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QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 25, 2013 -> 10:40 AM) Could not disagree more, except for the jump between High A and AA. That's the biggest, this, the second. WOW. this guy. This is the same guy that thinks demotion would not help Hawkins, two weeks ago, and the talent level between low A and high A is pretty much similar. This is also the guy who suggest to promote Hawkins to Double A 2 weeks ago. Caufield, as a poster, how about you stick to what you really believe in, stop flip flopping positions every week. And for the love of God, spare us from your irrelevant player comparisons.

So much for me being the only extremist on the Hawkins demotion front two week ago. What do naysayers have to say now? Having him keep aimlessly swing out there is going to break him down even further. Something have to be done at this point.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jun 24, 2013 -> 05:50 AM) The point is if you are going to be bad for a long time, like the Astros, Sale pitching ffor several years in meaningless games only increases his chances of getting hurt. He has already missed starts the last 2 seasons with soreness. So the other point would be, when you are ready to win, Sale would be more expensive and perhaps not nearly as effective. If it were a guarantee he would be healthy when the Sox were ready to win, you would not trade him, but pitchers, especially him, are far more likely to acquire a devasting injury than position players. Exactly my point. People who think Sale is in no bigger risk to injury than any other pitcher are either in denial or they really don't think bad pitching mechanics will attribute to a higher chance of injury.

QUOTE (Jake @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 06:39 PM) I have no reason to believe that Chris is any bigger risk than any other starting pitcher at this point. All starters are risky. You might lose a season to injury and/or ineffectiveness, but that's part of the deal. You'd have to get a Giancarlo Stanton++ type package to make sure you're getting another cornerstone in return and that makes you wonder why you would have dealt him in the first place. Most of the time, ineffectiveness due to mechanics/physical wear and tear is long term, not a single season. Exhibit A, Tim Lincecum. Pitching wins championship, we can agree on that. It comes down to whether you build your core pitching first, and wait for your hitting to come along, or build up your hitting now, and sign / trade for pitchers when you are ready. Given the risk and fragility of pitchers you just mentioned as part of the deal, which route would you take? I don't see us competing with the Tigers for another two years. By that time, Sale would have been pitching for 6 to 7 seasons, at least 3-4 seasons of 200 innings+. The risk is higher than ever given his frame/mechanics. Conventional wisdom says you always need an ace atop your staff, and don't let him go if you are looking to compete. But does conventional wisdom apply in every scenario and does conventional wisdom always win you championships?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 06:14 PM) I'm as confident in Sale as any of them at this point. Verlander is older and much more expensive. In case you haven't noticed, Matt Cain has an ERA in the mid-4's right now. The others don't have the record of Sale yet. We're good at keeping guys healthy. This is our task. Neither of us have hard evidence on this. This is just based on our instincts. So your are saying even the best of them aren't reliable to stay healthy/effective in the long term, yet we should hold on to them even if we will go on a 2-3 year drought, even though Sale isn't a safe bet to stay healthy to begin with. So why take on the risk if someone offer you a premium bat or two, which is more of a guarantee to contribute in the term, health wise? Also, in recent years we have had better luck developing pitchers, but no success on the hitting front so far. By your logic, you are really confident that the Sox will compete again as soon as next year with the $30 mil or so they have to spend, given how many whatever positions we have to fill.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 02:45 AM) That was when he was still above .200. He was way down in the .150's and .160's, recovered all the way to .229, but I never thought he'd go back down under .200 for the remainder of the season. Thought he had things somewhat figured out to at least make it through the next 2 1/2 months at Winston-Salem. When you're going 3/40+ AB's with that many K's, it's starting to become counterproductive. He's hitting .190 as of today. Way to exaggerate. Seems like you were analyzing based on a pure batting average to me, based on that post. The only difference between today and two weeks ago he was hitting homeruns, but he isn't anymore. Two weeks ago, he still boast the BB% and base hit minus HR % as he is today. So you basically went from open for promotion to Double A two weeks ago, to have him stay put last week, and now you suggest to demote him this week. Sometimes you got to look at the numbers and analyze further. Just by looking at his numbers minus the HRs he didn't he look like he has things figure out, even two weeks ago.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 06:03 PM) See, I disagree. with the principle here. I think that by far teh easiest way to stay in contention for the long term is to have an ace pitcher. If you can get that, then you've gotten the hardest part done. That reshapes your entire team, especially if he's underpaid relative to his performance. How confident are you that Sale can be the ace long term? If we are in the same situation now, and the guy we are talking about is Verlander, Cain, Harvey, or even Matt Moore, I wouldn't consider it either.

