Lip Man 1

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 9, 2016 -> 04:20 PM) Jimmy Rollins, Jim Thome (who was actually productive based on what we paid him after the subsidy), Omar Vizquel, Tom Seaver, Griffey,Jr., Roberto and Sandy Alomar, Steve Carlton....seems like we're back in the late 80's when we routinely would bring in aging veterans on their very last legs, then again in the mid to late 90's. Morneau seems to fit right in with this scenario. Former MVP's/All-Stars, etc.. Carl Crawford must be next. Seaver won 15 games both seasons with an ERA if I remember of under 3.5 and he pitched a ton of innings. There was nothing broken down about him at all with the Sox. Mark

Certainly didn't expect this. But wasn't it just a few days ago where Robin specifically said he wanted to keep Latos in the rotation and move Gonzalas to the pen? Now all of a sudden he's released. Sounds like somebody above Robin pulled the trigger (obviously) but I wonder if he was consulted or asked to give his opinion on this before it was done. Again you give them points for trying but as to whether or not it actually does any good, we'll have to see. Mark

Given that he won't be available for another month or so, it simply may not matter by then realistically. You give them points for trying but as someone else posted the real question is how did they get into this position in the first place? Mark

QUOTE (whitesoxjr27 @ Jun 9, 2016 -> 08:43 AM) What i got from the article is that the players suck and the front office and RV are fine. Correct me if i am wrong. I know Steve and I can tell you he's wondering about the Shields deal because Hahn is considered an analytics guy and all the numbers are pointing towards Shields declining. He can't figure that one out unless the deal wasn't really Hahn's. Just passing it along. And I saw nothing wrong with the column, the Sox because of their play on the field deserve to be called out. Again just my opinion. The only way the massive desperately needed changes might be made, again I said MIGHT is perhaps through embarrassing them publicly as much as they are doing it themselves. No guarantees of course but as others have pointed out, everyone is frustrated as hell. If nothing else it's nice to me that someone in the media even cares enough about the Sox to write something...anything at this point. Mark

Well I remember this one: May 16, 1978 - With the Sox record a dismal 9-20 and knowing that there was no way he was going to be able to re-sign him, Sox owner Bill Veeck traded slugger Bobby Bonds to the Rangers for Claudell Washington and Rusty Torres. Bonds would only play in 26 games for the Sox, with two home runs and eight RBI’s. Making matters worse was that to get Bonds the previous December, Veeck traded three players including future All Star Brian Downing to get him. Washington would become the target of fan displeasure because of his tendency to take it easy on the field while with the team. One fan made up a banner, hung over the right field wall, which expressed that sentiment “Washington slept here.” Torres’s claim to fame (and this is a great trivia question) was that he was on the field for all of the forfeited games in baseball during the 1970’s. Torres was with the Yankees when the final game in Washington was forfeited when fans rushed the field in 1971, he was in Cleveland for the nickel beer night fiasco in 1974 and was with the Sox during the “Disco Demolition” forfeit in 1979. Then you have what happened in June 2007 where they went 5-17. What I'd like to know, perhaps someone with research ability can somehow find this, is if ever there's been a team go from 13 over to one under in exactly 30 days, which is what the Sox just did - May 9 through June 8. Don't know if that's ever happened before. Mark

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Jun 9, 2016 -> 12:42 AM) I never understood this fan concocted macho part of baseball. It would look really bad on the Sox part. The Yankees in their hey day would often take a cue from Casey Stengel who'd often tell them, "now don't be afraid to start something, we'll all be right behind you" if they were in a slump. Two of the most vicious real baseball fights took place at Comiskey Park between the Yankees and the Sox in June 56' and June 57' Mark

Don't know if anybody saw the "official" verified San Diego Padres twitter account tonight. The post may already be deleted but at 7:11 someone wrote out "No Tradebacks" on it. Another web site had the screen shot of it. Royals last week and now the Padres dishing it to the Sox. Just a shame. Mark

QUOTE (Black_Jack29 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 06:36 PM) That massive selloff occurred when they were 3.5 games behind at the end of July. If the Sox sell off when they're 8 or 9 games behind, the bitterness won't be there. Agree with this. Mark

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 05:03 PM) Willing as in paying to go see a 55 win team? Yeah, I don't buy that for a second. I would bet you money that if the Sox really did a full and announced fire sale, attendance would drop by at least double digits percent. Well they lost (until the end of last season when attendance went up a bit) eight consecutive years attendance from the previous year (a franchise record by the way). With the revenue streams and the money being made by MLB (Selig before he left said MLB was now a nine Billion dollar industry - that's NFL territory) I don't think the Sox would suffer that much if attendance dropped by the percentage you indicated. Look at it this way. At the end of the 2006 season they drew 2,957,414. At the end of the 2015 season they drew 1,755,810 (an increase of about 200,000 from 2014) That's a significant drop right there...and they've survived. Mark

