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LOL, "Playoff appearances" are NOT the standard, playoff performance and fielding a competitive playoff team is the standard. The stated window for Hahn and any plan seeking accountability is "Championship Window", not winning an AL Central over four tanking teams or a Wild Card birth while legitimate micro small market teams Cleveland and Minnesota were actually trying. Fielding competitive teams that can compete in October is the goal. If they were like the Giants or other teams and played a competitive full series losing in a heartbreaking final game 5/7, than yes, they at least can say they fielded a competitive team with a possible chance at advancing and competing for a WS. The Sox were the least competitive team across all 2021 playoff DS/CS/WS teams. This was not a "crapshoot", this was a complete and utter domination by Dusty Baker and the Houston Astros. In terms of playoffs and "salary inflation", the Sox were 13th in 2005, and finished 12th in 2021 (CBA tax / full season tracking), with likely Top 10 payrolls planned until fans grow wise to Jerry's latest carrot scheme. Kenny Williams picked up several players who were key contributors to THREE playoff series wins (three more than Hahn plus Tony combined over nearly two combined decades of White Sox baseball), and an 11-1 (.917) playoff record in 2005, 12-4 (.750) overall. Meanwhile Tony La Russa, (2-6 .250 lifetime in eight + years with White Sox - the only record I and other Sox fans should give a rats ass about) and Hahn 2-5 (.286) were completely owned and nowhere close to fielding a competitive playoff team, despite three months of rest, Tony's "playoff switch" and "HOF schematic advantage", silly gamesmanship and unwritten rules obsession. Kenny Williams spread the payroll across dozens of successful bets. Hahn was all in on a few old Free Agents, going well over any other reported bid, and failed miserably. What Playoff "juice" did North Shore Cubby Boi Rick Hahn "squeeze" after $120M + spent during the past two seasons under their "World Championship Window"? $36.5M Keuchel 3 1/3 IP, 8.10 ERA, Banned from 2021 playoff roster, team and fans hope he does not return or does not vest next year. $36.6M Grandal Kudos he hit outstanding, Hahn's one shinning moment, though he calls shitty games, cannot catch breaking balls, had a Playoff CERA of 1-5 6.84 (McCann 1-0 1.00). $36.5M to go, two knee surgeries and counting. $13.0M Encarnacion OPS 0.000 Completely worthless from Day One. $11.3M Hendriks 9.00 ERA, Meaningless playoff appearances (9.00 ERA), but he should pan out OK the rest of the three seasons, not $18M + like the other three. Hahn's other decent signing. $9.5M Lynn 3 2/3 IP, 12.27 ERA. Hahn needlessly committed another $39.0M midseason and he petered out since then, with a likely knee surgery on deck and regression to follow. $8.0M Eaton DFA in July, worthless as most fans projected upon his signing announcement. Hahn thought this was wise. (Narrator "It was not.") $5.0M Kimbrel Completely worthless, Hahn doubled down and threw $16.0M more onto the fire in an attempt to salvage something, anything, for this complete disaster. In terms of "false narratives", Hahn has spent the past week claiming the Sox did not win their "ultimate goal" of winning the final postseason game. This is completely disingenuous. They fell far, far short of getting to that point, falling three rounds short and not even close to fielding a competitive playoff team this year, or his previous eight seasons. They regressed from Ricky Renteria performed in 2020, despite the fact they significantly bumped payroll. They are payroll top heavy and entering a third season with limited flexibility to properly fill RF (Hahn fielded 16 "solutions" the past two seasons) and 2B (Mendick and Romy are the current #1 and #2 options), and no signs they can afford substantial upgrades after going all in on Keuchel, Grandal, Kimbrel and Lynn's extension. Yes the money has been spent. Sadly it was spent by Rick Hahn. Kenny Williams didn't have a losing record as GM, didn't need to pawn off everything inherited by the previous GM plus four additional years to make the playoffs. Kenny Williams finished with a World Series after four seasons. Hahn began tanking after four seasons, pawning off anything he inherited off of Kenny Williams to buy five more years without a single playoff advancing team before or after. Kenny Williams was the only successful GM in a century of White Sox baseball. His only fault was keeping Hahn around for a decade, and he likely had no say in the matter. Kenny was sadly screwed by Jerry out of a promotion to become Toronto's President (Kenny still is third in command behind Jerry and Howard Pizer). He and his players deserved a better fate than be saddled with Jerry, Hahn and La Russa during his career.

