Dick Allen

Its not trading for someone and trading away immediately I'm not sure about. I don't know if you can sign a free agent and trade him away immediately.

I would agree with you, but it is Magglio Ordonez we are talking about. It would be hard for Boston to find a player like him available anywhere else. Besides, if you are going to trade him, you owe it to your organization and fan base to get the best deal that's out there.

If you are trading players, you want as many teams to know about it as possible. Try to set up a bidding war.

But if he told the Yankees he was going to trade Magglio to Boston, Steinbrenner may step in and make a better offer, or at least make Boston give up even more than they want.

I'm pretty sure there really is no "keeping quiet" in MLB. I'm sure the Yankees know whats going on with this. Every aspect of the proposed ARod trade, and Nomar trade has been on every sports show, every sports section. The only part that hasn't, was the possible White Sox involvement. What kind of GM would KW be if he tried to trade Magglio to Boston and tried to keep it quiet from the Yankees? They may put together a better package for him than Boston, or at least make Boston increase their offer.

That time limit thing I'm not sure about. I know they have one in the NBA if you sign someone who was not your own free agent. I am not sure about MLB.

At WSI, it says Bruce Levine is reporting the Sox are close to acquiring Williamson for a package of minor leaguers headlined by Arnie Munoz. He also said the Sox were close to acquiring Carlos Guillen for Valentin.

Wow, look at his salary on that page. Its over 2.5 billion. Steff talked to him, he hasn't signed.

I agree. They have a great rotation, but you have to score in the AL.

People said the same thing about Dick Allen

I can't imagine the Orioles not signing him, after going after these other guys. No pitching would make them the Texas Rangers east.

They have a huge edge. Hopefully, they sign a catcher and Guerrero and run out of money.

Did you see Hairston's salary according to ESPN? They said he made 300,000,000.

I think you could get Gonzalez for a whole lot less than $8 million.

I would agree with that, its just that the guy in the NY Post had the White Sox as frontrunners for him with that same offer, and that was yesterday. Maybe the writer of this Cleveland column took the other one as gospel and went with it.

But one would question a rookie manager basically scolding a future Hall of Famer at his press conference to announce his hiring. It probably is BS, but who knows.

I don't know how to link it, but Joe Sherman in today's NY Post says Thomas has demanded to be traded. Says Guillen has requested that Konerko, Ordonez, and Lee get traded, and that the White Sox are the frontrunners for Ponson with a 3 year $18 million offer.

He came up a secondbaseman with Oakland. He really hasn't played there for a few seasons, and I really don't know how he was defensively there. But he is a "grinder", and I think would fit in well in the line-up.

Winning isn't the cure all. The Cubs have been pretty brutal overall the last 10-15 years, yet have no problem packing them in. The White Sox had the best record in the AL in 2000, yet didn't draw 2 million, more than 500,000 below the league average.

Next year would be this upcoming season. By opening day, I believe the naysayers will be impressed with the roster.

That's in a huge pitcher's park. It would even be worse at the Cell. If he quit partying so much, and had a better attitude, his numbers would probably get back to where they were before.

KW could just be posturing. If other teams know he must get rid of players right away, he could never get any value in return.

I was thinking the same thing. He called the Clayton and Boomer Wells trades a couple of years ago. He said 3 years ago the Sox wanted Weaver, all as accurate as can be. Lately though, he has been way off.

Phillips is the guy who assembled one of the worst teams in baseball on a $110 million budget. What does he know?

Isn't there a way around it by signing a minor league contract? I could be very wrong.