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Oh my God! How many more threads are gonna be started bitching about the organization/ owner being cheap, about how we should have done this or done that or added this for that much money. I like Rick Hahn's Hoosiers quote, "Our team is on the floor." And it's a damn good team, a damn good one. It is exactly what we fan wanted; it's a World Series contender, a strong World Series contender. For all the bitching on this forum, that is all a fan can ever ask for. In this post and so many complaining others the "there's no guarantee" or "what if so and so gets injured, there's not quality backup". People are upset that, with this present line up (this team "on the floor") that for the White Sox to win the World Series, things really have to go right; they need to stay injury free. That complain is made over and over and over. Well . . . No Duh!! Every team ever is like that. If they don't have luck and stay injury free, they're not going to win the World Series. There's never a guarantee, never. Nobody in MLB has spent more money or had better personal or farms systems than the Dodgers and Yankees since the 2000s. Yet before this year, the Dodgers hadn't won a World Series before 1988 (That makes our 2005 win seem recent). The Yankees haven't won a World Series since 2009. No amount of money spent can guarantee a World Series and protect a team from injuries derailing a promising season. I got news for you guys: if Mookie Betts goes down either to injury or a bad slump and one of their top pitchers gets hurt for a long time, that $40 million on Bauer ain't gonna matter. Same thing with the Yankees or Padres, if they lose two important players, they're not making the World Series. So it's equally true for the White Sox. If one of our big pitchers go down and we lose one of our big bats, I got news for you, a back up LH bat and better back up catcher isn't going to matter. It ALWAYS comes down to a lot of luck and staying injury free, always. I'm excited to see what Vaugh can do. And I've said this before: I absolutely did not want Nelson Cruz, that steroid cheater. I don't want to cheer for a Cruz; I want a team I can be proud of. For all our complaining, I want to see what Collins can do, or to see a huge jump in performance from Cease. If we worked in the same office and could have a solid, hand-shake bet, I would bet that Cease has a better year than Musgrove or Taillon or whatever oft-injured pitcher somebody on here mentioned that the Sox have to have to "guarantee" success. To justify their complains, people on here are making statement and taking off with them like they're absolute facts. Come on, really? Are the Sox really not going to make the World Series because Joc Pederson is soooo much better than Eaton. Yet people are having shit fits on this board because we didn't sign Pederson. Or someone bitching about this back up infielder is so necessary when the Sox have Leury Garcia. Really? Are any of the many names listed on here THAT MUCH better than Leury? Ridiculous. For all of the complaining on this board, in my opinion, the rebuilt has been a total success, and we have to give Hahn and management credit for it. This White Sox team is what we wanted: It is a strong World Series contender and will be for, at least, four or five years. There are no guarantees (again, ask the Yankees and Dodgers fans). All fans can realistically ask for is the ownership and management to give them a a strong team, a team that is a serious World Series contender. And we have that, so if only for a minute or a thread or two, just stop bitchin'!

Tonight we got to see what Mahomes would look like if he was playing for the Bears.

They went cheap on every hole except closer.

Way more disappointed we didn't add another arm for the rotation.

Pretty much exactly how I feel about every single one of your posts.

World Series contenders have more than three established starting pitchers. I'm sorry, but you're just wrong. Legitimate contenders have been investing in depth for like TEN YEARS now. The White Sox go into every "contending season" needing every player to perform to his full potential in order to succeed. EVERYONE in the industry, including the White Sox, know that this is a dumb plan. Fanbases get excited about a rebuild coming together because it produces a situation where three quarters of your team is filled with pre-arb players, so even a small-mid market team is capable of spending to fill up the last quarter. Where most teams see this state as an OPPORTUNITY to spend money to make an impact, the White Sox see this state as an excuse NOT to spend money. And the "argument" sounds exactly like your post. "Aw come on, don't focus on what we DON'T have, focus on what we DO have! Look at these several exciting players, isn't that good enough?!" That's not how teams operate when they want to win championships, it's how they operate when they want to maintain the relevance required to keep making money. It's not thinking like a winner, it's thinking like a fucking hedge fund manager. The truth is, of course, that money FOLLOWS excellence in sports. There are a ton of ways to make money in this country -- people like Steinbrenner do it with an unwavering commitment to dominate his field, people like Jerry Reinsdorf should stick to selling real estate.

