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You keep saying this and then claim Baltimore has 2 for sure TOR arms. It’s hilarious.

This thread has become unreadable.

Yankees/Boston bidding war would be fantastic. Orioles you want in?

Good. Also thank God we aren't going to settle for ATL in the trade. I've hated that option the most forever. I dont know if Montas to CIN takes them out of the Cease bidding.

Like, what the f*** is the point of signing Tim Hill and Chris Flexen and DFAing guys like Luis Patino and Carlos Perez? Patino and Perez likely amount to nothing, but we know that Tim Hill and Chris Flexen are nothing, so we might as well see if we can get anything out of the young guys.

I love how there’s a Nick Madrigal side discussion going on in this thread

Would a garbage organization let its fans get shot in the stadium and then continue play?

After not seeing this thread for a couple hours I come back to over a hundred replies… thought something was cooking but no… it was just the sports guy peddling crumbs of wisdom. Joy.

I'll speak for him and everyone. But no one on here wants your advice on how to post better.

btw, I hate this gamble by the Braves. They’ve run out of pitching last few years due to injuries. They should have gone after someone more reliable.

I love the insane cockiness that emerges when a team wins 100 games after it has averaged about one good season per decade the last 30 years. Lol.

I like how we could be having some interesting conversations about Yankees prospects/trade proposals, yet we are locked onto the brain melting topic of Nick fucking Madrigal.

Because they are a big market team with an aggressive GM who's not afraid to take a big swing. I heard the Yanks are WAY more involved in Cease than is being reported and that makes me much more optimistic of a deal getting done now that there's a big hitter involved.

If only there was a place for O’s fans to talk about their team.

First time I’ve mentioned Elias. Your views are welcomed, but tone down the arrogance. You’re in a debate of opinions.

Not that anyone cares that a single fan is done with the White Sox but I am. A kid who sat in the upper deck in old comiskey wondering if Ivan Calderon could hit one up there. A kid who got to leave grade school early to see the first game at new comiskey! Who cherished his big hurt autographed card/ball he got at Sox fest. A kid who got to play on the field with other little leaguers! Who was bummed when the blue jays knocked them out of the playoffs. Who sat in the RF bleachers during the all star when Loaiza started. A college student who couldn’t watch the games but frustratingly followed them get beat by Minnesota late in the year in the early 2000s. Young adult who cherished my favorite team of all time, the 05 white Sox win the WS! An adult who emailed Rick Hahn before the “mired in mediocrity” press conference saying they were mired in mediocrity (coincidence?). An adult who has followed along the last decade but has lost interest due to Jerry’s incompetence and apathy. Again nobody cares when a single fan loses interest for good, but sayonara! You all are fun fans who are devoted and knowledgeable. I just can’t do it.

I think I’d rather have Anthony and Teel over Cowser/kjerstad and Ortiz.

Lol yes

For Orioles fans, our trade of Erik Bedard in 2007 comes to mind. Bedard had two years of control remaining, and was coming off two excellent years, the latter of which yielded a 146 ERA+. Our GM Andy MacPhail spent the entire winter shopping Bedard and finally in early February landed a package that included Adam Jones, Chris Tillman, George Sherrill and two others. Bedard was very good for the Mariners but couldn’t stay healthy for more than a half-season at a time. Meanwhile, Jones and Tillman became anchors of the Orioles’ playoff teams of 2012, 2014, and 2016, and Sherrill had an all star appearance before we traded him away. It turned out to be a very lopsided deal in Baltimore’s favor. I don’t think Cease’s stock is as high as Bedard’s was then, since he’s coming off a mediocre season rather than his best one. Thus, he won’t get a return that rivals what Bedard got us. But, he should yield two good future pieces and maybe something more.

Getz is building a halfway decent AAA team.

Love that this hopefully closes the door on a Cease to ATL move, I loathed the possibility of that happening.

You know what MLB are thinking. Interesting. As a fan I get this is the first time your favorite team has been on the buy side of a transaction but this is what negotiation looks like when the seller has all the leverage.

I’m not here to fight with White Sox fans or call anyone names. Nor am I here to tell you what Elias will or won’t do. I’m just here to give you my impressions and get your reactions to what I think would be reasonable offers from the Orioles that they might realistically do. My view is that Elias and Getz won’t get close to their bottom line for at least another two weeks. I doubt Elias has put a deal involving Kjerstad/Cowser and Ortiz/Norby on the table just yet. And I doubt Getz has made any demand that isn’t at least two prospects that good or better and two other very good pieces. So, we’ll see how it goes.

No, there really hasn't been a peep about Baltimore's interest since last trade deadline. I'm just tired of rereading the same arguments and pining for prospects that will never be traded here.

All I want for New Year's Eve Eve is for a real Cease rumor not involving Baltimore...

Yeah, but none of Maldonado, Hill or Flexen fit that description. Theyre just old and bad players that are what they are. Even if they have great first halfs, these guys aren’t returning anything more than backend 40 man / AAAA fluff best case scenario.

I just don't know what the expectation is: do what the Royals are doing? only point in signing free agents this offseason is to eventually trade them for minor leaguers IMO. signing guys with the potential for bounceback seasons feels like a far savvier investment than giving multiple years to Giolito types. If we had followed that logic and signed Bellinger over Benintendi, we might have one more top 100 prospect on the team.

Check back every 5 pages. I find it's essentially the same conversation again.

I see it more like "the team is bad and signing pitchers like Giolito to massive contracts isn't going to change anything, so sign depth pieces with retainable salaries who might perform and become a tradeable asset." TBH this is how I'd hope a rebuild would look, the team isn't signing bad contracts in a desperate attempt sell one or two more tickets and a couple Stroman/Bellinger jerseys, but it is addressing AAAA type depth and signing players who won't hurt a rebuild, but might help it if a handful of them can turn around their performances. It's actually kinda nice to see 4+ major league quality catchers and 8-10 pitchers in AA/AAA who could potentially join the major league team next year. A couple infielders match this description though outfield depth looks horrendous and is hopefully addressed. I even have some optimism that if all these players hit and guys like Benintendi/Moncada/Vaughn play closer to their potential, the team is much better than it was last year and might even compete for the division title.

I think my post made it pretty clear that I don't see much hope either for turning a huge pile of s%*# into enough to be traded so pointing out Flexen's negatives is preaching to the choir. I've also made it clear in many past posts that the culture is a losing culture and that's on JR and the only reason for not firing Grifol is probably also on JR mainly because he is going to be paid even if he not here, so why pay 2 managers . Even if it's possible Getz kept Grifol because of their KC connection all JR would have to say to Getz is Im not paying 2 managers and any chance Getz had of firing Grifol is gone. I think the lack of talent is self evident and hearing Getz acknowledge that doesn't change the fact that JR isn't going to pay for talent that's worth anything right now and even if he does in the near future it'll be the kind of middling $10M older vets that Hahn got that never seemed to pan out. Everything we complain about is on Reinsdorf. All I'm doing is clinging to any small sliver of hope that incrementally increases the chance of bringing in more prospects. Since Bannister was brought in and takes pride in helping pitchers find what they once had, Getz's plan has been pretty obvious given the constraints he's dealing with. Turn some short term reclamation projects into prospects and do the same thing with Moncada , Eloy Vaughn and anyone else who happens to do well this year. If by some miracle the Sox are within 5 games of 1st in the pathetic central approaching the trade deadline that will mean that some of the reclamation projects have panned out and they will be traded. That's best case scenario to perhaps gain 3 prospects from the pile of garbage off season acquisitions. Of course that can all be negated by holding onto Cease and he pitches equal to or worse than last year.

The White Sox could easily sign viable free agents. They’d just have to offer more $ than anyone else - just like 95%+ of all free agents. Players go where they get the most money the vast majority of the time.

It never does

No, he’s actually very busy dumpster diving for crappy players.

I can’t state this enough, the best Sox insider has said all along the plan was to deal him AFTER Snell and Montgomery go elsewhere.

Getz wasn’t the GM in July.

O’s fan positing incessantly on Cease rumors in White Sox message board saying something is getting old and childish is super rich.

Playoff in MLB is random and luck. 2023 had 2 teams barely made the playoffs got to The World Series. No one can reliably build for random and luck. People can argue about this, but no one can make valid case for a certain types of teams win in playoffs. This is same for NHL.

I personally would have signed one or the other catcher (Stassi or Maldonado) I’m also not going to fret about it. None of this will matter beyond 2024-2025, and none of the guys DFA’d or sent to AAA (Lee) are amounting to anything. I’m with @nrockwayand @CaliSoxFanViaSWside on this. I accepted the likely budget in November. People here demanded a vast roster overhaul and they are getting it. This is what it looks like when Hahn leaves you with dick at the major or minor league levels, and you are stuck with albatross deals like Benintendi.

Boston/NY/Baltimore seem like some pretty good suitors to me.

Days before the Rule 5 draft, multiple people were screaming that the White Sox could launch up to a dozen guys off this roster, and fill it up with fodder from other teams, and nobody argued with them for 4 pages. How is anybody getting angry at DFAing guys we would have gladly launched for hiding their counterparts from another organization on the 40-man for a season?

WHO CARES ABOUT NICK MADRIGAL IN THE YEAR 2023

No, he's not.

I really don’t want them to trade Eloy.

Not sure if this is a hot take or not but I would rather have Jasson Dominguez over either Kjerstad or Cowser.

Especially when they hated his character and couldn’t wait to get rid of him

I don’t disagree. I was just commenting that he was actually a little more useful than I thought he was. I don’t disagree that it’s an odd stance to take. Hell, I pulled a Madrigal auto out of a topps pack years ago. I wish he was good so I could sell it. Maybe the poster here will pay up for it! ?

Arguing with him is futile. He’s deified Madrigal and any argument in fact is simply dismissed as opinion. The funny thing is, Madrigal doesn’t even fit the archetype of yore he’s so fond of no matter how hard he wills it into existence.

Sports Guy is NERVOUS!

And @Pal I've seen some message boards that change the color or give titles to members with inside info. Might be helpful here too. ?