elgonzo4sox

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 9, 2010 -> 10:15 PM) The Twins were 0/13 with RISP last time I checked. Every single comparison between Yankees-Twins and Twins-Sox works. In that case, I know what's going to happen here with the bases loaded - ground ball double play,weak pop-up, or strikeout. We weren't only bad with RISP against the Twins, we were even worse when the bases were loaded.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Oct 9, 2010 -> 09:01 PM) It will be interesting to see what the Twins organization does in the off season. Hopefully it doesn't involve getting PK. They have an interesting decision to make: do they resign Thome?

QUOTE (Chet Kincaid @ Oct 9, 2010 -> 08:58 PM) On the twins fan forum, they are wondering why gardy won't tell his pitchers to throw some brush back pitches. Sound familiar? All too familiar. The Twins played dirty against us, and Ozzie and the umps let them get away with it. However, the umps treat it a little differently when you're throwing at A-rod or Texiera rather than Quentin or Beckham.

QUOTE (Chet Kincaid @ Oct 9, 2010 -> 08:50 PM) Haha even the great Joe Mauer is sucking tonight. CK, I like your attitude and your avatar. More Sox fans and Sox personnel need to adopt your attitude towards the Twins. The Twins hate us, and want nothing more than to beat the Sox. We Sox fans and Sox personnel need to stop the Twins love and Twins envy. The Twins are proving, once again, that they are a Garrison Keillor Lake Wobegon team: they are consistently above average, but not a great team.

I haven't seen an a** kicking sweep like this since...well, since the Twins came to the Cell in September. This one is much more fun!

Phil Hughes is dealing tonight...should be the end of the Twinkies...

Ahhh, there's nothing like October baseball...it's my favorite kind. And for all you folks wondering when Kotsay was going to get back in the lineup as DH instead of $4M/mo Manny, I give you tonight's Sox lineup: Pierre 7, Old Man 6, Teahen 9, Tank 3, Kotsay DH, Flowers 2, Morel 5, De Aza 8, Lil' Bridge 4, Pena 1 Kotsay is 3 for 7 (.429) versus Carmona, and Teahen's batting .370 against him, so maybe that is Ozzie's logic. C'mon Sox, we're better than these Indians - time to show it on the field.

PAULIE!!!! (grand slam HR, 4 RBIs) TANK!! (2 run HR) JONES!! (2 RBIs) JOHNNY D!!!!!! (6 solid innings to earn win #15) SANTOS!! (2 solid innings in relief, including striking out the side) MOREL! (nice defense at 3rd) Did we just see our 2011 rotating DH/1B duo: Konerko/Viciedo? I hope so... Let's keep on winning.

Sox lineup: Pierre 7, Missile 6, Paulie DH, Jones 8, Castro 2, Tank 3, Morel 5, De Aza 9, Lil' Bridge 4, JohnnyD 1 Three aspects of the lineup may be very 2011ish: Morel and Alexi on the left side of the infield, Paulie and Viciedo sharing 1B/DH, and of course Pierre leading off. Lester has been pretty filthy recently, and the Sawx will be trying hard to get him his 20th. Sox better bring their bats and their gloves...

Sox have already clinched the season series win over the Sawx, and currently lead 5-1. With last night's win and other developments, the Sox have clinched 2nd in the AL Central. With a win tonight over the Sawx, the Sox would be just one game behind the Sawx in the battle for the fifth best record in the AL. Heck, if Texas loses tonight, a Sox victory will put them two wins behind the #4 team in the AL. JohnnyD goes for win 15, and tries to prevent JonnyL from getting win #20.

QUOTE (Whitewashed in '05 @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 10:54 PM) I think you're going out on a limb on that one a little bit... just a little bit. Viciedo's nowhere near Frank's talent level, agreed. But I think Viciedo at best is a good 1B/DH who hits the ball hard - that's what I meant by the Frank comparison. Frank Thomas was amazing from his start in the majors, and I agree that Viciedo isn't equivalent to a rookie Frank yet. But Viciedo's also only 19, I believe...

