White Sox Hit Fork In Road, Go Straight
Time to break out the forks: The 2007 Chicago White Sox are done. After another pathetic display of offense and
"relief" pitching and inexcusable strategy by Sox manager Ozzie Guillen, it is painfully obvious to anyone who gets the game of baseball (and not so obvious to thos that don't) that this team has ZERO chance of competing for anything other than the privilege of finishing ahead of the Royals.
The Yankees broke a 1-1 tie in the eighth by putting up three runs. The Sox roared back with two runs in the bottom of the inning. It could have been more, but Joe Torre yanked Kyle Farnsworth in favor of his closer Mariano Rivera to shut the rally down.
In the top of the ninth, instead of calling on his closer Bobby Jenks, Guillen started off the inning with soon to be returned to the minor leagues Bret Prinz who gave up a one out single to Derick Jeter. Boone Logan
entered the ball game, fanning Johnny Damon, but yielding a single to Melky Cabrera and a walk to Bobby Abreu. Bases loaded, two out, top of the ninth, one run down. Here comes Ozzie. He's calling for the righty. And it's Bobby Jen. . .no wait. It's Ryan Bukvich. And there's a long drive high and deep and gone, a grand slam for A-Rod. Good night, everybody.
The sheer stupidity of putting a minor league journeyman like Bukvich in that situation over your closer in just plain astounding. If Jenks comes in and gets A-Rod, you are one run down going to the bottom of the ninth. Instead, you are now five runs down and will eventually be seven runs down by the time this nightmare ends.
So let's review. Very little hitting. Shaky defense. Great starting pitching. No help from the bullpen. And no matter how half full your glass is, nothing short of making some trades is going to fix it. It's a done deal, kids. As Bobby Knight once said "Just lay back and enjoy it."
The White Sox and Astros re-live the glory year tonight at the House That Greed Built. Maybe there is something to that Carl Everett curse deal.
Lightning Round
"relief" pitching and inexcusable strategy by Sox manager Ozzie Guillen, it is painfully obvious to anyone who gets the game of baseball (and not so obvious to thos that don't) that this team has ZERO chance of competing for anything other than the privilege of finishing ahead of the Royals.The Yankees broke a 1-1 tie in the eighth by putting up three runs. The Sox roared back with two runs in the bottom of the inning. It could have been more, but Joe Torre yanked Kyle Farnsworth in favor of his closer Mariano Rivera to shut the rally down.
In the top of the ninth, instead of calling on his closer Bobby Jenks, Guillen started off the inning with soon to be returned to the minor leagues Bret Prinz who gave up a one out single to Derick Jeter. Boone Logan
entered the ball game, fanning Johnny Damon, but yielding a single to Melky Cabrera and a walk to Bobby Abreu. Bases loaded, two out, top of the ninth, one run down. Here comes Ozzie. He's calling for the righty. And it's Bobby Jen. . .no wait. It's Ryan Bukvich. And there's a long drive high and deep and gone, a grand slam for A-Rod. Good night, everybody.The sheer stupidity of putting a minor league journeyman like Bukvich in that situation over your closer in just plain astounding. If Jenks comes in and gets A-Rod, you are one run down going to the bottom of the ninth. Instead, you are now five runs down and will eventually be seven runs down by the time this nightmare ends.
So let's review. Very little hitting. Shaky defense. Great starting pitching. No help from the bullpen. And no matter how half full your glass is, nothing short of making some trades is going to fix it. It's a done deal, kids. As Bobby Knight once said "Just lay back and enjoy it."
The White Sox and Astros re-live the glory year tonight at the House That Greed Built. Maybe there is something to that Carl Everett curse deal.
Lightning Round
- Shhh. Don't look now, but here come the Cubs.
- Why is Indiana wanting to terminate Terry Hoeppner's contract? Is it because he has had two operations on his brain in the last year? There is precedent for this, you know. The University of Pittsburgh has a coach who's brain dead and he functions okay.
- 1,998,000 reasons that Latinos differ from Blacks in baseball, courtesy of Torrie Hunter.
- There's a new Ana in tennis. Oh yeah, babe.
- Billy Donovan returns to Florida with a new six year deal. We think. Only Billy really knows for sure.
- Tonight is mullet night at the Sox-Astros game and our friends at Bugs and Cranks have come up with some good ones.
- If the NCAA really wanted to be led by an out of the box thinker, send Miles "Zero Tolerance" Brand packing and replace him with Gordon Gee. Anybody that serves the media cookies at halftime of a football game is alright with me.
The final indignity of Isaiah
Washington. Forced to be nice to gay people against his will to save
important advertising dollars and his job, Isaiah is not only forced
into rehab, he has to make a PSA on behalf of the gay groups. And,
after all of that, HE STILL GETS FIRED. So, in review, a man makes a common male reference directed at a gay cast member and winds up taking it up the backside anyway. He
does everything they ask him to do to keep his job, apologizes to the
cast, does anti gay bashing spots, sees a shrink, yet instead of saying
"Isaiah, you manned up when we asked you to", they still dump him.
What the producers will say is that they needed to move the plot
forward and that Washington's character needed to be
eliminated for that to happen. What they don't tell you is they dumped
him because he ticked off the cast, the crew and the network and that
Grey's is a show that attracts a lot of gays, both male and female and
their research showed that they still weren't over it. Their research
also showed empathy for T.R. Knight, the actor originally called out by
Washington.
- On a serious note, in every story you read about Washington, you see the word "slur". The media has as much to do with Washington getting fired as they did with Imus getting fired. Yes, both of them shouldn't have said what they said, but the media arrived with gasoline and built a roaring fire that swayed public opinion.
- Al Sharpton weighs in on the Paris Hilton "first she's in, then she's out" controversy. Like anyone asked.
- The Chicago Liquor commission has approved a liquor license for a health club. That features pole dancing. Huh?
- How does a swear word become a swear word? Here's how.
- "But congressman, if you vote for this bill, the Hispanics, who are highly organized and uncommitted in the next election may not vote for you." "oh, okay, I'll vote against it then." And so it goes in DC.
- These two Alabama law makers were not fighting as stated in the linked story. They were simply having an animated discussion and re-enactment of the Jerry Springer episode they had watched that morning.
- Memo to Dick Wolf: Dude, you won't be Gunsmoke like this.
- The inventor of cheese whiz and McDonald's French fries is dead. If Bill Clinton were still President, the flags would be at half staff.
- Seeing your house from space on the internet is sort of creepy and cool at the same time.
- Sean Connery says he is enjoying retirement so much, he will not take a role in the new Indiana Jones 4 movie. No word on whether he will continue to participate in "Celebrity Jeopardy."
Comments