winninguglyin83

sad day in my opinion. It will be a long, long time before we develop another player as talented and as classy as magglio. I don't like this news one bit. guy never did anything but play his ass off.

whomever recommended giving Borchard a $5.1 million signing bonus has some explaining to do. And, unfortunately, he still works for the Sox. not good

painful to watch a sub .150 hitter gruesome

tell Freddy to chill and we'll see him in February Why take a chance?

Garland is still young

nice execution on the rundown. impressive

They also need to learn how to deal with failure. It's a 162-game season. You're going to strike out with the bases loaded, get picked off, throw to the wrong base, get tagged out at home in the ninth, give up the go-ahead home run and let a ball go through your legs. The guys who make it are the guys who can put that behind them and play the next day. The guys who struggle are often the guys who dwell too long on the failures.

as an organization, and as fans, we have little patience. lots of folks were ready to dump Rowand last fall and last spring. Now, he has finally gotten an extended chance to play and delivered. As bad as Crede has looked, he still needs more patience and a chance to rebuild his confidence. The front office never really gave Kip Wells, Josh Fogg, Matt Ginter, Jon Rauch an extended chance to prove themselves. making the move from the minor leagues to the bigs is a huge adjustment. Most guys struggle for a bit. Sometimes you have to let a guy fail for a while before you finally reap the benefits.

He Gawn. And we can spend the $5 million elsewhere

no command. no future. we need better than this at 5th starter if we expect to contend.

WE have to have the 12th or 13th best record in the league since the all-star break. this team is flat-out dreadful, almost unwatchable. it's time to officially tank and go for the best draft choices.

have any of these faux number five starters made it out of the first inning without giving up a run?

something has to be wrong with his arm, elbow or shoulder. this makes up for the Todd richie deal == sort of.

more outstanding work by JimH. I hope you work in the Sox front office. The Number One thing we need to improve is player development. Frankly, ours is awful. In 1998 and 1999 we drafted a s***pot of pitchers high -- Parque, Wells, Fogg, Rauch, Ginter, Purvis, Stumm, Wright and others. What do we have to show for it? Not much. The best home grown pitcher we have is Buehrle, who was a draft and follow. How many position players have we developed on this team? Crede, who is starting to look like a bust. Lee. Rowand. Ordonez, but he came along 6 or 7 years ago. We havn't come close to developing a shortstop since Bucky Dent. We're terrible at running the bases, hitting cut off men, knowledge of the strike zone, patience and getting on base. Those are all things teams like Oakland value, draft for and teach in the minor leagues. The player development folks have some explaining to do -- and then they need to be replaced.

only if they were playing in the Carolina League

I hope you're right. good luck finding another Ordonez. I don't see it.

Superb post JimH We need some folks in the Sox system who can sit down and honestly evaluate players. The two things that concern me just as much as the way this team played are: a.) the absolute failure of every pitcher who has been promoted from the minor leagues. I don't if these guys simply are not good enough or if they are not being developed properly, but it's maddeningly to see Rauch, Diaz, Stewart, Munoz, Grilli and the others all get rocked game after game. Something ain't right. We need some new folks working with our minor leaguers. b.) the lack of legitimate prospects in our system. I know we have traded away a ton of guys. But Charlotte has NOBODY who will rank in the Top 20 in the International League. It's all career minor leaguers who aren't going to do a thing to help the Sox. Birmingham has a few guys -- Anderson, Spidale, Yan, McCarthy, Ulacia. But most of our prospects are in High A ball or lower. If we're going to remain tight-fisted and not spend real money on players or retaining players (like Gordon, Colon, Ordonez and others) then we have to be stronger in player development. Otherwise, we're doomed.

Suggesting we need somebody other than Shingo to close, somebody with the ability to deliver strikeouts and popups, is the easy part. Try finding somebody -- somebody who fits in the Sox budget. Interesting that Coop didn't have any names of replacement parts.

that didn't help. neither did the loss of our two bigs guns. And the absolute failure of every pitcher we have promoted from the minors. and Crede's regression. And Garland's failure to improve. And Harris' inconsistency. and Uribe's disappearance. And the prolonged presence of Mike Jackson. And ....

Boston only 3 1/2 out Boss' boys gotta be feeling the heat

no to the twinkies yes to the As

no pressure any more. Oakland not great offensively. turn him loose

A row all the way. solidified center field. plays hard. hits wherever he is asked to hit in order. positive, stand up guy in clubhouse. fundamentally sound. no brainer.

silly to even discuss Sweeney coming up. He's not hitting for any consistent power in A ball. Don't crush his confidence -- or foolishly make him believe he's nearly ready. Anderson could use more time in the minors, too. Let's be sensible here. Spidale would deserve more of a look than either of those guys. He's had a very solid year.

They'll be showing the Borchard bomb on the WGN news in a few minutes if you haven't seen it.