iamshack

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:39 PM) Yes, a 22 year old whose floor is a super sub is a quality return. Hmm...I read that closer to his most likely expected outcome.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:38 PM) What move makes you think they're unwilling to completely tank? Holding onto Ramirez (so far)? They obviously want to move Dunn, and they would probably love to get out from under the John Danks contract, although they'll be saying publicly they expect him to round into #2/3 form with a year under his belt in terms of recovery from the shoulder injury and increased stamina/velocity as well as better results in the 2nd half. They're obviously following Konerko's (perhaps JR's) wishes and letting him finish out his career in a Sox uniform. I'm mostly speaking of Sale, but yes, also Alexei, De Aza, Reed...they should be just blowing up the whole damn thing if they're willing to give up on Rios and Peavy for so little return.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:35 PM) Presumably that defensive capable SS is on the trading block in the near future. Viciedo, Garcia, De Aza, Phegley, and Beckham could well form the nucleus of a solid lineup if they can be developed. Gillaspie could be a solid contributor, or at worst a good contributor as a platoon player. We're missing 1b and DH looking past next year. DH is fillable, or they could try some combination of Wilkins and Flowers at those positions if they wanted to get crazy. You're projecting these guys to be failures, particularly Viciedo obviously, when the organization is not doing so. I meant Sanchez. Why are you trying so hard to make a 95 loss team an 85 loss team?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:33 PM) Not really. Trading Rios for a quality return, which is what we got, was by far the best of the options unless the organization is fully ready to give up on Viciedo. This trade makes it clear they're not. He's not losing his spot to Garcia. Suddenly a super sub is a quality return...c'mon, stop forcing bs down our throats.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:33 PM) Yay for English-major sounding words today, lol. Lawyer words

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:31 PM) They can sign Morales or Morneau or Carlos Pena or whoever, just because there's a ton of doubt that Wilkins or Black are anything resembling everyday major leaguers. Now you can argue....why not just completely tank 2014 as well??...as the fans have still turned out fairly well, to the tune of roughly only 1000 less per game compared to the 2012 team that was in first place for most of the season (granted, overall revenues have to be down 10-15% with the discounting, the lower television ratings...bordering on abysmal, probably). It also might turn out that Gillaspie AND Phegley are just placeholders for something better coming down the line, too. But, until/unless that something comes along, we're better off playing youngsters who MIGHT be part of the future if the F.O. deems them legitimately capable of making an impact. Wilkins/Black are simply another version of playing Danks/Tekotte extensively in the outfield. Because there has to be SOMEONE in the starting line-up each day that Robin turns in to the umpires. They should be prepared to tank the next two years, at minimum, now that they've traded these two, with Dunn and Konerko out shortly and Alexei on the wrong side of his career. The problem is they're unwilling to commit to doing so.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:30 PM) If we can't sign him, fine, we go with Andy Wilkins as the 1b next year and hope to steal a 1b somewhere else along the line. But calling this "minimal results" really ignores what teams are paying for defensive-capable SS right now. We have a defensive capable SS already. Who the f*** is going to actually hit for us?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:27 PM) I thought we traded Alex because we have a guy at Charlotte who is raking the ball and playing an OF slot. You know damn well that's not the primary reason. There are plenty of other things that could have been done to effectuate that.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:24 PM) Yes. Aside from his name sounding funny what's wrong with that? Well, the obvious thing would be that we won't win anything by doing that. The second would be that we don't even know if we can sign him. The third is this is an awful lot of effort to achieve minimal results.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:17 PM) Morales is a great fit because seriously, who would he be blocking? Andy Wilkins? Paul Konerko's corpse on a 1 year deal? I thought we just traded Alex to free the money up during a time where we will be uncompetitive. Now you just want to go spend it again?

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:18 PM) Morales will be short-term. I don't foresee the organization extending long-term offers to anybody during free agency this year. Sign him to a 2-3 year deal worth $10-11 mill a year and an option attached to the end, and it's a perfectly harmless deal. The only player he'd be "blocking" is Andy Wilkins. But what is the point of doing that? We trade one guy to sign another so we can get Leury Garcia?

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 01:12 PM) My problem is that so little of this money we're saving can go into the draft/int'l market. Which, ironically, is part of Reinsdorf's legacy. Right, which is why you need to get the prospects by giving up the cash in trades instead, which they seem unwilling to do. This is not altogether surprising; these assets we're moving aren't incredibly valuable. Which means you hold on to them if you seek to compete in the short-term, or, alternatively, if you seek to rebuild, you must trade your current assets of value, which we are also apparently unwilling to do. It just looks like we'll be stuck in the middle again with this approach.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 12:56 PM) Man, I can't get excited about this. Me neither. I'm glad everyone is drinking the cool-aid now but with the way we're going, I fear the best case scenario is either a rebuilt team that maybe becomes competitive a long ways down the road, or some reincarnation of our recent strategy of retooling that accomplishes nothing more than the previous few teams have. I'm just not a fan of selling off these guys for nothing when we'll probably just resign similar players. This talk of Morales makes me ill.