QUOTE (elgonzo4sox @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 09:23 PM) Morel is our first honest-to-goodness true third baseman since Crede. A good glove at 3B can prevent 1 to 3 hits per game, so I say make him our 2011 third baseman and let his bat develop. I'm sipping my victory whiskey to celebrate tonight's win over the beantowners, so my mind is starting to imagine things, but here's what I'm thinking: an infield of Morel - Alexi - Beckham - Konerko could potentially be our best defensive (and a pretty decent offensive) infield since Crede - Uribe - Iguchi - Konerko in 2005. You know the old adage: "Good pitching is mostly just good defense". Our pitching in 2005 was fantastic, especially in the playoffs, but all you have to do is watch the last two outs of Game 4 of the 2005 World Series to realize where a lot of the credit for that good pitching belongs. Look at how our season turned around this year when Omar took over for Teahen at third. I am starting to get really excited about a potential Morel - Alexi -Beckham - Konerko infield in 2011.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 10:21 PM) And Viciedo is the second coming of Pods? Viciedo, if he could get more consistent with the bat, add a little more power, and learn how to draw walks, is more like the second coming of Frank Thomas - a potentially great hitter, but a suspect fielder. He will never be a Morel or Crede at third base - first base / DH is definitely his best shot at playing time. Ideally we'd have Konerko and Viciedo on the roster next year to play 1B/DH, with Konerko getting more time at 1B until Viciedo can improve his fielding more.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 09:44 PM) Brenterview Can we get the Sox to have Morel trade numbers with Viciedo? Morel looks like the second coming of Joe Crede right now...

Freddy!!! 12 wins this year!!! JJ and Thornton, nailing it down!!! AJ HR!!! Alexi and Morel, with the bat and the glove (our new leftside of the infield for 2011?)!!! Sox now 5-1 versus the Sawx for this year, and at least 6 wins better than last year.

QUOTE (dmbjeff @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 09:29 PM) even with CQ at a small raise in arb, lets say 4 and paulie at 10, we are up to another 14 mil of the 20 or so million you had to play with. signing a vet for dh will still cost a few million or go cheaper with viciedo who you are already paying a million to. havent addressed catcher yet, i assume flowers then right? that puts us with 3 rookies in the lineup in morel, flowers and viciedo. that is about the only way we can hang on to paulie too. those are 3 huge question marks. i think they all have potential, no doubt, but if they fail, we are in some real trouble. we need to free up money somewhere. jackson or danks i think are sure to be traded this offseason. the other big contracts will be nearly impossible to move. I agree - with Peavy, Buehrle, Floyd, Danks, Jackson and Sale under control for next year, I agree that we have a 6 man rotation when we can probably afford 5 at best, so this would be the logical place to free up some money.

JJ!!! Thornton!!! Good job putting out Freddy's minor fire. I hope we can keep this bullpen duo together for next year...

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Sep 27, 2010 -> 12:23 AM) Haven't been watching many games since it was clear we weren't sniffing the playoffs. But I peeped some Morel highlights at MLB.COM. This dude has a SERIOUS glove. I had heard it was good. Insane range and a strong/accurate throwing arm. I'm on the Morel bandwagon. I just can never get too excited about a prospect with KW in charge. Morel is our first honest-to-goodness true third baseman since Crede. A good glove at 3B can prevent 1 to 3 hits per game, so I say make him our 2011 third baseman and let his bat develop.

QUOTE (dmbjeff @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 08:53 PM) financially heading into the offseason we have 68 mil tied up in only 10 players. assuming the thornton option is picked up and what danks will get in ARB, i see that being about 80 mil for 12 guys. throw in beckham, sale and another bullpen guy who are pre arb, we are at about 83mil for 15 guys. 10 more spots filled with about 20 million more? it is going to be very hard to fix the problems. i didnt even include quentins arb if we offer it. there is no way aj and pk both come back. we are going to see flowers,viciedo and/or morel all get a chance to play. next year could be a really brutal season. Now you're citing a real potential problem for Kenny. I don't know what the money situation looks like. I've been surprised with the Sox' ability to add salary (e.g. Manny), so maybe Jerry can give Kenny the money to basically keep the current team intact, including re-signing Konerko.

