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Moves only need to be made after THE move is made - Firing Pax and Forman.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 27, 2017 -> 11:28 AM) When it comes down to it, Law is a great evaluator. At the same time, he's very bent on himself. Looking back at these rankings in 2020, when these players start showing their true value, I think the actual rank is less important to some writers than where they were against the consensus of writers. This type of thinking, in theory, would make Law dive in on guys and write guys off but it's also a natural hedge. If Moncada becomes a very good player Law can still say, "I had him as the #17 best prospect, that's a very good player, That's a 3 WAR player, etc." If Moncada is a total bust than Law can say, "I didn't see him as highly as everyone else." or "I was the low guy on Moncada." I could be and probably am wrong, but given the insight Law has given us into his person, I wouldn't be surprised if he viewed these rankings as more of a pissing contest than a meritocratic process. That being said, to have an arm with one appearance above A ball like Mitch Keller in front of Yoan Moncada...I just can't get behind that. My impression of Law from his chats is he takes "updating your priors" to a more extreme level from half to half. These are some pretty big ceiling/floor jumps from AFL impressions.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Jan 27, 2017 -> 11:15 AM) Why is that nonsense? How do you think his job performance is evaluated exactly? Do you think someone at ESPN does a post-audit on his rankings every few years? Of course not, they simply look at how much traffic he drives to ESPN Insider. I'm not suggesting that's his reasoning for the Moncada ranking, but let's not pretend there isn't an obvious incentive here to stir up interest in his articles. ESPN has numerous shows where dumb viewpoints are the underlying hook. Why do you think Skip Bayless lasted as long as he did? Also, it's real annoying when the ranking Nazi's come out and accuse people of being "butt hurt" for questioning a specific player's ranking. First, this is a message board and we're meant to discuss things like rankings here. Second, we don't have to accept whatever a professional writer puts on their website as gospel. The amount of policing on what could be good, quality debate by certain posters is getting out of control here. Please, people aren't questioning his rankings. They are reflexively dismissing anything that doesn't rank sox prospects high enough as being biased. That isn't interesting debate it's just whining. You could use these to learn more about prospects strengths and weaknesses and decide yourself what you think is more important, or you could just get mad about output. And output (in terms of list rankings) won't matter, ultimately when these guys arrive next year. Would I now rank Moncada lower than Kopech because of this list? Hell no. I know Crawford is good defensively but no way in hell I'd take a 1-for-1 swap for Moncada. But it's good to know that Moncada is not finished developing. He may very well come up and struggle some more, he has a contact issue that will be up to him to correct. The good news is he already walks and could very well have some big power seasons where he identifies what pitches to drive. And that is more than most others in top 20 can do.

Maybe he'll say he's resigning. hahahahahahahahahahahahahaj kjkjkjkjk

Do you guys really think ranking a bunch of amateur pros across a number of different specialties is such a linear exercise?

It just sucks because Magneurius is such a great name it really seems like we won't get him in any trade.

For those who would like to obssess over a new teams farm system, complete conjecture over a new team that should try to acquire him: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/a-new-jose-quintana-idea/

QUOTE (fredmanrique @ Jan 27, 2017 -> 08:03 AM) I wish Colorado would go wild and all in. Q, Abreu, Robertson for Dahl, Rodgers, Hoffman, Tapia, Pint I know it'll never happen but how much would Q alone cost... I mean, probably closer to Dahl/Pint/3rd piece. Robertson would add basically none of the rest. Dahl is really good and already ML proven, don't underrate that.

Best finals I could hope for. Gonna be so much fun

If anyone can back that up actually I only remember an article from like two years ago on it and I don't have BP sub

Mariners DFAd Jesus sucre who is not good offensively but I feel like has a pretty good framing rep. Could be a good minor league deal

I'm on team Rondo here.