If you compare them to other contenders, there's no position player depth anywhere on the roster. The team is built with the expectation that Eloy, Robert, Moncada, TA, Madrigal, & Grandal will stay healthy. Maybe there's cover for Abreu. Maybe. But that's it. Anywhere else you immediately get into replacement level production. To not sign a Profar or La Stella like player is inexcusable. Expecting everyone to stay healthy and not slump is not realistic at all.

The scheme where Mahomes is injured and their o line can't handle a 4 man rush.

Interesting? Uh, I guess. A good thing compared to just having an ace fill one of those spots? Lol no.

I would say made-up statistics have a 78.3% chance of being wrong.

Except Cespedes checks so many White Sox requirements: - was sought after many years ago - old, aging veteran - has a family member in the system

I think they definitely cheaped out. By spending 8 million (ish) on Quintana, and 8 million (ish) on Rosario, this team could have had a good dependable 4th starter, and a LH bat that could DH (and play some OF in a pinch). Obviously time will tell, but I think these additions, for not really a lot by MLB payroll standards, could have taken this from a really good team, to what is certainly the favorite in the AL Central, and probably the AL.

This I don’t agree with. Most teams don’t have a top 5 catcher and then cry because they don’t have a top 10 to 15 catcher as their backup. We had a luxury last year and that shouldn’t never be the expectation.

I did read what you said and that was that teams would be going “belly up” before we know it. Sorry, but I LOL at that comment. You also stated that rather than JR spending $30M on payroll that you would prefer he use those funds to finance (thus keeping his current profit margins) a cheaper ballpark experience. :shrug:

LOL, nobody is going under. And you're advocating that JR should have made a massive payroll reduction this year so that the cost of a game is cheaper? Maybe you should think about going to Kane County if you want a cheaper experience.

This is the deepest this list has been in awhile. We didn't rank Vera yet because he hasn't officially signed but he'd slot in near Thompson and Dalquist. https://www.futuresox.com/2021/02/05/top-white-sox-prospects-starting-pitchers/

Elijah Tatis for Price

I hope that Pace watched the Super Bowl and realized that even Mahomes cant win with an o lone that can't block 4 guys and a defense that can't stop anything. Hoard more picks, get more players. There will be other opportunities to trade 1st round picks for a QB if you do everything else right. This is the way.

Is any team good enough to win the Super Bowl missing both starting tackles? Also, Bears should fire Nagy and hire Todd Bowles tomorrow.

Really? All I saw was a bunch of Chiefs DB's holding and committing penalties on literally every possession. It was pathetic defense and incredibly undisciplined.

Glad I took the Bucs in this one

One of the worst reffed halfs I can remember. If your a KC fan you have to be pretty upset.

Can't spend a $1 when you don't have $.50......

I think that is entirely fair...life is filled with a series of disappointments...I think the greatest team I followed was that 1994 team that ended with the strike. Still I feel it's different...I feel like we could have the makings of a super team...the A's or Reds of the 70's. And yes it's fair to prick that balloon...but half the fun of winning is the expectations...and the joy of having national media guys remember that there are actually two teams in Chicago. Why couldn't Vaughn come up and hit like Frank Thomas as a rookie? Why couldn't your fifth starter be Kopech for three and Crochett for three? Let's see if all these 25 and younger players can really jell into a great team. I don't want to start the panic trading or panic buying yet. As for the Farm System...I'm never that excited about a system that could produce a dozen major leaguers if they are a dozen solid average players. One Frank Thomas is worth a dozen Tyler Flowers or Yolmer Sanchezs. They are obviously worth something but if your system produces one star your can go pick up the Sanchez's and Flowers, Today, with all the young talent we've brought up the last few years we still have as our top five Kopech, Vaughn, Crochett, Madrigal and Kelly. Each could realistically be a special player. Top four have even looked special against major leaguers. OK...maybe last years list is better but this is very exciting.

And this is why Jerry has no incentive to be as competitive as possible

Hating the team is not something fans do. It’s invariably the front office/ownership group. Or the manager. Or the pitching/hitting coach, etc. What good, for example, was hating Mazara and EE when most Sox fans were already skeptical about them from the get go? On the player side, Madrigal has undoubtedly been the most polarizing from the moment he was drafted. He’s supposed to represent the player whose value can’t easily be measured in terms of intangibles, which drives the younger generation of more statistically-oriented fans crazy.

This is blind optimism at its finest. You're not necessarily wrong about your assessment, but you're ignoring that we have no depth and some big time questions marks. We're really not going into any better a situation with our starting pitching and since closer was lights out last year we really aren't making a needle move on that position this year.

