Balta1701

I wonder if they were in on Stassi.

Oh the Dodgers don’t need Lux right?

I like the fact that the upgrade over Benintendi is Benintendi and the upgrade over Eloy is Eloy and that’s almost half the projected improvement. And yeah I can’t even tell who is projected in RF.

Note that they never burn the so-called source that let them down.

Now that y’all have suggested this I’m genuinely wondering if the Cubs might be thinking it - clear out the White Sox for Nashville and there’s potential for a 10-20% fanbase growth in a few years. Is that worth $500 million? Maybe.

Maybe the real Shohei Ohtani was the friends we made along the way.

good for Tyler O'Neill. I'm happy for Tyler O'Neill. Yeah I have no idea who Tyler O'Neill is. Googling now.

Chris Getz said yesterday he expects to be better in 2024 than in 2023.

The problem obviously is that the players can't "Go Elsewhere". Probably a majority of even the Yankees roster has been assembled through methods other than free agency - the draft and trades, where players can't pick where they go. Juan Soto wants to grow a beard this year and demands his release from the Yankees as a consequence. Are the Yankees going to comply?

Let’s also note that a lot of guys on the Yankees do not choose to be there. They are drafted by them or are traded to them without their consent. Juan Soto currently has no control over where he plays next year. They may put on a show because they’re professionals but that doesn’t mean they like it.

Whose property?

Also the blue shirt guy might have also been Jason Benetti.

Now? WTF?

I see zero reason to think that giving Jerry Reinsdorf money translates to wins. In fact it is the opposite. Since 2012 attendance has been so low that he triggered one of his amazing clauses with his landlords that dramatically drops the fee he pays to the state. Did this extra money enable him to increase payroll and get better, pushing attendance back up? Naw not at all, instead he used it as a way to have no pressure to fill the stadium. His fees are low when no one comes, so he can employ an endless line of underqualified yes men and sycophants, and let the entire experience deteriorate for everyone. This has gone on for more than 10 years, so clearly it isn’t helping the fans or creating an experience people want. And hell, go back farther - he had such a secure revenue stream from his ballpark and parking lots and such low fees that he led the owners in violating federal labor law during the strike of 1994 to try to break the union rather than negotiating in good faith, costing the best White Sox team of that decade a chance at the playoff birth they would have gotten (and maybe spoiling one of the best World Series ever as I still want to watch those Sox against the Expos). They gave him all this money and the lack of pressure to create revenue allowed him to become a bottom feeder, a leech. He doesn’t have to win, he has very low ballpark fees and can endure on revenue sharing dollars, so he doesn’t have to interview outside GMs or listen to anyone who doesn’t tell him how great he is. Maybe trickle down wins isn’t a working political philosophy, instead it has left him to trickle down on the fans.

Read it as Cousins RIP. Not sure I'm wrong.

He has a responsibility to the shareholders? How has that gone the last 3 years?

Outside of some of the basics (reworking streets, etc), I am opposed to further substantial amounts of taxpayer money going to support Jerry Reinsdorf's family and the other owners. They took the city and state to the cleaners in the last deal. Under no circumstances should the city of Chicago fund a new stadium for this billionaire. He can absolutely pay for it himself. It's the third largest city and media market in the country, this should absolutely be profitable for him. If he can't make it profitable, then he should sell to someone who can or go bankrupt.

MLBTR had him at 4/$82.

This is only really true if the offers you’re getting for him aren’t great and you’re hoping that some team gets desperate. If you had one or two nearly acceptable offers, you stop wasting your time on leaks and figure out a way to get it done. Any team making a legit offer with the type of return you’d want has several options. Offers can go away. Cleveland or Tampa might have started the offseason with high prices for their pitchers and decide to drop their asks to ensure they remove payroll now that the Winter Meetings are over, and suddenly your trade partner vanishes.

I actually think they did a little bit, the press made it clear that both the White Sox and tigers were interested and that was true. Hahn used that information to know he had to make a decent offer. He just had a problem with the whole scouting the players first thing. And the understanding your team thing.

Actions speak louder than words. They haven’t signed any long term win now contracts. That was one of my complaints last year, if Benintendi didn’t put them over the top (with what I thought was a bad team), his contract would sting for years. They haven’t signed anyone to a market value “compete now” deal. They tried to fill their pitching staff with gambles, hoping that a couple guys will have some value, and they now have a decent number of plausible arms. They haven’t signed a single fair market value free agent reliever. The version of Rick Hahn locked in my nightmares has signed 3. They haven’t traded away anything of value to them. No prospects sent out for a mid level 35 year old veteran. They’ve probably added about $15 million and saved that much on Anderson and Bummer’s deals. In 2019 Hahn added something like $50 million to a 63 win team, had another $20 million in commitments for 2020, and gave up a couple catchers in the process. He turned all that into 0 players who lasted on the roster past 2020 and a big need for a catcher that eventually turned into a $70 million bill. This is acceptance of their situation even if they’re not broadcasting it. They are rolling a roster with the bare minimum of costs and finding guys who might benefit from playing time, but who won’t hamstring them if they stink. They are taking a year at least to develop and clear out the awful money mess from the former guy. The offseason did not have to go like this, they could have traded Quero for Perez, kept Anderson, signed Whit, kept Bummer, and signed Severino and someone else like that. Add $50 or $60 million, lose a top prospect, and set up for 90+ losses in any reasonable projection.

And if we're being totally honest...how did spending like Steve Cohen work out for Steve Cohen last year? They wound up selling off their most expensive pieces and footing a large portion of the bill to bring in prospects.

I'm sure they've listened but the package for that level of control is so big that it's doubtful someone is actually willing to give up that kind of a talent haul. The number of teams that could actually afford him I can probably count on my hand, and for most of them it would be a bad move, it would completely deplete their system to pay fair price for him. That makes him nearly impossible to move unless the White Sox give him away for less than he should be worth. Would you be willing to sell Robert for way less than he might seemingly be worth in order to get something right now? Rather than a giant return maybe the Orioles gave you a package around Cowser and Kjerstad as the only top 100 prospects, plus a couple of lower ranked filler pieces - would you do that? I very likely would not do so, and selling Robert at a discount is probably the only way right not to get people actually interested since the price of 4 years of control would be so obscenely high.

This offseason they had literally two options: 1. Admit their predicament, recognize that they were a complete mess and this wasn't turning around easily, and start looking towards the future. Put together a roster, but stop doing long-term damage - pick up guys who are cheap and who have a chance to be movable for something at the deadline, clear out contracts where they can be cleared out, pinch every penny and take some gambles to see if you can find any value. 2. Declare that their 101 loss team was 1 or 2 great leaders away and was competitive right now. Add a couple of $10 million players, trade for Perez, declare that this year will be breakouts for everyone and that, gosh I dunno this was Romy Gonzalez's year to be an all star and that surely this year all 5 staters would stay healthy. This is pretty much the 2023 plan just even more blatant. There's no easy way out, but at least so far they haven't acted like they're in denial about their situation. The nightmare version of Rick Hahn that poisons my sleep is still out there declaring that he's one player away and this is the time to go all in.