Ozzfest

[Valuist]

I think what makes him so good is that he truly does not care about being second guessed by the media, the fans, or even his players. He used a career National League setup man as his closer for up thru July, went closer by committee for awhile, then used a guy who was in Double A (Jenks) only a few months ago. He even used El Duque in the final game at Boston. Last week he didn't hesitate to bring Jenks in for the 8th with Ramirez and Ortiz coming up. When El Duque was going good in the 7th and 8th, he didn't feel that automatic compulsion to bring in the closer for the 9th. Baseball has been too "Larussized" in the past 15 years.

Personally, I'd like to see them save Contreras for game 2 vs either the Yanks or Angels. Contreras has been their best pitcher since the AS break and game 1 will be such a brutal scheduling spot for either NY or LAA that I would hate to waste their hottest pitcher in a likely easy game 1 win over a tired team.

[headhawg]

I will admit that I wasn't really in favor of Guillen becoming the manager of the White Sox, but I was less enamored with Cito Gaston and apparently those were the two choices. Every manager gets second-guessed, and that being true you have to look at the results. Well so far the Oz got 99 regular season wins for an alleged "weak" team plus a sweep of last year's champs, Chris Berman's "darlings" the BoSox. (Did anyone else hear the extreme Red Sox bias when Berman called that game at Fenway? Ridiculous. He should stick to something he thinks he knows and that's football.)

Anyway, Ozzie has exceeded my expectations. He says a little too much that I find somewhat unprofessional, but in that way he reminds me of Ditka when he coached the Bears. You have to take the bad with the good, and so far more good than bad.

Go White Sox.

[Valuist]

Off the field he does need to watch what he says a bit. He called out Magglio Ordonez earlier in the year and he probably shouldn't have done that. But I like his in game managing skills.