Chi Town Sox

If it's true, it makes sense, IMO. If JR will really do whatever KW wants and his comments do align with the shared story, perhaps Jerry is far removed with KW calling the shots and telling Hahn what to go in and hold firm at. My boss gets a bonus based on budget each year and if she makes a decision that I don't like or agree with, I'm definitely going to her boss or the owner of the company because I'm not getting what I want. Hahn could have known his hands were tied and used that Harvard Law degree to talk KW into signing subpar players to entice Machado. This is a business and every business has useless employees on the payroll, every company also has people that care about the budget even though they aren't the owner. This could all be BS but just sharing what he was told. Obviously, this all doesn't matter in the end because if we didn't sign a $300M free agent, we aren't going to sign a bigger one with this regime.

Thought I'd share an interesting story that is not Trout but related to these big deals, my brother has been doing some work at a White Sox employee's house. FWIW, He asked him about the Machado non-signing once he found out he was in the organization. As has been discussed, $300M was the number from day one and Manny badly wanted to come to Chicago as opposed to anybody else "at the table". We've also heard directly from Kenny that he didn't want to go to $300M, this is true but what isn't public is that "supposedly" JR does whatever Kenny tells him to do and was prepared to go to that number from day 1. Hahn is uber-pissed at KW along with many internally and KW is apparently 100% of the problem when it comes to signing and offering big money to free agents. If you look, the Sox really haven't made a significantly big contract signing since Albert Belle in 1996, KW took over just a few short years after that and we have not seen the money spent on a premier FA since that time.

Kuechel isn’t bringing any fan support back right now, it’s up to the young guys at this point.

But we are a major market, yes we have drafted pretty well but our front office has not done a good job of showing they can go for it in several years. I don’t have a fuzzy feeling that we are going to continually draft good players and find a way to trade them for someone elite because it has yet to happen. They’ve played well lately but overall they are a dumpster fire.

Lol, that’s basically what I said in different words...

I think we are seeing why some people out there picked them to compete a little and even finish 8th in the playoff race (I think Barkley did). There is talent there especially adding Porter but they will still be in NBA hell until they get a legitimate superstar or Lauri becomes Dirk.

Yeah, they are really "about people" lately 😝

But yet the two teams that everybody suggested would be all in on these players BOTH wouldn't hit that amount and it sounds like they had the chance to at least match it. I could be wrong but what do I know.

I am definitely sickened by missing out on Machado but it's interesting to imagine that maybe his interviews didn't go over that great, whether it be the hustle comment or the "dirty plays" over his career and it caused multiple teams to not want to go to $300M and try to get him for a "discount". Phillies wouldn't go $300M? Padres outbid everyone...crazy.

And if Jerry told him he won't approve $300M guaranteed for Machado, then what? Nobody knows what actually happened behind closed doors.

This is what nobody knows and what nobody will ever find out unless maybe when Hahn and KW are no longer in the organization and want to talk. The owner makes the decisions, anybody that has had to report any type of sale or deal to the owner of a private company they worked for knows how difficult these processes can be to accomplish.

Not ideal but I'll take some. The last thing we want is to get any more irrelevant than they already are.

They have been receiving backlash all day, they (hopefully) aren't going to come out and say that Harper is an option just to "fail" for a second time.

Regarding the two prized possessions, the only thing we can hope for is the White Sox fully expected (like everybody) that Harper would sign after Machado. They gave it the old college try to get Machado at a discount and are (hopefully) fully prepared to pony up for Harper.

I really hope so. It's super surprising to me that they would openly go after these FA's, act like legit players in the game and look like absolute fools to nationwide media.