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Anyone who is refusing to be vaccinated is an idiot. Being 100% vaxxed as a team is a competitive advantage.

It's funny, they are all over this, but had nothing on Graveman.

I am disturbed by the continued normalization of trading Vaughn.

Exactly! I don't think anyone has any way to confirm this, but I think the top 3 decision makers for the org all knew exactly when to strike on a high impact mega deal. Maybe that's me being too trusthwory and giving them the benefit of doubt (one last time), but with how good we know this core of Yo, Eloy, Robert, Gio, TA, Kopech, Cease, etc. not just could be, but already is, I think all of them are looking at each other and saying, "yup, it's fucking go time". Anyone who follows this team knows they're SO close to being the very best team in baseball and that there are only a few pieces needed, and nobody knows that more than Rick Hahn, Kenny Williams and Jerry Reinsdorf. Reinsdorf is the only one that matters though. I have bitched and moaned about Reinsdorf for years. But he's a great businessman and great businessmen are insanely competitive. He knows he's old AF and that he has the best core possible to give it a few more runs at his 8th championship. I could be WAY wrong here and Graveman could be their biggest signing and we're all furious come march. If that's the case then I will admit defeat and admit that I shouldn't have given Reinsdorf the benefit of the doubt. Again, it's all up to him. I don't think that will be the case though. I think we'll be looking back at this convo and saying, "wow we had a great offseason and Graveman was just the start of it. We really could win the World Series" Just my $0.02

The White Sox are actively looking to sign pitchers like this as we speak, and have in the past. Kahnle immediately comes to mind. They took a flyer on him then flipped him for more than they gave up. Sure, the deal didn't work out as Rutherford has stunk (for lack of a better word) but at the time it looked like a good deal for a former 1st round pick that still was somewhat highly thought of. Someone like a Keynan Middleton comes to mind. Big fastball, wipe out slider, nasty changeup, big spin rates, but ZERO established success. Free agent and has high leverage "shit" without a high leverage brain yet because he's still raw, even at 27 years old. Someone like him is the sort of pitcher Katz would be trusted to work his magic on and guess what? He'll be CHEAP but if all clicks, could provide big dividends. Not saying they're signing him, saying they're gonna sign a pitcher or two like him. A lot of you are probably thinking, "who?" and then will be like "oh shit this guy has big time stuff" when you see him pitch at Camelback in the spring I know it ain't easy being a sox fan and every one of us are scarred to some extent, but a lot of you gotta trust the process.

Hard to be proven wrong if you don't source anything.

I don't block anyone or complain about anyone or any posts to moderators. This is a forum that I choose to visit. Everyone's opinion provides to the level of entertainment received by stopping in here. Besides, if I miss one of your tweets as Steve Cishek on twitter I know I can come here and see it in your posts!

But you’re so cute, it’d be impossible to do that.

Don't understand why defense would be the reason to sign conforto over schwarber. Conforto's defense is awful. Worse than Schwarber's last year

Yeah, they really blew that evaluation on Lynn too. And pursuing Wheeler & Burnes was also super dumb cause those guys suck. Probably taking too much advice from Steve Stone? Amirite tray? I mean, it’s pretty obvious Kimbrel was going to collapse well before we acquired him. We should have known the second those stupid Dodgers & Rays’ organizations joined the mix that the dude was a ticking time bomb.

Names I’ve heard mentioned in regards to Phillies talks with White Sox: Jean Segura obviously. Rafael Marchan, Moniak, Kingery and Jose Alverado. I’d be good with Segura, Alverado and Marchan. Moniak is pointless

This year’s team, sure. He should be their 1B for the next decade though. Trading him would be very short-sighted

Let's hope Colson Montgomery can have same ease moving up.

And sign Max...would be lying if I haven’t thought about the scenario

Fuck it. Let’s get crazy. Sign Conforto for RF, Schwarber for DH, trade Vaughn in a deal for Marte for 2B and a reliever, deal Kimbrel for a lesser reliever and whatever prospects we can get, try to unload all of Kuechel’s salary for whatever.