I just want to see where everyone stands on this idea. Apparently most folks are very confident he will be health/effective when we are good again, or we will be good again as soon as next year. Where I am coming from is I see Sale as a risk. I love to watch him pitch, but he's always been an injury concern, and signs still show the past two years. In terms of risk management, we can get creative and transfer the risk to someone who is will to overpay and take on the risk. It might pay off for the other team if he stays healthy, but I rather someone takes on the risk than we do as it stands now. This idea won't even be considered if we are in contention every year, because no one trades their young ace if you are competing. But if we are close to the rebuilding mode, we might as well start from scratch and transfer the risk to someone else and fill one of our biggest needs in the process. If you aren't the Yankees or Red Sox, it takes some forms of creativity to stay in contention for the long term. I see a move like this as one of those moves. If Hahn does pull of this move, and most of the returns do pan out, and Sale is no longer the same pitcher a few years down the road, this will be seen as an incredible brilliant move.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 05:14 PM) If you are totally rebuilding and won't be in contention for several years, Sale would have to be shopped. Pitching 3,4, or 5 or more years in games that are meaningless doesn't serve any purpose. I don't see us competing with the Tigers or with other wild card contenders with just a few minor tweaks. Our biggest need is a middle of the order bat. PK is good as done, Dunn is too unreliable, Rios cannot be a number 3 hitter for a playoff team. Hawkins has a chance to be one, but he's too far away and is far from being a share thing. Taking a quick look at the FA list for next season, Unless we sign Cano, we will still need players to build our offense around.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 04:53 PM) If Mike Trout is available yes. If not, no. He won't be. But if the Cardinals come calling for someone to fill in for Jaime Garcia, and is willing to offer Taveras, Kolten Wong and two pitching prospects for Sale and maybe Alexei, I would have a hard time saying no. This would be a similar deal to the Rays/Royals trade this off season.

QUOTE (Jake @ Jun 23, 2013 -> 04:38 PM) No. Our goal is to be good as soon as possible and as long as possible. Almost any reasonable offer for Sale would undermine both of these goals. Agree with the first part, but I don't think Sale will help us with the second condition. He has already had two minor throwing shoulder/elbow hiccups the past two years. And I quote the unpopular Keith Law "with the way he throws, his shoulder is on buying time." I have a hard time time seeing him healthy/effective in 3 years. To go along with that, if we get a middle of the order bat for him, it will actually let us be good for as long as possible. Hitters are more reliable to stay healthy than pitchers, especially Sale.

