not have a top-10 system. Plus, there are also some rebound guys or off-the-radar guys that are capable of making contributions this year that would far outweigh their positions in any system ranking: Marquez, Nunez from the Swisher deal, Richard, Link, Getz, and my darkhorse Mr. Egbert, could all find themselves with extended opportunities this year. The best part of our system now is that there are at least some names to look out for. It wasn't that long ago that a guy like Nevin Griffith would go down with surgery and then all of the sudden there wouldn't be a whole lot to hope for. Now at least there's something. And on top of that, it's so great to see Gomes and Orlando out of here, along with Valido, and hopefully McCulloch and Broadway are shown the door shortly afterwards. Just get all that stuff out of here and clear space for some actual prospects.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jan 16, 2009 -> 10:17 PM) But I do remember that they were even saying into June/July that it didn't matter how well he hit....as long as he played good defense. You expect a first round draft pick with a PAC 10 background to be on a pretty fast track. The White Sox perhaps overestimated him (making the trades of Rowand, Webster, Reed and Young and keeping Anderson)...but he SHOULD have been ready. The fact is that it seems Brian Anderson might ALWAYS have that problem with his swing, just like Borchard did, and just like many feel Fields MIGHT have, although his 2007 results were better than anything BA produced...certainly over an extended period of time. If nothing else, the White Sox have learned that drafting "athletically-gifted/raw" players like Borchard, Brian West, Fields and Anderson perhaps wasn't the best approach...that projecting them, instead of targeting stars like Reed (2nd round) and Beckham, was too much of a hit or miss type of strategy. That all is an indictment of the Sox minor league player development system. The Sox drafted Brian and knew he needed work, yet apparently they let him climb the ladder without making him do the work, and when he had finally gotten to the highest levels of the minors and succeeded there on nothing but natural ability and confidence, instead of making him do the work and then bringing him up, they just brought him straight up. Brian's swing looked a lot better in ST last year, better than I'd ever seen from him. Will he still K a bunch? Yes, and so will Fields who you also mention, but there's a certain degree of improvement that any young, raw player is expected to make, and the point is, you're supposed to have those players make those improvements in the minor leagues, and you're not supposed to ask them to hit MLB pitching when you and your staff don't think they can hit MLB pitching. Signing raw, althletically-gifted, perhaps dual-sport athletes... there's nothing wrong with that at all. In fact, that is a great thing to do if you feel you can get a guy who is potentially a very special player. The problem is you need to have the right people on the farm to teach these things, and the philosophy has to be consistent, and you can't reward players with promotions when they don't deserve them. Beckham was an aberration, we normally never pick that high. Sweeney was a player that was considered a safe pick of sorts, as was Getz, i.e. they were both considered "baseball players" (no s***, eh?) who would bottom out as useful MLB players and, especially in Sweeney's case, perhaps achieve a lot more. As far as the draft goes, I just want guys with ceilings. Pick as many players as you can with big potential, and sign as many of them as you can. Every single year there tons of veteran free agents who end up signing minor league deals hoping to catch on somewhere as a possible 5th starter, or last man in the bullpen, or UT/bench player, etc. These guys can generally all be had for next to nothing, just the league minimum and in some cases maybe with incentives attached depending on the player and his history. So, overall, I see no reason to draft those kinds of players and spend money on coaches, trainers, signing bonuses, etc. just to try to develop someone you could replace with an easily available veteran at the minimum. When it gets late into the draft and you've already got the guys you think you can play then it's okay, but I really detest the McCulloch and Broadway type picks. Whisler was a bad pick, as was Lumsden as two recent examples, but at least there was potential there.

