Jake

Jon Garland or bust! Get the gang back together!

Was looking through episodes of PBS's Frontline - it is really quite telling how often they reported on the growing intelligence/spying over several years long before it became a major part of public discussion. If only people bothered to pay attention to PBS

I'm rooting for Phegley and it isn't impossible that he succeeds, but he is not and has never been a good prospect. He's small, he had never produced at any level until repeating AAA for the third season at age 25, and he is not a good defender. These things have always been true of him. He's had health problems, but he's also never done much. I wouldn't put all my eggs in his basket. He's a guy who at his best looks unlikely to be much better than average with a negative value defense, decent arm but not an amazing record of throwing runners out, and a bat that has traditionally been low average, very low OBP, and low power.

Davidson shouldn't start the year in AAA

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jan 22, 2014 -> 10:58 AM) I think giving up this early on Phegley is a terrible idea. He looked like a guy who needed to be in AAA a little longer. First success ever last year in AAA, then comes up and was absolutely the worst hitter in MLB when he came up. Probably could have used some more seasoning. We shall see. I've had the feeling that if one of Phegley/Flowers needs to be a backup, they like Flowers. If one has to be a starter, they like Phegs

If you're a marginal, almost-a-rotation-player guy or a not-close-to-starter guy, you come to Chicago. Thibs is going to get your ass paid

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 22, 2014 -> 10:29 AM) I am sure the north side is in meltdown with this as another failure up there under Theo. If Theo is good at anything, it is back-breakingly bad FA contracts

At least one of Viciedo/De Aza/Gillaspie/Keppinger/Dunn/Konerko has to go, and preferably two. Keppinger and ADA would be top candidates to go, in a vacuum. Keppinger because he just doesn't fill a need and doesn't look like he will in the future either, given how many right-handed and switch-hitting infielders we have near the majors. De Aza is a good player to have on the team, but he is older and ought to have trade value. Unlike Keppinger, though, you can only really trade De Aza if you get something rather useful in return. Going into the season with a 4-man outfield isn't the worst thing in the world, but right now there is simply no way to have Davidson as your starting 3B without dumping one of the infielders. Gillaspie can be useful as one of our very few LH bats, plays 3B better than Kepp, and hopefully we are trying to teach him to play 2B so he can provide some utility depth -- not to mention he is just young and cheap and has greater than zero value for us.

At least one of Viciedo/De Aza/Gillaspie/Keppinger/Dunn/Konerko has to go, and preferably two. Keppinger and ADA would be top candidates to go, in a vacuum. Keppinger because he just doesn't fill a need and doesn't look like he will in the future either, given how many right-handed and switch-hitting infielders we have near the majors. De Aza is a good player to have on the team, but he is older and ought to have trade value. Unlike Keppinger, though, you can only really trade De Aza if you get something rather useful in return. Going into the season with a 4-man outfield isn't the worst thing in the world, but right now there is simply no way to have Davidson as your starting 3B without dumping one of the infielders. Gillaspie can be useful as one of our very few LH bats, plays 3B better than Kepp, and hopefully we are trying to teach him to play 2B so he can provide some utility depth -- not to mention he is just young and cheap and has greater than zero value for us.

It's not foiled if you didn't want to be paying them $40M per year indefinitely into the future

At equal contracts? I'm picking Tanaka. This guy was just as dominant at what he did, but against much better competition. At half the price, less hypothetical risk of injury...I'm happy with Abreu

That puts NYY at around $205-210M payroll for this year. The only thing worse than giving a huge contract is to double it by paying luxury taxes on it

Welcome back to salary hell, New York!

QUOTE (Downtown518 @ Jan 22, 2014 -> 08:41 AM) Ken Rosenthal ‏@Ken_Rosenthal BREAKING: Tanaka to #Yankees, seven years, $155M, opt-out after fourth year. okay then, never wanted the guy

Can Joakim fill in at PG? He would will his way to success

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jan 21, 2014 -> 07:31 PM) Your story seems to have changed over the last few days, Jake. Seems to me like you've jumped on the same bandwagon as many others after the first folks started to criticize the author. I'm still fond of the article because it was such a fascinating story, but I do see how it is problematic. I think much of it comes from editorial carelessness. I try to give Hannan credit that he wasn't reveling in her transgendered-ness, but I do understand why people might feel that way. I've been frustrated with the notion that she "deserved" to be outed because that is just another thing. I felt okay about this, mostly, because she happens to be dead. Mostly, after re-reading the article, I can see how I read over troubling parts without alarms going off because I assumed benign intent on the part of the author. Now that I've heard many of the criticisms, I can see how it is actually quite difficult to argue against them beyond "well I think this is what he meant."

For interviews, I prefer Phil Emery. That dude will tell you EXACTLY what he is thinking. I've never seen a guy pull out PFF stats and salary numbers nonchalantly to explain and justify a roster move.

Most of the argument is about his journalistic integrity. It isn't that people can't or wouldn't find out, but whether this article was exploitative or unnecessarily harmful. I enjoyed reading it, but it became much more about her transgender status than it needed to be to be a good article or lay out the facts.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Jan 21, 2014 -> 05:41 PM) Krohl/Vanderbilt previously attempted suicide, no? There are many different reasons she could have committed suicide, among them being outed as a man, being outed as a fraud, depression. We are putting the blame on Hannan, but ultimately Krohl/Vanderbilt took her own life. Hannan may have played a part but he didn't do this to push this person over the edge. Not too many people are arguing that this fiasco caused her to commit suicide -- there was quite a bit of lag between Hannan's last convo with her and her suicide IIRC. Either way, it is always a very complicated thing and in this case, we know that she had been suicidal before. Like you said, who knows why, though I bet her difficulty with her gender identity didn't help. I wouldn't want to try to draw a straight line between the threat of this article and her death. It isn't clear that he/Grantland was willing to publish it if she were alive.

This is why I keep going back to the whole thing being careless. Hannan and the entire editorial staff never bothered to mention what the circumstances were that led him to out her to the investor -- did he press him for more details, etc.? There were so many steps along the way where Hannan could have been up front about the fact he was entering tricky territory and somehow nobody ever made that kind of thing appear in the article.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jan 21, 2014 -> 04:32 PM) Smart move - it likely wouldn't be denied even if they aren't, and you get some points with the fans. Seems like every team is sprinkling rumors that can either make it seem like they were involved, maybe even offered more than everyone but got turned down while also having rumors that make it seem like they weren't really interested. This way they are covered whether he turns out to be great or a bust.

There is a limit on how much you are now allowed to spend internationally and on the draft -- they did give a big bonus to Soler, though. Nonetheless, it is a relative certainty that their spending on draft and sanctioned international signings would have gone down when Theo came rather than up

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jan 21, 2014 -> 03:40 PM) Guessing, false info, the internet. Pick your poison. The Sox have heard jack s***, so I assume everyone else is in the same boat. When you say they haven't heard anything, does that mean Tanaka's people haven't actually negotiated with anyone? Just give us a single bid and we'll pick the highest one? Seems like an odd tactic. Or does this mean that all teams have gone back and forth and have basically reached their limit and now everybody's waiting?

Hannan could even have just said she was born under the name Stephen Krohl or simply "another name." Imagine if he had just said she was used to be named Steven Krohl and let people guess at what that means.

He looks like he was being brief for the sake of not letting the story turn into "look at the freakshow"