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Well gee I guess there will be no offseason for anyone then. No one is going to spend any money and no organization will have a different plan than the one they had the year prior. Got it. I bet teams like the Blue Jays for instance just aren't going to try to get better until owners quit crying poor. Your shilling for ownership at every turn is truly pathetic and digusting. You shill not only for reinsdorf but everyone else too.

There should be no question that the C position will get significantly worse defensively with McCann gone, and most likely, the pitchers ERAs will increase. McCann leaving means more time behind the plate for Grandal who will be 1 year older, and it's most likely going to be Collins picking up the rest of the ABs. If it's Grandal + Collins + Yermin behind the plate, oh boy, we're going to be baaaad back there. If there is one guy I would be 100% on board with throwing big money at this offseason it is Realmuto. Grandal's contract is moveable for sure and he doesn't have a NTC. Sure it could be seen as a "shrewd" move, but signing Grandal with McCann already here coming off of an All-Star season was already a shrewd move behind the plate. Realmuto is p4p one of the best players in all of baseball. He's the best C in baseball and would be a serious addition to our core. He's the best C in the game IMO since Yadier Molina, and Yadier IMO is the best one since Ivan Rodriguez. I would absolutely throw money at him. And I think there would be several teams willing to take Grandal off of our hands and still give us a good prospect because his deal is not bad at all and he is still a good player, just nowhere near as good as Realmuto. Edit: I'll add one more thing: Realmuto as a C is a better longterm, big money investment than Machado or Harper would have been, and because he's a C, no matter how great he is, I don't think he can do better than 6 years guaranteed with any options after that being heavily incentivized.

Steve's opinions very rarely directly reflect the FO plans. It's not that he's always incorrect, just that he's not in the know as much as some assume.

If they're not ready to sign a big one year deal then the rebuild never ended.

I am just going to say it. With the line up the Sox have it is WAY easier to hide a bad to mediocre RF, than it is to hide the fact our starting pitching was not deep enough. We need a top half SP WAY worse than we need a RF. We could go into next season with internal options in RF, and as long as we do something with the rotation, I will be good.

Whatever the WAR says, Realmuto is a much better defensive catcher. And it makes sense because in Realmuto you are talking about getting a guy who will be the next guy worth talking about after Fisk and then AJ. He'd be locked up for many years and nobody would be talking about moving him off of the position by midseason 2021 and especially by the 2021-22 offseason. But mark my words those conversations will be coming re: Grandal even if I don't say a word about it personally. Yas is a good hitter though and lefty bat is nice. But we already have enough DHs here. The fit really isn't great or necessary. As a short-term fix, fine, but anytime there is a player the quality of Realmuto on the market I think you have to take a shot. It's such an extreme rarity.

And even if Engel hits .220 next year, we know he will catch the ball, which is what we really need for our pitching.

Most of my takes are correct, but people focus on a select few due to the fake news moderators that slander my name around here

Need this one

This is a fun hot take.. well done.

Could you add something hotter - possibly a blue flame emoji for Jack Parkman's gamethread takes?

I'm elated that your Padres are getting beaten down, @caulfield12. There is no other team I want to lose more than the Padres after they lied about Shields' health. Fuck them.

Brosseau taking Chapman deep. Love it. Now get three outs.

Trade Vaughan to the Red Sox for left-handed right fielder Verdugo. Seems fair.

BTW just in case anyone cared, Yas burned the shit out of his scrambled eggs this morning. What happened was that there was a spider crawling across the ceiling in the kitchen, and it was really high on the ceiling but still kind of in the area where the stove is, and he was watching the spider because the spider may have been poisonous, but regardless, if the spider decided to descend on some silk into his eggs then certainly his eggs would be ruined. So he watched the spider for about 4 or 5 minutes until he smelled something burning which is exactly when he realized he fucked his eggs. So then he took the pan off of the flame and went to flip the eggs over with the spatula to see if they could be salvaged, but then just as he was flipping the eggs, out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of the spider descending from the ceiling, at which point he dropped the pan onto the floor with the spatula in it. But then as he tried to catch the spatula with one hand, somehow he accidentally kicked the pan with the eggs in it about 6 feet across the floor until it hit the bottom of the refrigerator. When his wife came in and asked what happened, he of course explained himself and said it would never happen again.

If anyone seriously believes that JT Realmuto is only a marginal upgrade over Yasmani Grandal, all I can say is ?

I just don’t think it’s an idea would exploring as there is literally zero chance the Sox go through the gymnastics of moving Grandal just to sign Realmuto. The Sox may add a better backup than Collins, but the starting catching position is not a problem for us and will not be a priority for us this offseason. A TOR starter, a high leverage reliever, a veteran swingman, and a RF upgrade are where Hahn will spend his time and effort.

Trump is up to $1.8 trillion on the stimulus. Pelosi started at $3 trillion, and said she would make a deal at $2 trillion and was called crazy. Looks like she should have written the Art of a Deal.

This White House lies so often, I would be more likely to believe Trump was healthy if they told me he was on deaths door.

