Balta1701

So do they know how many legs he has?

Furcal has narrowed his choices to the Cubs, Dodgers, and Braves, and will likely make a decision before the winter meetings start next week.

QUOTE(Wanne @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 11:42 AM) What the heck is it with these teams throwing all this money at pitching...could the "White Sox Effect" be in play here?...or just desperate times?!? Do you think the A's spent too much throwing a three-year contract worth nearly $21.4 million to Esteban Loaiza? While that's not out of line for a staring pitcher...for him it is IMO. I think your main problem is the "Desperate times" part...there's simply no one available on this FA Market, so teams with money to spend from attendence boosts and revenue boosts this year aren't being smart about how they spend it.

QUOTE(longshot7 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 01:55 PM) is it just me or does every other person around have a Family Guy avatar? My god.... I just post a lot.

QUOTE(mr_genius @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:46 PM) meh, Germany will probably just give in to their demands. Dude, that joke only works when it's France.

QUOTE(Milkman delivers @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:54 PM) Overbay still an option? What would we have to give up to get him?

Who's the highest paid shortstop in baseball other than those 2? Rollins? Renteria? Aside from Renteria, what shortstop would they buy to play 3rd base?

QUOTE(SSH2005 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:46 PM) I guess the Rangers and Diamondbacks would also be very interested in Marte considering their bullpens sucked last season. This would make some sense with the rumor that the Sox fallback plan on Konerko leaving could be Troy Glaus or Hank Blalock. Look at his splits against lefties. Myers owns lefties but righties kill him. Ozzie would only use him against lefties. We hope.

QUOTE(mr_genius @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:43 PM) Yea, those are good points. I just don't think an extra 3 million or so per season for Konerko would break the budget if we're playoff contenders every year. But you're right, we do need to get Garland signed before he becomes a FA. If we don't we're going be facing the same type of situation in a couple of years. The only way that signing both Konerko and Garland (and AJ) is impossible is if we don't get a salary increase commensurate with the big attendence increase last year.

QUOTE(KevHead0881 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:41 PM) I was being sarcastic (hence the green), but no, I don't want Giles. I don't think I'd want him if we had to slightly overpay him The only person out there who we can get by "Slightly" overpaying for him right now is probably Konerko.

QUOTE(fathom @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:38 PM) I think any significant addition to this team will come via trade. Which then brings along the question...what are we willing to give up? If we sign that Myers dude...ok, Marte is a trade piece...but look how little Florida got for Mota. You're not going to replace PK with just Marte. Borchard? No one wants him. We just traded 2 of our best starting pitching prospects That basically leaves us I think with Tracy, and our outfield talent as potential trade bait. Sweeney might not fetch enough right now because he hasn't shown much power...Anderson is probably going to be our starting CF next year...which basically means in my eyes we'd probably be talking about dealing Owens.

QUOTE(KevHead0881 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:29 PM) The way I see it is that the production of a healthy Thome would make up for losing Konerko state wise. In order to improve our lineup over last year, we'd have to find a more productive replacement for Carl Everett. May I suggest Brian Giles? Only if you want to massively overpay for him.

QUOTE(fathom @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:33 PM) JimH and I clearly don't agree on much during the season. However, I agree with almost everything he's stated during this offseason. If we lose PK, I'm not going to start conceeding the division to the other teams. If anything, I'd be excited to see what additions KW would make to this team. If this were last year, I would agree with you. But look at the FA Market this year. There's a reason BJ Ryan is getting so much. There's a reason Giles is asking for a 5 year deal. This FA Market is horrific. Last year, we were able to find bargains in people like Dye, AJ, and Iguchi. Can you see anyone who's left out there who is a potential bargain other than a guy like Nomar or Thomas who has been hurt for years?

QUOTE(JimH @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:20 PM) Well I'm not the GM I'm just a fan, so I don't know. But I suspect it will involve finding a guy who can play a lot of 1B while serving as insurance at 3B. Maybe a combination of two guys. In addition, I see them bringing in a #2 hitter no matter what. In other words, it'll involve finding a guy who basically either isn't available on the FA Market or who is a significant downgrade from PK offensively. Or, in other words, it'll involve either us not winning the Central Division next year or it will involve us trading away our up and coming outfield talent to try to fill the gap.

QUOTE(SSH2005 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 12:13 PM) And what would that be? Plan B if Konerko leaves is to figure out what Plan B is and tell people.

QUOTE(Rowand44 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 10:49 AM) It'll be Iguchi unless Owens is somehow the starting cf which I highly doubt or if we trade for a 2 hitter. He's still a much better option then Juan. Just to play Devil's advocate for a moment...what if 2006 started off with the Uribe of the first months of 2004 making an appearance?