QUOTE (fathom @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 11:55 AM) I'd love Ellsbury, as he'd be the perfect fit. However, it seems like that would be a huge long shot. Morales seems like a real good fit as well. Yeah, we would either have to outbid someone by a LOT, or he would have to have tremendous faith in Hahn and our pitching staff to put a competitor in place very quickly. Otherwise, why on earth would he sign here?

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 11:49 AM) I think this was the inevietable conclusion. No one else in the AL was going to claim Rios. Texas claiming him was probably thinking the Sox would basically give him away for nothing. I also think Hahn knew if someone claimed Rios, he was going to be a goner no matter what. The Sox traded Carlos Quentin, a guy I would rather have for a few million less than Rios is making in the winter and got Simon Castro. Would paying Rios $4 million for the rest of this season just so you may have a shot at someone Castro-like make any sense? No.

Oh, and btw, I'll take the cash instead of Garcia.

Alright, may as well find a taker for Adam now. Any chance we use some of the money from Alex's contract to chip in toward's Adam's in order to move him?

QUOTE (Chet Kincaid @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 11:12 AM) Rios was my favorite player on the team. I've always thought that the guy was unfairly criticized. I hate the Rangers but I'll still root for Rios. Mine too.

QUOTE (ron883 @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 11:32 AM) This doesn't hurt the rebuild much IMO... The sox have so much money to spend. They need to sign somebody. Hopefully that somebody is Ellsbury. I don't see him getting massively overpaid like Cano will. Who knows though. Are you nuts? Ellsbury is going to get a monster contract.

Greg was just seen rushing Alex to the airport.

All I know is Dan Hayes doesn't know jack...and yet he was like the first to report this. My guess is he was given the info first by the Org...and he had a name of a guy he would have never come up with otherwise...So I have a pretty good feeling it is going to end up being Garcia.

QUOTE (Jake @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 10:31 AM) There is no pressure to dump salary. We have enough money to buy players if we want them. What we don't have is talent and our money can't buy that. Our players can buy that, though As alluded to several times over the past few months, there are not many good players to buy.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 10:03 AM) You can certainly take that into consideration that somebody may be willing to pay more for a lesser player because, frankly, they can, and they will be a better team overall because of it, if I'm understanding what you're getting at. The Red Sox could pay Jacoby Ellsbury $40 million a year for the next 10 years and he'd be good and "worth" it to them because they can afford it financially and they can make the playoffs and the World Series and Jacoby wins an MVP and saves a falling baby andall that jazz, and they aren't going to mind. That doesn't necessarily make it a smart investment though. It depends on how you want to evaluate it. I can fire off about 500 scenarios at you right now too. In the end, we assume that people act rationally and we try and figure out what that value is. It's clearly not black and white, but it establishes the framwork for evaluation of contract and production and gives a base for what is to be an expected and fair (or unfair or bad) offer to a given player. Yeah, I think we are in agreement. I just think the part about people acting "rationally" gets strained a bit around this time of year, as perhaps it should.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 09:48 AM) Well there's marginal value too. Adam Dunn is only a 2 WAR player, but in the Orioles lineup, he'd essentially act as about a 3-3.5 WAR player because the guys they have had DH have put up a -12.5 RAR offensively. Still, you don't want to pay $15 mill next year for Adam Dunn. Well, that depends, doesn't it? It's just not simple. If adding him allows me to play in the Postseason, whereas not adding him might not, then maybe I am willing to do so. What if I am working off a budget of $130 million whereas others are working off a budget of $85 million? We adjust performance for park factors...we could certain adjust salary data for budget factors, could we not?

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 9, 2013 -> 09:13 AM) We see eye to eye. Dunn is like a 2 win player just as a DH, and when you bring fielding into the equation, it drops to 1 win. It's not a pretty contract. I really like what Dunn can do at the plate, but there's no surprise that he went unclaimed. I understand the whole concept of wins above replacement, but it's just not this simple. A player has a particular value to each potential buyer. While it is perfectly reasonable to establish a baseline value for each player, there are many other factors which effect value, especially monetary value. These variations are magnified around this time of year, when more risk is acceptable for the opportunity to play in the Postseason.