QUOTE (Iwritecode @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 02:33 PM) One division title and a single playoff win isn't exactly what I would call winning baseball. You misunderstand I'm saying the philosophy of ignoring the minor leagues in favor of trades and free agent signings was the philosophy and there is some evidence it remains so to this day. People forget in the first three seasons of operations the Sox brought in Fisk, Luzinski, Kemp, Paciorek, Cruz and Bannister. That worked out pretty well especially given what the time period from 1968-1980 looked like. That plan was derailed by two things, one JR suddenly realizing how much it cost to win. He publicly said that after 83 when the players were wanting raises and of course collusion starting in 1985. Mark

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 01:55 PM) And with the fan base, you don't have a lot of patience for rebuilding. That may be true but honestly given the past nine (soon to be ten) seasons I wonder if that opinion remains in play. There may be more fans now willing to 'blow it up' and start over of course with a different front office making the decisions. Mark

By the way just wondering what's the latest on Josh Reddick. How far removed is he from returning to active playing? Mark

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 01:48 PM) Which all means all of his bluster of the White Sox was just talk, because despite everything, he is still talking to them about a job. I'm sure it was all talk, part of the Twins PR approach. Mark

Interesting that Rollins is now hitting sixth. Mark

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 01:45 PM) Correct. So when he said that it's primarily JR's fault, I would disagree. The is money being spent. How it is being spent is the issue. So is it JR or front office? In my opinion a little of both. But Kenny to me is the single biggest issue with this organization. Mark

QUOTE (LVSoxFan @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 01:25 PM) That actually makes sense, but at what point does he realize that "his way" doesn't work? The more this goes on the more I wonder if the relatively instant success of 2005 (in that they had just hired Ozzie the year before and gone all-in on the "smartball" approach and boom! World Series win after 88 years) convinced KW and JR that "their way" is genius. And that would be understandable, had it sustained itself. But here we are 11 years later with exactly one playoff appearance to show for it (which was a no-contest, first-round exit) and we've basically replaced KC as the Comedy Central bottom-feeder year after year. Hell you can't even call it the Comedy Central anymore with teams like Detroit, Cleveland and current WS champion KC). What I'm not seeing here is... a learning curve. Historically though that philosophy has been in place almost from the start as at the first press conference EE said (paraphrasing) 'the way to win is with trades and free agent signings not the minor league system.' And that certainly worked early in the 80's when the Sox spent a lot of money and had a guy like Roland Hemond around to execute it pretty well as G.M. Mark

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 12:53 PM) Funny how things change when you need a job. Given the amount of money he's made in his career I seriously doubt he "needs" a job. If he's interested its because he wants to keep playing probably not for the small amount of money he's going to get (small in relative terms to the average person.) Mark

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 12:05 PM) Years is an understatement. Try decades. Would you be OK with the White Sox tanking for 20 years? Well it's about to be ten years in three months. Mark

And regarding the salary cap issue. As long as the MLBPA is among the strongest unions in the world MLB will NEVER have a salary cap. I've very confident making that statement. So either you learn to live with it, adapt, spend money and succeed or you swim against the current, consistently lose and alienate your fan base. It's simply a matter of choice although I understand there are many more factors, stadium lease, concession / parking revenue, MLB as a whole almost literally printing money today with all the revenue streams. Frankly the desire to actually win among some owners may not be all that strong anymore. Mark

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 12:08 PM) So what you're saying is that the 8th highest 25 man roster isn't good enough to compete? If the salary money isn't allocated properly, it really isn't. Part of it is the money is and has been spent on players who weren't that good. Dunn, LaRoche and Danks come to mind. How about the money paid to Jeff Keppinger a guy the Sox signed and paid with a bum shoulder? Mark

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 12:02 PM) Because of the awful imbalance in the salary structure with no salary cap that makes it difficult for teams to compete with the "richest" owners. JR has said many times that it's mostly who spends the most money has the best chance of winning. He has fought against that for decades. For what its worth, I have been told by a few folks who have worked for the Sox that money is actually the least concern. They are making it...a lot of it. JR's business philosophy has always been and he's never hid this, he's said it publicly, that he refuses to pay top dollar for managers / head coaches and he refuses to pay for unproven talent. (Which is perhaps why the Sox minor league system has been poor for at least 15 years.) You can agree or disagree with that attitude. What I'm saying is, if JR actually wanted to he could have a 140-150 million dollar payroll with no trouble. It's a matter of choice. MLB operates one way, JR another. That's his right...but its clearly not working that well. This comes back to something I and others have noted. JR wants to win, but he wants to win, HIS WAY. Mark

