OmarComing25

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Sep 8, 2016 -> 12:51 PM) Using advanced metrics, Jose Abreu is a better defensive 1B this year than the 3 time defending GG winner, and only slightly worse during his career. That's just because Hosmer's defense has always been way overrated. He can pick it with the best of them, but that doesn't mean much when you have by far the worst range of any 1B.

QUOTE (Nixon @ Aug 8, 2016 -> 04:47 PM) They've already confirmed there's another season coming. Started watching The Last Kingdom, it's like that show Vikings on History Channel but with competent writers. If you liked The Last Kingdom I'd definitely recommend the books, they are amazing. I just finished the 9th book and every single one is a great read (also all relatively quick reads, the pacing is really well-done). IMO no one writes battle scenes better than Cornwell.

For what it's worth, the difference between Abreu's 2016 and 2015 numbers is basically 2-3 HR. Even when he was struggling in the first half, he was top 5 among all hitters in average flyball distance. Rotographs has been calling him a great buy-low candidate for fantasy all season because of this, because there was no way that low homerun rate was going to continue. Turns out they were right.

QUOTE (ron883 @ Sep 7, 2016 -> 09:50 PM) Jose starts finally producing when it doesn't matter and people keep calling me out? Too bad he couldn't do it back when it mattered. I'll reiterate what I've previously said. Jose isn't what we thought he was. The league adjusted to him after his rookie year. He is a mid-tier first baseman. So the league adjusted to him and only decided to pitch to his weaknesses when games mattered for the White Sox, and then stopped giving a s*** when the Sox fell out of contention?

Sorry for your loss, can't imagine losing a parent.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 7, 2016 -> 09:06 AM) Make it simpler than this; ignore the wild card for a minute. Pretend it doesn't exist in your planning. Is that team, on paper, clearly better than the Indians? They'll have some people like Napoli regress yes, but that roster is still pretty loaded, they'll have money to spend after a playoff run too, they'll be looking at having Brantley back and Miller for the whole season, plus other guys farther along. Does that patched together White Sox team stand out relative to them? If not, then you're in "and if everything goes correctly we can compete for the wild card" territory, and that's not good territory to be in. I want to rebuild but I don't get this logic. Following this, you should only try to compete when you're clearly the best team in your division? That means that only a small handful of teams should be trying to compete in any given year, which would be ridiculous.

QUOTE (fathom @ Sep 2, 2016 -> 02:40 PM) Cubs pitching and defense continues to be unreal, as Giants are 0 for last 35 against them. Lester no-no thru 5

QUOTE (SI1020 @ Sep 1, 2016 -> 07:41 PM) Honestly in this day of age of stat deconstruction I don't know what stat or stats matter anymore. I look forward to the day when wins and losses no longer matter and titles are given based on Pythagorean wins or SRS because nothing real seems to carry weight. The bullpen is bad and blown saves helps us figure it all out. That and watching so many late inning nightmares. Another thing what is this deep love for FIP? You can go back years and find stat geeks who don't like FIP. To me the whole premise behind FIP is absurd. Some really good pitchers are going to come across not so good and others not so good are going to look better. It is a very selective and flawed stat. It has its flaws but it has its uses too. I don't think any "stat geek" would tell you to only look at FIP (or any single stat for that matter), but it's a useful part of the whole picture when evaluating a pitcher. ERA also makes some really good pitchers look bad and others look better than they are. Those flaws aren't unique with FIP.

QUOTE (Hatchetman @ Sep 1, 2016 -> 02:50 PM) Sox pen is 28th in innings pitched, 25th in xFIP I'm not sure how innings pitched is a relevant metric for how good a bullpen has been. All the 28th ranking shows is that the starters have gone deep into games for the most part.

Even if the money was there, I wouldn't really want to "go for it" through free agency. Imagine all the hand-wringing if the Sox had signed one of Gordon/Heyward/Upton this past offseason and they played the same way here. Last offseason was considered a deep free agency and for the most part the big money free agents have been huge failures.

QUOTE (bmags @ Aug 31, 2016 -> 12:44 PM) Does Hamels not qualify? He does, but I only included the top 5 by the metric. He's 8th (2.8 fWAR, 5.1 RA9 WAR, 3.95 combined) behind Sanchez (3.6 fWAR, 4.5 RA9 WAR, 4.05 combined) and Porcello (3.7 fWAR, 4.6 RA9 WAR, 4.15 combined). Of course in reality he'll probably finish top 5.

