moonslav59

I guess the word “somewhat” was being kind.

When you overlook the “recency affect” Pivetta & Perez have pitched like our ace for much of the season.

To be fair, I cherry picked the hot streak sample sizes, but we have a lot of players trending back up to their norms and just Verdugo going the wrong way. That has to be positive. Duran could provide a big spark. Houck could, too with Sale another huge boost in a few weeks.

"Best staff?"

Toores should play 2B, where he would be more than fine. LeMahieu should play 1B, where lack of power diminishes his comparative value, there. The Marlins are paying $3M a year on Stanton's deal, so it's not a bad deal, if he can stay healthy. Although Hicks is just making $10M, that seems like an overpay, too- all the way to 2025! Judge has one more arb, and many players are FAs after 2022. Their window might have been 2022-2023, and they are blowing one of those seasons.

A simple Google search shows yes. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/07/cole-hamels-to-hold-showcase-for-interested-teams-next-week.html

Cole did have 2 decent games out of the 6 prior games, but his ERA was 5.24 over those 6 games (2.40 in those two games combined). The 3 hit shut out vs the Astros was very impressive, but I hesitate to make conclusions over just one game. He has done well in 3 of his last 7 starts, so maybe making a big deal over just 4 bad starts is not the right thing to do, either. Big game for him and the Yanks, tonight. A Yankee loss could wipe out any last glimmer of hope.

Kinda like the 2019 Sox. High expectations- near .500 ball.

While Verdugo has been in a somewhat long down trend.

Tomorrow's NY Post headline: "Fork Inserted!"

On paper, this should be the hardest game to win in this series. Cole struggled a bit before his last start, but with the Yanks hobbled by injury and disease, we should be the faves. I'm hoping the bats wake up after a few days off and a low hit game, last night. GO SOX!

You expected big things from Houck back in 2019?

In my head, several times, only.

Damn Rays won in 10, after scoring 2 in the 8th to tie the Braves. Astros beat the White Sox. Oak-CLE 3-3 in the 6th.

Looking at just the numbers, Houston is better than us, before we even look at defense. That's scary, but we are playoff warriors, and I'm not in the "Playoffs are a crap shoot" club.

Plus, there is Cora being all gah-gah over Kike's 2B defense. I was all gah-gah over his CF play, especially of late.

Actually, yes, but no inbreeds that I know of.

ERod is not pitching like an 84, anymore. With a 4 man rotation, we stack up a bit better than looking at their 7 starters. Sale Eovaldi ERod Pivetta/Perez/Houck Our top 6-7 pen guys blow theirs away. Our top 3 hitters are much better. .930 JD .924 Bogey .911 Devers We need to see continued growth from the rest of our line-up, and many are trending upwards: .794 Arroyo (.857 since May 31, 80 PAs- not counting tonight) .774 Renfroe (.860 since May 1st- 224 PAs, but has dropped, recently) .761 Verdugo (downward trend) .741 Kike (.999 since June 19th- 94 PAs) .672 Dalbec (.830 since June 10th- 85 PAs- went up tonight, too) .650 Vaz (.723 since June 24th- 57 PAs) .582 Marwin (.798 since June 28th- 24 PAs) OPS is updated after tonight, but trend does not include tonight's game.

Speaking of Deliverance, I white water rafted down that same river, the Chattooga River) this summer on my way to Maine.

I read some where, Houck was going to start a game in Toronto.

When they lost Verlander after not re-signing Springer, I had my doubts. You called it. They are up7-1, tonight on a very good White Sox team, but before tonight, they had these numbers... 6 of their top 7 PA players were over .800! 7 of 8 were over .787! Out of the 12 players with 100+ PAs, 10 are over .748. Their only 2 low hitting players are ... Myles Straw at .680 (Their 4th OF'er is at .829) Martin Maldaonado at .548 (Jason Castro, the other catcher is at .748) Their top starting pitchers by GS'd have these ERA+ 121 Greinke 142 Garcia 148 McCullers (ERA went down, tonight from 2.94 to 2.80) 129 Urquidy (10 day IL) 121 Odorizzi (10 starts) 146 F Valdez (9 starts) 145 C Javier (9 starts) For reference, our rotation has this... 127 Eovaldi 108 Pivetta 115 Perez 95 Richards 84 ERod (ERA went from 5.52 to 5.19, tonight) The big Astros weakness is the pen. 21 saves (60%) 14 blown saves 40% inherited runners scored .705 OPS Against (better than I expected) 1.318 WHIP 4.09 ERA The Sox pen... (before tonight) 29 saves 14 blown saves (67%) 31% IR scored .710 OPS Against (worse than HOU!) 1.368 EHIP 3.57 ERA (Andriese really killed our pen numbers. He had the most PAs Against and a .942 OPS Against Our main pen guys have these OPS Against: .518 Barnes .574 Ottavino .618 Whitlock .674 Taylor .712 Sawamura .678 DHern ??? Houck Tough team to beat!

The Astros are looking more and more like the AL team to beat. Not that the CWS or Rays are push-overs.

Well deserved. Isn't it nice having a pen arm that can go three?

This could be one of the first signs our new guys are changing the tune on finding and developing fine young pitchers. I'm not sure, if they should get credit for "developing" or putting the finishing touches on Houck, but did anyone expect anything from him back when DD and his farm crew were in charge?

Next Roster moves: Marwin will replace Chavis. Sale will replace Workman or Rios. Andriese may not return, or he may replace Rios or Workman. Cordero, Brasier & Valdez wait in the wings.