Al's cheesy beef says his source says that Cespedes to the whitesox is a real possibility. Would start 4 days a week rotating between LF, RF, and DH. NSCishek made it sound like a possibility too. Maybe this needs its own thread.

I feel the exact opposite. I feel okay about our DH situation, but feel confident that, no matter who it is, we'll be much less bad than last year with EE. My optimism is with the back end of our starting rotation. All four guys there have pretty big upsides. I would say that Cease and Kopech have huge upsides (TOR stuff), and Rodan and Lopez have very good upsides (Let's say solid 3- starter upside). Now, I admit that these percentages are totally off my head, but I think there's some validity there somewhere, and I think I might be being a little conservative in my expectation here, but here goes: I think Cease has a 30% chance of approaching his huge upside in 2021. With Kopech, for the 2nd half of the season when he comes up, I would say he has a 25% chance of approaching his huge upside. I would say with Rodon, due to fear of injuries, he has a 20% chance of being a good 3-level pitcher for our World Series contender. With Lopez, I'll say a 10% chance of becoming a solid 3rd starter on a contending team. Now, add all those up: (and to a simplistic degree odds do work like this), with four options with strong upsides and the odds come to 85% likely that the Sox have, at least, one good pitcher from that group of four. I think there's a chance that the Sox are very strong with their 4th starter, strong to the point where if Keuchel takes a little step back from last year, the Sox will still be very strong in, at least, their 1st four starters. To be honest (and I am an optimistic fan), I think I devalued the odds for Cease, Rodon, and Lopez, but I think I overrated Kopech a little. But that is my weird logic about why I feel good about the back end of our starting rotation.

I've been saying this for a while. Makes a lot of sense. There seems to be some smoke around him right now.

If you look at our lineup, the DH slot prob hits 7-8 when it is Collins/Mercedes eventually Vaughn who could go to 6. We have some players who may regress but look at the potential improvement Edwin OPS .627 Mazzara .589 Moncada(ill) .705 Robert .738 Not having the veteran DH only, allows you to mix and match, try multiple, ride the hot hand, rest guys. A manager who should know how to handle that part of strategy especially since the NL game required more manager maneuvering is also in place.

Is that you Jerry?

Late April 2018 TJ surgery not 2019. He missed almost all of 2019 when he had a rehab start and had a capsule sprain. But his 2020 showed he was finally healthy. 11 starts 2.70 ERA and 1.163 WHIP and even better second half in 6 starts with a 1.37 ERA. I always like pitchers, who after injury, have a strong 2nd half. Rodon pitched 4 games 2 starts, 7.2 innings total, 8.22 ERA and 1.565 WHIP. There isn't a world in which Walker gets less than Rodon. According MLBTR Walker was the 23rd ranked FA this year. Guys like Rodon who were non tenders , injured and sucked are probably all lumped together at over 100. He's lucky the Sox gave him $3M.

c ) Yax vs. Wilson is toss up. Wilson is 4 years younger, so for a team you give the edge to Wilson. For next year? Probably Yasmani. 1b) Tough one, but I go Abreu. 2b) Cheating aand going with Javy Baez here. But otherwise, Nick Madrigal. SS ) Tim Anderson over Baez, but I'd play Baez at 2b so this is a moot point. 3b) I'd play Moncada at third and Bryant in OF. But if I had to choose... I think I'd go Moncada, but extremely close. LF) Eloy CF) Roberts RF) Bryant or Heyward if I had to choose DH: Rizzo or Vaughn SP: Gio, Lynn, Hendriks, Keuchel, Mills with Cease/Kopech awaiting

Hoping that the Sox still sign one. With JR's thinking, maybe waiting for lower cost later. Why pay $8m now if you can get same guy for $7.99m in March? Think of the interest he could earn!

The last few Sox moves & words seem to signal that they're pretty much done. With a few decent FA SP's and LH bats still available and money left in the budget, I hoping that they're just waiting to see how ST goes and try to get them cheaper, too. But, for now, their depth plan is like trying to fix all your repairs with duct tape and if it doesn't work, just add more duct tape and hope for the best.

