Goin' mobile
After a successful test run on State of the Sox, I’ve activated a plugin that will make browsing and commenting on this blog a lot easier on many smartphones, such as the iPhone, Droid, Pre, various Blackberries and others.
Give it a shot, and let me know if you have any problems.ย My phone ain’t smart enough to handle it yet, so I’m flying blind and relying on the kindness of strangers to inform me of any issues. So far, the feedback has been positive, and I hope it improves the experience for those of you on the go.
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Baseball America has the list of minor-league free agents, which I always have an unusual amount of fun browsing. The White Sox system’s casualties:
Chicago White Sox (10)
RHP: Dylan Axelrod (Hi A), Fernando Hernandez (AAA), Kelvin Jimenez (AAA), John Van Benschoten (AAA), Ehren Wassermann (AAA)
C: Justin Knoedler (AAA)
SS: Eider Torres (AAA)
OF: David Cook (AA), Josh Kroeger (AAA), Michael Restovich (AAA)
A few thoughts…
*I liked Wassermann’s story, and I’m sad he couldn’t back up a pretty impressive start. He really was a Teutonic Shingo.
(By the way, I call dibs on “Teutonic Shingo” for my next band’s name.)
*Reading through newspaper coverage of spring training, it’s funny to think that some people thought Don Cooper could resurrect Van Benschoten’s career. I was halfway rooting for it just so we’d have more reason to use the nickname “Dutch Oven.”
*Blasts from the past: Oneli Perez and his extra finger, Million Dollar Man Ben Davis, Doomerang-throwin’ Dewon Day, former legit prospect Daniel Haigwood, Alex Cintron and his tiny head, Baseball America favorite Ricardo Nanita, and Jerry Owens, who received an impassioned defendorsement from Dave Cameron at FanGraphs.
*Random guess for Charlotte’s 2010 Opening Day first baseman: Ryan Shealy.
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Phil Rogers takes a look at who needs a 40-man roster spot.ย He spends a lot of time discussing Stefan Gartrell, who pretty much fulfills the Rogers Prospect Prototype.ย That’s why it was such a shock to see him jump on the Brent Morel bandwagon — and he’s on Miguel Gonzalez’s trail as well.
The Sox only need to have room for John Shelby and Brandon Hynick (who wasn’t even mentioned, as Larry pointed out before I got a chance to read the article).ย Unless they think Brian Omogrosso’s arm can be salvaged, and he’s had a brutal injury history, there’s nobody else of note. Gartrell is the best of the rest, and he seems destined to meet David Cook’s fate (see above).
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Arizona Fall League:
- Phoenix 7, Peoria 6
- Jordan Danks went 3-for-5 with a strikeout.
- Brent Morel homered for the second straight day, along with two singles and two RBI.
- Kyle Bellamy allowed two hits and struck out two over two scoreless innings.
- Jacob Rasner worked around two hits and two walks for two scoreless innings himself, striking out one.
- Justin Cassel allowed one run on three hits and a walk over three innings, striking out three.
Stefan Gartrell strikes me as Heath Phillips in position player form.
The site is beautiful !
Thanks.
If Brent Morel gets one at-bat in Thursdays AFL finale, his .414 average will lead the league (link: http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-19-white-sox-brent-morel-nov19,0,5314503.story) Pretty impressive since he hasn’t played above High-A.
And yes, I know that everyone hits in Arizona, but there are still some pretty impressive prospects out there. Now he just needs to hit for more extra bases (only 1 double and 2 home runs in 24 hits).
Ryan Shelly former colorado and royal first basemen, he is kind of a burn out but… hey what the heck is AAA for.
Someone will give wasserman a shot, likely an NL club, haha. Some of those other guys are your basica maybe they get a cup of coffee type guys cook, restovich, kroeger they are a basically below replacement level.
After watching that video on Morel Im not in love with his swing but the results are hard to argue with, so far so good for the kid, his strong AFL showing makes him a definite prospect and thus trade bait.
Shelby needs a 40 man spot, he is still a toolsy power and speed combo guy despite a downer of a AA year when basically everyone else in birmingham excelled. He gets 1 more year if im in charge.
What did you not like in Morel’s swing?