QUOTE (Princess Dye @ Jan 16, 2009 -> 09:59 PM) The post in its entirety is awesome. About this part though.... isnt it worth something that Owens' career stats at AA and AAA both trounce what Lillibridge has done at each level, albeit with less opportunities? And Lillibridge is almost 26 yrs old. EDIT: i probably shouldnt say 'trounce' - but he's just proven to be a far better minor league walk-getter than Lillibridge Owens may be a better bet to reach his mediocre-at-best ceiling (speedy, powerless CF with no arm who really should be playing LF) than Lillibridge is to reach his ceiling (star-caliber everyday SS and lead-off man) but that doesn't mean you ignore the potential of one player and hope for mediocrity out of the other. Lillibridge also, to his advantage, can play multiple positions well AND can pinch run, so even if he doesn't hit he's still more valuable than a guy who can't play any important position and can ONLY pinch run. The Sox say they think they've identified some issues with Lillibridge and they think there's some things they can fix so hopefully that is the case and Brent makes the Javy trade a steal. Also, minor league numbers only mean so much anyway. In the case of a guy like Broadway for example, they mean a whole lot because the guy has to show he can get out minor league hitters on limited stuff to deserve an opportunity. If you take a guy with nasty stuff who sucks in the minors, like say Grant Balfour for example, he could just all of the sudden "figure it out" and make some changes which lets his natural ability work for itself. With a guy like Owens, or Brad Eldred, or someone along those lines who only has one tool, they have to play very well to deserve a shot, because when they are given a shot you are essentially asking a Major League team to ignore all those players' flaws and act as if those flaws are not important. With someone like Lilli OTOH, someone who has the tools and ability to play a premium position very well, those guys just need to come through in a few opportunities and they're given the keys until they fail. It's a bad example as the players couldn't be more different, but Carlos Quentin was the same way. He popped in during I think the third game of the season and did a nice job, so he just stayed there. If that had been DeWayne Wise for example then he wouldn't have stuck, and the only reason Wise did stick at the end of the year was because the Sox were playing for their lives. I have to add though that I understand Owens is getting lots of hype from the Sox once again and may in fact be the starter on opening day. That's Ozzie though. The Sox know he has no power, they know he can't take a walk, they know he can't play CF, they he has no arm, and they know he isn't even that great of a baserunner, but they're apparently willing to overlook all of that for speed. And that I guess just goes to show you how high Lillibridge's stock could climb if he impresses in ST.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 01:33 PM) UFC this weekend. It's in Ireland, so you can get the PPV feed at either 2 or 9 CDT. Some interesting fights. Franklin vs. Henderson at 205 really intrigues me. Then there's the Shogun/Coleman matchup. Coleman beat him in PRIDE when Shogun blew his arm out falling to the mat. If it's old shogun, he runs through Coleman, but we'll see what Shogun shows up, Coleman can still be a tough matchup with his wrestling and ground and pound. http://www.mmaweekly.com/absolutenm/templa...7&zoneid=14 Dennis Kang making his UFC debut, he was a fast rising guy when he was fighting in the PRIDE Bushido events, had a few stumbles recently, but he can be an exciting fighter, I will be interested to see how his UFC career goes. The loses to Misaki, Akiyama and Mousai are nothing to be ashamed of. Franklin-Hendo should be fun. Taking Hendo there. Coleman is a very dangerous opponent for Shogun. I agree that if it's the old Shogun he should take out Coleman pretty easily, but Coleman is supposedly in great shape and extremely motivated for this fight, and if Shogun has any lingering injuries - even though he says he's all healthy - or if there's any part of his mental game that is not there, Coleman could take him down, hold him there, and do just enough to win a couple rounds and steal the fight. This is a bad matchup for Shogun because he has nothing to gain really. He's expected to destroy, and if he doesn't, it'll probably hurt his standing. And if he loses he could even be at risk of having his contract renegotiated or even out-right released, ala CroCop and Sokoudjou. Kang is added depth, and a fun guy to watch fight, but I'm not all that excited about him in the UFC because of the title picture. The only guy IMO who might be a threat to Anderson at middleweight right now is Demian Maia if he can get the fight to the ground, and aside from that everything is really in limbo. Wandy wants maybe one more fight at LHW, preferrably Chuck, but then he's going down to MW. Hendo and Franklin seem to be both going back and forth, and the GSP-BJ winner is going to have to defend the WW belt against Thiago Alves. If GSP beats BJ and then goes on to beat Thiago I could also see Thiago trying to take the MW belt from Anderson since he'd still be a good-sized middleweight. So basically you've maybe got some interesting fights (Anderson-Maia, Anderson-Hendo II, Anderson-Alves maybe?, Anderson-Wandy) and all Kang is going to be able to do is either ruin a potential fight by beating a contender or finding himself a spot somewhere in the middle of the pack along with guys like Wilson Gouveia, Ricardo Almeida, Patrick Cote, Thales Leites, etc. But then again, Anderson might retire at some point, especially if he has to face underwhelming opponents like Leites and Franklin for the third time or Bisping over his next two fights, and if he does retire a guy like Kang would make the MW division look amazing in terms of depth and parity. I'm rambling, time to end this post.