southsider2k5

We needed a pitcher able to give us multiple innings with the state of the pen right now. I am kind of surprised we also didn't see a Burdi for Hamilton swap to get another fresher arm into the organization.

Just because a guy doesn't dump his business in public like Ozzie did, doesn't mean he doesn't take care of his business.

People's initial expectations of when the Sox could compete were always way too optimistic. I remember having this debate as we were making the initial deals to get the rebuild rolling.

I don't think enough people realize that the rebuild doesn't end with the guys getting to the majors. They also have to learn how to win and overcome. I mean even Michael Jordan got his ass kicked by Detroit for a few years before figuring it out.

The pandemic doesn't change that they have a young and electric core of players locked up for around half of a decade in many cases. The idea that ONLY Jerry is going to not spend this winter is ridiculous. One of two things will happen. Either owners are going to spend nothing this winter because of the pandemic, and the prices of players will drop so that they can finally sign, or things will get back to a more normal window with the expectations of a more normal 2021 season. You won't see just Jerry not spend this winter.

I am flat out saying that you are absolutely moving the goalposts around to fit your argument, which is also changing from post to post. One minute you are using 15 years ago with Cleveland to justify one thing, but then 5 years ago is too much when it doesn't fit what you want it to fit. In recent years the White Sox have turned over both their drafting, development, scouting, and analytics people. In the longer terms teams have absolutely tried to hire way Sox personnel. The hyper focus on ONE small piece of the scouting/drafting/development ladder doesn't really disqualify any of the above. Back to McCann, the reason they didn't look to resign him long term was that there was a real chance that last year was a fluke, including his second half fade as evidence. At worse, they have made McCann an extremely rich man this offseason, by turning his career around for someone else to pay him lots of money. When you go back and look at player acquisition, are you telling me that they should have turned down Eloy because he was right handed, or not signed Robert because he wasn't a switch hitter? Should they have passed on Andrew Vaughn even if they felt he was the best available pick at #3 because he wasn't a lefty?

There were stories about Robin conducting his business behind closed doors.

100%.

This is pretty overrated. Almost all managers keep their drama in the locker room. We have no idea how Ricky handles himself behind closed doors.

So the parameters are now for raiding management, but 15 years ago for how good Cleveland's offensive development is. Got it.

Wow, that is pretty impressive.

Toronto was public turned down by Jerry when then asked to interview Kenny Williams to be President of their organization.

Is this where we are pretending that no one had interest in hiring the Sox front office people, or that their people have been largely turned over underneath of Hahn? Do we remember how many teams tried to hire Rick Hahn away before he was promoted to GM? That he was in the running with the Mets and Cardinals before dropping out? Or that the Sox actually blocked Kenny Williams from interviewing with Toronto for a promotion?

This isn't going to lead to Grady Sizemore posts is it?

For guys who are hoping to go pro, that is just scary, let alone for the real life implications here.

We are supposed to envy one of the worst offenses in baseball? What?

This is impressive for its mental gymnastics. The Sox pick up McCann off of the scrap heap, turn him into an All-Star catcher, but they still have the problem.

He's been unlucky in that he has gotten a TON of bad strikes called against him. That doesn't show up in BABiP

He is actually getting exposed to a lot more high level talent this way, and a lot less duds that he would have faced especially in A+ ball. Granted you can't simulate actual play, but he is seeing much better stuff this way.

This is where the White Sox trade philosophy for the Eaton/Sale/Q trades comes into play. They very clearly concentrated on quality over quantity in these deals. They wanted as many top guys as they could get, versus taking a return like Cleveland did for Clevinger where they got less stars, but more mid level type guys so they got more volume than we got. We also seem to really have tried to time the arrival of the first wave to get here as clumped together as possible, which means the system would be cleaned out more all at once than if we had staggered the guys a bit more. This is where the next international class comes into play. We have some high level guys that we have brought in with the last two drafts, and we have more potential guys coming in the next couple of international classes if we can hit a home run here. It is also where all of the HS and former intentional picks need to start picking up the slack. If we start getting some breakouts out of these overslot HS picks, we can start filling in the gaps of the system. Otherwise things will drop off majorly instead of just a bit.

That's really awkwardly written. I think he is actually trying to say that he DOESN'T believe that because of his first sentence, otherwise the second sentence doesn't make any sense with the first one.

You don't remember it all. The Sox tried to extend him, repeatedly. Then he disappeared and had an unauthorized and experimental surgery outside of the US without telling the team. Even after that they tried to extend him, and he accused them of trying to take advantage of him due to his injury.

You might be too young to remember, but Magglio burned that bridge to the ground.