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There's no cubstalk.com, I really hate having to find a new MLB team. Fuck KW and Hahn.

Well guys, this is the end of the line for me -- I won't be coming back to the site as I am no longer following the White Sox. Special shout out to @Brian as I feel you helped me see the positives in current wrestling and also were willing to let the past be the past and move forward with constructive conversations. Take care friends.

Unreal. Welp, it's been nice guys -- but I can no longer root for this team (I am assuming they WON'T get Harper based on these comments/remarks by Kenny Williams). I am in complete shock. It's not like the Padres offered some astronomical deal -- KW and co. just wouldn't go past certain constructs like the $300 mill and the 10 years. They weren't serious suitors from the beginning and they tried to pry their way into it by trading for Jay and Alonso. Without Machado/Harper this team in 2019 is disgusting. Further, the Padres now have taken Tatis and Machado away from this organization. It's downright hilarious and torturous to be a White Sox fan. I am shocked, but at least this will make my fantasy baseball game better as I won't need to bias myself with any sort of fandom to the White Sox.

We haven't reached 1,000 pages yet, we need to get there before he signs tonight otherwise he'll sign with the Padres.

If you love fantasy baseball, then the "Sleeper and the Bust" podcast : https://fantasy.fangraphs.com/category/podcast/ is great.

That Raw was pretty damn good! Easy to do when you bring up 4 of the most electrifying talents from NXT. I have fears with bringing up these guys without clear paths... I hope WWE has learned from their past mistakes of call ups! The Riot vs. Ronda match was great, but storyline sense made no sense to give Riot another shot. Served the purpose of making Ronda look like a beast.

Yup -- echoing the sentiment: CALM DOWN. Until Machado/Harper sign, there's no reason to blow up based off quotes on twitter.

There just doesn’t seem to be a lot of interest here on soxtalk which is unfortunate.

Friendly reminder that Yoan taking grounders at a different position, generalized quotes from players, and assumptions by sports-people are completely baseless and one should be weary of making even the slightest conclusions based off of them. We don't know jack right now... all we know is that things are heating up and the Padres appear to be real competition for Machado.

LET"S GET IT BOIS! It's a new day, YES IT IS! After a rough night of rumors last night, we all got a fresh night of sleep and are ready to see our CAPTAINO Hahn reward our deligience and hard work all offseason with a MANUEL MACHADO!!!! COME TO PAPA

He said *at least* so there's a chance that both the Phillies and Padres are 'left out.'

I know this thread is long and posts get lost, but don't misconstruct my stance here -- I'm very confident that we sign Machado. It's just that the recent reports have escalated the free agency to the brink IMO. The time is now for these guys to sign, I feel confident that with the smoke today we are on the verge of seeing Harper and Machado signings this week.

The men's EC prior to DB and Kofi tearing the house down wasn't bad, it just wasn't helped by the storylines going into it. Daniel Bryan was fantastic in an almost Flair-like heel persona throughout the match. Samoa Joe being eliminated so early was a downer, but the storylines going into it kinda made it so.... Joe has been an afterthought. Hardy was eliminated after his 5 moves of doom, Orton eliminated AJ Styles with one move, AJ Styles performed well, but nothing spectacular. I just wasn't invested in any of it due to the storylines. The story hurt the first half of the match. Admittedly, woman's wrestling is notorious for botching and this match was no different, however, the woman's EC match was entirely enjoyable. As stated before, I'm a huge bayley/banks fan, so there could be bias here seeing them win the inaugural titles, but I thought every element of it was played out well. How Nia destroyers herself allowing the two teams to take out Tamina. The whole segment in the middle where every wrestler got a chance to show off their finisher moves. The emotional ending with Banks overcoming 2on1 odds and altering her submission hold due to her injury.

For me it's not about the winning. It's about how I feel the organization is ran. I have no problem following a losing squad if I feel that they are doing things right and to the best of their ability. Losing out on Harper and or Machado means one of two things: 1. The other teams that got them were willing to spend an astronomical amount of money for them where it can be called 'stupid money'. I think this is HIGHLY unlikely from what we've seen so far. 2. The Front office is cheap and cares more about lining their pocket books than the team. We literally have no money on the payroll coming up, they have no excuse to be outbid in any rational bidding sense. If they lose out and it's #2, then fuck them.

I've giving it some thought. I don't know, it's tough. I'm not even sure if I will pick another team or just be a neutral fan and avoid following the W'Sox. Perhaps the Cubs, Rays, Yankees, Padres, or Oakland.

In 2015 (or 2016, I can't remember) I was ready to leave this franchise as their decade of just horrid decisions leading to mediocre or terrible teams was just not enjoyable. They turned it around by trading their stars for the prospects and I was completely reinvigorated in baseball and the White Sox. I've been a White Sox fan since I was born, I'm nearly 30 now. However, the questionable decisions with the front office, their inability to complete deals with the stars (and instead pocket the money) is still prevalent. It goes without repeating how well the White Sox are set up for this market. They doubled down on it all offseason by not shying away. I'm not unreasonable, if Manny and Harper get astronomical deals unforeseen and clearly ridiculous, I'll give the F.O. a pass on it, but if we miss out on them within reasonable amounts, I will be furious enough to walk away. Baseball's the only sport I follow, and I won't waste my fandom on an organization like that.

