chw42

QUOTE (balfanman @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 04:13 PM) I agree that the Rays are probably better defensively and it's more than likely just a matter of semantics between us, but I don't think thatr the edge will prove to be "enormous". Other than Pierres' arm I think that our outfielders (any combination of Pierre, Rios, Jones, or Quentin) will prove to be among the best in the majors. Teahen, who knows yet; Ramirez could also be elite if he finds consistancy; Beckham, probably not yet but by the end of the season I'm thinking that he will rank among the best 2nd basemen. While not the most agile at 1st base I believe that Pauly more than makes up for any range issue with his scooping ability, saving countless errors. All in all, I think that by the end of the year our infield defense will rank in the top third of the league as well. A. J. is well....A. J., average at best defensively but apparently knows how to handle pitchers. I'm not that familiar with the Rays catcher but I can't imagine that all things consdered that he's tremendously better than A. J. Again, I'm not argueing that the Rays are better defensively, I just don't think that the difference will prove to be all that enormous. JMHO. The Rays arguably have one of the best outfields in this past decade. Both Crawford and Upton are amazing fielders and Zobrist is good just about everywhere. Their outfield could save 40-50 runs for that pitching staff, which is just mind boggling. Those three had a combined UZR of +40 last year and that was with Zobrist playing only 60 games last year in RF.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 03:58 PM) They can play in the drizzle can't they? Yeah, but it said showers, not light showers.

I looked at weather.com. It's going to rain until 9. Maybe we'll get this game in and it'll end at like 1 in the morning.

QUOTE (WCSox @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 03:46 PM) Pierre looks weak defensively when he's compared to Crawford, but so does just about every other LF in the game. I'll take Pierre's defense over that of Quentin, Pods, Carlos Lee, Albert Belle, etc. Crawford makes everybody look bad. He's a great CF playing left field.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 01:42 PM) Did anyone else notice that every manager in baseball is a complete idiot because none of them used the lineup that statistically was best? How good is this stat, really, how good is it? I'm asking cause I don't know, but I find it odd that every manager in baseball went with the wrong lineup. It's hard to maximize a lineup completely. Because what the stat believes is that the best hitters should be in the 4th, 5th, and 2nd spots, while the perception around baseball is that the best hitter should hit third and a contact guy should hit second. According to that lineup optimizer tool, a more optimized and somewhat acceptable lineup would look something like this. 1. Beckham 2. Rios 3. Ramirez 4. Quentin 5. Konerko 6. Teahen 7. Pierzynski 8. Kotsay/Jones 9. Pierre Beckham being our best OBP guy who can run, is hitting leadoff. Rios being our 4th best hitter behind Beckham, Quentin, and Konerko should hit second. Quentin being our best run producer hits 4th and Konerko being next hits 5th. Ramirez, being the 6th best hitter hits third. Teahen and Pierzynski are next in line, put them at 6 and 7. CHONE and most projection systems don't like Jones and Kotsay, so they go at 8. And of course, the sabermetric world hates Pierre, so he's hitting 9th. It does not take handedness into account, so that's why you have 4 straight left handed bats to round out the lineup, this also just proves that our left handed hitters pretty much suck. This system is not without its flaws, but all of this was formulated through a lot of research. I wouldn't ignore it, but it's a nice measuring stick for just how much better our lineup could be. I inserted the above lineup into the optimizer: http://www.baseballmusings.com/cgi-bin/Lin...361&Model=0 That above lineup would score 4.908 runs. The max amount of runs will be 4.921. That's a difference of .013, which would have been one of the best optimized lineups on that list.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 03:13 PM) Both. And there's really no debate. The Rays were 5th, 5th, 3rd and 1st in the AL in R/HR/BB/SB IN 2009. The Sox were 12th, 6th, 9th, and 6th in those same categories. There's no realistic reason to believe at this point that the Rays won't have a better offense than the Sox. The gap in defense is even more significant. The Rays were ranked 1st and 2nd in all of baseball the last two years in UZR. They were ranked 1st and 8th the last two years in DER (defensive efficiency ranking). The Sox were ranked 21st and 27th in UZR the last two years. The Sox were ranked 20th and 16th the last two years in DER. This is just common sense (not saying you don't have any). The Sox have been a very bad defensive the last two years while the Rays have been the best. Yes, they do. They have above average, and in some cases, elite caliber defense, in LF/CF/3B/SS/1B. The White Sox have above average defense at exactly 1 position. And that's RF with Rios (or when they play him in CF). Alexei has the tools to be an above average defensive SS. But he's not there yet. PK is good at scooping up poor throws. But he has zero range. Everybody else is either below average or not proven yet. It's not even close. Edit: Pierre has good range. But that arm. His range makes his lack of arm strength not all that troubling.