This will not be a popular topic for most people, as Sale is the closest to being untouchable on this team. But I always like to go against the popular ideas. If we do fall out of contention by the trade deadline, would you consider offers for Sale? Please elaborate rather than shooting the idea down. Here's why I would consider - Durability. The tall, lanky frame, along with his delivery has always been a concern for injury. I am not confident that he will be healthy and effective two years down the road. He is one of the top 5 starters in AL currently. I expect him to be so for the next year or two. But if we go into rebuilding mode, we won't be competing for a few years. Sale may not be the same pitcher when we are ready to compete again. - Trade value. He will probably be at his peak value at the trade deadline, 24 year old ace recently signed for a long term team friendly contract, and having another hell of a season. He is still relatively healthy. We will be able to net a haul for Sale that will fill several different areas of need and continue to rebuild our farm. - Possibility of trading for an impact, middle of the order bat. The only offers I would consider are ones include a potential middle of the order bat who's close to major league ready. We have had success developing pitchers in recent years, but we struck out more than Adam Dunn did when it comes to hitting prospects. If we can net a middle of the order bat, with a number 2/3 starter prospect, along with a position player with potential to be a everyday regular, I think it will be best for the team long term. - Update: we just lost a frustrating one to the Royals! Reasons to go against it - While long term health is a serious concern, in the event that he actually stays healthy for the next 5-10 years, he will lock up the number 1 starter spot for this team. This is the bet we are taking. - Sale is already proven, prospects are always a risk. - We might be missing a true ace once we are ready to compete again. - Not a popular move for the faithfuls. If attendance is bad right now, it will turn for the worse if we trade Sale. It will be a shot to the fan's face to trade your most exciting player on the team who is only 24 right now, who is also locked up for the next 6-7 years. Conclusion I absolutely love Sale on this team, it will be hard for anyone to let him go. But if I am a betting man, I wouldn't bet on him staying healthy in a few years. He will be at his highest value this summer. Whether we trade him or not, it's a risk we are taking. If we have the potential to address the biggest need of this organization, and rebuild our farm to make a run once the Tigers' time runs out, it's a risk I can take.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 22, 2013 -> 08:45 PM) This is his 2nd "40 days in the desert/completely lost" period of the season. Failing miserably twice, he's no longer going to get the benefit of the doubt based on how he performed in 2012. Everyone knew a high school kid in the Carolina League was a huge risk, it's just that his results last year were so surprising they pushed him too hard. Striking out 60% of the time, that's too much to overcome psychologically. The mental part of the game is overwhelming him now. That stretch of homers probably made him so overconfident, when all he was doing was masking his swing plane flaws by homering his way through the negative results, but without any kind of consistency. Just streaking up and down, like Mitchell did last season. I wouldn't be as hard on you if you didn't feel strongly against the notion just last week. I brought up the Mitchell/Walker comparison because we've been down this road, rushing a raw athlete up a level before he's ready for the pitching is a risk to his development (of course people are still fairly optimistic about Walker because he WAS having a nice June).

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 22, 2013 -> 05:38 PM) http://www.milb.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?g...ox&sid=milb http://www.milb.com/scoreboard/index.jsp?s...mp;ymd=20130622 Hawkins down to .192 from a season high of .229. 3/37 with 22 strikeouts during that stretch. Still has a season OPS of 767, amazingly. It's getting close to time to pull the plug and send him down to Kanny so he can play together with Anderson, Micah Johnson and Barnum. That would be my play. About 10 days ago, I was against moving Hawkins down, but enough is enough. They might think about putting Micah Johnson in the OF and sending him to Winston-Salem, too. If I'm Buddy Bell though, I stick all four of those guys together and let them win a second half championship in the SAL and learn how to play AND WIN together, as well as learning how to play the game the right way. You need to be flamed for such irrational suggestion. Because you are panicking, and If he fixes himself mechanically, he'll dominate anywhere. If he is having the same issues, he's going to struggle almost everywhere.

4 walks in 2 games. I think the Zews of Walks is pretty fitting.

QUOTE (oldsox @ Jun 21, 2013 -> 06:35 AM) Since the Sox need catching, there is a AAA catcher available who is hitting about .330. Can't remember his name. Fegley?? I hear he is available because his current parent team won't bring him up. Freegley*

He won't be a tougher sign than Rodriguez, but Engel is a toolsy outfielder, ranked pretty high on the BA draft board(~150). He was perceived as a 4 or 5th round talent. So it depends if he fell due to signability issue or his draft stock just fell.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jun 17, 2013 -> 12:01 PM) Why? Are you saying the amount of overhead you noted is the remaining pool (assuming Freudenberg is slot) TOTAL underneath the pool limit? There might be other signings from rounds 11-40 that signed for over slot, we just don't know yet. But the signing of Matt Ball probably took away the $100K we have left after the Michalczewski signing. Which makes the signing of Rodriguez impossible. We can still sign Engel if we want to go up to 5% over pool limit, and pay the 75% tax (assuming the rest of the round 11-40 signings only signed for $100K or less).

