Noesi gets to prove he earned it - Lineups & Preview 5/23

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Chris Sale's joyous and blissful return to game action means that one pitcher who had been undeservedly eating up starts had to lose his job. That pitcher was, by proxy, Frank Francisco. Scott Carroll was pushed to the bullpen, leading to Francisco getting DFA'd. Somewhere, some minor league filler will get released to add Francisco (who knows what organization), and that guy will naturally hunt down Chris Sale to get his revenge, ending the vicious cycle of job-bumping.

Staying in the rotation for the foreseeable future is Hector Noesi. Seemingly the worst option available in major league baseball earlier this year, Noesi's has proven himself in four starts to at least be better than Scott Carroll. His 5.32 ERA with the Sox is even better than John Danks.

And probably a few others.

Noesi still is pretty undesirable. He has bleh control, is an extreme fly ball guy, and just seems to get hammered despite having stuff that should and does miss bats in the zone. A 19.4% strikeout rate in a White Sox uniform is pretty decent. I would suggest a nice bullpen future at a lush farm out in the country for Noesi, if he hadn't been so terrible out of the pen in the past. I would suggest a lot of things for Noesi if he hadn't been so terrible in the past. There's raw stuff, but not much practical application unless we're going to have our GM make some obvious statement about using games for development.

Dan Hayes:

 “We feel we've made progress with him in the starting role in terms of getting him where we want him to be and having a regular schedule for that makes it more likely we're going to get to the point where we want to with him than putting him in the pen right now and not being as consistent with his usage.”

Close enough.

White Sox Lineup:

  1. Adam Eaton - CF
  2. Gordon Beckham - 2B
  3. Conor Gillaspie - 3B
  4. Dayan Viciedo - RF
  5. Adam Dunn - 1B
  6. Alexei Ramirez - SS
  7. Paul Konerko - DH
  8. Alejandro De Aza - LF
  9. Tyler Flowers - C

Hector Noesi - SP

Alejandro De Aza had an RBI double last night, so I checked to see if he was trending up under the radar and...he's hitting .179/.223/.209 for the month and that double was his second extra-base hit in all of May.

But other than Paul Konerko probably needing to retire after this season (which he has had the forethought to prearrange) no one else is in a death cycle.

New York Yankees Lineup:

  1. Brett Gardner - LF
  2. Derek Jeter - SS
  3. Jacoby Ellsbury - CF
  4. Mark Teixiera - DH
  5. Brian McCann - C
  6. Yangervis Solarte - 3B
  7. Ichiro Suzuki - RF
  8. Brian Roberts - 2B
  9. Kelly Johnson - 1B

Hiroki Kuroda - SP

Kuroda is 39, faded toward the end of last season and has been touched up early this season to the tune of eight home runs in 54.2 innings and a 4.68 ERA. Don't trust this. Don't trust HIROK. He will outlive us all.

 

 

Where to Watch: 7:10pm CT on CSN Chicago.

 

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