Thursday, May 19, 2005
Series Preview: Cubs at Sox
I suppose I should say that interleague play in May is taking away the magic of interleague play, except that I've always found interleague play to be less an exciting mid-season event but rather more an unfortunate byproduct of the Selig years.
This subject will be exhaustively covered elsewhere (feel free to peruse the links to the left), but I will quickly put in my 2 cents Re: the White Sox.
The White Sox Suck. Alright, now that I put that out there, let's get into the reasons why that is a stupid thing to say and why the White Sox certainly do not suck (as much as it pains me to admit).
The Hitting
The White Sox are not actually much of an offensive juggernaut. I mean, they aren't terrible, but they aren't exactly tearing the cover off the ball, either. Actually, I take that back; their starting lineup is extremely mediocre. How do they have the best record in baseball again?
Just to highlight a few players:
Cubs killer Paul Konerko is struggling this year, despite showing excellent power. When you're only hitting .211, you need more than 10 homers to justify your existence. Especially for a first baseman/DH. Of course, not to worry, the Cubs are just what he needs to get back on track.
Tadahito Iguchi has gotten off to a decent start here in his first trip around the States. A .304 BA with middling power and middling patience is enough to get by when you are a middle infielder (get it?). The Sox have to be pretty happy with him.
Scott Podsednik has roughly as much power as I do, but he is a bit faster than me (which is why he is in the majors and I blog). So far he is getting on base at a .380 clip and has stolen 24 bases, which puts him on pace for about 95 steals. Wait, let me try that again: which puts him on pace for 95 steals!!!
Finally, A.J. Pierzynski has hit very well for a catcher, and has the only OPS over .800 of anyone in the starting lineup. Like I said, the Sox are all oddly average offensively.
Add all this mediocrity up and what do you get: an insight into the fact that their pitching has obviously been quite good. Speaking of which...
The Pitching
Impressive. Most Impressive. (that was my Star Wars moment for the day).
The only starting pitcher for the Sox with an ERA over 4 is Freddy Garcia, and he clocks in a 4.02. We all know about Jon Garland, who apparently has put it all together (whatever "it" is) and is an impressive 8-0 with a 2.44 ERA. Nifty, indeed. Mark Buehrle has also been quite good, and clocks in a 7-1 with a 3.33 era. He's what Andy Pettite was supposed to be for the Astros (sorry guys, didn't work out).
The Cubs are going to face Garcia, Contreras, and Orlando Hernandez to which I say: Lucky us. We managed to dodge their two best pitchers. We should have a chance offensively this weekend against the Sox. (must...keep...straight...face. Gah, I can't do it!) As usual, the joke's on us, as our offense is clearly pitcher independent; Sean Estes would have no trouble shutting this team down. Jose Mesa, on the other hand...well, we like facing him. Maybe our real offensive talent is taking down perfect closers, which brings us to...
The Bullpen
Okay, this is just stupid. What sort of bizarre ass deal did Dustin Hermanson strike with Ol' Fire and Brimstone to get this far in the season and be the owner of a 0.00 ERA. I mean, my god, he is just not that good a pitcher. He's not a bad pitcher, but he's not good either. It's funny (more funny in a "sucker punch" sort of way than funny "ha ha") how our should-be awesome pitchers (*cough* LaTroy *cough*) suck and their would-be mediocre pitchers (I'm subtley implying that Hermanson is mediocre) end up setting the damn world on fire. I swear, sometimes I feel that the Cubs are cursed.
Most of the pitchers in the Sox bullpen are doing pretty well, with the exceptions being Shingo Takatsu (a.k.a Mr. Zero) and Luis "don't call me Jose" Vizcaino, who have been smacked around pretty well this year.
The Analysis
Um...Comiskey Sucks!
This subject will be exhaustively covered elsewhere (feel free to peruse the links to the left), but I will quickly put in my 2 cents Re: the White Sox.
The White Sox Suck. Alright, now that I put that out there, let's get into the reasons why that is a stupid thing to say and why the White Sox certainly do not suck (as much as it pains me to admit).
The Hitting
The White Sox are not actually much of an offensive juggernaut. I mean, they aren't terrible, but they aren't exactly tearing the cover off the ball, either. Actually, I take that back; their starting lineup is extremely mediocre. How do they have the best record in baseball again?
Just to highlight a few players:
Cubs killer Paul Konerko is struggling this year, despite showing excellent power. When you're only hitting .211, you need more than 10 homers to justify your existence. Especially for a first baseman/DH. Of course, not to worry, the Cubs are just what he needs to get back on track.
Tadahito Iguchi has gotten off to a decent start here in his first trip around the States. A .304 BA with middling power and middling patience is enough to get by when you are a middle infielder (get it?). The Sox have to be pretty happy with him.
Scott Podsednik has roughly as much power as I do, but he is a bit faster than me (which is why he is in the majors and I blog). So far he is getting on base at a .380 clip and has stolen 24 bases, which puts him on pace for about 95 steals. Wait, let me try that again: which puts him on pace for 95 steals!!!
Finally, A.J. Pierzynski has hit very well for a catcher, and has the only OPS over .800 of anyone in the starting lineup. Like I said, the Sox are all oddly average offensively.
Add all this mediocrity up and what do you get: an insight into the fact that their pitching has obviously been quite good. Speaking of which...
The Pitching
Impressive. Most Impressive. (that was my Star Wars moment for the day).
The only starting pitcher for the Sox with an ERA over 4 is Freddy Garcia, and he clocks in a 4.02. We all know about Jon Garland, who apparently has put it all together (whatever "it" is) and is an impressive 8-0 with a 2.44 ERA. Nifty, indeed. Mark Buehrle has also been quite good, and clocks in a 7-1 with a 3.33 era. He's what Andy Pettite was supposed to be for the Astros (sorry guys, didn't work out).
The Cubs are going to face Garcia, Contreras, and Orlando Hernandez to which I say: Lucky us. We managed to dodge their two best pitchers. We should have a chance offensively this weekend against the Sox. (must...keep...straight...face. Gah, I can't do it!) As usual, the joke's on us, as our offense is clearly pitcher independent; Sean Estes would have no trouble shutting this team down. Jose Mesa, on the other hand...well, we like facing him. Maybe our real offensive talent is taking down perfect closers, which brings us to...
The Bullpen
Okay, this is just stupid. What sort of bizarre ass deal did Dustin Hermanson strike with Ol' Fire and Brimstone to get this far in the season and be the owner of a 0.00 ERA. I mean, my god, he is just not that good a pitcher. He's not a bad pitcher, but he's not good either. It's funny (more funny in a "sucker punch" sort of way than funny "ha ha") how our should-be awesome pitchers (*cough* LaTroy *cough*) suck and their would-be mediocre pitchers (I'm subtley implying that Hermanson is mediocre) end up setting the damn world on fire. I swear, sometimes I feel that the Cubs are cursed.
Most of the pitchers in the Sox bullpen are doing pretty well, with the exceptions being Shingo Takatsu (a.k.a Mr. Zero) and Luis "don't call me Jose" Vizcaino, who have been smacked around pretty well this year.
The Analysis
Um...Comiskey Sucks!
# posted by Jason @ 5:00 PM 
