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I don't understand why people keep arguing around deadline moves. It's a total crapshoot unless you grab the stud on the market or have a fix in mind for a guy who underperformed and the fix actually works. I would prefer the Sox didn't trade for Castillo for these reasons, but I can understand why they tried. This is just such a pointless waste of time, and that's saying something for this place. The team made the ALDS and ran out of steam when they were 1 win away from the ALCS. Let's build on that this offseason and see if they make the right moves to build a serious contender.

IF they acquired a better starting pitcher who brought them an extra win to take first place, they miss the first round against Houston to gear up for Cleveland. If they take first place, they open the ALDS at home against Cleveland or Houston, and maybe they're completely overwhelmed by that crowd, as they were in reality. Again, I'm not even sure what you're arguing against, as I agree with you that they could have done better in acquiring a starting pitcher. But of course, in this discourse, we can always imagine somebody dropping their no-trade clause because they know Sox fans are so great to play for. Or Mason Adams and Boston Smith could be turned into a top notch SP and a closer. Unless they're trading for a starting pitcher who is also the best hitting coach in the game, you keep ignoring that when it came to crunch time, this team twice set the strikeout record in clinching games. But hey, acknowledging that this team had more problems than just one starting pitcher makes me one who idolizes Chris Getz. LOL.

yankee stadium (ruth's) fenway camden jacob's field (cleveland) rate & comiskey metrodome (minn) both tiger stadiums kaufman (royals) Big A (recent reno) Oakland Coliseum Previous Arlington Safeco (Seattle) Olympic Stadium (Atlanta) RFK (DC) Shea (previous) Both Milwaukees Wrigley Old Busch Riverfront (Cincinnati) Dodger Coors Field (Colorado) Whatever San Francisco's called Milwaukee's old park had a great vibe to it. I believe you couldn't see the field from either Arlington or Cleveland's concourses. Dodger Stadium and Kaufman were both cool in that I always saw them on TV as a kid and visiting was a life's dream. Safeco is cool walking by the bullpens. RFK sucked in that from the middle tier, you couldn't see popups for the upper deck overhang. Riverfront and RFK both sucked in that they were old, worn down, the astroturf in Cincinnati had patches and was fluorescent. The RollerDome sucked, too. Magglio Ordonez left our group comp tickets, as we kept running into the White Sox at the hotel we stayed. That didn't suck. I mostly just remember the seated game experience for most of these. There's often drinking involved, which limits the note-taking. San Fran and Fenway have great neighborhood experiences, as does Seattle, Wrigley. I never got to the Bowling HOFs across from Busch stadium. Riverfront was one of the cooler fan experiences, everybody dressed in red crossing the Ohio River bridge. Sat near Joe Crede's aunt and cousin at the Sox game in St. Loo. Great food in Seattle, one real option in Dodger stadium (King Tacos?). If you walk from the Embarcadero in SF, Red's Java Hut was a must stop. My wife and I drank beers in their parking lot during their first modern World Series run, and we fell in love with that team. Rooted for them that year. Saw Curt Schilling no-hit the As into the 9th until Shannon Stewert broke it up with 2 outs. Milwaukee can heat the stadium to about 30 degrees warmer than the outside temperature. Whenever I joke that I bet they can get it up to about 120 in the summer, whoever I tell that to corrects me that they probably don't have the heat on in the summer.

I thought he passed away last year?

You're also obsessed with declaring a single trade a success. They may not try to "win" every trade, but they do try to improve the team with each trade. I get it, you idolize Chris Getz and need to frame everything as a complete win over and over and over and over, just to make sure everyone gets exposed to that very niche opinion that is very underrepresented, LOL.

Go look at the numerous posts around the trade deadline — many posters were saying that acquiring two starters was a must. Most notably, @Chicago White Sox was screaming it from the hills. I told him at the time that the Sox would likely half-ass it as always and Castillo would be their only starter acquisition. You mention the Doyle acquisition but Getz had to give up one of his starter options that could have helped this year just to acquire him. The trade deadline was a D and better acquisitions could have definitely been the difference in winning the division and advancing in the postseason. I don’t understand why this is even a controversial take. It was a one game difference in the regular season and the Sox also had a demanding 2-0 lead against the Guardians in the ALDS after playing the first two road games. A starter or even two that actually pitched in the postseason, unlike awful Castillo, couldn’t have made a difference?

This is funny. I agree with you that had they acquired a SP who did better, maybe they make up that one game. I doubt one starting pitcher gets them further in the playoffs. So there's not really an argument to "win" or "lose". You keep on obsessing over a single trade, like that made the difference. It didn't. They had a great defensive OF in the playoffs thanks to the Doyle trade. Brazoban and Bart were good pickups. One got injured, and the other regressed. That's always the risk with deadline trades. You're not picking up a guy who threw in 3 games that season. He's had an entire season's workload by the time he gets to the Sox. You're also obsessed with declaring a single trade a failure. A GM amasses players. They don't try to "win" every trade. I get it. You hate Chris Getz, and need to frame everything as an utter failure, over and over and over and over, just to make sure everybody gets exposed to that very niche opinion that is very under-represented here. LOL. Most pitchers traded at the deadline did worse on their new teams. It's a crap shoot. The Sox really had one prospect at peak value and that was Bonemer. Anybody else would have been selling low. And please tell me which starting pitcher they could have acquired for Mason Adams and Boston Smith. I'd imagine if teams were clamoring for those guys, Adams/B. Smith for Skubal would have been the first trade off the board.

Exactly, the guy was basically a huckster.

Just like the certainty Iowa will win some blowouts over teams like WSH or Minnesota or Wisconsin but still get pummeled by Ohio State. Although to be fair they did give Indiana one of their toughest games in 2025...mostly because it was at Kinnick.

