Register now to remove this ad

Page 233 of 299 FirstFirst ... 133183223231232233234235243283 ... LastLast
Results 3,481 to 3,495 of 4478

Thread: A Realistic View at 2017 Part I

  1. #3481
    Deity
    Join Date
    Jun 2012
    Posts
    10,488
    Quote Originally Posted by S5Dewey View Post
    First the disclaimer... I have ZERO first-hand information as to what has happened in any ML clubhouse. This is just the way I see things based on my observation and experience.

    Most players aren't a problem in the clubhouse as long as things are going well for them. It's when things go south that the problems start.

    Josh Beckett is a good example of that. He was a leader. As long as he and the team weree winning he was the guy you wanted on the mound. He would lead the team to wins on the days when he pitched. When things went sour for him was when he became the problem in the clubhouse.

    IMHO the dust-up with LaRouche and his son was what made Sale unhappy with the White Sox management. After that nothing the ChiSox could do would be right in Sale's eyes and that manifested itself in the throwback uniform incident. After that Sale was sick of the White Sox and they were sick of him.

    The 2016 season may be an indication that Sale is a bit of a prima donna. Being very good will do that to some players. I don't see any doubt that there's a gamble involved in signing him but he could also very well be someone who just needs a change in scenery. Moncada aside, for the money he's making that's a risk I'd be willing to take. If he turns out to be a problem in Boston he'll be very tradeable.

    At that point we have to hope that Moncada doesn't become the next Mike Trout (or Mookie Betts!)
    It is all a guess, I think, from a fan's perspective what type of person he is. What I know about this guy is that he is young - he is good- and he has the mentality when on the mound that anyone in the game would love to see on their team. To be this good, which he obviously is, and to finally have a chance to play in the post season - It really is what is all about. We will see what type of person he is or becomes but based only on what we know, I think that we are beyond lucky to have this guy playing for us. Now, that being said, maybe someone knows something about him that we don't but personally I'm pretty pleased that he will be pitching for us.

  2. #3482
    All-Star
    Join Date
    Jan 2017
    Posts
    1,038
    Quote Originally Posted by cp176 View Post
    It is all a guess, I think, from a fan's perspective what type of person he is. What I know about this guy is that he is young - he is good- and he has the mentality when on the mound that anyone in the game would love to see on their team. To be this good, which he obviously is, and to finally have a chance to play in the post season - It really is what is all about. We will see what type of person he is or becomes but based only on what we know, I think that we are beyond lucky to have this guy playing for us. Now, that being said, maybe someone knows something about him that we don't but personally I'm pretty pleased that he will be pitching for us.
    Never heard anything negative about him in the clubhouse. Have heard he was liked by the White Sox players.

  3. #3483
    Deity Kimmi's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2015
    Posts
    26,666
    Quote Originally Posted by Eddy Ballgame View Post
    Why? Is it because he didn't want to pitch in a shirt that had a collar on it?! I wouldn't want to wear that thing, either. Those guys in the 70's were all pissed that THEY had to wear it.

    This team has too many guys who would never let one guy be a clubhouse cancer. Farrell is also not the type of guy who would tolerate that stuff. Sale's never pitched in the playoffs before. He wants to win badly. My guess is that he'll be an ideal teammate.
    My guess is that Sale was fed up with the White Sox front office and the uniform cutting tantrum was the boiling point. Regardless of what the situation was, Sale was out of line.

    That said, I'm not sensing in any way that Sale is going to be a problem in the clubhouse. He said he learned from his mistake. As you said, Farrell and the players will not allow that to happen and Sale really wants to win. I'm guessing he's much happier now and that his focus will be on getting his team to the playoffs.

  4. #3484
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Quote Originally Posted by cp176 View Post
    I was not trying to compare him to anyone else. If you don't think, based on accumulated stats, that he presented a more up and down type pitcher (like most knuckleballers do ) that is fine. You are trying to make a statement here and all I get is that you really liked Wake. Good - so did the rest of us.
    When you said, "If you value consistency, you might not want to be signing the knuckleballer," I took that to mean you feel Wake and knucklers in general are more inconsistent than other pitchers. If I misinterpreted what you said or meant, I'm sorry.

    I think Wake was remarkably consistent over his slightly better than mediocre career.

