Saturday, May 19, 2007 - Posts

With offense going south, Ozzie barks at North

Ozzie Guillen made national news before the first Cubs-Sox game of the year by letting The Score's Mike North and A.J. Pierzynski get his goat on live radio.  Ozzie entered the fray with an expletive-laden rant when Pierzynski used airtime to complain about Toby Hall taking his playing time.

Here's the likely story line for the next week: Ozzie is out of control, Ozzie is going to get fired if he keeps it up, Ozzie apologizes to everybody, and ohbytheway, the team still can't get 10 hits in a game.  Whether or not it's an intentional diversion tactic, that's what it will do.

(It's utterly hilarious listening to Mike North get on a high horse, by the way, especially when Ozzie hangs up the phone.  After all, who would willingly tear themselves away from North's velvet pipes?)

We knew that A.J. was afraid of seeing his playing time reduced, and on one hand, he has some right to gripe.  He's batting .273/.304/.545 against left-handed pitchers, far and away better than the team's line of .199/.283/.280, and has homered twice against southpaws.

But that's about as far as a defense can be taken.  Even though Guillen comes off as thin-skinned, he's completely in the right.  Guillen needs to know if Hall can take the work should he be pressed into emergency duty, and considering the aforementioned team line against lefties, he also needs to find out if Hall can contribute as a DH down the line.  With the game played at Wrigley, Ozzie really had only one choice.

Pierzynski was wrong in the first place to criticize his manager publicly for doing his job, but he looks even worse when considering that only Jorge Posada has caught more games than Pierzynski so far this season in the American League -- and that's because Posada is leading the league in hitting.  Pierzynski is not. 

It's especially childish when considering Hall hadn't even suited up for the Sox when Pierzynski made the comments.  If a month down the line, Pierzynski hadn't seen a single at-bat against lefties and was being replaced in-game, there could be a case.  Instead, A.J. comes off as a kid who just couldn't wait to whine.

Maybe A.J. doesn't need a shot in the arm, but the rest of the team does.  Hopefully Ozzie and Kenny Williams will make him take his medicine with everybody else.
posted Saturday, May 19, 2007 2:34 AM by Jim with 2 Comments

A non-support support group

A couple years ago, Kenny Williams made the statement saying that all five of his starters could win 15 games.

Presumably, he has to still believe that four of them could do it, even though a couple names have changed.  Williams wouldn't lay that great of expectations upon John Danks, but he certainly is paying Javier Vazquez to be better than Freddy Garcia or El Duque.

That said, it looks like no Sox pitcher is going to have an especially gaudy win total, but it won't be their fault if that's the case.  Plainly put, the Sox offense isn't capable of getting its starting pitchers 15 wins.

Four Sox starters have ERAs under 4.00, and Danks (4.10) would join them if it weren't for a Juan Uribe misplay.  Jon Garland and Jose Contreras are tied for the staff lead in wins... with three.  And Contreras has a sub-.500 record.

Despite throwing a quality start, Mark Buehrle dropped to 2-2 and was denied his 100th victory again after his loss today.  The Sox are 3-5 in Garland's start even with Garland's ERA near 3.00 and a drastic reduction in hits allowed.  We don't even need to talk about Danks, since his lack of support has been mentioned often.

Here's how the Sox starters rank in run support out of 45 American League pitchers with 40 innings pitched:
25. Javier Vazquez, 4.67
32. Mark Buehrle, 4.25
40. Jon Garland, 3.81
41. Jose Contras, 3.64
43. John Danks, 3.24
That's right -- no Sox pitcher ranks in the top half of the league in run support.  Even the Kansas City Royals have one up there (Jorge De La Rosa, "Cy" to you).

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Joe Crede missed today's game after getting hit in the face with a grounder during practice.  I'd normally say that it's the Sox's loss, but with Crede owning a .531 OPS so far this season, he needs all the help he can get.  If he turned around his 2005 after breaking his finger...

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Minor league round-up:
  • Columbus 4, Charlotte 2
    • Jerry Owens went 2-for-4 and stole his 20th base in 25 attempts.
    • Andy Gonzalez continues to struggle.  Not only was he 0-for-4, but he was caught stealing and picked off.
    • Josh Fields and Brian Anderson both went 1-for-3 with a walk. Fields doubled and struck out two times, Anderson did neither.
    • Carlos Vazquez pitched 1 2/3 innings of perfect relief, and has yet to allow a run in 10 2/3 Triple-A innings.
  • Birmingham 5, Montgomery 2
    • Adam Russell rebounded from a tough start to throw seven innings of one-run ball.  He allowed only three hits, walked four and struck out six.
    • Dewon Day continued to maintain a high BABIP, striking out the side and allowing two hits and an unearned run in one inning; Oneli Perez earned the save.
    • Jason Bourgeois continued his hot hitting with a 2-for-5 day; Donny Lucy went 1-for-3 with a solo homer and scored three runs.
  • Winston-Salem 11, Lynchburg 6
    • The Warthogs scored in each of the first seven innings.
    • Aaron Cunningham went 1-for-3 with a double, three RBI, and stolen base No. 13; Micah Schnurstein hit a double and a triple; Paulo Orlando fell a homer short of the cycle and drove in four runs.
    • Kyle McCulloch struck out seven over six innings, and none of the three runs he allowed were earned.
  • Lexington 6, Kannapolis 1
    • Brandon Allen and Hancer Vargas had two hits apiece; the rest of the lineup went 2-for-25.
    • Ricky Brooks gave up four runs in five innings, but did strike out eight.
posted Saturday, May 19, 2007 1:34 AM by Jim with 0 Comments