It is great that the offense finally woke up, wether it was a bad pitcher or not, we all have seen the sox get shut down by bad pitchers. Harris proved he needs to be in the lineup and hopefully Carl proved that he can get the job done. The key to all of this though is that the sox need to play hard no matter what. Too many times I have seen them swing for the fences with one out and a guy on 1st and 2nd. That's where they go wrong, they are starting to remind of last years ball club which isn't good. What happened to small ball that Ozzie made them play in the beginning of the year. Have you seen our record when we don't hit homers? It's 4-15 and when did those 4 wins come? I am sure in the beginning of the season because right now they are not winning when not hitting a homer.

 

I think Ozzie needs to talk to them about playing small ball again because that is the only way we are going to win. It's like when we face a tough pitcher we get shut down. I am sick of seeing them miss opportunities on tough pitchers. If theres a guy on 2nd with one out facing a tough pitcher they swing for the fences and just fly out or K. Maybe if they tried moving him over and then getting a hit, that could be better but no. As long as they play hard they will win. We all saw this in the first half and I want to see it again.

It's not as easy as saying "I'm going to get a single instead of hitting a home run." Tough pitchers are tough for a reason, they don't give up a whole lot of anything. Your basic goal is to hit the ball hard. That's pretty much necessary for a homer or a single. It isn't that easy to do when a pitch is coming at you around 90 MPH. I don't know how you can say for a fact that someone is swinging for the fences on every pitch. All you need to do is miss the ball or get under it a little bit and you get the results you are talking about, whether you are swinging for a homer or not.

It's not as easy as saying "I'm going to get a single instead of hitting a home run." Tough pitchers are tough for a reason, they don't give up a whole lot of anything. Your basic goal is to hit the ball hard. That's pretty much necessary for a homer or a single. It isn't that easy to do when a pitch is coming at you around 90 MPH. I don't know how you can say for a fact that someone is swinging for the fences on every pitch. All you need to do is miss the ball or get under it a little bit and you get the results you are talking about, whether you are swinging for a homer or not.

I don' t buy the "trying hard" argument.

A hitter can try and still go 0-for-4.

A pitcher can try and still get rocked.

Put in the pre-game work and listen to the coaches and see

what happens.