Here’s the problem. I’m hopeful that Ceases takes a massive leap forward, but that’s not a guarantee after a horrible 2020 season. He should be the #5 starter to open the season with a better #4 starter brought in. I love Kopech but there is nothing wrong with him pitching in AAA until an injury opens up a spot or until he forces the issue. Smart organizations plan for injuries and as constructed things could get real ugly quick with an injury to the big three. Perhaps Don Cooper was so bad at his job that there is a lot more optimism for guys like Rodon & Lopez, but it all seems like unnecessary risk driven by budget considerations. As for Vaughn, I think he’s going to be a star at some point, but that‘s a ton to put on the kid without a solid backup plan. That doesn’t mean we have to go sign Nelson Cruz, but even a left-handed role player would do wonders for this roster. Leury & Engel are both weak against RHP and Mendick is mediocre all around. I’m may be the biggest Zack Collins fan on this board, but it’s a bit scary to think that he’s our likely DH to open the season with only Mercedes to provide any real competition. Brad Miller has a career 111 wRC+ against RHP and can actually play a variety of positions. He’d give another option to throw into the DH mix until Vaughn is ready and would likely not cost all that much.

I watched Wentz 2019 highlight reel. Lord help me. Now I’ll be disappointed if they don’t get him.

We can only hope the next CWS ownership have LAD deep pockets. Oh what a refreshing change it would be. And such an ownership would get rewarded handsomely by the base for their committnent to excellence. Reinsdorf believes it's the fans responsibility to make the product better. You only need to look on the west side to see what blind loyalty brings a fanbase - a 22 year championship drought despite being among the top NBA teams in attendance. And don't look now folks but we're going on 16 years since the 2005 one-year revival of Damn Yankees. Reinsdorf is a paper billionaire because of the Bulls, not the Sox. When Balmer grossly overpaid for the Clippers the net worth of the NBA owners took a nice spike upwards. But even Reinsdorf has to take a back seat to the McCaskeys. They are the titanuim standard for getting rich off blind loyalty.

Jack said 3y/105m, and Bauer technically got 3y/102m, so it was close.

This aged well

Andrew Vaughn will tell.

The two biggest holes on this roster are a decent #4 starter and a left-handed bat that plays the IF. Jerry not being willing to pony up like $3M for a Brad Miller type is beyond fucking pathetic.

The answer was “yes” as soon as the question made it to the word “cheap.”

I already expressed my unhappiness about that in a different post because they resigned that piece of $%^% Rodon. Renteria gets fired because of the way he handled the pitching staff the last week of the season and the playoff series, and part of that was because he used that guy. And now we resign him to give him the ball every 5 days? So maybe the full question is, did management do EVERYTHING and I mean EVERYTHING to win this year? Because like I said. Finishing second to Minnesota will be completely and utterly unacceptable.

Been there many times. Been to Hooks games in Corpus many times. Been to games in half a dozen major league parks. What does that have to do with anything? What I said was this runaway salary crap isn't good for the game. If you disagree...explain your opinions...don't knock others for theirs. By the way...try reading what I said. I didn't advocate massive payroll reductions for the WS this year. You can knock off that condescending LOL crap. You don't strike me as that bright.

Except the White Sox have had about a 25-30% success rate in free agency with these Tier B/C free agents like EE, Alonso, LaRoche, Cabrera, etc. The only way this philosophy works is if you’re at closer to 50-60% in free agency, or have great coaching as well as talent evaluation on a consistent basis. Teams like the Rays, Braves, Cardinals, Brewers, Indians and A’s just a few that come to mind. What doesn’t work well is being stuck in the middle. Which is where the Mariners have been since their near great Ichiro-led teams of the early 2000’s.

Baseball is on steroids when it comes to money. The owners and players both make obscene money IMO and the fans foot the bill. Most of us are fans because we went to games in our youth and learned to keep a scorecard. I saved my allowance and packed a lunch so I could get to an extra game or two. Favorite players were on the team for most of their careers. We were hooked. Most normal families today would struggle to find the extra $ in the budget to take the family to the park. Seniors on fixed incomes refuse to spend at current prices even if they can afford it (as a matter of principle.) I don't blame Bauer or any player getting as much as he can but really...$40 mil is nuts and next year that will serve as the new benchmark. I certainly understand the short career argument and would support a higher ML starting salary. The top-end guys need to slow it down big time IMO. I would totally support a Bill Veeck type ownership that didn't pay the big bucks to select free agents but made the effort to put the fan first. Affordable tickets, parking, food, etc. should come before overpaying a few select players twice what they are worth. I think JR has put together an excellent team and I support his decision to draw a line in the sand with these few select free agents that get fans so goosey. In general, I would rather improve my team with three 10 million type guys than one 30 million dollar guy. Actually...It would be OK if JR took the 30 million and lowered the prices on tickers, food & parking. I for one am glad JR is a financially responsible owner in that we will continue to have a team to cheer for. Some of these teams will be belly up before you know it.

Long answer: no they have not Short answer: no