If picking up a RF means we have less to spend on pitching, then I’d say roll with what we’ve got in RF including Mazara. He looked a bit better down the stretch, and he may have also been impacted by getting no summer camp since he had COVID. If it still seems like we need to fill a hole in the lineup, then we could pickup someone before the trade deadline. Put all resources towards pitching this off season.

Odorizzi is my cheaper target. I'd rather him than Stroman.

Honestly same. Just find a lefty bat to pair with Engel and role with that. Doesn't have to be a huge signing. Even if they end up having to go with Engel as the primary starter, you at least have good defense and speed in a deep lineup.

This isn’t about pettiness, Eaton is a huge fucking disruption in the clubhouse and should not be signed under any circumstance. I love the player and how his skills would fit the team, but full stop he is not worth the headache.

By this logic, bring back Ozzie too

I think if his doctor gives him the OK to be out of isolation, he should have to hang around and monitor him without any PPE, and no one in the WH or Trump family, Lindsay Graham and the rest of his enablers should not be allowed to wear any PPE around him either.

I understand who Conforto’s agent but you can look as far back as last season Mookie Betts forgoing his free agency, Yelich same thing - the 2 best right fielders in baseball. The Sox aren’t in this position anymore where they can sit on their hands and let these superstar/star players slip through the cracks, unfortunately the tough decisions to get rid of young high ceiling guys is upon us. I would GLADLY get rid of Cease for “1 year” of Conforto

If he could learn LF, it would be ideal.

I didn't think there was a shot in hell the Nats would decline their $10M option on Eaton, but sounds like its possible. Eaton is jackass and I am not sure this FO will show interest, but his skillset is a good fit for the roster. Definitely one of the better options if he does indeed become a FA. I don't think he is half as good of a defender as he was when he was with the Sox, but would still be at worst an average RF.

The people you're trading for pitching depth are your pitching depth. They just need to actually develop. Trading Mendick and Collins makes no sense when you lose Yolmer and McCann. Unless you're bringing in a left handed rightfielder, trading those young pieces makes very little sense based on the small sample size of 2020.

Let's not pretend that you wouldn't be earning just as many blue flames

If Adam LaRoche is willing to come out of his retirement doing undercover missions to stop sex slave trading in Southeast Asia and we can bring the entire band back together including team leader Drake then I’m totally game.

Vaughn is definitely a bit short for a 1b and not the prototypical 1b prospect, not just because of height but because typically 1b prospects in the top50 overall have 70-80 raw while vaughn is more 55-60 raw that plays up due to his hit tool but really I don't care how he produces at the plate and really stretching and scooping is only a minor part of 1b Defense (there was a FG article that really about 75-80% of a 1b defense is not how he receives and scoops throws but how he fields balls hit to him as most of the Receiving is just routine plays.

Oh? Who?

I'm not sure who would argue the opposite. He's been good. Time for Coward and Bars Nagy the playcaller stinks. Nagy the HC is good. These guys play HARD for him

So you expect a Top !0 RF in baseball to just forego Free Agency ? Not likely. You just can't give up Cease (+) for a guy with 1 year left with just a hope and a prayer of locking him up.

So there are rumblings that the Nats may decline Adam Eaton's option. What are people's opinions on him in RF?

There are four downs in football Tom Brady! Learn to count and show some sportsmanship instead of being a whiny baby!

Brady lost track of downs ?

Kmet a wasted pick, much bigger needs

Just to help Harry with this question: "do you know what it would do to the Market if the State of Illinois was forced to declare bankruptcy" If Illinois was a nation, it would have the 18th highest GDP in the world; ahead of countries like Saudi Arabia. Now when you do your analysis on the catastrophic damage a state that size filing for bankruptcy would do to the economy - if it were allowed - you'll have a starting point on the debt we're talking about. 782 billion is the states GDP

The big thing for me is not going to Cam. Cowardly. I said it before - if you want to take a swing swing big. Newton was either going to be rejuvenated and great or he was a low risk guy you move on from. Foles is better than this - you just know he is totally mediocre. But Foles is good enough you know whether it’s Nagy or a talent issue.

Tim Anderson already has the catching position locked up, sorry

I don't think Vaughn is a prototypical first basemen, unless one considers Prince Fielder to be the prototype. Vaughn has some hefty thunder thighs, short arms and short legs. Definitely not the body type that one would consider to be best suited for 1B. Catcher or DH perhaps.

Just for the record, we just added a fire reaction for the post reacts. Enjoy.

Stoney was on the WS Talk Podcast. Some notes: - again repeated Ricky is great before and after the game, but didn’t have much positive to say about him in-game - hated the production from EE - very critical of the performance from Mazara - doesn’t think Sox should sign Bauer - extremely critical of Grandal’s defense, and said that Frank and Ozzie hated his pitch selection

Ozzie could do eeny, meeny with his bullpen and win games in 2005. That means he's smart! A half season later the BP was floundering. Does that mean he got dumb, or that managers are as good as their bullpens? Either way, the Cubs once yanked Lou Boudreau out of the radio booth at midseason and replaced Charlie Grimm(?) with him. Might it happen here? God no!

/ Close thread

I wouldn’t mind seeing Ricky get replaced since he is terrible at ingame strategy decisions. To his credit though, the players love him and always play hard for him, there is no clubhouse drama and he seems to be a good guy in general.