Balta1701

Has Corey Kluber shown any sign that he's going to decline in the next couple years? Was there some red flag this year I missed?

I think this is pretty rough logic. The White Sox have a $50 million ish payroll counting Abreu. They have room for 3 big signings, or maybe 2 big signings and some smaller Cruz/Brantley types. Historically they've hit a payroll ceiling around $120 or $130 million, and even with shared revenue growth, they're probably not going blow way past that by the amount of another huge contract that until they can win enough to actually sell some tickets. By definition, "one of your 3 big contracts" impedes other pursuits because now you are down to 1 or 2 other big contracts total, and by the time those early deals are ending their deals, any of the young guys we brought up will be hitting arbitration years. So, ask yourself, if it's all you get, does Corbin + Machado + a handful of other guys make this team a contender next year? If not, you don't get a do-over in 2020, you're in the place the White Sox were in 2016 - not having a lot of money to spend because of what they did the year before. If you think that does....well, go for it.

Why would a team give up something of value to trade for a more expensive catcher when that team could just sign Ellis themselves? Colorado has some young catchers already, they didn't do anything in the big leagues last year, I could talk myself into believing that Narvaez would actually have some good value to them given how he produced last year, but Castillo?

Try to plug the holes in the bullpen using the talent that they have built up, take advantage of their strong starting rotation and the fact that every other team in this division is so weak to make 1 or 2 more playoff runs, see if you can hit a groove and win a title in there, then figure out what you need to do.

If you're going to make decisions thinking about "If everything goes right", fine, but don't do things that impede the long term plan in the process. Don't commit our 2020 rotation slots or 2020 free agent spending on a pitcher in 2019 just in case everything goes right. Pomeranz on a 1 year deal is a fine idea, we clearly need 2 guys just to fill out the rotation, just don't tell me that your dream is Drew Pomeranz and Lance Lynn added to this rotation next year will give it any reasonable prayer of being above average, and don't impede the org from doing actual work in 2020 when it might matter.

Some guys will improve next year, the team will be better, Eloy Jiminez will be a monster but may or may not need a little time to adapt, but the team is something under a 70 win team without Kopech and maybe 75 if they land a Machado, even with a couple starting pitching adds to fill the rotation. Kopech, Cease, Rodon, Lopez, and Giolito is the makings of a league average rotation in 2020 and, depending on Rodon being traded or not, a really good rotation in 2021 as long as we actually give them time to pitch in 2020. We have no obvious candidates for 3b anywhere in this organization right now so sign away, unlike last year you can even talk me into Moustakas (although waiting on Arenado would seem a smarter move). We are loaded on outfielders and so we should expect that we're going to have a number of breakout outfielders hitting this team in 2021 including more than 1 guy who can play center field. With a reasonable amount of things going right and wrong, this team should be around .500 in 2020, probably a few games under because of that starting rotation, and really good in 2021 once the rotation gets a year together.

And a 12 WAR season from the rotation, the ideal case, is not going to put this team anywhere near .500. The league average this season was 11. That is not a "pretty darn good rotation".

Charlie Morton's been on record in the local papers talking about retiring. I think there's a decent chance the Astros talk him into coming back, maybe even for more than 1 year, but I am seriously skeptical about the idea that he'd come to a team like the White Sox knowing there's a good chance he'd be traded and moving midseason.

Well, first of all I was replying to a person who said that everything was going to go right this year for this to be a pretty good rotation, so Rodon being hurt, Gio having a bad ERA, and Lopez having bad peripherals - none of those are allowed, because we were just told that wasn't going to be the case. Secondly...if we're going to pull the plug on one of those guys...fine. It might happen. Why are we predicting there will be no pitchers available on the free agent market next offseason? If we really have to spend money on a pitcher, what would we rather be doing, having $10 million or $15 million locked up in 2020 on someone like Lynn, or having $25 million available to make a run at someone decent like Verlander or that lefty who closed out the World Series? When was the last time there were 0 pitchers available on the Free Agent market? Keep your options open. Keep 5 rotation slots available for those guys, and adapt once we're there if necessary.