QUOTE (DBAHO @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 06:18 AM) Also, if Kotsay puts up a .292/.349/.434 line in say 250 AB's for the Sox (that was his line from 113 AB's with the Sox last season); 1 - Would you be happy with that from the DH platoon split? 2 - Is that line good enough to stop the Sox from acquiring a Lance Berkman at the deadline? If Kotsay is hitting near .300, there is no way Ozzie stops playing him, so the second option may never happen. If he's putting up that line, I'd be okay with it, just not in the 5th spot. At least that's near the average DH production.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 12:59 AM) I'm not even sure we have the better bullpen when Howell is healthy. We have a clear edge if Bobby can rebound from last year's mediocre performance. Adding Soriano was a big upgrade for Tampa. Adding Soriano does help. But when you look at our bullpen, we have a lot more talent there and a whole lot more potential.

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Apr 7, 2010 -> 12:33 AM) Well, I'm not sure which of my questions you were answering when you said the Rays. I'm guessing you meant that you would take their roster and not that they have no faults in their lineup. Maybe in the long run theirs will be better, but for this season, I will take our players with their track records over any projections. Also not sure how you quantify their offense & defense vs. our pitching. Is there some stat for this or is it just your opinion? Theirs is just as good as ours right now. We have the better rotation and bullpen, but they have one hell of an offense. I'd say that our starting pitching is one tier better and our bullpen is one tier better. But their offense is somewhere near the likes of Boston and New York while we'll hover near the middle of the AL.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 11:28 PM) Is that statistic actually coming out? Well I don't know what they'll do with the data they get from hit f/x, but eventually, it will at some point.

QUOTE (Ranger @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 10:50 PM) I can't understand ever wanting a Sox player to "suck". If he didn't suck to begin with, there would be no need to replace him in the first place. But he probably will suck, that's the thing. And even if he does, Ozzie will be reluctant not to play him.

QUOTE (OldSmoky2 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 10:11 PM) Of the seven AL teams ahead of us in those projections yesterday, five lost. Doesn't mean it's not a useful stat, but just pointing that out. There's a few issues with that argument. You have to look at how many runs that team scored, how much value their lineup brought to begin with, and how many runs the pitchers on that team gave up.

This would be a great win. Toronto lost. A sad Chris Bosh is a good thing right now. If the Raptors don't get in, our chances of signing him could go up.

QUOTE (joeynach @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 07:39 PM) If his FIP is significantly higher than his actual ERA doent that imply that Jenks defense behind him was exceptional? Not exactly. FIP measures everything a pitcher can control. So HR, HBP, BB (not IBB), and K are in the formula. Of course, the part where it is not perfect is where it does not take hits other than home runs into account at all. xFIP is better anyways. Hopefully, when hit f/x comes out, we can get something better and more accurate.

QUOTE (everafan @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 07:34 PM) Every year there are Indian apologists - people who think Shapiro is some kind of SABR genius even though he couldn't win when he had Lee, Sabathia, Hafner, and Sizemore in their prime. This is why he won GM of the year in 05. Rob Neyer believes the ALC shakes out like this AL CENTRAL 1. Twins - 85 2. Indians - 81 3. White Sox - 77 4. Tigers - 76 5. Royals - 72 The Twins would have been big favorites if they hadn't lost Joe Nathan. Now they're just favorites. And yes, the Indians went 67-95 last year. But somebody has to be this year's big surprise, right? Fausto Carmona, Travis Hafner and Grady Sizemore all played exceptionally well in spring training. The Indians have a new manager. I'm just saying, don't be shocked if they do something amazing. Shapiro is no SABR genius. I didn't even know he was SABR.

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 07:54 PM) They have 3 guys in their rotation with less than 40 games pitched in their careers. What would people here be saying about Kapler if he was our starting RF? I think Zobrist is gonna play there a lot with Rodriguez/Brignac platoon at 2B.

