Balta1701

So yeah this happened

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jan 13, 2018 -> 05:02 PM) Ewww. He will not be worth the contract. 25 mil for a #3 starter? If he's the last piece in a 2018 title team he makes sense.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 07:33 PM) Sox haven't gone to arbitration since 2001 with Keith Foulke. He'll lose IMO. Sox haven't gone to arbitration since 2001. They'll settle in-between, those numbers are pretty close anyway

QUOTE (yesterday333 @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 06:58 PM) I think moving Avi would be the idea here. and if not you still have the DH. I think spending big money on a DH is a terrible idea even if he's at a serious discount compared to what you thought he'd be at earlier in the offseason.

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 06:10 PM) I think he's looking to buy assets that are undervalued and is kicking the tires and sniffing around any potential deal that offers that opportunity. Salaries seem highly suppressed this offseason. If the Sox can take advantage of what appears to a near historical lack of FA interest they should do so. JD Martinez is a uniquely terrible fit unless Garcia is moved because Garcia and Martinez at the corner OF spots means we have no where to play the mutant at AA when it gets called up later this summer.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 05:16 PM) $10.85mm; new record. Thanks. Presumably this sets the standard for Seager next year and Moncada/Bellinger in a few years as being around $11 mil.

If anyone sees what Bryant signed for please post it - genuinely curious if he topped what Ryan Howard got in his first arb year.

Recently declared strong Republican contender for Senate and current Congressperson from Ohio: If the Republicans don't want me saying this represents all of them, then at some point it'd be nice if they made it tougher to say that.

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:44 AM) This is a cruel reminder Balta. Not cool, man. My vote is to bring Mark Buehrle out of retirement to pitch opening day. OK, seriously. I could go either way with MiGo and Shields. My guess is Renteria goes with Shields opening day followed by MiGo, Giolito, Lopez, Fulmer. This is what polls were made for. I went with Gonzalez. I liked watching him pitch more than Shields, and I don't want any of the Rookies having to pitch in that setting without having seen it from the bench once.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 12:37 PM) oh no all political problems weren't solved instantly I guess that means nothing matters and people don't actually have different responses to things for sometimes confusing reasons like I'm not disagreeing with you that things are still bad, Republicans in general have succumbed to Trumpism, that lots of people will never recognize Trump for who he is or that racism is even a real thing in 2018 cut supporters of white supremacy out of your life Basically my point - this will not change at all until something different happens in November. And especially since the Republicans have made it 100% clear they don't care how often elections are rigged in their favor, there's a good chance that nothing different happens in November and this is just who we are as a country.

No, death is not an option.

Who do you want to be the opening day starter: James Shields Miguel Gonzalez This should be a poll question shouldn't it?

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 12:34 PM) Fun conversation. I can imagine worse ones. Like sitting around a table while your 70 year old relative spouts all sorts of racist stuff about countries he's never visi.....oh.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:27 AM) And a couple of months latter, Democrats won big victories in elections across the country and a month after that won a Senate seat in Alabama. And the Republican party joined together to pass their tax cuts with him and have continued confirming judges and launched a much more intensive campaign to defend him from any liability for his actions during the campaign along with a foreign power committing criminal acts on US Soil to support him.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:21 AM) The AIDS story was published on 12/24, so a lot of people probably never even saw it, even among the heavily informed. Why did the allegations against Weinstein unleash a tidal wave? Why do some police shootings of innocent black people result in large protests and others don't? It's maybe an interesting sociological question but that doesn't mean there can't be a difference in the response and reaction among the public. There still seems to be more of a widespread emotional response to this one. I don't know why this one and not other ones, but I'm not going to dismiss it. It won't instantly "change" things, but it does play a roll in the continuing story of the Trump Presidency and opposition to it. There was an equal or bigger widespread response to his description of "Very fine people" chanting "Blood and soil" and "Jews will not replace us".