On the contrast, even if the perceived level of pitching is roughly the same in Low A, a demotion might actually fuel a fire under him and encourage him to work harder to move back up. A demotion could also be a change of scenery and a fresh start that he needed. Also, he might have a better chemistry and he can work better with the hitting coach in Kanny, which could be a possibility given he performed quite well in his short stint in Kanny last year.

QUOTE (danman31 @ Jun 16, 2013 -> 03:26 PM) I agree that the level has nothing to do with it, but if being demoted is such a huge blow emotionally he probably isn't cut out for MLB anyway. Exactly the point I wanted to make a few days ago. If he doesn't have the mental make up to handle adversity such as a demotion when he's striking out at a historical rate, he will not be able to make it in the majors. And it isn't a case where he is play well, or just struggling minorly, and the org sends him down in a surprise move. He is struggling badly, and he knows it. Such a move, if it does occur, is only to help him. It's not that they are pushing him down in favor of a better player.

QUOTE (Springfield SoxFan @ Jun 16, 2013 -> 01:27 PM) Does the new CBA still allow a team to pay for college costs for high school signees? If so does that count against a teams bonus allotment? Yes, and no it will not count against the pool value. I believe Michalczewki's contract has the future tuition stipulation as well.

QUOTE (danman31 @ Jun 15, 2013 -> 10:06 PM) They do that on a semi-regular basis. Obviously if they liked the player in the first place there's a good chance they still like him a few years later. The Sox have almost $800k for those players. If Michalczewski and Freudenberg signed for slot - I think they probably signed for more than slot - the Sox would have $420k for overslot players outside the top 10 rounds. The $420k is the combined amount underslot the bonuses for the eight players that we know the bonuses for. So the Sox have those numbers plus the slot bonuses for Michalczewski and Freudenberg as far as we know. Either way, I doubt $300-400k is enough for Rodriguez. Maybe Engel bites for that much, but honestly, he doesn't interest me at all. What I meant was the Sox have savings of $420K they can sign over the slot value for the rest of their picks. You can't really factor in Freudenberg's slot money when considering how much slot value savings we are going to have, he will at least sign for slot value, and if he doesn't sign, the Sox will lose the slot value. On a side note, this only goes to show you how hard it is to sign high potential high school players that aren't drafted in the first two rounds in this new system. You can sign several picks under slot in the first 10 rounds, but in reality, you will only have enough to sign one or maybe two high impact high school players past round 10. We only drafted 7 high school players this year, and it looks like we will come away with only 4.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 15, 2013 -> 06:57 PM) Their pool number is $5,301,600. 5% of that is $265,080. As long as they stay under 5,566,580, they don't hit the 5% threshold and get taxed. http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2013/6/6/44016...pel-colin-moran I think you might be thinking of the amount that a team can go over when signing picks from rounds 11-40 without counting against the pool money.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 15, 2013 -> 09:22 AM) Fixed. If the Sox decided, they could add about another $260k in bonuses without going over the tax number, but I really doubt they will do so. Correct me if I am wrong, but the $260k (or 5% of the Sox pool value) will get taxed 75%, which is about 200K, but they don't have to give up a pick within 5%. If they don't want to get any extra tax, I don't think they can sign a guy like Engel, let alone Rodriguez.

Lowry's signing was for $400,000, can someone please update? So the Sox have about $420K to play with right now, that's not including the Trey Michalczewski and Matt Ball signing. It will be hard to sign all of those two, Octavio Rodriguez, and Adam Engel with the said amount. I would say they should go up to 5% over pool and pay the 75% tax if they have a chance to sign all 4 players.