    He played for peanuts compared to what other pitchers doing less than he did made. He was team guy, and know that just about all of us really liked him, even if he made it difficult for some to watch.

  5. #3485
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Quote Originally Posted by Fisk View Post
    Never heard anything negative about him in the clubhouse. Have heard he was liked by the White Sox players.
    I've heard the same. I'm not going to make assumptions based on the uniform tantrum.

    I'm just glad as hell we have...

    Chris Freakin' Sale!

  6. #3486
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Sale turns 28 this March. He's easily one of baseball's best 5 pitchers in the past 5 years combined.

    Here's a look at some 5 year category rankings.

    WAR

    35.7 Kershaw
    27.7 Scherzer
    26.4 Price
    26.2 C Sale
    22.7 Verlander
    21.9 Felix
    21.4 Kluber
    21.0 Bumgarner
    20.8 Lester
    20.6 Greinke
    20.5 Hamels
    19.6 Cueto
    19.6 Quintana

    ERA-
    55 Kershaw
    67 Jose Fernandez
    71 Cueto
    73 deGrom
    74 C Sale
    75 Hendricks
    75 Greinke
    75 Syndergaard
    76 Scherzer
    77 Tanaka
    78 Darvish, Roark, Price & Harvey
    79 Arrieta & Felix

    WHIP
    0.89 Kershaw
    1.04 Tanaka
    1.05 Bumgarner, Scherzer & Jose F
    1.06 C Sale
    1.07 Arrieta & Hendricks
    1.08 Cueto & Harvey
    1.10 deGrom & Harvey

    xFIP-
    66 Kershaw
    70 Syndergaard & Jose F.
    73 Carrasco
    74 Strasburg
    75 C Sale
    77 C Lee & Kluber
    78 Price, Darvish, Felix & Pineda

    Only 2 pitchers are in the top 6 in all these categories, so one could argue Chris Freekin' Sale has been the second best starter in MLB.

  7. #3487
    Legend Nick's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2016
    Posts
    6,997
    Quote Originally Posted by moonslav59 View Post
    Sale turns 28 this March. He's easily one of baseball's best 5 pitchers in the past 5 years combined.

    Here's a look at some 5 year category rankings.

    WAR

    35.7 Kershaw
    27.7 Scherzer
    26.4 Price
    26.2 C Sale
    22.7 Verlander
    21.9 Felix
    21.4 Kluber
    21.0 Bumgarner
    20.8 Lester
    20.6 Greinke
    20.5 Hamels
    19.6 Cueto
    19.6 Quintana

    ERA-
    55 Kershaw
    67 Jose Fernandez
    71 Cueto
    73 deGrom
    74 C Sale
    75 Hendricks
    75 Greinke
    75 Syndergaard
    76 Scherzer
    77 Tanaka
    78 Darvish, Roark, Price & Harvey
    79 Arrieta & Felix

    WHIP
    0.89 Kershaw
    1.04 Tanaka
    1.05 Bumgarner, Scherzer & Jose F
    1.06 C Sale
    1.07 Arrieta & Hendricks
    1.08 Cueto & Harvey
    1.10 deGrom & Harvey

    xFIP-
    66 Kershaw
    70 Syndergaard & Jose F.
    73 Carrasco
    74 Strasburg
    75 C Sale
    77 C Lee & Kluber
    78 Price, Darvish, Felix & Pineda

    Only 2 pitchers are in the top 6 in all these categories, so one could argue Chris Freekin' Sale has been the second best starter in MLB.
    Yep....need to keep the eye on the big picture....world championship. Sale has brought us that much closer.

  8. #3488
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Other than Kershaw, I don't think there's any better pitcher in MLB than Chris FREAKIN' Sale!

    Plus, his luxury tax contract cost is a small fraction of what pitchers of his quality are making on the open market.

    I am so pumped up about this year!

  9. #3489
    Legend
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Posts
    5,426
    Quote Originally Posted by moonslav59 View Post
    Other than Kershaw, I don't think there's any better pitcher in MLB than Chris FREAKIN' Sale!

    Plus, his luxury tax contract cost is a small fraction of what pitchers of his quality are making on the open market.

