lasttriptotulsa

QUOTE (miracleon35th @ Oct 27, 2016 -> 10:01 PM) Sox have made some unwise acquisitions and Shields is one of the worst. To make matters worse the Sox have been terribly unlucky on trades and with high Draft picks. Courtney Hwawkins? Carlos Rodon instead of Schwarber. Carson Fulmer? Instead of bemoaning that any further, it is time to look ahead.. Rodon over Schwarber was and still is the correct call.

QUOTE (Lip Man 1 @ Oct 27, 2016 -> 02:45 PM) I guess pitching is scarcer then even I thought if these numbers make him "worth" anything. Mark Almost any pitcher that can give you 180 innings of even mediocre performance is worth something. Those numbers would be right in line with what Danks did in 2014. He ranked 81st that year among starters with a 1.7 fWAR. Doesn't seem that impressive but considering there are 150 starters at any given time in MLB he definitely had some value.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 26, 2016 -> 03:06 PM) Rooneys_2005_World_Series_Call.mp3 Reminds me of how much I miss Rooney calling games.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 26, 2016 -> 02:06 PM) Their absolute low during this rebuild was 2.6 million people at Wrigley, or 32.6k per night. The White Sox haven't seen 2.6 million people since 2007. The numbers they report are the number of tickets sold not turnstile count. The Cubs had a couple years there were towards the end of the season they had some pretty sparse crowds. I remember seeing that you could get tickets on Stubhub for less than a dollar at times.

QUOTE (Coach @ Oct 26, 2016 -> 12:45 PM) You are right. I am wrong. Apparently all the retailers selling jerseys and such are also wrong. Apparently people come to Chicago to go to a Sox game. The f*** you talking about. Nobody said the Cubs didn't own the city right now but your assertion that it will always be a Cubs town is ludicrous. Over 116 years the popularity of each team has ebbed and flowed with how successful the team is at the time. In 2006 after winning the 2005 World Series the Sox drew 2,957,414 people. That is 89.8% capacity. The Cubs drew 3,342,708 for 93.4% capacity. Very small differences. Had the Sox sustained their success for a couple years they would have had a real good shot to catch the Cubs. They didn't. attendance began to drop in 2007 when the team was terrible again. You can't base the future off of the past 2 decades and ignore the 90+ years of history before that.

QUOTE (Coach @ Oct 26, 2016 -> 07:39 AM) And who cares about many years ago. I am talking about the last 25 years. Wrigleyville was a dump many years ago but that does not count anymore. My point is that no matter how the Sox do compared to the Cubs, they Cubs will always fill their seats because of the stuff outside and around the stadium. Sox can't compete with that. QUOTE (Coach @ Oct 25, 2016 -> 05:25 AM) My dad, who grew up on the north side, told me the other day, when he was growing up, he did not even know Chicago had a 2nd team. It was all Cubs. No matter how the Sox do, it will always be a Cubs town. Obviously you care about many years ago since your entire first point was regarding the era your father grew up in and that it will always be a Cub town despite the fact that 116 years of history prove that to be absolutely untrue.