Where did I get mad? I find it hilarious. Nothing about my post was funny. I want sustained success. You want to win a WS in 22 at all costs. Differences of opinions. But guess what? Winning a WS is hard, and largely a crap shoot once you get in. The more chances you get, the likely you are to win one. I don't want to sacrifice our extended window with dumbass moves. We already had a major fuckup with Madrigal/Heuer. Enough of them.

Glad you find that funny @maloney.adam! Trading Vaughn for short term rotation help is idiotic.

Some of us want to be good for the next 5-7 years, not push all the chips in right now and suck balls again in 24.

Vaughn for Bassitt or Gray/Castillo would be very disappointing. I don't think we have enough to get either without him, but talk about going all in on the next 2 years and shortening this window. If that's the plan, there is a surefire way to do it!

If we trade Vaughn one-up, I'd like Whit Merrifield, please.

Unpopular take, but I think Eloy has a higher defensive ceiling than Vaughn, but a much lower floor and is a risk to himself if he doesn’t radically change how he handles plays around the outfield walls and sidelines.

Bullpen as it stands, if we assume Kimbrel gone: Hendriks Graveman Bummer Crochet Ruiz Lopez Foster Bilous Burr Severino Lambert Bold I think are locks. The rest are competition. Severino, Bilous may be closer and more productive than we expected in November. Ideas for relief: With a return to a 93 mph fastball, he may still find starting. But, I think approaching Folty on a switch to bullpen and a move to Sinker/Slider vs. his absolutely obliterated 4 seamer could be the potentials of a new bullpen stud. Or he'll suck. Probably will know his options late. Aaron Sanchez - at this point he just continues to get crushed under the workload, and his Curve/FB/Sinker all have tremendous break - an area I think Katz did well in addressing. Also - opener potential. Incredible name alert: JD Hammer - 94 mph fastball, above avg dropping slider. Cool glasses. Other than that probably better options. Oldies - squeeze that pulp : Bryan Shaw - Cleveland is much smarter than me, but his stuff feels like his use of the cutter SO exclusively is underrating what he gets from his curve, slider. I unno. Brandon Kintzler - I just don't think the Phillies pitchers are used well. He's old as hell and probably just sucks now, but he was a decent reliever with Cubs, Marlins then sucked as for some reason the Phillies upped his extremely meh 4 seamer. Blake Parker - I like split finger pitchers, always have always will Yusmeiro Petit - excellent control, and maybe a normal offseason after a normal year gets one more year. Nice stuff on his cutter still.

I think he has the latest edition of the Baseball Encyclopedia memorized. He definitely knows a lot of names. If he ever wrote a tell all involving seedy characters, he probably would have to go into witness protection.

If Caulfield ever writes a book, he will definitely name names. It might be all that he does, but he will at least do that.

Moniak is like getting soap for christmas

Lux is way, way better

versatility is one way to describe it.

Least surprising take.

Well go ahead, buy into the hype with Vaughn but check back with yourself after next season and see if he lived up to it. I suspect he may become a slightly better than average hitter (.250-.270 BA with 20-25HR ) and that he will be deployed in a platoon role once again next season. Not that bad but maybe less than what I hear that some fans expect from him. I do not think Hahn can replace Vaughn's production in a trade, so he stays, at least for another year. And no, Hahn is not going to trade Eloy. Trade Eloy and replace him with Vaughn? My God what has gotten into some of you ? -