Rodon, Giolito, Kopech, Lopez, Cease. Which one is not in the rotation in 2020? Which one should we block with a guy on a 2 year deal? That doesn't count any of the other guys at Charlotte or perhaps Dunning staying healthy either. Unless Rodon is traded, every one of those 5 should have a slot open for them in the 2020 opening day rotation and they should not be blocked until something catastrophic happens or we give up on Giolito completely, which you clearly don't believe will happen based on the previous post where you assumed he would be a lot better. 3b? OF? Bring it on, but with one caveat - in 2021 our outfield is going to be F***ING OVERLOADED, because we have 4 outfielders who should be at AA this year who will be arriving then. So yeah, give me an outfield upgrade, but let me know where those guys are going to play 2 years from now, because if none of them make it then this won't matter anyway because all of our talent imploded.

I'm sorry, but not only is that not a rotation where everything is remotely likely to go right (Jesus 3 of the 5 guys had ERAs over 4.75 this year I think the average is over 5 and you're expecting all of them to get better?), even if everyone stayed healthy and improved on last year, just go look at how that rotation stacks up against the Native American Sterotypes from Cleveland. Kluber, Klevinger, Carrasco, Tomlin, and a 23 year old at the end. The guys in our rotation would be 5th starters in that actually good rotation even if many things went right. Go look at the Astros rotation this year to play the same game, with Verlander, Cole, Morton, Keuchel, and McCullers - our guys would be the injury replacements. That is not "pretty damn good" even if everything goes right.

If we want someone slightly better than Shields but who will also likely pitch a strong number of innings, Gio would be a decent bet, that's a very consistent 170+ innings per year. He might require more than a 1 year deal though, which might make him very tough to move in trades or to the bullpen.

I'd buy all of this thinking except there's no line in there about an opt out. That's the one thing that could sabotage us. Machado might not be willing to accept less money to play for another team, but he might be willing to do so if he got an opt-out after 2 or 3 years where he could sign another 8-10 year deal, and that's something we simply cannot offer with this franchise in its current state. If everything else you say is true, and it might be...that's the one way to beat us.

Lord I hope someone gets fired over him, whether it was the pick originally, the scouting, the development, how he was moved around, that is such an organizational debacle, but yeah dropping from the 40 man seems like the right move after his 2nd half. Somewhere in there this org made a mistake worth >>$10 million.

And you mentioned Rodon, and you mentioned the bullpen. Someone from that list is going to get worse this year or get hurt or both. Or if it's not them, then it'll be someone else they're counting on like Abreu or Narvaez or the free agent signing.

He hasn't seen the big leagues since 2015 so space filler in the Charlotte rotation seems most likely?

So you're assuming that every player on the roster takes a step in the right direction? There's one problem. My first rule of thumb is "First do no harm" in 2019. That means - play the kids every day, bench them if needed, rest them if needed, but don't be aggressive with them because you need to win a game. Don't trade away talent this offseason to get better. Don't sign guys who might cost a draft pick. Don't sign guys who might even potentially block the spot of someone we might need in 2020 (that counts the entire starting rotation). Don't sign guys that cost us substantial resources or money that could be spent going into 2020. Stay the course, we've done the job so far, now don't take detours just to win 75 games instead of 70 next year.

Wasn't this guy one of the Yankees prospects at some point? Along with Betances?

No but they better be "Well above average" at something and I have no idea what that could be.

The shoulder he's been on the DL with since August.

I will change my tune on guys like this if and when I think this team is ready to compete, but I see no reason to spend money on a guy in 2019 unless they're someone like Machado or Harper that simply won't be available after 2019. If we're still after pitching after 2019 (and frankly, that means we had one of those guys completely flop, which makes competing harder), then I'd rather have more money available when someone like Sale hits free agency.

So if his health was outstanding starting in 2017 WTF was with all the disabled list time and injuries affecting his 2018 performance?

This team has a young and weak bullpen, they scored 220 fewer runs than the Red Sox, their defense rated 5th worst in baseball by DRS, and adding Eloy helps but doesn't nearly fix all that. So, if your rotation isn't a "well above average playoff caliber rotation", your team is on a path to sucking.

You didn't answer the question. Yes, that rotation looks better than one with Shields in it. Does it look like a path to not sucking? Because that still looks like a below average rotation to me unless the young guys break out into aces.

Do you think that Keuchel at age 32 and 33 really is going to be a good reinforcement for this rotation?