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I would argue MLB has been way less focused than they should be on the entertainment factor of their offseason and general scheduling.

If anyone was wondering, I can speculate that I will be disappointed if we don't get either.

It's both literally true and also Cashman would not spoil agent relationships by publicly stating they are out on a player.

Ha, well realistically what you'll erase is the game 163, and remember the sox getting swept when they went into a 3 game series up 2.5 games, and collapsing in game 3 when we had a 4 run lead (?).

I'm not sure he'd have a ML contract if not for Manny.

Starting spot. Backup spots, sure, though this is where the glut of college relieve pitchers starts to become irritating, as how many will they have to keep on 40 to prevent poaching of the most obvious rule 5 candidates around.

I don't know if it's can't afford it. I think it's not wanting to have $55 million tied up in two players when you really only have a short term crunch in the position. Had they not acquired stanton I don't think it's a question they get one of em.

He would have to be age 26 mitch haniger for me to reserve it: https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/h/hanigmi01.shtml So to get 400 ABs he'd need to tear up charlotte quickly, then have a year like that. (now granted due to the deep well of outfielders I expect no FA acquisitions in OF next year, but still.)

Cordell will turn 27 in the season. How good would Cordell have to be for how long for you to actually hold a roster spot for him in 2020? He'd have to be pretty damn good all year. The dude missed his window. It sucks, I wish him the best. I'm glad he got some time in big leagues last year.

These binary trades you are requiring I take on are strange. That same offseason saw the Royals trade Esteury Ruiz to the Padres in the travis wood/cahill trade. He was an 18 year old rookie league outfielder. He hit with decent patiencea nd power last year. That's the type of player I'd prefer, and was not in Aball. Aball was a stand-in for "young".

And he was selected in the third round, which really starts to complicate the money proposition. For him to guarantee he would make more in NFL, he would need to be drafted in first round/early second. For that to happen I would have a hard time seeing a team spending that capital when it's not clear he will join team.

There was no requirement that we had to trade Swarzak for an outfielder.

Eh, it could be literally true (i.e. the last formal offer was for x years/200 mill), but not true to the current moment of negotiations and not a take it or leave it offer.

He was a pretty big wild card in baseball too though.

they may be selling that but they aren't seeing 20k butts in the seats I can tell you.

And one other part though, they also pose more of an immediate roster spot issue when they are injured yet not established. I think that better displays the urgency in which those guys needed to hit. We had to make decisions fairly quickly with them.

but he was near 26 when we got him with a back injury. Technically they are more developed but their margin for error seems so much more slim than with a younger player. He basically needed to prove it really quickly.

That's not what I'm saying, I'm saying the lost time due to injuries is worse for a 24/25/26 year old prospect who needed to prove themselves at mlb level almost immediately. They lost 6 months and were effectively replaced.

I would have been happier with the process in that, personally. I was open to these trades at time despite preference being younger wild cards. But seeing how necessary it was for them to get playing time right away to decide whether they would stick (AAA would not define that anymore), I'd hope that any flips sox still may do targets younger players. They may not make sox, but they'd have a longer window of being trade chips even if they don't pan out. The value of these guys died 6 months after they were acquired.

I think a lot of posters (@iamshack specifically) said that should have been game all along. I was open to it as sox had shown some ability to target these types of players in the past, but they were injured but also...they just didn't have very high ceilings and I think taking less certainty in a tradeoff for higher payoff (players that still may grow into their bodies and raise ceilings) made more sense for rebuilding sox than targeting these players to see what they did with an MLB spot. They really could have just used waivers for that exclusively.

I think the injuries showed off the risk in acquiring 24/25 year olds.

Not sure that would work out well for white sox.

Clock is ticking man, I don’t know they’ll have a chance.

Sox really whiffed on their targets they acquired from duke/swarzak. I hope they re evaluate that type of return.

I can't express to you if I was a phillies fan how much i would gag at my new outfield of McCutchen Pollock and ...Hoskens? Herrerra? My rebuilding team suddenly looks old and broken down.