QUOTE (dmbjeff @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 08:37 PM) But every year it is something that goes wrong basically. Last year it was Wise as an everyday guy, along with Fields. Then we have the Erstad, Mackowiak year. We have had bullpen issues in years past. My point is, as soon as we fix one problem, another one opens up. It is like having 2 wounds and only 1 bandaid. Next year we may solve the DH problem and then have an issue with SP, bullpen, OF, IF etc. Right now looking into the near future, we have very good SP. That is the one huge plus at the moment. We have some other positives, Alexei and Beckham will continue to grow into next year and Rios reestabilished himself. Pierre proved to be what we expected, but nothing great in terms of baseball value.(OPS, WAR etc) We have huge gaping holes at DH, 1B,3B,RF heading into the offseason. I say RF cause CQ has been mediocre for 2 seasons now. That is alot to fix in my opinion. DH: sign an aging preferably LH slugger, or put Viciedo on the 25 man roster and use him primarily as DH, with some rotation. 1B: sign Paulie at $10M to $12M 3B: Morel for his glove, and live with his bat as it develops (the Crede approach) RF: Give Quentin another chance. Even with the subpar year this year, his slugging numbers were good overall, although he's very streaky.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 08:42 PM) Just saw one of the worst calls of all time on the play with Morel at 1st base. That wasn't even close - not even a bang-bang play. Definitely the worst missed call at first I've seen this year. C'mon Sox - Beckett is definitely shaky....

QUOTE (dmbjeff @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 08:09 PM) I am of the believe that the organization right now is not very solid. I think letting your manager dictate your offseason moves(Thome or other DH bat) is a bad idea. KW should have known better. Ozzie ran a bad team this season. His lineups, his idea that Kotsay was a fine part of a platoon. The 2 of them have been in position together since 2004. That is 7 seasons and we only made the playoffs 2 times. If you take into account the payroll, which the past 5 seasons have been over $100 million, we have only made the playoffs once during that span. If you look at the other team's in our division, they have lower payroll but still manage to make the playoffs, because they have deep farms and competent GM's and manager's in place for the most part. I just think it is time for a change. I blame Ozzie more than KW, but KW's decision to listen to Ozzie instead of making the decision by himself like he should have, makes me want him gone. The makeup of the roster is completely on the GM and those decisions are his. I just don't think he did the job and I wouldn't keep a guy who can't make his own decisions in such a large job as a GM. Why not just let Ozzie and Kenny fix the DH mistake they made this year, and see what happens next year? If that's all it would take to contend, then we're real close and only need to make that incremental improvement, plus deal with a few other issues such as closer (where we have multiple options in-house already) and the timing of Peavy's return to the rotation. Why clean house? The Twins never clean house - they have more stability than the White Sox...

QUOTE (buckweaver @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 05:44 PM) Haven't yet seen it mentioned...but perhaps he announced this at week's start because an extension has been agreed on in principal and all involved said they needed until Thursday to get all the lawyers' approvals, etc. What a great start to the off-season that would be with four games left to go this year. I can't believe Konerko could be allowed to leave after all's he's meant to this organization, his numbers this year, and the ease with which the organization could drop $3M on Manny for, really, 12 singles over two weeks in games that meant anything at all. I really think it'd be hard for Kenny to justify letting the captain walk when 2-3 years at $10M/year(ish) would probably get it done and allow the classiest White Sox player since Harold Baines finish his career where he should. I am very hopeful that the respect Jerry has for Konerko will show itself soon, perhaps on Thursday. When the team got back into town for this homestand, Jerry obviously told Ozzie "cut the crap, you're going to be here next year". Hopefully he will similarly make sure that Konerko is here next year, and get it announced soon. Konerko is the heart and soul of this club, an anchor on the infield, and has done everything possible to earn a spot here next year.

AJ!!! Sign that man to a new contract!

QUOTE (dmbjeff @ Sep 29, 2010 -> 07:45 PM) id rather have a "fire Ozzie and Kenny and get fresh ideas and people in place" We'll have to agree to disagree there. The Sox will finish this year with 5 to 10 more wins than last year, and in 5th or 6th place overall in the AL. You don't do a major housecleaning after a season like this one, regardless of how painful it was to get swept at home by the Twins this month. Instead, you try to do incremental improvements.