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 12:17 PM) Again, wasn't stating this was a turning point or would shake something loose. I'm saying having a president who openly demeans certain minority races and religions is rare (or the favorite "not normal") even when you go back historically to times where status quo was much more more racist and bigoted. My point was that I think even keeping lip service that all groups are equal and welcome is important even if its papering over policy which is doing the opposite. I'm hoping it doesn't lead to much more dramatic backsliding on rights since he is anchoring conversation to these despicable ends. Presidents words are still important even when people are fatigued by his nonsense. I think it has already led to backsliding on rights - uprooting 200,000 people who have lived here for nearly 20 years, something like 40,000 US homeowners, and sending them to El Salvador, seems like a reasonable example, and we just announced that one last week. A guy got blocked from coming to a conference in the US from the UK this week to talk about his research on Multiple Sclerosis because he was born in Iran. If we don't want this to be who we are, we actually have to show it in November. Until then, we proved in 2016 that this is who we are. This is him speaking for us.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:08 AM) We all know he's a racist and he's instituting policies to support his white nationalism. There's still something emotionally visceral when certain statements are made. Which one of the previous ones do we need to bring up? "They all have AIDS" was only published 3 weeks ago.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:08 AM) The Republicans who were present in the meeting have had various responses, none of which even attempt to address his comments: https://twitter.com/AlexNBCNews/status/951846421896073216 d They're not going to. They learned their lesson when they dared criticize him for things like saying a judge with a Mexican ancestor couldn't adequately decide his case back in the campaign and then the voters elected him anyway. Enough of the Republican base fully agrees with this statement that they'll just keep their mouths shut, wait for it to pass, and then move on to funding more immigration enforcement.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:03 AM) I did not state that he hadn't done or said anything prior to hide his intent anywhere in that post. No, but the idea that "THIS" will somehow shake something loose...not going to happen. If you didn't understand who this person is before now, it's because you deliberately don't want to.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 12:00 PM) No it's not. It's kind of like releasing their taxes. This guy can not be healthy, and certainly not as healthy as was claimed by his doctor. Obama occasionally took Nexium to treat acid reflux apparently.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:55 AM) He's taking his physical today, which seems a bit odd to me. I am wondering if he wants to go back to his old life and will try to use this to bail, like his bone spurs. Make something up, he's got to go, Mike Pence, your turn, keep doing all the great things Trump has done.... Although that would contradict the healthiest person to ever be POTUS from 2016. I'm just wondering when they report he beat Kim Jong Un's record for 18 holes in golf. Why on Earth does that seem odd to you? It's basically required of them.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 11:44 AM) I've seen some takeaways that it could be good he is showing the real intent behind such policies, that it can't be hid behind anymore, but I was with a coworker whose parents were immigrants from Pakistan when this broke and they were shook. Not even a country listed, but they are constantly fighting the idea that they are unwelcome or not American (they are American). The symbolism of the office and country matters even if actions are hypocritical to it. I don't know. Because nothing he's done or said so far has made that obvious or apparent. There's a reason why Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell, the people every Republican House and Senate voter have supported indirectly, have issued no statement yet.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jan 11, 2018 -> 10:30 PM) Ron, he was not being serious in his ripping Abreu, but you are being serious. What player in Sox history has had the numbers consistently that Abreu has put up? He's been so consistent it's scary. He's a great hitter and a stupendous clubhouse guy yet fans on here would get rid of him in a minute if we could get more prospects. Prospect means you ain't done it yet. Your question = this pitch.

QUOTE (oldsox @ Jan 12, 2018 -> 09:19 AM) I wish I knew more about Palmeiro and his steroid usage. When did he start using and for how long? The guy could hit. If you believe Canseco, and well that involves believing Canseco, his first book says that he introduced Palmeiro, Gonzalez, and Rodriguez to steroids in 1992 when he arrived in TX. The next year Palmeiro's HR jumped from 22 as a 27 year old to 37 as a 28 year old. It's just Canseco's word and a circumstantial case, but then Palmeiro pointed at Congress, lied to them, and tested positive 3 months later. Canseco also said that one of the reasons Palmeiro was a fan of Stanozolol, the steroid he tested positive for, was that it helped you strengthen without exploding you a-la Barry Bonds, so that Palmeiro never lost the kind of smooth motion his swing had.

QUOTE (wrathofhahn @ Jan 11, 2018 -> 09:21 PM) Espn had the article that he signed for something like 4.5 million. So I don't think it really prevents us from bringing in someone else. I also think the return we can get for Migo is pretty limited. We basically traded him at his peak last year and got Ti'Quan Forbes back. Ideally you would want someone with a little more upside like Tillman or Buchholz that you could pump and dump The guys with a little more upside may be looking for more money - a number of teams have been interested in Tillman, for example. When it comes down to it, the return for any of these guys will be pretty small if they're traded, and I can't begrudge the team for going with a guy they're comfortable with. The main priority is not to be able to trade the guy for a huge return, it's to turn the 4 rookies/semi rookies we'll have up this year + Rodon into a dominant rotation. There's way more talent there already than anything we'll possibly get back for moving any of those guys. Gonzalez gives us a guy that we know can eat some innings, that knows his role, and that won't be in the way when beautiful, beautiful Kopech finally arrives.