QUOTE (steveno89 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 04:39 PM) I could see more scenarios where the Sox win a Conforto for Jones deal than us regretting dealing a setup man in the next few seasons Conforto seems to have the floor of a fourth outfielder and the ceiling of an above average regular He really struggles hitting the curveball, but is a great fastball hitter. He would be worth the risk, but I'm not certain the Mets want to move him Yeah this is just for fun. But ears perk up when I hear a young player is blocked. Flashbacks of Carlos Quentin/Eaton acquisitions.

QUOTE (ChiSoxFanMike @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 04:32 PM) The Sox would be taking a risk by putting all their eggs in Conforto's basket if they traded a legit asset like Jones for him straight up, but I personally really like Conforto and think he has All Star level potential. No they wouldn't. Jones is a year removed from being inactive for almost 2 years. Conforto is already in the show, had a down year but still generated a lot of hard contact. Trading a setup man for good chance at a productive outfielder especially with this teams farm setup is a no brainer to me. That said I doubt conforto is even as available as I discussed.

QUOTE (soxfan2014 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 04:28 PM) I was referring to if they didn't have all 4. They picked up his option because of the uncertainty of Cespedes. I'm saying they should have just declined his option and if it didn't work out with Cespedes, they could have aimed for a real CF since whoever is going to play there is out of position. I also think the Mets just straight up underestimated how toxic Bruce would be. edit: said overestimated first.

QUOTE (soxfan2014 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 04:23 PM) I feel like regardless of the situation of Cespedes, they probably should have declined his option. You already have 2 corner OF in Conforto and Granderson and if you failed to re-sign Cespedes, you could try to get a true CF or try to re-sign Bruce to a cheaper deal (I bet he'd still be on the market) or another option. Granderson Bruce Conforto Cespedes - 4 corner OF. Roster construction, but I guess anything works with that staff when healthy.

I would be totally stoked about Jones for Conforto. Sox have had really good success on trades like that.

It's still crazy to me that they aren't just eating it with Bruce and benching him for Conforto but instead they are jerking Conforto around again. Would love if that were a possibility but I know that's just thinking too much about how Collins doesn't like him, not an organizational dislike.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 02:46 PM) To be fair, the value of the peso has already dropped by more than 20% since his election and will drop further once the US Pulls out of NAFTA to do this. That pushes the opposite direction. Regardless, the punishment will be on Americans in the grocery store. So much produce comes from Mexico, remember the poster that claimed inflation was actually rampant because oreos are smaller? This will be much more real shock to the average us consumer.