QUOTE (Coach @ Oct 25, 2016 -> 05:25 AM) No matter how the Sox do, it will always be a Cubs town. It's just that simple. Even when the Cubs were losing 100 plus games, they still put more butts into seats than the Sox could ever dream of. This is just nonsense. Up until the '90s when the Cubs started taking over it was a pretty even split. From 1901 to 1989 the Cubs won the attendance battle 46 times, the Sox won it 43 times. Total Cubs draw: 82,475,823 for an average of 926,694 per season. Total Sox draw: 75,212,098 for an average of 845,079 per season. A difference of roughly a whopping 1000 people per game. The Sox dominated them until the '20s. The '20s were pretty split. The Cubs took over through the '30s and '40s. Then the Sox dominated them through the '50s and '60s. Cubs got em in the '70s and the '80s were pretty much split. The Cubs have lost 100+ games three times in their history. The Sox outdrew them in two of those seasons. The notion that the city has been and always will be a Cubs town is just blatantly false. If the Sox start winning consistently the fans will come out.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Oct 20, 2016 -> 11:52 PM) Maybe. Hard to tell how a guy views money after he already has ~$30m or so. I wouldn't be surprised if he'd make $3-4m extra this year, and getting that extra trip in means a lot more in the sixth year. I hope FanGraphs does an article on it -- they always have a really good arb estimator model. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they aren't already talking to him to get an idea of his plans. If he does opt in to arbitration they should look at buying out his first year or two of free agency and give him a little bit more during his arb years.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Oct 20, 2016 -> 09:15 PM) Really? You think he's a likely non-tender candidate over the next three years? Also, he's all but guaranteed a raise -- the arbiters don't look at total value, they look at how much of a RAISE the guy has earned. Dingers and ribbies have shown to be chief there. He could get hurt this year and never play again. Is it really worth risking $25M to MAYBE make an extra $2M next year? I wouldn't think so. It would make a lot more sense to opt out after next year.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Oct 20, 2016 -> 01:40 PM) His value is probably not as high as you think. While he remains a productive hitter, Abreu just ranked 11th among first baseman in wRC+ and just 14th in fWAR. Further, he is about to opt into his first of three arbitration seasons, and his raise will be beginning from a base of about $13m per year. Given that his cumulative RBI and homerun totals (which tend to be the types of numbers that drive arb prices up) overrate his overall production, he's going to be making close to his actual market value very quickly. If he produces like he did this season going forward, in fact, he may even be at market value on opening day of 2017. That doesn't mean we should dump him or anything, but it means that the return may not be worth much (if any) more than what we get by keeping him around. Plus, by all accounts, Abreu seems to be one of the only calm and stabilizing leadership personalities in the clubhouse, so his value to the White Sox may very well be more than it is to another contender. Abreu would be a fool to opt into arbitration right now. He would barely make more money, if any at all, in 2017 and would risk losing the guaranteed money he has coming in 2018 and 2019.

Other than a couple minutes at the start of the 3rd, nice game for the Hawks. Nice to see the Kane/Panarin/Anisimov line come alive.

Number 500 for Hossa!! Congratulations, the HOF awaits.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Oct 14, 2016 -> 12:48 PM) But, then you remember that Russ Feingold is probably back in the senate. Hopefully. Johnson making some headway though in the polls. Should be a good debate tonight. Looking forward to seeing Feingold take him to school. As a side note. I got a chance to meet Feingold a few weeks ago at a small fundraiser in a tavern. Awesome dude. Made his way through the entire bar making sure to shake hands, learn everybody's name and chat for a few seconds with each and every person there on his way in and then shook nearly everybody's hand again on the way out. A good friend of mine served two terms in the Wisconsin State Assembly and knows Feingold fairly well. He told me the guy is about as sincere as you can get, especially for a politician. My buddy had very little support and was not taken all that seriously at first as a viable candidate by the Democratic Party of Wisconsin due to the unlikelihood of him defeating a long term Republican incumbent. That all changed once he received an endorsement from Feingold. Then he was taken very seriously.

Multiple women come out of the woodwork accusing Bill Cosby of rape. Result? Life, reputation and career ruined. Multiple women come out of the woodwork accusing Donald Trump of sexual assault/rape. Result? Reasonable shot to be the next POTUS. What the f*** is wrong with our country? And I am in no way implying that Cosby is getting a raw deal.

QUOTE (Lip Man 1 @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 07:32 PM) Ron Kittle told me the team outright quit in the second half of 1984. Remember they had won seven straight and were in first place at the break. The big difference between 83 and 84 was Jerry Koosman. I had so many guys tell me off that club him not being there was a difference maker. Even JR admitted that was one of his biggest mistakes as owner, letting the Sox trade him for Ron Reed. Koosman was like a second pitching coach, kept players in line and acted as a reassuring voice in the clubhouse when things got tight. Tony LaRussa told me a big part of the reason Bull had a bad 84 and retired was because Kooz wasn't around. They were tight and would drive to the ballpark together. But back to the point, the 84 team had nothing to do with my comment that the 83 team was in my opinion much more talented than the 03 club as the poster originally suggested (i.e. the most talented in franchise history...) But carry on with whatever you are suggesting. Mark They lost 25 more games because they traded a 40 year old Jerry Koosman? That's a bit of a stretch even for you.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 10:22 PM) Uh, Bernie Sanders might have something to say about the rigged election as well as Trump. Don't let them bother you. You have the right to say it's rigged. Right now we're ONLY hearing about Trump being a sleazeball and NOTHING about Bill Clinton. Can you imagine if they were trying to find women Bill has had? For the millionth time, BILL CLINTON ISN'T f***ING RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT!