I'm not a sage when it comes to determining player value. I'd like to know from anyone better at it what they think of the Value section at the very bottom of a player's page on Fangraphs under the Dollars portion. Dollars is described as "WAR converted to dollars based on what a player would make in Free Agency". I assume the number is the worth in millions. According to that info here is what I saw for the 2021 season. Conforto: $6.5 which is the worst of his career. Also the worst defense of his career. RAR Runs Above Replacement (batting + base running + fielding + positional + replacement) 8.1 Vaughn: $2.4 3.0 RAR 127 games, 469 PA Burger $2.5 RAR 3.1 . 15 games, 42 PA Sheets: $3.4 , 4.2 RAR , 54 games ,179 PA Eloy Jimenez: $1.9 , RAR 2.4 , 55 games 231 PA. Eloy had a .8 WAR in his 1st 13 games back after injury and finished the season at .2. Those last 32 games hurt the Sox bad. Edited to include him. Madrigal : $10.7 All positive numbers across the board for batting, base running, and fielding. 13.7 RAR Scwarber: $24.5 30.6 RAR basically his hitting value more than cancelled out his negative values in other things but his fielding didn't look so terrible in LF. Much like Vaughn will always be negative but negative passable . RF for both highly questionable. Escobar : $23.9 29.8 RAR all positive numbers, 3rd best of his career all coming in his last 3 full season, not counting Covid year. Segura: $19.8 24.6 RAR 5th highest value of his career which shows you his consistency. Gavin Lux : $8.3 10.3 RAR Tony Kemp: $21.7 RAR 27.1 No history of anything remotely close to these numbers. Madrigal size and 30 yo. Bryan Reynolds : $43.8 , RAR 54.6 to give you some perspective we have.. Bryce Harper : $53.0 , RAR 66.1

You can google my Twitter handle + Jerry Reinsdorf and see how much I’ve roasted JR over the last decade or so. It’s plenty. I call it as I see it just like you do. And I think you’re wrong. You’re looking at the Graveman signing incorrectly and retrospectively. The White Sox signed him because they feel like they know how to take his 2021 success and build off it. They don’t feel like they’re “buying high” and hoping for the best. They see a pitcher with high leverage, shut down “shit” that went untapped until 2021 and think they can tap into it even more. Everyone I talked to “in the business” thinks it was a great signing for the Sox. That doesn’t mean it will be, but as it sits now, there’s not a whole lot to nitpick about this move. That is unless, like I said, they piece mail the rest of the offseason. I’ve been told they won’t but if they do we all have a right to burn it down. Just gotta let the rest of the offseason work itself out

Trust of the process is earned, not given. The Sox, from a signing MLB talent standpoint have been pretty abysmal. If we're being honest with ourselves, this team is only where they are because they were incapable of building around some stars and flipped them for young talent that pretty much all hit - which is a testament to their abilities at the lower levels to identify talent. Their supplementing of this group has been atrocious though and not at all what they promised. They have signed 1 nice asset - Grandal - and had to trade from the youth to acquire the other one (Lynn). Keuchel is a donut, Kimbrel was a shit show, Eaton was a flat out embarrassment, and their scouting of Cesar was amateur hour.

And they simply can't have every player making 8 figures. As much as we want them to be, they simply aren't a Top 5 spending team and have a lot of money tied up in a lot of different places. They luckily don't hold a lot of "bad money" but Vaughn should provide them + production at a base level salary. That alone provides a decent amount of value. Trading Madrigal also impacted plans, as that's another position where money is now going to have to be spent.

One thing Schwarber does well defensively is throw, but the rest is pretty bad. The thing is, with Robert in CF fully healthy, I wouldn't be too worried about the range in the corners. They can cheat towards the lines and the Sox would be fine. What they need is someone who will make the plays when the ball is hit their way, and being able to throw would be a big plus.

Schwarber can’t play RF, end of story

That ship has already begun to sail, I'm afraid. Trading league minimum salary cromulent pieces for a closer that was not needed at the last TDL started the "window shortening" process. (Actually, it started when they didn't try to regain the year of control on Kopech/start to stretch him and Crochet out to start last season.) With every big contract handed out to SPs, the less likely Giolito re-signs here. With every big contract handed out to shortstops, the less likely TA re-signs here. Add into it the aging process on Hendriks/Keuchel/Abreu/Grandal and we can already see the ending of this window coming. With exactly Jack and Shit in MiLB to replace soon-to-be departing and/or aging pieces, we should probably make peace with the fact that this window ain't gonna be "5 to 7 more years." Agreed. But once you accept that this window will close (probably in 2023/4), will it really matter in 5 to 7 years? I dont "want to" trade Vaughn, but we don't have a lot of years to wait for this org to get it together. Banners fly forever.

