Maxbialystock

My gosh our hitters have taken a lot of pitches tonight, including Leon looking at three straight strikes in his first at bat.

How can you be so sure there was no chatter from the first base coach? I mean, it's fundamental and a habit. You can't stop coaches from talking to every baserunner who sticks around their base. I'm not buying it. I think JBJ misjudged that fly ball, period.

That's a pretty good explanation if true. But how do we know he didn't remind JBJ how many outs?

What job? He was in foul territory down the 3d base line. Nothing he said or did would have made have made a difference because by the time JBJ would have seen him, he would be dead meat.

Bad as that was, the Guardians just topped it. Man on first, 1 out, pop fly that lands on the pitcher's mound because both the thirdbaseman and the pitcher thought the other would catch it. Finally, the thirdbaseman grabs it, fumbles and still has time to beat the runner going to 2d. But the bad part is they also still had time to throw out the hitter who must have decided he was out and didn't have to run it out. Double play, maybe a GIDP by and Indian.

No. This was all on JBJ. The play was right in front of him. He had simply made up his mind to score and nothing could dissuade him.

Did that really just happen? That fly to left wasn't even that deep, and JBJ thought he could score on it from 1b.

Fascinating, against a lefty pitcher our 7, 8, and 9 batters are all lefties (Leon switch hits). 5 lefties in this lineup. Also interesting that Pedroia is the DH, no doubt because of his knee. The the Sox Hitting thread, there has been ample discussion of the importance of different slots--that 2d is key, 3d not so key, 4th and 5th key, and 1st does not need to be a basestealer. But what is abundantly clear--to me, anyway--is that Farrell has thrown off the shackles of a set lineup and is trying a lot of different ones. And tonight's is exhibit 1. Betts is finally, finally batting cleanup, and Nunez has the mission of getting on base as the leadoff. Pedroia is probably a good choice for #2 even though he is rusty. Beni is OK at 3 especially when the stats guys say 3 is inconsequential. The last five--Devers, Bogaerts, Moreland, Leon, and Bradley is kind of like what he has already been doing recently. No Brock Holt, which is fine with me. Also no Ramirez, which is kind of a surprise.

Turns out I was wrong--someone else pointed out the Chisox are 4-26 in their last 30 games. Yankees have their game at Cleveland well in hand, so the margin should remain 3 games with us now going on the road.

Another good start for Fister and great hitting by a new/old contributor Young. Yesterday Beni and JBJ had the big dingers, today Young who had 5 of the Sox 6 rbi's. Let's hope Kimbrel comes thru in the 9th.

Actually, I like your stats and theories and have no complaints on general principles that Holt shouldn't bat 2d (if at all in my view). I was just saying that Farrell only did this once and it seems to have worked. I continue to be astounded at how much Holt gets to play and expect that to change when Pedroia returns. For Holt fans, I don't mind agreeing that sometimes he does good stuff and he sure is versatile. I could be wrong, but I think he takes more pitches, including strikes, than any other Sox player.

Interesting lineup with righty Pelfrey on the mound--Holt leading off at 2b, Young in RF and batting cleanup, Nunez 2d at DH, and Leon catching at 9th: Holt 2b Nunez DH Benintendi LF Young RF Devers 3b Bogaerts SS Moreland 1B Bradley CF Leon C These days Farrell seems determined not to repeat lineups.

Actually, Boston currently wins 56% of our games and Chicago 38%, which means the White Sox would normally be odds on to take at least 1 of the 4 games and not a bad bet (albeit odds against) to take 2 of 4. If Fister has turned a corner, I like the Red Sox today. If not, today will be a challenge.

In addition to which, last year the Sox got going with a nice 6 game win streak in August. However, they really won the division in September when the bullpen got very good.

Meh. Last night our two hottest hitters, Nunez and Devers, were 0 for 8. Throw in our next hottest Vazquez and the three of them were 0 for 10. But we still scored 4 runs, which 75% or more of the time is enough for us to win this year, and won. And Holt scored a run (thanks to an error when he hit to the opposite side of the field). This is really far-fetched, but Farrell rarely uses his lefty bats back to back high in the order. By putting Holt in front of Beni, he gave Beni a chance to see what Shields was throwing against lefties. The point is, it worked and worked on a night when nobody was hitting that much--just Beni and JBJ with those two huge 2-run dingers when we needed them. Besides, it's just 1 game, and there can be no question he has been tinkering with the lineups ever since Devers and Nunez joined the squad.

Short thread. Does this mean we prefer griping?

Sox stay hot, including Pomeranz. Not so Nunez and Devers, which is fine when Benintendi and Bradley come thru.

Showed up on mlb.com at 7:34 last night. He could not throw his 3d flat ground session because of soreness.

Pomeranz tonight and Fister tomorrow. Because of the day(s) off, Sale will pitch the first and last games of the total of 5 against the Rays and Yankees. I think it was spudboy who declaimed in last night's thread that ERod is borderline worthless and our 5th starter if not our 6th. I sure hope not because Price had another setback--pain while pitching--and we will need Fister, which means we darn sure will need ERod too.

The day after I now think ERod had a pretty good game last night, all things considered. As I look back at the mlb.com summary of the play by play, it's apparent that the White Sox did hit him hard, but most of them where caught. I think he did get better as the game went on. I also think that leadoff error by Bogaerts could have set him off but did not--he got out of that inning fine. Six innings and 2 runs is definitely a quality start. I also thought the Chicago pitcher Carlos Rodon pitched well --good stuff and good command of his pitches. Once again the killer b's--Betts, Beni, Bogie, and Bradley--struggled, 2 for 18 and no rbi's or runs scored. In the previous 9-5 win everyone in the starting lineup got a hit, but last night was clearly a struggle. I don't think that means the improved lineup isn't really improved. I'm down on Farrell but have to say I thought he managed the pitching well. Sending ERod back out for the 6th was a gamble especially after Moncada singled, but it worked and thereby limited the bullpen to 5 innings in an 11 inning game. And how about replacing HanRam with Moreland at just the right time? Of course, Ramirez made that a lot easier when he struck out three times in four at bats. Speaking of which, the Sox struck out 14 times last night while getting no free passes and they still won. Which leads me to the conclusion this was a very good win, 4th in a row, that has the Sox now 3 games up on the Yankees. Last year's team, which had a similar record about this time, had a 6 win streak that started on 12 August, but last year other teams were also winning and it took a great September to get the AL East title. Congrats again to mvp78 for getting this team going in the right direction.

I've seen ERod throw five different pitches tonight---4 seamer, 2 seamer, cut fastball, slider, and changeup. Not bad. The problem is that the only pitch he trusts when he absolutely needs a strike is that fast ball, and, just to be sure, he goes for the middles of the strike. He throws the slider and changeup very sparingly. The first inning, I think he one non-four-seamer (93 mph). And all three Chicago hitters in the first hit the ball hard but were outs. The error by Bogaerts didn't hurt except for elevating the pitch count.

Porcello gets a well deserved win. Sure can't complain about 5.1 big innings , 6 scorching k's, and just 5 runs and one measly dinger. Our cy younger ace is back! Well, maybe not. A porcello start is like a box of chocolates.

Yes he stinks tonight. He has decent stuff--two seam fastball, four seam, slider, curve, change up. None of them great but still a good arsenal. But he is dead meat when he can't hit the strike zone except right in the middle of it. His curve has been especially bad, but his slider not bad at all. Control is the sine qua non for any MLB pitcher, and great control will allow you to succeed when you really don't have good stuff. Great control gets the hitter to hit your pitch weakly.

3 sources: espn, twitter, and MLB.com