Balta1701

Well that wouldn't exactly make things better would it, if ownership left him to go give the press conference and then covered it up from him?

If it were me I would try to keep the payroll flat for 1 more year with the knowledge that a playoff miss in '23 means blowing it all up...but that's really easy to type. From the perspective of the ownership group - they definitely made a fortune in 18-19, had an actual legit loss in 2020 although it was smaller than the one Reinsdorf claimed, turned a small profit in '21 but a portion of that probably went into covering the losses in 2020 and there were also still attendance restrictions for the first 1/3 of the year. At best they're probably breaking even in 2022 thanks in part to tickets sold based on the 2021 playoff run (although they may have some actual losses with a payroll this high). Without the ticket and ad sale support of having been a playoff team, 2023 starting with the same payroll as 2022 seems to have a good chance of starting in the red - losing money on paper without revenue growth. I know the other owners don't have control, but going from 2020 to 2023 without any actual profits returned to any of the owners? They aren't going to be thrilled about that concept.

How many other GMs would have allowed a manager to be hired over their objections while also covering up that manager's DUI in the initial press conference?

I think a little under $10 million, and I think Quintana will likely get a decent amount more than that.

So they're going to release Grandal and go with Zavala and a rookie (Perez)? As catchers for a rotation that they think is going to compete? Or they're going to spend extra money to bring in another veteran? Which they'd probably have to do anyway if they dropped Grandal because you need some idea of who steps in if someone is hurt? Not happening.

At this time last year you were still writing plans about how to make this work if the payroll was $175 because you didn’t know if it would go higher. How are you that confident about their budget for next year? What do you know that gives you that certainly? A payroll cut of 12% following a season where revenue and performance on the field disappointed isn’t unheard of with this franchise. How are you that confident?

Back of the rotation was healthy? What happened to Cease?

They are perhaps the two most likely players in the entire white Sox 40 man roster to be back next year. I look forward to hearing how it is insanely bad luck that they didn’t play 140 games in 2023 and no one could have predicted it.

Qualified hitters per team in the AL Central: CHW: 3 MIN: 3 KCR: 3 DET: 2 CLE: 6

White Sox are the second healthiest team in the AL Central. White Sox fans: “this is insanely bad luck it will never be this bad again”.

Does Ethan Katz offer no feedback or opinion in this spot, or is it just the White Sox way that he offers an opinion and is always ignored?

Here’s a hard one. What if they have to drop the payroll to $170 million? That would still be a huge number for this franchise, and there’s no easy path to doing that without dropping something they can’t replace.

If there’s one thing that is very White Sox, it would be telling their new coach that no, he doesn’t have the authority to hire his own staff.

Naw, he does too great of a job. He’s been telling JR that for 10 years.

When guys talk a big game and then don’t back it up, you remember.

Yes, yes he is. I suppose you could note that he now has a different GM than the one who hired him and that's always a spot where something might change, but yeah, he's employed and the White Sox don't exactly have a reputation for paying big salaries to managers.

I mean, the obvious answer at the time was to not pick up Kimbrel's option. The fact that we were so desperate to get rid of Kimbrel that we risked leaving our 2023 roster hamstrung with a high salary guy just illustrates how bad of a move that was in the first place.

I'll be totally honest - I thought Pollock would hit better than this, but I also thought he'd suffer his usual series of leg injuries and play like 50 games. I will say this though - literally no one would have thought that signing Pollock to a 1 year deal with that vesting option for money would have been a good use of resources at the time. There were better options available for less money for the whole offseason. It salvaged something out of Kimbrel, and we had the fights over how unreliable he was as a closer last offseason so I'm going to leave it at that.

Bellinger will almost certainly be non-tendered by the Dodgers. His salary if they go to arbitration will be close to $20 million, he won't get half that on the FA market. He will also be available on a 1 year deal.

Mumbles something involving the words Trayce Thompson.

I think that Pollock increasing his option by hitting his contract incentives is entirely worthy of a thread

The White Sox aren't stealing a top GM, but top GM's aren't born into those positions, they are hired from lower positions. This is why a solid search could be conducted, to identify promising candidates from lower levels in various organizations, and someone is then brought in who has a vision for how to fix this mess, top to bottom - not just player acquisition, but drafting, developing, training, everywhere else. And then that person is allowed to bring on their own staff and rebuild this foundering organization into something fitting their identity. And yea, I know it won't happen and that drives me batty.

They're not going to interview external candidates if Tony laRussa is expected to manage again. If they know he's not going to be able to, or they know they're going to replace him, then they'll announce he's retiring and get on it. If they don't announce anything, it's because they're going to try to bring him back depending on his health.