Trade him while his value is highest.

No one wants to hear it, but it was Grandal who had a career year with the Sox last season. Hard to remember, since he was below the Mendoza line at the Allstar break. But make no mistake, Yasmani had his highest season OPS of 0.940 last year, well above his career average of 0.807. That would qualify as a Sox free agent that got better when they got here.

Lol, are you new here?

Obvious result was obvious.

No way in H.E.L.L. the Mariners would go for that trade proposal...

We shall see.

I would make that deal in a heartbeat. It would be worth it for the PR alone.

This bugged me for some reason - you forgot the Nationals

I can confirm that I may or may not have liked this post.

I don't know if you are serious or being sarcastic. If I thought you were serious I'd give you a "like" but then again if I give you a "like" ,some other admin might check to see who is giving you the like and could tell everyone else.

Look I get that Leury hit a big homer in the playoffs and had a fairly decent season, but let's not forget his history. He's got a pretty good history of missing periods of time due to injury, and even in his career year, he put up an OPS+ of 96. He's a great tool to have off of the bench, but if he is a starer for you, you are already looking to replace him and upgrade.

I'd rather sign Leury to be the 2B starter, than a lot of these trades and trade targets bandied about.

I was 17. And I didn't watch baseball again until 2000.

This is what you get when all the teams are owned by rich white men. You also get black QB's consistently hit much later than white QB's without penalty flags.

I get why people are insisting the division will be pushovers, but I do think we need to have some caution in that. First of all, Detroit will likely spend some money. Second, Minnesota could as well, and although they crumbled this year, if they landed a Rodon and a couple of relievers that could be a place for a rapid turnaround. Third, it is possible the CBA could force Cleveland and KC to spend more - a minimum payroll would do that. Second and a bigger one - talent doesn’t always equal record. Last year Seattle outplayed their Pythagorean record by 14 wins and that was after trading away their closer. Had Cleveland done that, the White Sox miss the playoffs. In 2019 the Brewers outplayed their by 8, the 2018 Mariners outplayed theirs by 12. I believe it was 07 when the Diamondbacks made the World Series with a negative regular season run differential? Point being, don’t count out teams just because you have a talent advantage, some randomness is guaranteed. Finally, 2 wins last year earns home field advantage, and even though you don’t have to agree, I give the white Sox a much better chance of those first two games were at home.

Yeah, Leury had a 2 fWAR season last year and you're going to get him fairly cheap. There's no reason not to bring him back, unless, like I said, someone else offers him starter money.

I can give you Tuesdays at midnight in my garage. No pay, work for tips. Warning: raccoons are aggressive around here at night. Nah, seriously, you're funny. Me too, but saying this now could be a ruse, as others have posted.

He’s young. He can learn to hit lefty.

I know lol it’s pretty comical honestly.

1. Kopech should be starting this year. He has a decent chance of being a better starter than reliever, he has the arm, the secondary stuff to succeed as a starter. 2. No, technically they could always wait another year and turn him into a starter, but whenever it is done they would have the same problem - the innings jump. 3. Whenever Kopech is turned into a starter he will have an innings limit because it will be a big jump from his previous year. That means something like 130 - 150 innings, if reached, will see his arm hitting a wall and you don’t want to just push him through it without rest. So, if you do turn him into a starter, you will probably need someone to take 10 or more starts. 4. He does have an injury history, so there is need for caution. However, if he gets a minor injury you still have to try to work him back into the rotation afterwards, otherwise you really are giving up on him as a starter. 5. He could very well be a top of the rotation starter, but he should not be off limits in trade discussions. If you got a front line starter for him who was already stretched out, or an all star at a position of need with several years of control, there could be some benefit to moving him overall. It is unlikely there is a match out there for that, but worth checking on.

Yes. He’ll be more valuable to us starting. No. No. No. No. No. No further questions, Ton of Chimp poster guy.

Ray ray is totally going to rug us on this OMI coin

How about Kimbrel and Hernandez for Madrigal.

In an alternate universe where Semien isn't traded, this is what YourWhatHurts and other gone-but-not-forgotten posters would have called him from 2015-2018 until he turned into an MVP bat.

This will give us extra time to form strong relationships with family members of the players we’re targeting.