mac9001

If you've been to Gary or Hammand recently you know there's no credible plan on spending billions, he'll much less millions in an area as economically challenged as those communities. Developing in AH provides a dense concentration of households with incomes exceeded $100,000. The collective wealth of the North West Suburbs is probably 50x of NWI. You can sell developers on hotels, restaurants, retail, smaller event venues, a wide range of entertainment options. There's no economically viable plan to do that in NWI. The Bears know they have a weak hand, they made the opening move and committed $200M because they knew if they didn't they'd have to spend $400M. When they develop the land and start to sell off pieces to private equity they'll sell it for billions. Sorry, but no, NWI is a bluff, a really bad bluff from an organization that doesn't need a single penny from the pubic to still come out billions ahead. But at this point they have nothing to lose, either their bluff works and the state kicks some money in or they're right where they started.

They don't have to agree to anything. The Bears will whine, make empty threats, then they'll build their stadium and pay their tax bill. They're not leaving Chicago for Hammand or Gary. If they leave it's just a matter of time some billionaire with enough ambition and ego builds a competing suburban stadium development (see Ishiba) and completely guts the a NWI stadium monopoly on holding premium events in Chicago. It also opens up the Bears to potentially encouraging Chicago (or even a different suburban development) from making a play for a different NFL franchise. If you build on the Chicago River developers will line up, if you build in AH developers will line up. Building in NWI is like building in Waukegan, you can, but you shouldn't and you won't. If your gonna make a threat like this you threaten to move a across the country, there's no way Kevin Warren could with a straight face on camera make a legitimate claim they're considering Gary Indiana.

They didn't spend $200M on the land in Arlington Heights without essentially committing to the development with or without state funding. Everything that's occurred after that was about leverage. They're not moving to NW Indiana even if they were to get billions in funding. It was always going to be AH or if they managed to get enough leverage against Chicago a new lake front stadium. They'll just partner with developers on a piece meal basis and work with AH on a tiff for infrastructure. The state will eventually kick im some money because at the end of the day roads and sewers are going to get built anyway and the unions will make sure the state kicks the money in so they control the contracts.

I do feel to some degree they're doing him a disservice by not letting him focus on a single position. If you let him play 100 games in center he might actually prove he can be defensively valuable. He's probably the fastest guy on the team and his athleticism is vastly underrated.

I don't think there's ever been an MLB team that said we have to much depth up the middle. I'm still not convinced we have any regulars on the current MLB roster that won't just fall off a cliff. As impressive as Colson was last year I'd be equally unsurprised to see a 40% K-rate next year as I would a 30+ HR season. The other guys could all put in 70 wRC+ seasons and make these decisions relatively easy. If they just keep drafting short stops with the first 3 picks for the next 3 drafts I'd be fairly content with the strategy.

I don't doubt the stuff. I've seen video, looked at numbers. I believe in the stuff. But dudes who manage to throw strikes for a few months for the first time in their career while at high A ball don't leave him with feeling like this works out. I would have taken every dude with a big time fastball in the R5 draft. Take 5 of them, if even one works out it's a huge win.

If the outcome of Taylor becoming a starter (ish) is 1 less bullpen arm or a few more losses that's a price worth paying. The Sox are still going to be really bad this year, if it gets us to a place where Taylor can throw 150 quality innings next year, I'm totally in favor. But the more sensible plan would be to just sent him to Charlotte for 2-3 months and let him build up to be a 5 inning guy then use him out of the pen in the 2nd half to limit innings.

I'm not saying Taylor is one of your 5 starters, he's the opener for let's say Cannon and you let Cannon pitch the rest of the game if he's keeping it competitive. With how quickly guys are getting pulled I'm not sure this doesn't reduce the bullpen load.

I don't see why you couldn't make Taylor a 3 inning opener. If he makes all 33 starts you're at 99 innings with a plan to get him to 150+ the following year.

I'm sure Paez isn't complaining as he'll be collecting a MLB salary, but his command likely would have brought him to the bigs eventually on an appropriate development timeline. Now we're gonna take a guy from high A ball and likely try to stash him as a innings eating clean up reliever? He's obviously going to start eventually but at this point in his career and given the Sox starting depth (even if it's not quality depth there's real depth there) how likely is he to get any starts? I feel like our 2nd R5 pick is likely just waived by end of spring, but I kinda feel for the guy a bit because this probably wasn't the best move for his development. I almost feel they should limit the MLB R5 draft to players in AA/AAA and if a guy below AA is drafted they need to be placed on the 40 man and must be rostered at AAA. The R5 fee should also go up substantially.

You have to figure a prospect who's value is derived almost exclusively based on his command is going to have a very fragile grip on their prospect ranking. You're almost always looking for an excuse to downgrade because they don't have the luxury of having a bad season (or missing it due to injury) and their rankings are based entirely on the performance.

I like Pallette, he might even eventually have a MLB career. But he hasn't demonstrated the level of command one would require to succeed at this level. If you're willing to claim guys on waivers and make multiple R5 picks there is no shortage of dudes with stuff that lack MLB level command. We have 3-5 guys on the system right now have have legit big league stuff, but don't have anywhere near the command to succeed. If you just keep recycling these guys eventually you'll hit on one or five. Pallette should have been given a chance last year as it was time to recycle half the bullpen. I don't really have an issue losing a guy like him because they're fairly replaceable, but if you just keep the 40 man loaded with these dudes that show no progress or have demonstrated elite levels of failures then what's the plan? Wheres the strategy? If you're gonna just fill the 40 man roster with garage and let it rot you might as well do it with your home grown garage, at least there's sentimental value behind it.

1) I presume the Sox will be high on that waiver list 2) If (when) he's walking everyone there is likely not to be much of a market for his services

Pretty high probability that Palette is walking 6-7 per 9 in the bigs and he's back in the Sox system by mid season. He may find his way into a MLB bullpen eventually, but his command still needs a lot of work.

If he can't find success in the rotation you can hope the stuff plays up in the pen and you're still not paying him a lot. Now we need two more like just like this to have actual depth (even if it's poor depth).