QUOTE (Lip Man 1 @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 10:45 AM) Who said anything about the 1984 team? And the discussion centered around "on paper" the amount of talent on hand according to the original poster...not on actual results. To wit, here is Buehrle > Wood's original comment: "That team on paper has to be the best team in franchise history." Mark The '84 team was basically a carbon copy of the '83 team that nearly made the World Series plus the addition of Tom Seaver. Yet they somehow managed to lose 25 more games than the '83 team. They very much fit the definition of a very talented team that amounted to nothing.

I think the '04 team was better on paper. A lot of the pitching staff struggled that year but they looked good going into the season. The offense was just sick though. They finished 3rd in runs scored and 1st in homers despite losing an MVP level Frank Thomas for 80+ games and Magglio Ordonez for 100+ games. I think if Frank and Maggs didn't go out with injuries there was a chance of them being back to back champs. They had their pitching woes but they had so many horses in that lineup that they could have made some noise in the playoffs (which was pretty much the standard of early '00s White Sox baseball).

QUOTE (Harry Chappas @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 11:53 AM) cub have no cash issues as seen from the heyward contract. QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 11:57 AM) They will pretty quickly. Unless Arrieta gives a discount he's going to be paid in the $30M per year range in free agency. That would mean in 2018 they would have roughly $86M tied up in just Heyward, Lester and Arrieta. That is a hell of a lot of money for any team to have committed to just three players.

Conor G due up 2nd. This game is ovah!

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Oct 10, 2016 -> 11:29 AM) Per Fangraphs: Line drive percentage decreased from 19.1% in 2015 to 15.7%. Ground ball percentage increased from 33.1% in 2015 to 35.6%. Pop-up/infield fly ball percentage increased from 16.8% in 2015 to 18.5%. Soft contact percentage increased from 18.4% in 2015 to 20.7%. Hard contact percentage decreased from 37.3% in 2015 to 31.3%. Here is a supplementary article that explains it all as well. Of course your BABIP is gonna be extremely low when you're popping out, hitting fewer line drives, and hitting weak grounders far more often than you used to. Is that enough evidence for you? You're talking very small numbers here. Frazier put 394 balls in play this year. So overall this year he hit (versus what he would have with last years percentages): 13 less line drives 10 more ground balls 7 more popups 9 more softly hit balls 23 less hard hit balls Obviously some of those overlap too (less lines drives / less hard hit balls, popups / softly hit balls). Those type of numbers do not entirely equate to a 35 point drop in BABIP. His hard hit ball percentage is pretty well right in line with his career numbers but his BABIP was 40+ points less than his career mark. Part of that can be attributed to a higher HR/FB% but overall he did have some bad luck this year. No reason to think he can't rebound at least some.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Oct 10, 2016 -> 11:10 AM) Yeah, I'm not worried about voter fraud or anything. If people want to cheat, they will find a way no matter what the rules. There are just so many random petty services that require IDs, it just seems funny that voting is not one of them. I need an ID and a utility bill to get a local library card, but not to vote. Voter ID laws are a joke. Voter fraud is virtually non existent. The only reason the laws are created is to suppress votes for Democrats. These laws overwhelmingly effect minority, elderly and handicap voters who are both far less likely to carry a valid ID and have less capability to acquire one. I agree with you in the sense that is should not seemingly be a big deal to show an ID as they are used in many other places but when the laws suppress millions of voters in an attempt to solve a problem that does not exist they need to be repealed.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Oct 9, 2016 -> 10:41 PM) And somebody wanted to ban Greg for an intelligent debate about Chelsea Clinton. Wow. There is absolutely nothing intelligent about repeatedly saying that Chelsea Clinton is going to be gifted an 8 year term in the White House immediately following her mother.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Oct 7, 2016 -> 10:02 AM) I agree, but keep in mind that Flowers is a great pitch framer Edit: Those who watched the games this year should know how often strikes our pitchers threw were called balls. Was far more prevalent this year than last. There are so many faults in pitch framing stats that I put little value in them. There is just no way to accurately measure how well a catcher is framing pitches in comparison to another when they are catching two different pitching staffs and with different umpires behind the plate. The eye test certainly says the Sox were not good in that department this year with Navarro being worse than Avila but even the best framing catchers versus the worst is only maybe 3-4 pitches per game.

QUOTE (Dunt @ Oct 7, 2016 -> 09:43 AM) Him and Avila were essentially the same player by fWAR. Avila was better defensively and Flowers was better offensively. He was highly replaceable. Sox fans really need to let him go already. Not really. They had the same fWAR but Avila did so with less than 2/3 the PAs that Flowers had. Avila was clearly the superior player when healthy this year.