Hey, when you're talking mediocre mid-80s White Sox, you are really in my sweet spot. Greg Walker was a great looking young hitter when he came up. I remember Bill James writing, somewhere around 1984-5, that AL fans could really look forward to watching three terrific young first-basemen develop and dominate. The three guys he had in mind were Don Mattingly, Kent Hrbek and Greg Walker.

Walk's 1984 campaign was beautiful thing. As a 24 year old, he went .294/.346/.532 (basically what he's doing for Cheat). Remember, this was the mid-80s, when those numbers meant something. His OPS+ was 135 and his OWP was .657. He was going to be the next big thing. (It still kills me that we added this great young bat to a team that won 99 games - taking Tom f'ing Paciorek's place no less - and still tanked in 1984.) It never really happened for him. He pinged through the 80s with a few decent years but it seemed like when he was healthy, he wasn't developing and whenever he started going good, he got hurt.

Then in the Summer of 88 he had this seizure while warming up for a game. The way I remember it, Herm Schneider (or one of his assistants?) saved Walk's life by sticking a pair of tape scissors into his mouth and pulling his tongue out of his throat. It was scary as hell. He was done for the year but he came back in 89. I remember being at the Home Opener that year and as they introduced the players, Walk got biggest ovation (excepting, maybe, Harold) because we were all just so glad he was alive. I remember how happy he looked just to have made it back. Its stories and threads like that that make it worthwhile to watch a team over decades.

but i don't think anyone would be screaming and hollering if the sox were to call him up at some point in the season - especially a lost season. i probably wouldn't be either, if he were producing a decent line in AAA. my point is that this isn't a guy who has done so much damage to his reputation that your average sox fan is going to boo him at his first appearance. and i frankly think you oversstate who regular sox fans are, or at least how i define them. i'm not talking about season ticket holders. i'm talking about the casual fans who watch a few games a week and go to a few a year. i doubt most of them could pick masset out of a lineup, let alone recall his name.

and i thought "those cunning japanese." perhaps that's what this guy was thinking - they don't change, they're just waiting for their chance to pounce.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/baseball/mlb/specials/spring_training/2008/03/27/matsui.wedding.bet.ap/index.html

haegar make actually end up being a legitimate starter one day. broadway, not so much. if the sox were actually intent on keeping a long man, which i don't think they are, he would be the best option.

Hey, Larry, I think you should really check out the link I provided in the FanShots section of this web-site. I think it's right up your alley! After you've read it if you could just click the "recommend" button at the bottom of the page to show your appreciation, that'd be great. Thanks, friendo!

Throwing everything into one big thread is a bug, not a feature, from my perspective. I like having different places where different conversations can proceed simultaneously. Having the running banter of quickly written, relatively short comments is great for the main, top-of-the-page posting and game threads. If the top post changes, the banter can just move to the new thread. But I also like having some threads that are more drawn out and, hopefully, a little more developed. Those seem like the kinds of things that belong in the Fanposts. My suggestion has been to find a way to move the Fanposts summary up on page so that everyone can seem them easily and contribute. When you look at the views numbers, its pretty clear most people aren't looking at the Fanposts as they're currently configured. I guess that means that, de facto, Larry has what he wants - all the action is in the one main thread - but, like I said, I see that as a bug.