Balta1701

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:39 PM) Would they make a play for "aces" in Price or Cueto...? JR in the past said he would with Tanaka, but are Price/Cueto too risky because of their respective ages and more wear and tear? Please no more giving up resources to add pitchers to this roster while also drafting pitchers non-stop. I'm begging here.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:37 PM) But you can't just look at that side. We have Sale / Q / Abreu in 2016 who more then off-set that based upon their production. And 2016 is 1 year, I'd be concerned if we had 3 to 4 years or something like that. We are 1 year from that being removed and when you are 1 year away it is also easier to move at least a portion of that burden to another club (maybe not much, but 10% is possible). And like I've said, I can't fully put Melky in Danks range. Danks is a pure sunk cost. Melky is 2.5 months into the season and has gotten awful luck. Not saying he should be hitting .300 and being great, but his performance is better then the stats indicate and I would be stunned if these past 2 months were the player we will get the next 3 years. Not saying he'll ultimately be worth the contract but he isn't going to accumulate this negative WAR the entire contract. At least not at this stage in the process can I personally assess / come to that conclusion. The other side though is the number of needs we have. Assume Garcia and Eaton are decent enough players...we still are staring at needing to fill 6 different lineup positions in 2017 with, to my eyes, 0 players in the minor leagues on pace to be ready to fill those as of right now. A 2017 opening day arrival even seems early for Anderson with how he's performing at AA unless everyone is ok with 2017 being another rebuilding year. The money alone wouldn't be as bad if we were holding a bunch of players who could fill those roles. We're not. That makes this a looming disaster. Business as usual for the White Sox will turn this into a completely lost decade.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:31 PM) The White Sox have been way more patient with their young players than Soxtalk would like. Beckham? Viciedo? Seriously? They were patient with Viciedo? When they called him up from AA during his 2nd year to sit on the bench? When he got a starting job after a decent but 1/2 season stint at Charlotte? When they moved him from 3b to 1b to 3b to RF to LF within a 3 year stint? They were patient with Beckham when he got 259 minor league PAs before being called up to the bigs?

QUOTE (OmarComing25 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:26 PM) Who are the bad contracts? Alexei is up after this year and LaRoche and Danks are gone after next year. Even Melky is only 3 years. Robertson is a bit high but I wouldn't necessarily call it a bad contract. For next year it might make things a bit difficult but after 2016 I don't see anything that will hamper the franchise. Danks and Melky is enough. That's 25% of our payroll for 2016 already down the drain. How much have we complained about Danks's contract being in the way the last 2 years? We now have 2 of those for 2016. Meanwhile...the guys we have who are currently "really cheap" start being less cheap. We start feeling that next year as Sale, Quintana, Abreu, get more expensive. In 2017 that trend continues. We've already got $70 million committed for 2017.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:22 PM) I am open to trading. I'd probably prefer to move Q then Sale but it does all depend on the package. I think Dodgers are team that could offer a package that made sense. Doesn't mean they will though. I suppose Rays / Priates could as well. The Pirates would actually be a really interesting match for Quintana...although their rotation is so completely on fire right now that they probably don't feel much of a need to make a move. Earlier in the season they were talking around here about the need for a strong lefty in their rotation, and they actually have enough talent to move to make a deal. Now that Morton is back from the DL and on a roll, that probably is lessened. Maybe if Liriano or Burnett implode over the next couple weeks.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:20 PM) He was projecting into the future though. I think the Royals are a strong team and respect everything they do, but I don't see them as some unbeatable juggernaut with tons of talent coming to make them better. No one knows what will happen but no reason other teams can't contend with them. Very good team though and Caufield points out Twins / Indians as teams to be most scared of. I have little concern over Tigers (long term...this year, yeah, still relevant, but long term, they are a mess) and still think we are in as good a spot as Twins / Indians going forward (if not better). Royals are better then us, but we have benefit of larger market and potential to increase payroll (unless Royals decide to play at our level which is always possible). I don't know what the Royals broadcast situation is, but at this point they're massively outdrawing us and massively outdoing us on interest. I very much disagree with us being in as good of a position as the Twins. The fact that they're already competitive this early, before the bulk of the talent they've built up arrives...should terrify us. I probably agree about the Indians being as ****ed as us, they probably have a slightly better system but still weak and that's not something worth bragging about. They're similarly stuck with bad contracts for veterans and don't really have an obvious path to getting better in the next couple years without doing something drastic.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:18 PM) So, good news is, money isn't tied up to crappy players, downside is our farm talent is in the pitching crops so we have to get creative / find other ways for new position players. Which is exactly the logic where I've followed to reach the point that I'm ready to trade one of our top 2 lefties.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:13 PM) Finally coming around? No one was more adamant then me all off-season. And I also completely disagree with you in the fact that all other teams have brighter futures then the White Sox. I think the Tigers future is horrific and I don't see the Royals continuing to trend upward. Twins and Indians have prospects but we have young stars to build around. I think the Sox made mistakes but they are still in a position where you can pivot and improve. Tough moves are going to have to be made and you will have to win some trades but somehow they are going to have to get some young, athletic, position talent capable of playing / ready to play at the major league level. I know, i know, derailment. I have to. It's hard to trend upward that much when you have the 2nd best record in baseball.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:04 PM) Yup. Balta went there on page 2, not even 20 posts into it. Surprised it took that long. I was going after the "commonly made racist remarks part" of that quote and not thinking about the Conservative beliefs part. That was, for once, not my intention, that was in the original quote from the person who knew the shooter.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:08 PM) There was a rumor he/Noesi were going to take Rodon's next start (against the Rangers) and let him take a breather. Unconfirmed, but logical. You're missing what the question was.

