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Yes, should not be hard to add a reasonable 2b at the deadline. The 2b additions did reasonably well Using OPS+ since fangraphs maddeningly never splits out team additions like baseball ref does Harrison on As - 79 Escobar on Brewers - 113 Turner on Dodgers - 152 Schoop (unmoved) - 95 ( ish) Iglesias on Red Sox - 142 Baez on Mets - 141 Frazier on Padres - 86 Story (unmoved) - 120 (ish) Hernandez on White Sox - 69 (nice) Red sox acquired Schwarber (154 OPS+) for their 19th ranked relief prospect and picked up Iglesias off of waivers. Better scouting is needed, but how much are we willing to pay? The true upgrades will require substantial cost. If they go for a top guy like Semien, I'm all ears. But if you were to throw a bucket of escobar, leury, iglesias, galvis, etc in a bowl, I wouldn't say with certainty anyone provides meaningful upgrades over what the sox got out of Leury this year. And I think it's reasonable Romy could pace that on 550k. And if he doesn't, go trade for Jose Iglesias again, nobody seems to want his very good production plus defense ever.

Why can’t Romy be the answer?

Dude just rakes at every level. Too bad he wasn't signed by the Rays.

just a beautiful trade James McCann to White Sox Dallas Keuchel to Mets

I put together a google sheet each year that puts all salaries and free agents in a place where you can pick up options, free agents and a trade center and see total salary. I'll probably put that together rightafter WS.

I am incredibly excited for this season. That of course makes me nervous.

Well, this has to be the team. Tampa is excellent, but the game plan against them has been to surrender the run (because they are amazing) and throw at some beat up corners. I do not have heavy confidence in this staff to get him prepped best for this gam.e

Sox were 5th in ERA this year. 162 games. In February/March, gospel around here was our offense would crush but we were severely challenged for depth in the pitching staff. Would love to go back and time and ask if the sox finished 1st in pitching WAR and 5th in ERA if they think that would qualify the pitching coach to have done a good job, or if the better evaluation is to be traumatized by a playoff series. For all the talk of cutting the legs out from under the offense to get better at the margins, the pitching staffs no control/ all velo approach seems like the better place to optimize for the playoffs. Getting a guy like Joe Kelly (curveball heavy) or McHugh (slider heavy/cutter) are interesting players to add and Kelly is never fazed in the playoffs.

I have to say, I'm more confident in fields but this feels so much like the 2017 bears, and I just want to breathe a relief where he just puts a whole game together with like 250 yards and 3 TDs. That bears team also felt like it would move it into the opponents territory and stall over and over at the 40.

Yeah you guys are starting to way overthink things. It's a 1 year deal regardless. Kinda sucks for carlos having to make this decision right before CBA.

That was pretty awesome. Can’t really think of a comparable team in Chicago that has high expectations with new players, stumbled and could never quite be healthy all year, then smoke through the playoffs. It’s like if the 3 alphas worked lol

I don’t think this is a very good comp, both BA and BB% very unlikely to be at Eaton levels, but he could end up with plus power.

There isn’t a lot. Yolbert could be a utility soon, but Romy is an interesting guy there. He hit for a lot of power and played multiple positions. Going 20/20 in Birmingham is pretty eye opening. Carlos Perez is a guy I think can be a backup catcher and just bring in a vet like Chirinos. But, in bullpen you could end up with bounce back years from Foster, Fry and Marshall. McClure and Schryver have interesting arms or profiles (McClure is super tall) but need to show more. Starting….you basically need Kopech and Crochet to convert - those are your main prospects there. Birmingham will be interesting. With Jose Rodriguez, if he continues to keep raking, being a guy many of us hope is the next position player starter. He’d only be 21 and who knows, he could explode and be ready. But mostly, if they weren’t in AAA last year not much in depth.

Just learned Carl Crawford’s son is in this class. How many games do we think KW will fly down to scout of his? 100%

What is this pro talent for pro talent trade you all have in mind? Or are we just weakening depth so we can have Brad Miller instead of burger (yay?!?!)

I wouldn’t expect anything pre cba

Get over yourself balta

this is where I feel like I'm crazy compared to what I'm reading. I'd honestly feel so much better if we had found our Logan Webb or Max Fried and lost, but I probably would be focusing on the offense. But for second year in a row our pitching entered the playoffs and could not throw strikes and implode. Now Giolito was great last year, but now we'll have an entire pitching staff co into next years playoffs thinking "not again". But to watch that pitching where we gave up 5, 9, 6 and 10 runs and think "we need to trade Eloy"..man I don't know. In the playoffs there will be games pitching will shut you down but you really should also have games where you shut their hitters down. And yet pitching is such a pain to develop but hard to exit out of. Two years ago this is why I wanted to swap out some of these guys for more established players. Really hard to cut the cord on Cease when he found such excellent swing and miss stuff, he could very well put it all together this offseason and be the best pitcher on the staff. I don't see a reason to subtract to solve log jams. Just keep adding. If all we did was add Scherzer and trade kimbrel for some good looking 25 year old A ball pitcher would people really be mad? Add Add Add, don't trade players for "balance", you won't be as smart as you think.

soxtalk offseason plans: cut off the nose to spite the face

Lance Lynn threw 157 innings this year. Kopech could throw 150 with some dodger-like IL time and nobody would say he didn't throw a full season.

well you'd be saying good bye to a few more sox for it to work. I mean Meadows is certainly better than Nomar Mazara.

He looked so much better in a recent spot start. I also wonder if he just has an easier time preparing for starting.

There are few replacements that have a better chance than him, and would be cheaper.

Sox over the last decade have shown they can easily replace a .900 OPS player at DH, yes

I really adding stuff like this just in training would help just as much as talent diversification. I know there isn't one cool trick to solve everything, but sox hitters have made adjustments before. But a lot of what they are asked is just approach and selection. I think we have some incredibly athletic hitters that could get much better vs. offspeed pitches https://www.nbcsports.com/bayarea/giants/how-nasty-sliders-help-mike-yastrzemski-giants-games I'm sure TLR will get right on this.