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Cut Avi Trade Abreu ($24 million) Sign Machado/Harper Acquire Greinke Acquire Goldschmidt $40 million + $32 million + 14.5 million = $84.5 million 84.5 million - 24 = $60.5 million in new payroll. Goldschmidt if you re-sign him probably gets JD Martinez money? So 80.5 million committed until 2021 across 3 players. Not sure with abreu/garcia removed how you project arb for the rest of lineup, but may be tight flexibility wise.

Re: fourth quarter. What i've seen from twitter reactions: - When we ran three straight times against dolphins we should have passed - When we passed three straight times against Packers we should have ran - When we mixed it up against vikings, we were being too conservative still It just comes down to execution, I thought we were calling similar stuff to earlier, it just didn't work because vikes are good at d. But the criticism I've seen mostly comes down to "why don't you call the successful play?"

I have gotten much better at avoiding those videos since that one louisville one a while back.

I expect this lions game to be pretty brutal. Not even sure it's a game where you say "talent wins out". Bears need to find their run game just as lions appear to have shored up run d.

This was a huge, huge huge win.

Ugh. It really is gonna rely on our special teams

Man I'm still on edge of my seat.

Anyway go win this game offense. Please don’t make me concerned

Those are the drives Goodall gets wet dreams over. Overruling play after play to keep a game artificially close

Nagy is really starting to put it together on what aggressive means as an HC and how you can show your team not to slow down. Part of me thinks that's why he didn't take it easy in buffalo or det. Teach these guys for games like this.

I’d rather have a lead, but still just as nervous as if we were behind

It does have a feeling a little like 2012 vs the Texans. Hopefully we can break the trends.

No way that is not the best part. Beat guys talked about what a big part of offense Shaheen was in preseason.

Shaheen activated. I am a believer.

I would not have strong opinions about it. I have said I think moderate competitive advances are important to developing our young players. That said, these would be one of those signings that I would continue to view Hahns success with. He may sign Happ and we say “at that price who wouldn’t!”, but if he underperforms, it just really adds to the case for me that Sox would need a different Gm to finish rebuild. If he succeeds, a sign that things are improving on pro scouting. Too often, Sox seeing something in a player other teams didn’t has indicated something negative. I’m anxious for the positive examples these next few years. If I was Happ though and had a choice, I’d probably try for the NL.

I imagine it could be useful for evaluating minor league free agents and more.

Thome has been a very interesting person in this org. His name seems to pop up all over from scouting to personally coaching guys. Im not that surprised, as I have always heard that Thome is one of the best people you’ll ever meet, I’m sure everyone wants him around.

Or another attendance thread. Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll get much through thanksgiving. Maybe a surprise lower tier FA (league signing not necessarily white Sox)

Yeah Friedman is clearly terrible with his, uh, two straight World Series appearances and NLCS appearance. If only he could do as well with a budget as the previous GM that had similar budget.

Totally forgot he didn’t make 2000 all star team. Had he won MVP that year I wonder how often that would have happened.

It was just kinda time. Frank kept getting injured, Sox had just won World Series and were in full on compete mode. He went on to have pretty good year in Oakland while sox got Thome so it was hard to complain. Otoh, Sox has such issues in CF maybe Rowand + Thomas could have ended up better.

Maybe it's me, but when I read stuff like the olney quote, it always reads like pulse from agents who are trying to frame their player as the next top guy on the list for teams that strike out on hauls. I'm all for sox trading away welington, another failed fa pickup, but the tea leaves for grandal seems murky. Worth just monitoring and waiting. Also, If i'm going to spend big money on a free agent player, i'm going to target the bat. How many people cared about Heyward's defensive ability when his bat disappeared? They already become "get me out" contracts. With Harper, there is at least a good amount of security in his OBP.

I think cubs will spend a lot while contenders, but when even the yankees, dodgers and red sox have shown that this latest luxury tax is a meaningful deterrent, I tend to believe no team is immune.

They certainly appear to have hardest financial road of the contenders that may buy. Their expected payroll is what, like 208 mill? This would likely push them to 240 ish range. Which, depending on the deal, could put them into huge taxes in years 2-3 of deal. So it will be hard.

Cubs are going to be among the genre of teams offering a short term contract, which I think will be valuable only if harper does not see the high end long term money he is seeking. edit: this is pure speculation on my part, I am not able to listen to what bernstein is saying.