I’m kind of curious, too. I thought it was a lot quieter than other recent homegrown Sox prospects.
watch the video again and note that he is constantly too far out on the front foot on everything offspeed, poor weight transfer and a bit of a recognition problem if you ask me
thats a pretty fixable mechancical flaw but I have watched a lot of hitters and that weakness is their for him, hopefully he resolves it quickly
True. I was looking mainly at his hands/bat path, which seemed to be shorter than most guys.
The silver lining is that he’s pretty good at making contact despite the front foot issues. So he’s got that going for him, which is nice.
I just looked again. I think you grade a bit tough! For the most part I thought he looked pretty balanced and keeps his weight back nicely. Yes, he got fooled on a couple of pitches but who doesn’t?
Jim,
The blog looks great in mobile view, at least at first. It has the following problems though (although maybe I need a little educating):
1. I don’t see an option to log in while using mobile view. If I’m not logged in, I don’t see an option to post, so I have to turn off mobile view, log in, and go back to mobile view.
2. I don’t see an option to reply to specific posts when logged in and using mobile view.
3. When using the on page forward and back buttons that are rendered in mobile view, I went back and forward, and the fonts turned large and the screen zoomed in a bit, but I couldn’t zoom back out. Perhaps it’s a temporary issue.
Overall, i do like the mobile view and would rather have it then not, even with the bugs/ config problem. #1 is probably the biggest issue.
I’m on an iPhone 3g, current firmware, and I have been accessing the site a good bit via mobile. Oh, one more fairly big issue, I don’t see a scroll bar in this publish window, so I can’t really scroll it back up to review/edit my post.
1. I believe the login option is buried in the menu at the top. Might be under something named “My Account.” I don’t remember, but I have the box checked to allow mobile sign-on, and was able to do it on my boss’ iPhone on State of the Sox. Let me know if you still don’t see anything.
2. Replying to specific posts may not be possible yet. Threaded discussion is usually a feature of specific themes, and the mobile theme the plugin uses may not have it built in. I will investigate.
3. Sounds like a blip, but when I have access to a better phone, I’ll give it a shot. I’ll check out the scroll bar as well. Maybe it urges brevity or something.
Thanks for the feedback.
When did the sox acquire shealy, and how? It looks like he had good numbers in 08, split between the AAA and the ml club, but must have been injured in 09, as he only had 108 plate appearances…fielding was uzr150 too. I’d say he had some potential, just by the numbers.
They haven’t. That area of the post was referencing the minor league free agents. Shealy spent last year in the Kansas City Royals organization. Jim’s just guessing that the Sox would sign him because, I’m assuming, he’s an ex-Royal and we perpetually have an opening at 1B in Charlotte that we fill with retreads in lieu of actual prospects.
Correct. In the tradition of Ben Broussard, Jeff Liefer, Ernie Young and Brian Myrow.
Ahh. See, I didn’t know Shealy was a minor league free agent. If I did, then I probably would have picked up on the fascination with ex-Royals humor.
Interesting article about revenue sharing: http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&page=rumblings091119. I wonder if the Sox are justified in crying poor, because I think this shows that a lot of teams are doing just that, though unjustifiably so.
I’m not suggesting they aren’t justified, because their payroll isn’t in the bottom third of teams that are specifically referenced but it’s an interesting debate when you consider they are likely to have a big-market local media contract and the ticket sales to accompany that big market. Definitely makes me wish all this information was public.
It’d be nice to know which teams were losing money, to get an idea if it’s the usual suspects or not.
Thanks Jim, found the login option with your pointer. The very first line says soxmachine, and there a dropdown flylet to the right. Once you click it, you get several options, including login.
Justin Knoedler and I were classmates for six years. I knew the Giants gave him a cup of coffee, but I had no clue he was in the Sox organization. Maybe I should have talked to him at the class reunion, but that was two years ago.
Kirk Reuter’s brother Brent taught my high school TV production class for half a semester. But then he left with some kinda nerve disorder, I think.
I guess what I’m saying here is that I’m low on brushes with greatness.
In mobile posting news, I’m able to scroll through my whole post by moving the cursor (iPhone, hold down on screen). No brevity required!
Crap.
I mean, good to know!
I’m pretty limited on brushes with greatness, too. I saw Huey Lewis in O’Hare one time, though. That was pretty wild.
I did notice that you could move the cursor by holding down on the screen, but it was really slooooowwwwwww. Scroll bar would still be nice, but that’s a platform issue. ๐