What was TB's record in games Peralta started? Ofc WEddy also argued that Robbie Ray and Castillo were "equal" acquisitions at the deadline based on overall team results in their starts. In 2026, Luke Keaschall hit .281 vs left‑handed pitching and .277 vs right‑handed pitching, with stronger production on the road (.293 AVG) than at home (.258 AVG)Keaschall or McCarthy instead of Dominic Fletcher/Braden in RF the last two months gets the job done as well.

Two offenses that went quiet in postseason but Padres were just 2-3 big plays away from a completely different result against Milwaukee...France girder ball, Machado robbed homer by Mitchell that would have tied it and Morejon/Miller wearing down at the exact wrong time for SD.

The new season of The Diplomat was just outstanding. Literally the best writing on television right now.

They still only lost the division by one freaking game, even with how bad the offense was. You don’t think had they acquired a better starter other than Castillo, who was a complete and utter failure, it couldn’t have made the difference? You are being illogical and you also must realize you have lost the argument when you are being up unrelated trade rumors from years past.

Does WestEddy believe they actually would have gotten the same performance out of Peralta? There's a nice symmetry going from Brewers to ex GM Stearns to now the Rays facing Milwaukee. Just like former Guardians Caminero Yandy Diaz and Jake Bauers all facing each other ... Rasmussen traded from MIL and ending up with Rays, etc.

We might have also gotten the guys the Cubs got; or the Padres.

Somebody just said this somewhere... The offense collapsed in the last 2 months. Once they got to a clinching game in Chicago, they started setting strikeout records. You seem to be ignoring everything besides Luis Castillo. Maybe if they would have taken the offer on the table for Luke Keaschall...

According to my research some of Veeck's minority partners were some of the richest people in America at that time but the reason he never went back to them for more financial help after their original investment was because he promised them that he would never do that and he said that he'd turn a profit every year for them. It was a matter of him giving his word and not be willing to go back on it. Take that for whatever it's worth to you. I've never heard anything along the lines of trying to make it easier to sell the club by having the lowest payroll.

Came back and wanted to comment in this thread. This was by far the most exciting and fun season (I was 13 in 2005) I have had as a fan, especially given the expectations prior to the season. Thank you to every player on the roster that contributed to this truly historic season. The Sox have a really good core of young players both in the majors and the minors. And now is the time to supplement the roster and make this feeling an annual feeling. I love being happy and I love being pissed off at games again when they don't play well. Means I (we) care as fans again and that baseball is back on the South Side. Let's go Sox

And lost the division by one game and a playoff series to the same team after being up 2-0 on the road. A starter other than Castillo who didn’t pitch in the postseason could definitely have been the difference, without even mentioning also adding a second starter which most posters wanted Getz to do.

I am pretty sure every single team's fan base would say this about their manager.

Yeah, maybe a competent starting pitcher gets them into first place, and they still lose games 3 & 4 in Cleveland, and game 5 in Chicago because the offense shut down. Or they lose their s%*# and can't perform before an insane home crowd in games 1 & 2, and they're 3 and done. No, it's not a stretch to say they needed another SP and didn't get one. It is a stretch to pretend that another SP would have revitalized the team, kept half the offense from slumping after the TDL, and becoming overwhelmed when they got to a clinching game. They went 5-4 in Castillo's 9 starts.

Ultimately, I'm a skeptic about the importance of managers, especially how much they can add (I could see a bit more that they could subtract by really pissing in the punch bowl). That said, if they do have big impacts, it's in the soft and hard to measure things. Creating an atmosphere where players are able to meet their potential, avoid bad mental/emotional issues, that kind of thing. Sox were a team that you'd say before the season that if everything went right, they could sneak into the playoffs, but of course it won't really work that way. Yet they got in! So I will give Will Venable credit for being in charge of a team that greatly exceeded expectations and did so in a fashion that so many people involved in it felt like was due to the social environment in the clubhouse, which is Venable's domain. Many of the things people get mad at Venable about are things that I actually think they should be mad at Getz about, if they are going to be mad at anybody. Today's managers do not control the team's philosophy over things like the use of openers, how lefty/righty matchups are weighed in personnel decisions, the batting order, etc. I remember last offseason when Venable said explicitly in an interview that the batting order was something set by front office stat guys and at that time he wasn't comfortable even trying to explain why it was the way it was. He sometimes has to independently implement the front office vision and can do that in a better or worse way, but I strongly suspect he's getting feedback in near-real-time on that stuff and adjusts accordingly (not unlike the hitters getting daily reports on their swing decisions).

I'm really not making up people saying that Getz got "lucky" with particular players working out, having little to nothing to do with this season's success, or predicting quick regression back to 100-loss seasons. That's all a regular feature of the comments here.

I read a few years ago that the owner of the Brewers said they were happy how their stadium was built but if they had to do it all over again they would have had the stadium built in downtown Milwaukee. Evidently there was one area in the Milwaukee downtown where a stadium could have been built.

Tampa is interesting in this context. They had the best team in the AL, yet right before the season they traded Tristan Peters to the Sox for a little cash. Peters would make the All-Star Game while CF is arguably Tampa's weakest position (nearly league-worst offense mitigated somewhat by excellent defense). But of course, nobody will be overhauling the crew in TB's front office. Over in Boston, I don't know if anyone is ready to put Craig Breslow in the front office hall of fame. But I found his comments near the deadline interesting when he said (I'm paraphrasing a bit) that he's not trying to win trades, he's trying to win games. Basically, judge me for how the team plays rather than how many trades he wins and by how much. We all remember how great it was when Rick Hahn was winning the offseason.