Obama could not get through immigration due to an insane republican house but I still think it's a valid criticism because he ultimately prioritized healthcare when Immigration could have been first and passed. I think that's the right call, but it's kind of undeniable he could have passed it if he prioritized differently.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 02:07 PM) Ha, I knew I'd get someone on that. In all seriousness, it's curious there's a lot of people here who are very much concerned with women's rights and "breaking the glass ceiling" for women (for good reason) here but no one seemed to acknowledge the history that was made in November. Trump's campaign was the first successful presidential campaign ran by a woman. That's quite a piece of progress in that respect. There was no mention of it here though. Are we for the advancement of women or not? If you weren't around for 2008 would the policies Pres. Obama's campaign ran on change? I don't see the reason to include the bolded. It's a matter of record. Doesn't really change regardless of personal attributes. In 2008, Obama ran on: Universal health care - got it. Taking troops out of Afghanistan - He escalated the amount of troops to numbers higher than any number during Bush admin. Still 10,000 troops there. Not sure how you could give him credit there. Close Gitmo - Still rolling. Immigration reform - Pres Obama referred to this as "maybe my biggest disappointment." Iraq War - I don't remember the specifics of what he said on this one but he had a window of ending it and he did well with this promise. Restore habeas corpus - He didn't do this in his first term and effectively did the opposite with the signing in of the NDAA Act in his second term. Afforded future presidents (Trump) scary powers here in the states. Ending the war on whistle blowers - Prosecuted more whistle blowers than all previous presidents combined. Established precedent for some scary actions for Trump. Bush tax cuts ending - Got it. So he made good on Iraq War efforts, Health Care and Bush Tax Cuts. Failed on immigration reform and Gitmo. Did the opposite of what he ran on in Afghanistan, restoring habeas corpus and ending the war on whistleblowers. It was poor phrasing but why I said it that way is in any campaign a ton of stuff comes up and most will not be actionable, but 08 the main focus was Iraq and Healthcare and then the economy as september happened. In 2012 immigration and economic recovery were huge, and then obamacare. A sizeable group was super pumped about Obama about net neutrality in 2008 but it was by no means a large focus of the campaign. I'm sure there's a bunch of other things from campaign stops that we're brought up but never could get legislative momentum. But the major themes were certainly health care it was like 50 % of every dem debate, and the other 50% to foreign policy. Immigration to me was the one huge thing he absolutely campaigned on throughout his tenure but could only pull through with exec orders that, as we've seen, are flimsy. But when 8 years pass I think the things that don't change seem like the things that were always the big items, but the things that did are forgotten about quickly. The lily Ledbetter act was pretty big at the time, barely mentioned now. For you the foreign policy things like whistleblowing and reigning in presidential powers were big failures, but they were just pieces of an equally weighted campaigning on ending torture and unneccessary wars. His foreign policy is muddled and will continue to be for good reason.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 01:51 PM) Offensively Tilson is going to be much closer to JB Shuck than Adam Eaton. What I hope is that defensively he is closer to a real CF than Eaton or Shuck. I hope to hell that he can be 2015 jb shuck offensively and not 2016 shuck. No defense can save that kind of production.

QUOTE (Con te Giolito @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 01:44 PM) I'm just saying the idea that our offense has been completely neutered by firesale trades is wrong. The Sox infield of Frazier-Anderson-Lawrie/Saladino (inevitable injury)-Abreu is probably going to score a lot of runs this year. If Tilson has so much as a pulse at the plate he'll give Jewel-brand Eaton production with his bat. If Melky does what he did last year as a DH that wont be too bad. Eaton is so ridiculously overrated by a couple nice throws from RF its sick. Good on Hahn getting the deal he got for him, still cant believe it. I agree with whoever said in another thread that the Sox lost about 8 wins with the trades. I dont think any of those are coming from the offensive side though, more the obvious rotation downgrade from Sale to Holland and the looming disaster in RF. The white sox offense was 22nd (off memory, maybe 21st) last year in runs scored. They weren't good last year and they won't be good this year with a worse lineup. Maybe catcher is better offensively. Tilson also may have less speed this year which could effect what his BABIP can be. I hope he's better than Shuck, but we aren't talking about a significant driver in quality of offensive production there.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 01:37 PM) I have a feeling there will be plenty to impeach him for. More than there ever was for Bill Clinton. He already has been caught on tape talking about trying to have sex with a married women and grabbing women without consent, then accused of 15+ cases of doing actually that, had a staffer get briefcases of cash while lobbying for a dictator, has an illegal charity foundation, hasn't paid taxes in 15 years, has been getting flooded with foreign donations, has not released his taxes, has multiple conflicts of interest that he not put at arms length. He's also using an unsecure blackberry for white house communications and was calling foreign leaders on non-secure lines while president elect. How many House Republicans are acting against any of that? None. That's a big list up there with some more important and more vetted than others, but there would have been 20 investigations at once for 8 years by Chaffetz if that was a dem.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 01:32 PM) Yeah, it is pretty easy to make that argument pretty convincingly too. Part of me just thinks he wouldn't want to give them the satisfaction of "winning". For what it would take to actually convince a bunch of house republicans to impeach Trump would mean Trumps approvals would have to be below 15% i.e. worse than Nixon's. For that to happen, he will have needed to be in an insane obvious and self made scandal. Mere incompetence will not be enough.