Gillaspie and Abreu are not "worse defensively" than they were last season. They're actually better than they were last year per UZR. Flowers is worse and LaRoche doesn't play 1b much. Those guys have actually gotten a bit better defensively, but "a bit better than terrible" is still pretty weak.

QUOTE (OmarComing25 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 02:02 PM) Exactly, and trading Sale for prospects could easily turn this into a worse debacle. As a comment I saw on reddit stated: "I'd rather have a guaranteed yearly Cy Young candidate than gamble on 5 top prospects - which could yield f***-all and could realistically end up yielding a group that develops into a decent position player, a 4th starter, a solid reliever and a 4th OF - a nice package but hardly worth a guy like Sale." How is it going to be worse? Is losing 95 games a year really that much worse than losing 90?

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:58 PM) I can't understand the reality behind this. This is player who always gives you a better chance of winning. Seriously I can't find logic in this. What's the point of having Chris Sale win a ton of games in the next few seasons for a team that is going to be older, more expensive, and weaker than the disastrous 2015 team? Why is it so important for us to get to 72 wins? Explain to me how this team has a path to being competitive with multiple bad contracts for players who will be aging and virtually nothing available in the minors to help over the next couple years and you'll convince me to hold onto Sale. I was in exactly your position last year saying "oh we can still wait even until 2016 with him and grow as a roster rather than trading him." Now I'm looking at this team as facing even more years of rebuilding after the 2015 disaster with virtually no hope for reinforcements over the next several years. Give me a path that actually could work over the next couple years and I'll get your point. Right now I don't see it. Minor league system is bare except for a couple starting pitchers, 5 positions in the lineup are disasters, even the talented guys we have in the OF in Eaton and Garcia are struggling.

QUOTE (shysocks @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:39 PM) And those responses include trading Sale for less than he's worth? Because nobody can give you what he's worth. I'm at that point. What good is Chris Sale to us if he's just going to put up ERA's in the mid-2s for the next 3 years on a losing team? We spent the offseason saying "We can't waste Sale's good years like this". We're doing exactly that! We are now on a direct path to wasting them. Show me a way to put together a competitive team out of this mess and I'll stop thinking that, but if I'm now at the point where "This team looks like a debacle for years to come", what exactly is the point of having Sale for 2-3 years on that debacle?