Abreu now batting .400/.429/.884 against Verlander with 4 HR

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Aug 31, 2016 -> 10:28 AM) CY Young Race Corey Kluber: 175.2 IP, 3.07 ERA, 3.11 FIP, WHIP 1.05, SIERA 3.53, 4.5 fWAR Jose Quintana: 172.1 IP, 2.77 ERA, 3.34 FIP, WHIP 1.10, SIERA 3.95, 4.4 fWAR Chris Sale: 177.2 IP 3.14 ERA, 3.35 FIP, WHIP 1.00, SIERA 3.51, 4.4 fWAR David Price: 183.2 IP, 3.97 ERA, 3.46 FIP, WHIP 1.23, SIERA 3.55, 3.9 fWAR Masahiro Tanaka: 173 IP, 3.12 ERA, 3.26 FIP, WHIP 1.06, SIERA 3.69, 4.5 fWAR Kluber with the slight lead I think as of now but a wide open AL Cy Young race. I like to go with 50/50 WAR for the Cy Young, gives credit for both results on the field and for pitching well enough on the things you have the most control over. The contenders shake out this way: Quintana: 4.4 fWAR, 5.8 RA9 WAR (5.1) Sale: 4.4 fWAR, 5.2 RA9 WAR (4.8) Kluber: 4.5 fWAR, 4.7 RA9 WAR (4.6) Tanaka: 4.5 fWAR, 4.4 RA9 WAR (4.45) Verlander: 3.9 fWAR, 4.5 RA9 WAR (4.2)

QUOTE (bmags @ Aug 31, 2016 -> 09:43 AM) Disagree. Hamels fell down last night. Q will reign. C Y Y O QUINTANA N G I really would much rather Q win it than Sale, it's almost going to make me root against Sale a little bit this next month, as silly as that sounds. Love what the Mariners did to Hamels yesterday, let's hope the Twins can do the same to Kluber today.

Mariners helping a potential Sale/Quintana Cy Young case by torching Hamels for 6 runs, Quintana now with the ERA lead among the contenders.

QUOTE (bmags @ Aug 30, 2016 -> 11:13 AM) He did have a start where he used 21 changeups. I think that is developing more than you are giving credit for. http://www.brooksbaseball.net/outcome.php?...16&s_type=2 This chart illustrates this well. He's used his changeup more often in August than in any other month of his career, by far. This month he's thrown his change 16.95% of the time, while his second-highest month in usage is June of last year at 11.62%. He has been a legitimate three-pitch pitcher this month.

Came into this thread expecting the Wire to dominate the poll and conversation, pretty surprised there's little talk of it.

It's going to suck when Quintana ends up as the most deserving for Cy Young but the voters hold his W-L record against him. Hopefully he can at least get to 15 wins, that might do it if he finishes strong.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 11, 2016 -> 11:40 AM) The first one was very forgettable. Had almost no link to the source material as far as narrative. To be fair the book is a collection of interviews from random survivors, it'd be pretty difficult to adapt that to film.

QUOTE (HeGone7 @ Aug 9, 2016 -> 02:17 PM) Can we all compromise on 2.5 years? Since really it was one great half that has gone down followed by solid or disappointing hitting for your most important hitter. 2014 1st half: 166 wRC+ 2014 2nd half: 168 wRC+ Despite the drop in homeruns, he was actually a better hitter in the 2nd half of 2014.

So this story turned out to be completely overblown (in terms of Puig's antics).

Dombrowski claims he last talked with Hahn on Friday.

QUOTE (Black_Jack29 @ Aug 1, 2016 -> 05:16 PM) We'll have to agree to disagree on that one. Betts is a really nice player, but he's not a perennial All-Star with borderline-HOF skills. Starting pitchers can also dominate a game by themselves, and that makes them more valuable to a playoff team than a single position player. Betts' main advantage over Sale is that he's cheaper and under team control for one extra year. IMO he's already a top 10 player in the league (9th in WAR over the last season and a half) and he's still just 23. Since the beginning of last season he's provided more value than Sale, he's really really good.

QUOTE (Black_Jack29 @ Aug 1, 2016 -> 05:00 PM) If you're arguing that Sale and his contract are worth less than that, you're fooling yourself. The fact that Hahn didn't reach an agreement with Dombrowski today doesn't prove anything, as none of us know what they discussed. Given that the Red Sox didn't trade for a starting pitcher with another team, it's possible that they had limited interest in Sale to begin with and were prepared to go into the playoffs as is. That could change this winter. Betts is worth more than Sale alone, if the Red Sox believe this year's Bradley is the real one then he is too. If they wouldn't budge on Moncada then they're probably not going to budge on two guys worth more than Moncada. We just have to hope they'll give in on a Benintendi/Moncada combo in the winter. Hopefully their pitching blows up down the stretch and they miss the playoffs. That's the best shot.