Even with my latest remarks in this thread, I do feel very confident that the White Sox sign Manny Machado, and I even have a level of confidence that they sign Harper, too. Go Sox.

Elimination Chamber was a lot of fun! Just goes to show you how great the talent is in WWE. The storylines going into EC were horrid and the card was terrible, but the talent overcame it. 1. Women's EC: Wow, this was absolutely fantastic. Booked really well. WWE went with the emotional Bayley+Banks win where Banks was able to overcome the odds in the end playing nicely to Bayley/Bank's storyline of one person doing the work at the end. Really, the whole match was fantastic. 2. McMiz vs. Usos: Surprise Uso victory here, I got that wrong, but I see how it will likely play towards McMiz breaking apart. Great match too. 3. Finn vs. Lio/Bobby: Finn wins, I got this wrong in my prediction, but I see how Bobby will likely move on now from Lio, that makes some sense. Finn winning the IC title is nice for him, but this match kinda sucked. 4. Rousey vs. Riot: Squash match but a very nice post-match ending with Charlotte and Rousey both being beat down by the suspended Becky. That plays well with the storyline. 5. Corbin vs. Strowman: Match sucked, Strowman gets 3on1'd at the end, but a very cool spot with strowman being powerbombed through two tables. This whole saga between all members involved is really a low point. There's nothing going strong for any of these guys. As individuals, I like all 4 of them, but this thing has been a dragged out mess and needs to just end. 6. Men's EC: Match was mediocre until Daniel Bryan vs. kofi was left and then it became phenomenal. What an amazing showing by Kofi. Had me believing in him and I was at the end of my seat rooting for him. Great performance. AJ Styles delivers another so-so performance, I'm REALLY losing my faith in him. Hardy sucked, Orton sucked, both guys are too old now to perform. Kofi Fucking Kingston tho. The PPV as a whole was definitely a hit. Loved it, and that makes WWE 2/2 on PPV's to enter 2019. If only they had a better card + storylines going into this thing!

Lmao pure typical white sox loser syndrome?? Id quickly leave this franchise if the sox lose out on harper and machado within reasonable contracts

Well, that kinda sucks. Good for the Brewers, but would have been great for the Phillies or Padres to sign Moustakas :p.

That's factually incorrect: https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/chicago-white-sox/contracts/ But, I think I get your point -- that they'll need to spend more $$ to fill out the roster in some areas. I see no problem there even with Manny+Harper.

I've seen the sentiment around that if the White Sox sign both Harper and Machado we'd be screwing ourselves over in the future, financially speaking. https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/chicago-white-sox/yearly/payroll/ If we signed Machado for 250/8 years (31.25 per year) and Harper for 320/10 years (32 per year) that only puts us at ~90,000,000 going into next year!! The White Sox are a team that should be around, I don't know, $150,000,000. That leaves us a TON of room to build around, extend, and make finalizing moves, additionally, with the glut of prospects we have, we could make trades for cost-controlled pieces if push come to shove. The only monetary excuse for not getting Manny or Harper (and potentially BOTH) is that the Phillies went haywire and gave one of them a monstrous contract.

For sure. I'm just not convinced that the business model of suffocating fans with content is the best approach. Almost universally on the internet I find that fans want Raw down to two hours, that the current PPVs length is just torturous, and that the amount of wasted time on their shows is preposterous. If I were 'in charge' I wouldn't be for a setup of limiting ppvs to the big 5, but I'd definitely cut out the gimmick PPVs and replace them with a set up like this: January: Royal Rumble Feb: No way out (meant to build to WM) March/Early April: Wrestlemania Late April/Early May: Backlash June: King of The Ring July: Bash at the Beach August: Summerslam September: WWE Evolution for Woman and also can do Saudi events during this time October: Halloween Havok November: Survivor Series December: Starcade

Just throwing this out there for fun: Phillies payroll now is at 125,000,000 and in the multi-year summary hovers around the 90,000,000 mark. The white sox payroll is 80,000,000 now and then goes to 25,000,000 for the next two years and then 10,000,000 for the following two. Doesn't mean anything much, but f***ing hell, we have money to play with. So much money that we could sign both Harper and Machado, have contract extensions for Yoan and Eloy set up, AND sign other free agents.

It would suck...but there are a lot of other reasons to stick with this team. Plus, if we don’t get Machado/Harper, we’ll still have all the cash we set aside to land 1 or both. Lots of talent, lots of options still. Just a different path. It's less about the team and talent on it and more about the front office and their continued failure. In particular, if they can't grab Machado or Harper and the contract that Mach/Harp gets isn't earth-shattering, it would go to prove how fickle these guys are. They came into this season with almost no contractual obligations towards the future. They had an open checkbook, have had very little real competition here, and had the need. They need to get this done.