QUOTE (shysocks @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:11 PM) Because minor league players aren't fair value for Sale, it's just a fact. The talent combined with the contract make him a rare asset, and if you want him, your MLB team is gonna have to be involved. There aren't any more ways I can say it. QUOTE (LDF @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:28 PM) and i disagree..... There aren't any more ways I can say it. Under normal circumstances (i.e. 2014) I would totally agree with Shys. It's no longer normal circumstances. We're now staring over an abyss, that makes more drastic responses something we need to consider.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:26 PM) Part of the problem with eye witness testimony is that people aren't actually witnessing things in their entirety, so they often fill the gaps with something they think they saw. Or they see something but they don't actually focus on it enough to recall it properly later. Cops are trained to analyze entire situations as they come upon them. They're trained to catch characteristics of people so they can recall them later. It's necessary for the paperwork they have to eventually fill out. And it's something they do on a routine basis. Except that while filling out those documents they're also doing exactly what you said in the first line, filling in the gaps with things they think they saw. They're training in that skill too.

So, papers that say "working memory training techniques that are currently available are ineffective" are popping up repeatedly in the searches I'm doing. Link Link - high stress situation tests for officers reduced working memory performance but improved training in other areas Inherent working memory correlates with incorrect decisions in shooting tests

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:20 PM) That's right, I am sure all they teach at the police academy is brutality techniques. Is there training that actually works to improve eyewitness memory recall? Does such a training exist and actually produce quantifiable results? Again I've never heard of it and there was no reply to that question in your comment so given the lack of one of those I'm going to assume you believe the answer is no until you reply with something useful and educational.

No complaints. He ready to go Saturday?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:14 PM) How much different is it to assume that the judges and lawyers know the law better then other people because that is what they are trained for? You can work to learn information, it can be a specific goal. Is "working to learn how to recall things accurately" something that there is similar training for? I've never heard of such training, it's just being asserted that it's a skill that would be picked up. That you drop someone off in a court room and they get used to it.

QUOTE (OmarComing25 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:11 PM) I agree about the panic mode. Some fans want to blow it up but that would mean selling low on a lot of guys. I don't want another Nick Swisher scenario. You have to hope that some guys rebound before you trade them, though that ship unfortunately might have sailed already with Alexei. Who would we actually be selling low on that might rebound? Duke? The guys I'd try like crazy to move include LaRoche and Robertson. Duke's been terrible the last month so dumping him for nothing seems questionable. Other than that...Quintana and Sale are guys at pretty darn high value so we're not selling low on them. Alexei and Samardzija are guys who we'd be "selling low" on but both of them are likely to be unrestricted FAs at the end of the season so moving them becomes much more of a priority (unless Samardzija continues to be this bad where we can't get anything at all for him and you're ok with waiting until 2020 to get a return on Samardzija's draft pick, assuming he declines the QO).

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 01:03 PM) All black people commit crime. That's an accurate stereotype too right? You clearly believe that because that last line was a direct quote from you on the night of the baltimore riots.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 12:54 PM) Lol, I see, so being southern and conservative that tells some racist jokes means you're a murderer? The best way to change stereotypes is to perform the stereotypical act.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 12:54 PM) On a side note, how miserable was Monday/Tuesday? PNC Park is my favorite in baseball but man that had to suck. I went into them expecting the white sox to lose and was just enjoying the view and asking Abreu to homer. I got myself into "Sammy Sosa playing with the Cubs in the 90s" mode and wasn't all that disappointed, just enjoyed the experience.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Jun 18, 2015 -> 12:46 PM) Okay I get what you mean. Realistically, if they could get the kind of haul that he's "worth", I'm with you. That's just not going to happen. This is why I disagree with you on the Quintana thing too. He's a very underrated pitcher and I just don't think they'd acquire what he's worth. Maybe I'm wrong though. On this one I think the prevalence of advanced stats will help. You could make a case to me that trading Quintana, holding Sale, developing Rodon and the kid we just drafted, and clearing as much payroll as we can could set us up for 2017 even though I'd be skeptical given our typical development and trade history. But personally, I'm beyond that, I think they're set up for a lost decade barring a major overhaul in everything, from players to organization to decision making.