QUOTE (docsox24 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 05:31 PM) The difference of course is that AJ is the C and Kotsay is the DH. I expect far greater production out of the DH. He was a vaulable player when he could play above average CF. He can't do that anymore and he should be a role player. He has no business being a DH. He has no business being a starting player and he has no business batting 5th. That too. If A.J. played anywhere else (LF, 1B, anything that doesn't require speed), he'd be a far below average offensive player.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 05:31 PM) Zambrano has more god given ability than anyone on our staff, but his mental state makes him dicey. I think I would take Floyd as well, because you know what you are going to get from him, especially in a big game. This would have been true like 3-4 years ago, but I'd have to say that both Floyd and Peavy are far more talented.

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 05:12 PM) Who is defending Kotsay around here? Who ever defended Erstad? I wouldn't say the Ranger was defending him, but that was in response to his post.

QUOTE (Ranger @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 04:26 PM) Reasonable. Your mistake is in assuming that people that can make a case for having him hit 5th is the same as them having some sort of "Kotsay-mania". The argument above is a valid one. You can pretty much guarantee that just about every game, the LRLR matchup is going to matter late in the game unless it's a blowout or some pitcher is throwing a complete game, which doesn't happen much anymore. The real issue is that none of the left-handed hitters on the roster are all that fearsome (although Teahen has the best potential to improve and be that), so it's a pretty good idea to separate them as best as can be done. He really doesn't. They are very, very similar hitters in terms of production. They are similar, but A.J. is slightly better. A.J.'s career ISO: .142 Kotsay's: .132 Plus, you have to take into account that A.J. can actually post a .142, while Kotsay is hovering around .110. And you cannot tell me that there is not a Kotsay mania going on when Hawk talks about him like he's the most perfect player ever and that he can do no wrong. He's the new Darin Erstad.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 02:41 PM) AJ's OPS since he joined the sox, starting in 05 .728 .769 .712 .728 .755 Kotsay hasn't played regularly because of injury for a couple seasons, so it's hard to give numbers on what we might get from him, especially if we're careful enough to keep him healthy. But he put up a .732 in 2008, and a .783 with the Sox last year. I'll be the first to admit "Sample size!", but if Kotsay hits like a .300 hitter, we're talkign ab out 10-20 points of OPS difference at the worst. AJ and Kotsay seem like pretty similar hitters when it comes to OPS. You can't get me mad about that one right now, the numbers just don't back it up. Weighted On Base Average tells a similar story, but it says that A.J. is the slightly better option. A.J.'s wOBA since 05: .318, considering he put up a .326 last year, I'd project him to get one around .320, which both Bill James and ZiPS agree with. CHONE and Marcel have him slightly below .318. So we can say that he's going to end up in the .315-.320 range. Kotsay's wOBA in his last season with more than 400 PAs (2008), he put up a .316 wOBA. In his last alright season back in 2005, he put up a .321. Considering that Kotsay's regressing more than A.J., you can mark him for a .310 wOBA this year, which again, ZiPS and Bill James agree with while CHONE and Marcel have him lower. That 5-10 point wOBA swing isn't a lot, but it's a potential difference maker.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 02:38 PM) The biggest misconception about Kotsay that I can't stand is that he's fast. He almost got doubled up yesterday with the bases loaded on a slow chopper to 2nd base that wasn't turned quickly at all. Exactly, he used to be fast. But people don't forget so quickly I guess.

QUOTE (ChiSox_Sonix @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 02:32 PM) There's nothing wrong with the player he was 5 or 6 years ago Bad grammar there. I meant to say that some people still might think that he is as good as he was 5 years ago.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 02:29 PM) Like it or not, there's logic to breaking up the RH hitters. Beckham, Quentin, Konerko, Rios all in a row, followed by Jones/Kotsay, AJ, Teahen, and Ramirez...if you don't break them up, you're setting yourself up to be hurt in the 8th and 9th innings by LOOGY and ROOGY people. That's not just for the heart of the order too...yes, Quentin and others have splits that say they hit RHP fine...but there's always going to be an occasional RHP, say a side-armer or sommething like that, which you can pull out of a hat to frustrate those guys, and if you don't break them up you're giving away innings. The ideal solution is to get an .800 OPS out of Teahen. If he can do that, he can fit in that 5th spot and not be a hole. Otherwise, I'll live with Kotsay until it's May and hes hitting .220. If he can hit .300 out of that spot, even if he does so with no power, at least he breaks everything up. You can get that out of A.J. He actually hits for more power than Kotsay too.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Apr 6, 2010 -> 02:28 PM) I'm not a big fan of facts. Fact.