    I am so pumped up about this year!
    Steamer600, which assumes 200 innings for each starting pitcher, projects Chris Sale with the ninth-highest 2017 WAR with the lefthander finishing in a three-way tie for third in RA9-WAR:

    http://www.fangraphs.com/projections...rs=0&sort=19,d

    http://www.fangraphs.com/projections...rs=0&sort=20,d

    http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/201...-wins-and-rwar

  10. #3490
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Quote Originally Posted by harmony View Post
    Steamer600, which assumes 200 innings for each starting pitcher, projects Chris Sale with the ninth-highest 2017 WAR with the lefthander finishing in a three-way tie for third in RA9-WAR:

    http://www.fangraphs.com/projections...rs=0&sort=19,d

    http://www.fangraphs.com/projections...rs=0&sort=20,d

    http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/201...-wins-and-rwar
    I'm not sure why.

    He had the 7th best WAR last year and was just 0.1 away from 5th best. One guy ahead of him died (Jose F) and another one, Porcello, is likely to drop some.

    He has the 4th best WAR over the last 5 years combined, and is still in his early to mid prime years. One guy ahead of him on this list, Price, placed 12th last year and is older.

    My guess is Sale will finish somewhere between 2nd and 6th in 2017.

    Maybe they factored in the BAF (Boston Adjustment Factor).

  11. #3491
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Some bench questions:

    Who is best for 10-20 day replacement at these positions?

    1B: Travis or Holt (assume HR is the DH for argument's sake)

    2B: Holt or Hernandez?

    3B: Holt or Rutledge (Hernandez)?

    SS: Hernandez, Holt or Marrero?


  12. #3492
    Legend
    Join Date
    Jun 2016
    Posts
    5,715
    Quote Originally Posted by moonslav59 View Post
    Some bench questions:

    Who is best for 10-20 day replacement at these positions?

    1B: Travis or Holt (assume HR is the DH for argument's sake)

    2B: Holt or Hernandez?

    3B: Holt or Rutledge (Hernandez)?

    SS: Hernandez, Holt or Marrero?

    Depends when in the year the replacements are needed. Travis is likely to be ready fairly early in the year (assuming HR is DH). If so, he is probably the one when available.

    I am a fan of Hernandez and think he could handle second and possibly short.

    Why have Rutledge on the team if he is not the short term replacement for 3rd? Holt has shown he could handle 3rd.

  13. #3493
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Quote Originally Posted by oldtimer View Post
    Depends when in the year the replacements are needed. Travis is likely to be ready fairly early in the year (assuming HR is DH). If so, he is probably the one when available.

    I am a fan of Hernandez and think he could handle second and possibly short.

    Why have Rutledge on the team if he is not the short term replacement for 3rd? Holt has shown he could handle 3rd.
    I'm not a big fan of Holt at 3B. I do think Rutledge is slightly better. I think they got Rutledge in case Pablo flops. We'd then have 3 guys to choose from- not 2: Rutledge, Holt and Hernandez.

    Holt at 3B was part of the reason we signed Pablo.

    I think Holt's best position is 2B, but I too like Hernandez a lot. I think I'd still give Holt the edge at 2B.

    I like Hernandez at SS over Holt. Holt should only play SS for as long as it takes to get Hernandez or Marrero up from AAA.

    I didn't mention the OF, since I do not think there's much to debate. Young should DH vs all LHPs, but if an OF'er goes down, Young would play FT in LF with Holt as his back-up. Maybe Holt could play vs some righties Young has trouble with.

    Beni hurt> Young in LF.

    JBJ hurt> Beni to CF & Young in LF

    Betts hurt> Beni to RF? & Young in LF.

    (Moreland can also be used in a pinch at a corner OF slot.)

  14. #3494
    Rutledge is in position to be the platoon partner with Pablo

  15. #3495
    Deity moonslav59's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Sugar Land, Texas
    Posts
    80,047
    Quote Originally Posted by jacksonianmarch View Post
    Rutledge is in position to be the platoon partner with Pablo
    Yes, and as bad as Pablo is vs lefties, there's a good chance Rutledge starts 20% of the games at 3B.

    However, although Holt bats left, he's actually slightly better vs LHPs over his career (but still worse than Rutledge):

    B. Holt .709 vs LHPs/.704 v RHPs

    Rutledge .721 v LHPs/.704 v RHP

    Sandoval .673 v LHPs/ .835 v RHPs

    Since 2014, Pablo has the worst OPS vs LHPs in MLB at .521.

    If ever a platoon was in order...
    .

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •