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They might not get on base.

For what it’s worth the Cubs were in a 40 man jam and didn’t really want to trade Horn. Hes been electric in spring training this year but would be a bit of a risk to keep over someone like Cuas or Riley Thompson. There was talk of a Keegan Thompson trade but that didn’t materialize. I was looking forward to seeing horn pitch this year. edit: he also added a sweeper like every other pitcher in the cubs org. He’s probably going to be a 7th inning guy for the Sox this year but was sometimes used as a multi-inning guy in AAA last year. Lots of upside in return for a guy that was lost in the Sox org in Thompson

I don't know....under the old poster assignment rules Soxtalk held me in the minor leagues for a long time and I've never really forgiven them for that.

I know that it is only Spring Training, but I'm beginning to worry that this team is not very good.

Some non-Statcast games will record every strikeout as 3 pitches and every ball in play as the first pitch (and every walk as 4 straight balls), but that's not what actually happened. He's had some good takes today.

Every GM in baseball : "Chris what if I told you that we may make available our 26 year old starting pitcher in AAA" Getz: "Don't f*** with me, are you serious?!?"

Not that I think Thompson will amount to much (I am much higher on Mena) Getz trading younger prospects for 26 year old AAAA players is getting annoying.

We have an average production RF for the next 4 to 6 years? That’s quite the bold take for a kid with like 100 major league plate appearances.

I 100% believe that is who Jason is. It is a geeky, dorky nerd who realizes how lucky he is in life and enjoys every freaking second of it. Steve Stone is authentic all right. He's an authentic jerk. He's shown open professional contempt for each long term partner I have ever heard him with. He did it to Harry. He did it to Hawk and he did it to Jason.

Pritzker is going to take a meeting with the Sox ownership group and significantly soften his stance if not totally turn it around.

Since I don't follow the NBA, I'm not sure if I should be insulted or not, so I just went ahead and thanked you for your wonderful post,

If the Sox are very confident that Thompson will never amount to anything, the time to trade him is right now. However, you aren’t going to get a young prospect for him straight up. So you make this trade, hope Horn pitches well enough, and then you flip him for a young prospect. It would basically be flipping Thompson for said prospect, but the only way to get there is this indirect route. I have no idea if that’s the actual plan here, but that’s what I’m going to tell myself to feel better about the trade.

Can't expect a $2 million/year player to catch up to major league velocity like this, sadly.

I see this all the time here, people citing age. The ONLY reason Matt Thompson isn't worth a bag of baseball's is because of his age. If you think he never figures it out, this is when you move him. Bailey Horn at least is closer to the big leagues and a lefty reliever so more likely to get some actual MLB years out of him. No issues with the logic behind this trade. Are the White Sox right about their internal evaluations? Well, that's the scary part for everyone but the only people who value Thompson are uber-Sox fans.

Very weird trade in all honesty. I’m sure Bannister doesn’t have much faith in Thompson, but trading for a 26 year old reliever that must be placed on the 40 man roster is just an odd thing to seek in return given where the team currently stands. At least Horn is lefty and has pretty good stuff. Hopefully it works out like Bannister is envisioning and we have a quality trade chip come July.

Bye mom!

The Sox own a $16.5 million option on 2025 and an $18.5m option on 2026. As of today, there is a near zero chance they are picked up. The guy is a career .275 hitter, with an .811 OPS as essentially a DH. Outside of what looks today like a fluky 2020, his OPS the last three years is .785 from a guy who has played in 259 of 486 possible games or about half of the teams games. There is no reason on god's green earth to extend this man as of today, unless he is willing to tear up those two option years AND take a large discount to do it.

What the F kind of stupid post is this. Now we're associating Tim with being a gangster......... The stupidity amazes me! BUT it shouldn't

I don't really see what the problem is here. Trading for a major league ready lefty reliever with 6 years of control for a guy that walks the world and is very unlikely to ever make it seems like a perfectly reasonable non-descript baseball trade.

Feel for Jesse. That might be all she wrote for his MLB shots at his age, and he could have easily carved out a nice role this year.

Trust me ur the zach lavine of this board we should have traded you last summer…

That was Dejong Gone

I'm on board for most of this. No, Thompson is far beneath Mena in terms of pedigree and performance through last season. I just don't see .377 BABIP as being anything close to being sustainable at the MLB level, same with the near .400 BABIP posted in lower levels. Hopefully he develop to be what Adam Engel was when he was healthy, not as good a fielder but hopefully a better hitter. I'm not asking for much this year. Just let the borderline players like Sosa, Colas, Fletcher and Lee if any of them are brought up this year, vs. have them ride the bench as all rookie position players beyond Vaughn have done. Need to be able to flush any of these offseason veterans for either a trade or once a younger player makes them expendable.

I agree that is has been a bizarre approach.

A 26 year old who has never made the big leagues, who requires a 40 man spot on a team without many available 40 man spots, who has a minor league walk rate of 5 BB/9IP, and a minor league ERA of 4.2 is a guy who has a chance to be part of the future? I guess in terms of "he's been designated for assignment" is an activity that would have to happen in the future.

We have 6-7 reasonable rotation options in AAA? We don't even have 5 reasonable rotation options on the MLB roster, much less in AAA.

I'm really hoping they are just moving guys Bannister really really doesn't like and has advised the FO that he can't fix because between this and Mena, they are playing a very dangerous game, especially for a team that purportedly values cost controlled young pitching above all else. And why would we trade for a reliever (that we used to have) when we aren't going to be competing for awhile? You couldn't get anything else for him?

Can we use all of our Royals connections to get in on this arrangement?

You keep making these “everyone is an All-Star once traded” comments but no one has said anything of the such. Liking Mena as a prospect does not mean that he will be a star or even a productive major leaguer. There is a wide range of outcomes with prospects and some of us felt there was some untapped potential with Mena given his youth & athleticism. And people here liking Mena more than Fletcher (especially given the state of the team) doesn’t mean we hate Dominic. I just worry that Fletcher will end up being a 4th OF and that doesn’t really move the needle for a rebuilding club. I am no expert here and hope I am wrong, which is obviously very much possible. Regarding Fletcher specifically, he has hit at every level, but his production in Reno wasn’t great when you compare it to how other DBacks OFs performed there and they did so at younger ages and/or during their first stops there. As for his major league performance, the batted ball data suggests he got super lucky and he was trending the wrong way when he got demoted. Pointing that out doesn’t mean I think he will suck, but he’s still got to prove himself over a longer period of time to say he will become an average production RF for the foreseeable future. Finally, regarding this trade, I don’t think you will find a single poster who thinks Thompson is a quality prospect and will lose sleep over this trade despite your allegations. It’s just unusual for a rebuilding team to trade a young, athletic pitcher that doesn’t require 40 man roster protection for a 26 year old reliever. That doesn’t mean it will be a bad trade as the likelihood of Thompson turning into something useful is low and Horn has some upside that the org must be optimistic they can tap into. Just weird that we’re proactively making trades that are aging our talent base when it seems we are a few years from competing.

I didn't realize Getz posted here and was so vitriolic

I love how you think it’s an outrageous thought that the Sox could ever make a bad trade. Their free agent signings are bad enough before you even begin discussing their poor trades.

Horn literally walked five per nine last year

I just assume Nicky Lopez is going to bring some of that Naperville ghetto behavior to the team

Problem solved.

Stone tweeted like for Jason and love this new guy before either broadcast as their full time announcer. How was Jason getting too big for his britches, or in Boyer’s words “respect for Jason or respect for a normal person”, before he started the full time gig as Hawk’s former PT fill in? If Steve had an issue with Jason, it wouldn’t be the first or second time he didn’t like a co-worker. He also didn’t leave the Cubs in good terms, and had an open feud with his Score co-host, though Murphy didn’t get along with anyone there beyond Mike Nort, plus the well documented disdain he held toward Hawk Harrelson. All this to accommodate the 120 or so games Stone deems worthy to show up for each year. Hunky Dory for Boyer for Stone to skip a fourth of every season vs. constantly bitching at Jason for actually performing quality work nationally, which helped what little standing and credibility the White Sox hold in the sports industry.

You're married to JR?

I'd like to get the year of control back if possible.

giant you say

I would agree, that is an awful lot of LH bullpen-only arms. Not counting Drohan, that's 10% of a 40 man roster, whereas normally 1 or 2 LH relievers is normal, which is 7.7% of a 26-man roster (or 3.8% if you had only 1). That's just collecting LH relievers. They also have LH relief pitcher Fraser Ellard in camp. Ky Bush is there too and is also LH, although for now he's a starter.

Yes, trading young and bad for old and bad doesn’t seem like the best strategy in baseball GM’ing. Just like how you should always be quick to drop a 29 year old pitcher with a 5+ ERA off of your 40-man roster to claim a 24 year old lefty outfield prospect.

I'm fine with this because Thompson hasn't figured it out and is buried on the depth chart (I wonder who was in charge of developing him 🤔), but man, the Tepera trade seems so worthless in retrospect. Also, Getz feels like he's in MLB: The Show mode.

Convoluted indeed. Next to zero chance something like that happens. JR threatening to move the team is 100% a bluff. His threat to move worked last time. It won't work again. Time for the one trick pony to learn a new act. Or he can just be grateful that he had a seat at the table.

The jist of it is money spent there isn't new money, it's money that would have been spent elsewhere. Economic impact is minimal at best. It really doesn't matter the project. This will have a hotel. People staying at that hotel won't be staying at one on Michigan Ave. It will have apartments. People renting there won't be renting higher end apartments elsewhere. People eating at the restaurants and drinking at the bars in the 78 won't be eating at the restaurants and drinking at the bars in other neighborhoods. It' doesn't increase spending. It just shifts it.

Bring back the Melky and Carlos Sanchez comedy acts.

Man I have no idea who half these guys are. Why would I...