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 09:36 AM) Of course he's wrong... because he doesn't support your views, among other reasons. And if it's 10,000 or 20,000, it's 20,000 vs. 27 million people. The point remains the same. The nitpicking is amazing and I'm done with all this for a while. Nitpicking like say...only acknowledging the most superficial of the points I made?

QUOTE(RockRaines @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 10:41 AM) You can never have too much pitching Ok, who's available to pitch? Right now we have 6 starting pitchers, a full bullpen, and the only real quality bullpen guys have already been grabbed (aside from basically Wickman). Seriously...for us to hire pitching, we'd have to find someone who's a better option than the guys we have now, and there's not a single pitcher on the market other than AJ Burnett who even comes close, and given that he'd cost almost as much as PK and he wouldn't really be better than anyone in our staff except MAYBE Garcia...that answer doesn't tell me anything. You can have too much pitching if you have so much pitching that you can't throw guys out there, and you can have too much pitching if you have so much you can't afford an offense (for example; Minnesota last year).

QUOTE(EvilJester99 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 06:46 AM) A ton of money flying around and just think the Yanks haven't really done anything..... I think the Yankees are quite literally looking to save a little bit of money up this year...they're dropping a couple of big contracts in Williams and Kevin Brown, and they've got a couple young guys they've plugged into their lineup with Cano and Wang. They have a hole in CF still to fill...but other than that, I think they're saving their cash for 06 when the Lee's become FA, and there's a much better FA Crop.

QUOTE(SoxFan562004 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 09:37 AM) Rick Hahn (sp?) had a quote on the Score that said they would take the money and spend it on other players, which might be a no brainer, but it's good to hear. What other players? There's really no other option available at all this year for PK's money, and aside from 1b, we don't really have any obvious places in our lineup to put someone. Are we gonna remove Podsednik now? Dye? Uribe? Crede? And who's available to fill those slots? After 2006, yeah there's a good free agent crop, probably led by the Lee's, but seriously...who is out there this year who could provide anything close to what we'd be losing by letting PK walk? Furthermore, how in the name of Hell would we expect to be able to beat the Angels next year if they run both Vlad and PK at you?

Here's my sole point on this matter. If we lose the guy without whom we would not have won the world series...it should be because some other team offered him an insane amount of money - a B.J. Ryan type contract, which no one in their right mind would match. I'm taking something ridiculous like $75 million or more over 5 years or a 6-7 year guaranteed deal or something like that. There is no reason why we should not be willing to keep PK at the price the Angels and O's have reportedly offered. Those contracts are expensive yes, but they aren't so shockingly expensive that you'd laugh at the team signing him. The guy has back to back 40 home run seasons and was our best run producer last year by far. He fills a direct need in our lineup. He fits in there perfectly, even more so with Thome (who can give him an occcasional day off.) PK and Thome in the middle of that lineup solves virtually all of hte problems our offense had last year - lack of a lefty power bat, OBP, etc. Cleveland is improving every year. Minnesota keeps bringing up young pitching. The Yankees and Red Sox were both down last year, and Vlad the Impaler may have been hurt during the playoffs. Every one of those teams could perform a lot better next year just with the cards they already have. If we let PK go for that kind of money, we are begging to finish 2nd or 3rd in the AL Central.

Ozzie Guillen needs a couple more rings as a manger and about a 10 year tenure in order to qualify himself for the HOF. His numbers as a player don't do it. It's the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of Very good. And Pete Rose's name should not appear in the HOF until after Shoeless Joe's name gets put in there.

QUOTE(SoxFan562004 @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 09:44 AM) Now, history is nice, but the reason I would do it is you don't want them coming in flat to their playoff games. It worked for Philly last year. If there's any team which I would not expect to "Come in flat" it's a team led by Peyton Manning. Edit: Oh yeah, and Garland wasn't that flat in the playoffs for us either (Thanks Jon!)

Ok...I think that the whole "Steroid hearings" making Congressmen look good may have just been taken about 1 step too far. Or maybe 7 steps. Or something like that.

QUOTE(CanOfCorn @ Nov 29, 2005 -> 09:28 AM) It's nice to see the NFL trying to connect to the next generation of potential football fans. I mean, c'mon, no matter how they sound, it's time to find an act that'll actually sell cross-generations. The Stones aren't revered by the kids as maybe a U2 would be. And I'm no fan of U2. They had U2 in 2002, right after 9/11. And you have to admit, if any band works playing in front of a list of 9/11 casualties, it's U2. And sadly, they can't just book U2 every year.