Worst team I have ever seen with guy on 3rd and 1 out.

Good job by Melky but we all know how this game will end

 

Exactly.

Worst team I have ever seen with guy on 3rd and 1 out.

Um, they got the run in.

Also, the hugging s*** needs to stop.

Um, they got the run in.

Yes that had nothing to do with my point.

Oh boy

Of course.

Huge break for the White Sox. Rios was on first, Orlando killed a double into the gap, Rios would have scored easily but ball bounced over the fence.

 

I always think the umps should use some judgment on that play & give the guy home if he'd clearly score, IIRC the rule book does allow that. Anywho.

What a s***ty throw

75-87 seems about right.

5-4 Royals, run scores on the contact play, grounder to Abreu but throw home is high.

Petricka gives up far too many hits to be a set-up man

Again this team just good enough to lose.

I don't know if there's a stat to show this but I feel like Petricka does better when he comes into the game with runners on than when he leads off the inning himself. His OPS is about 100 points lower with RISP than with the bases empty, that's about as close as I can get.

Again this team just good enough to lose.

 

KC is the cat and the Sox are the mouse it plays with before the kill.

Is there any doubt this game will end 7-4?

KC is the cat and the Sox are the mouse it plays with before the kill.

Yep Tampa did the same thing also.

Is there any doubt this game will end 7-4?

 

Ok, 5-4. Loss is a loss.

So Duke and Petricka are LOOGYs and ROOGYs only. They are not f***ing 8th inning people.

How will Conor Gillaspie get us this week too?

Yes but most hitters today are taking the same hacks on 3-2 as any count. Again, it's not just Eaton, whom I'm not a big fan of, but it's a disease in baseball today. Many (most) hitters swing from their heels with two strikes. Pete Rose was talking about that. It's macho s***.

 

Greg,

 

1. I don't care about most hitters. Adam Eaton was paid to be an elite lead-off hitter on a team with Championship aspirations. I hold him to that standard.

 

2. In a steroid Era, the teams that win are the ones who put up a lot of what's known as "crooked numbers". Lead-off hitter is arguably the most important hitter -- not just to start games off, but in every INNING -- that is, if you want to amass this quaint little thing called "a rally". Most pitchers hate lead-off hitter reaching base, doesn't matter if its via a rocket to LF, or a bleeder through the right side or via the HBP.

 

If nothing else, defense has to come on, which opens up a big hole esp. on the Right side of the infield. Suddenly the next batter hitting a weak grounder, and instead of 2 out, noone on, you've got 1st/3rd, no outs and the pitching coach sweating..... On top of that, when someone who is as fast and as aggressive as Eaton is on base to distract the pitcher, the latter's mechanics and focus can sometimes go to crap -- which leads to, say, an overthrown breaking ball hang over the heart of the plate. Before you know it, you got a 3-run HR.

 

3. a 3-2 count is in some ways more difficult to hit in than 2-2 count. At 2-2, someone like Eaton knows he needs to protect the plate, it removes any kind of "thinking". Whereas on 3-2, Eaton is conflicted. On the one hand, he loves to hit HR. On the other, he is so close to taking a Walk and being in a position where he can show off his speed on the pads. "What's a Spanky to do!". haha.

 

So on 3-2, sometimes you will see a hitter hesitate if only momentarily -- and in a sport where 50 milliseconds are everything, that barely perceptible motor delay, is enough for a hitter to jam himself on a borderline fastball.

 

Incidentally, this is why the elite pitchers seem to have an ability to handle 3-ball counts better than their peers. They just throw a sinker or a cutter on the corner, and since the hitter is a hair too hesitant and yet doesn't want to take Strike-3 looking.... the batter will basically jam himself.

 

Bottomline, Spanky needs to be on base 40% of the time and shrink his stike zone as much as possible with 2 strikes. His OBP is disproportionately important to Sox success during any kind of winning streak, it's not a coincidence. Yes, Adam Eaten had a reputation in Arizona system as being able to put on a HR show in batting-practice for such a seemingly small guy, but in real games, in a pennant race, I don't give a crap about his predilections.

 

Just get on da base, Adam. duuuh derpity mcDerp

Lol at this team. Sickening.

Well...Greg had a point...they did get swept.

Yikes at that last pitch to Geo..

A team of guys just collecting paychecks at this point. Sox are KC complete little b****.