Chisoxfn

Cease's stuff is so good. Will be exciting if his arm and body can hold up and if the franchise can build up his stamina. Guy clearly has starters stuff. Downside wise, he'll be a darn good reliever (closer / set-up guy). I'm hoping he can stick as a starter though cause he's got electric stuff.

Welcome aboard; Great to have a fellow Sox fan on board. My one word of advice is be patient...you've jumped onto the Sox at a difficult time, yet exciting time. Difficult because the team is not very good at the moment, but exciting because we are in the 2nd year of a massive rebuild and our young players and minor league system are extremely strong and offer us fantastic hope at being a strong team in the near future (2020ish).

I consider everything "ifs" until they happen, but I see many scenarios where a few months from now we are getting much better quality starts (or are at least seeing upside out of our starters). Right now we are going to be as bad as it gets (i.e., Miguel (now his replacement) / Fulmer / Shields). Replace 2 of those guys with Rodon and Kopech and things are much more interesting, especially if Lopez keeps limiting guys while making strides with his command and of course Gio getting things back together and taking steps forward. Now all of a sudden you have 4 guys who long-term you believe in (still need to figure out if any can emerge as aces) but that is a huge difference from the current rotation. Of course it could always just completely blow up, Rodon could reinjure himself, Gio could continue sucking, Lopez gets hurt and Kopech gets hurt. The nice thing is when it comes to Kopech / Rodon, I see no scenario (where they are healthy) where they aren't at least good major league pitchers. Both of them have way too good of stuff. Injuries are the only thing that train-wreck their careers, imo.

Fantastic news. Getting him healthy and being the guy he is (and will become (if he is healthy) would be a huge benefit to the rebuild.

They would still be using straws, just these non-plastic paper based versions that are better for the environment. I presume they would use the rest of their existing straws and than go to the lower footprint ones.

Way too premature for me to make any statement on Rick related to this years team. I was thoroughly impressed with him last year and think he is a good manager. That said, baseball is tough and he's going to have some bad squads that will be difficult to manage through (losing regularly is tough, whether you know your team is bad or not..it stings).

I'm not concerned; He's the one guy on our staff that I'm not worried about. I think Gio will turn it around as well. The real question will be what is there upside. In the case of Rey Lo, we are talking about a guy who has thrown just over 90 innings professionally at the big league level. I'm excited that he seems to be getting guys out and his stuff clearly plays. Pitchability and going deeper into games will come with experience. It isn't like his stuff deteriorates around the 80 pitch mark or something...this is more about him just learning to pitch more efficiently.

That is awesome. I'm getting fired out. Quietly I hope we trade down...more fun to have more picks haha.

Yeah - Let's do a separate draft thread.

Ah so nothing to this other than yoan was a little hurt. Better answer!

I like that Ricky pulled him. Set the tone and message. Yoan will be the better player because of it or at least I hope he will be.

Echo those sentiments. All the best to Pop and family.

I think Minny puts a scare with Houston and the series goes at least 6. Minny has got to be the best 8 seed in NBA history. Really been enjoying this postseason thus far. Maybe because I literally stoped watching basketball the final month of the season (couldn't really take the Bulls post Niko trade). Too many games where Dunn / Lavine / Mark weren't playing and they are the only reason to watch. Glad Davis finally got a win...albeit my big plan is for him to get tired of not winning and forcing a trade to Chicago. I am very curious to see if Indy can knock out Cleveland. I have a feeling we are going to see Lebrun just go nuts the rest of the series. Philly sure seems like they are headed to the post-season. Just watching the east makes me wonder what the Bulls chances would have been had they kept Butler and been entering this off-season with a shit-ton of cap space (they would have). They'd have been one of just a few teams and probably could have pretty quickly retooled. I'm kind of surprised that the Bulls keep saying they are going to stay quiet. Pax clearly has said they don't intend to tank another year so why not try and sign LBJ (not that he'd come) or make a run at Boogie or George and put them around the new pick and the rest of the players.

What kind of stuff does Hamilton have?

This team will absolutely get a top 5 pick; my gut tells me we will be picking top 3 and I wouldn't be shocked if we were picking #1 overall. Bullpen and rotation are so so awful.