QUOTE (CB2.0 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 12:46 PM) Wasn't Morneau the Twin who was burning Sox hats before a series 7-8 years ago? My how times have changed. Yes among other things (in commercials he referred to the Sox as well...) Mark

QUOTE (Black_Jack29 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 09:29 AM) Maybe Gonzalez or Putnam (though Gonzalez is scheduled to start tomorrow). Albers was awesome last year and for the first five or so weeks of this season. So while he may have been over-worked last month, his track record doesn't suggest that he's going to suck for the rest of the season. I read today where Robin said Putnam has a sore elbow again. I don't know what his status is or will be moving forward. Mark

QUOTE (LVSoxFan @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 10:10 AM) As we enter another week of it's the players!/It's the manager! arguing, I keep flashing back to something on the 2005 World Series DVD. In the beginning, as they're setting up the whole 88 years "curse" thing, somebody (I can't remember who) said "There wasn't any curse, just a lot of bad baseball teams." I LOL'd at that for its truth. I think the reality here is that we've got the perfect storm: a lacking team AND a manager who's not up to it--even though everybody keeps arguing it's one or the other. And when you look at it that way, whose doing is that? Yup, KW (with the approval of JR). I've said it before, I'll say it again and I've been saying it for years: as long as KW is running this team, expect more losing seasons. Even getting rid of him isn't a guarantee if JR's simply going to hire another yes-man. But this problem starts at the top, people. I was shocked to look at our record against the central in just the Ventura era--not to put it on Ventura, but for senior management to not feel any sort of urgency, because if we can't even win the central, duh, we aren't going to the Series or anywhere else. Now for my total arm-chair conspiracy theory: I read something by chance about White Sox attendance that startled me. I could never figure out how JR could keep fielding losers when it kills attendance and... doesn't that mean less money for him? What this thing said, if I read it right, was that certain taxes kick in when the Sox hit a minimum attendance for the season. If they do NOT hit that minimum, there is no tax, and it's a substantial break. I'm sure somebody here can present this much better than me. So, in this scenario (if I'm correct), perhaps the reason JR's okay with the non-stop losing is that he has a financial incentive to not win--or not make a serious stab at it financially, instead coming up with these KW-engineered experiments that if they win, great--and if they fail, tax break! Again, I could have misread that but usually when somebody keeps doing something that makes no sense, it's because they're making money doing it that way. Even tossing that theory aside, though: this organization needs a Cubs/Hawks-like housecleaning. This season is going to be brutal. It already is. With no end in sight. You are correct on the stadium agreement. If the Sox fail to meet certain attendance figures certain clauses do kick in. But I think it refers to them having to pay rent or give funds to the Illinois Sports Stadium Authority or pay upkeep expenses. The point is though, that in a way, the Sox do have an "incentive" financially to not draw a lot of fans (which is one thing they do VERY well!) Last summer the Tribune had a long and thorough story on all this. Mark

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 8, 2016 -> 07:43 AM) You're forgetting Cox, Torre, Leyland, etc. Baseball is a business. It used to be results-oriented. Let's not act like the 2011/12 and 2015 and 2016 teams were completely lacking in talent or expectations. It's easy to say that after the fact, with hindsight. We have had a losing record against all four AL Central teams since 2009. I can understand that with the Tigers and Detroit, but not with the Indians and a rebuilding Twins' organization as well. What I can't understand is the disparity in records head-to-head, and the fact we can almost never win key ALCD games in August and September (which goes back to the Guillen years, too). They've changed almost all of the players other than Sale and Quintana from 4 years ago and are still making the same sorts of mistakes and suffering from the same issues that plagued the team every month except for April, 2016. Right now, that one month seems more like an anomaly than a sea-change or progression in Ventura's managerial ability. We've also had the fifth worse record in the major leagues during his tenure, and almost all of the teams in the bottom 10-12 have changed managers/GM's at least once if not twice during that time. What is it that the White Sox see in Robin Ventura that nobody else does? In the end, it doesn't matter how much the organization believes in him if it's not backed up with results...with another 3rd or 4th place finish comes even less revenue to work with next season, and the downward cycle continues until there is no choice left but to trade Eaton/Sale/Q/Robertson and possibly Rodon. I'm pretty sure very few White Sox fans at that point would continue to support the manager and GM that put them in that position in the first place. JR can do what he likes, it's his team after all, but cutting off your nose to spite your face probably isn't the hallmark of most good businessmen. VERY well said. Kudos. Mark