Yes, let's look forward. This is a guy described as a Paul Goldschmidt type, Paul Konerko on steroids, making very little money with a ton of control. Looking forward, a guy like this is exactly what the team needs even if JR breaks the bank, because even if he does have a huge payroll, eventually that means luxury tax. That his something JR didn't want to pay even when he was printing money with the Bulls. Vaughn is a keeper. The Sox will rue the day they let him go unless a team overpays.

Good idea but nope on Gore. Far too many questions about his command. I’d be ok with Vaughn for Reynolds or K. Marte (part of package).

I'm tired of hearing about different ideas for trading key assets for another third starter. Generic "rotation depth" is not a top need. I mean, we could use it like all teams could use it, but it's not a priority for this team. We need a TOR starter who can take the mound in key playoff games. We should buy one, but if we can't I'm not interested in gutting our team to get just another dude.

lol

Outs Above Average: Eloy Jimenez: +2 (LF) Vaughn : -3 (LF) FRAA: Eloy Jimenes: -0.2 Andrew Vaughn: -3.8

Liam will have to throw 6 innings in 3 days and then come home and jab them in their sleep cause he's a psycho.

The Natural Immunity Warriors

We would have...EASILY....the worst defense in the league. Schwarber makes ZERO sense on this roster. None what so ever. We already have a glut of bad corner OF / 1B / DH types, and we're adding another? It makes no sense. Yes the bat is nice, but as Hawk says, "where he gonna play?". So you sign Schwarber, you now basically have to trade one of Eloy/Vaughn. Its likely Vaughn (who is the best OF defender of the 3, probably) and now you're stuck playing 2 of Eloy/Schwarber/Sheets in the OF nearly everyday. ITs terrible. And you're paying him $20M AAV to boot? Hate hate hate hate hate it. But it what a "White Soxy" move, so I wouldn't put it past them.

RIP nearest toilet 30 minutes later.

Jesse Rogers on the White Sox Talk Podcast said he thinks the Sox are “closer to pushing all in” than they have been in the past decade. Pointed out adding a big left-handed bat is a huge priority with Schwarber & Conforto guys he’s heard they are exploring. Also said they will certainly address 2B (exploring many options), SP (hasn’t heard them connected to the top free agents), and RP (threw out bringing back Tepera as a possibility). Didn’t rule out Semien at 2B, but feels it’s unlikely given him being RH (acknowledged he does hit RHP) and what should be a substantial price point. He pointed to Escobar being the more logical solution via free agency if adding a big LH bat elsewhere. Chuck then threw out the Kimbrel for Segura hypothetical and Rogers didn’t completely rule it out, but didn’t feel like it was something the Sox would aggressively pursue.

The only second basemen better than Segura in FA is Semien (far better). And there really isn't anyone particularly close.

Or a Greek island…

Above teams sorted from highest bullpen payroll to lowest. Number is the league ranking of bullpen fWAR Dodgers ($45m) 5th in bullpen fWAR Yankees ($35m) 3rd White Sox ($29m) 2nd Red Sox ($29m) 9th Astros ($18m) 14th Blue Jays ($13m) 25th Cardinals ($12m) 11th Brewers ($3.75m) 15th Giants ($3m) 6th Rays ($3m) 1st

“Segura has a 98 wRC+ as a RHH vs RHP” Soxtalk: “BOOOOO” “Escobar has a 98 wRC+ as a SH vs RHP” Soxtalk: “Yaaaaaaaaay”