35thstreetswarm

“Full Rays” sounds pretty good to me.

The off-season presents a difficult scenario for fans from a psychological perspective. It presents a series of binary choices—“should your favorite team sign [great player]… or no?” Of course the desired answer is always “yes.” It narrows the fan’s focus to a series of those decisions and makes them lose sight of the bigger picture of team quality and construction. It creates this bizarro-world anti-season where the only currency is transactions, not baseball play, with splashiness and recency rewarded. It leads to people orgasming daily over teams that miss the playoffs while cursing teams that will prove to be much better when it matters. I fall victim to it like anybody else. But I try to keep things in perspective by remembering that soon baseball games will be played, and “off-season-winning” transactions have a pretty abysmal track record in the real world of the baseball season. We all wanted Trevor Bauer last year. We all lusted after the Padres’ roster. We wanted Paxton, or Richards, or for god’s sake SOMEONE better than dumpster-reclamation Carlos Rodon. We don’t know shit.

Maybe you should take up a collection to pay Robert another 25 million this year so you could be more entertained by his compensation

Yeah, I agree he's not the ideal choice if I had my pick. But I'd be pretty jacked up at that lineup and willing to roll the dice a bit on the defense (which we'd be doing anyway with the likely internal options.)

Is "afraid" really the right word to describe your reaction to the addition of a 30+ HR middle-of-the-order bat?

I said no to both. I'd be at peace with the RF decision. I think failing to add at least a mid-rotation SP -- at least by the trade deadline -- would be a mistake that will cost them down the stretch.

Impossible. They have failed to land my preferred FA right fielder and therefore receive a zero, which I’m pretty sure is less than 75.

I wasn’t planning on responding again, but “working to”? “Looking to replace”? Are you kidding? So in other words, other organizations get credit for imaginary transactions that haven’t happened, and “plans to replace” that you invented, and the White Sox do not—I see. And other teams have subtracted huge pieces…but they have “plans” so those subtractions don’t count against them? I’m afraid the old mask has slipped, my friend. Why not just say “those other teams are better because they’re not called the White Sox” and be honest about it? I have no idea what will happen the rest of the off-season and neither do you. Maybe the Sox will build a super team. Maybe they’re done adding. But there is no basis to penalize the White Sox for their incomplete offseason as of March 15 and credit their competitors, and your attempts to do so make your bias blindingly obvious. And by the way, none of this even bears on my original point, which is that the quoted article is a ranking of teams, not a list of “who won the off-season” (a contest history teaches you don’t necessarily want to win).

We get to count our own players as off-season acquisitions? Hooray, and thank you, Steve Stone!

I was happy with the Kimbrel trade? News to me, given that I wasn’t really, and said I thought we gave up too much in the trade at the time. It is also interesting to see you rest your entire evaluation of the Sox roster on the loss of Carlos Rodon, whom you trashed all last offseason. Anyway, I see you haven’t answered my invitation to explain what the Rays, Yankees, Astros, Red Sox have done in their offseasons to inspire you so much more than the Sox adding two of the best relievers in the game. I do think it would benefit you to aim your hyper-scrutiny on another roster once in awhile to gain some perspective.

Perhaps they are looking at, you know, the baseball teams rather than evaluating only the moves made by the White Sox FO in this incomplete off-season with tunnel vision. What have the other AL teams at the top of the list done to get so much better? The Rays? The Yankees? The Astros, besides as-of-now losing one of their best players? Boston? In the big world outside this board this is a reasonable ranking.

With a 3-0 count

What’s the point of discussion if you’re discouraged from expressing an actual opinion that other posters are being unreasonably negative?

Bummer - I was quietly hoping the Sox were in play for Freeman, and that they would advance their trailblazing effort to build a contender comprised solely of first basemen and relief pitchers.

I agree. A quality SP would be the biggest difference-maker for this team.

Fun trivia answer -- last pitcher to bat (at least in the pre-universal DH era)? Kendall Graveman

I kind of hope that cheater goes to the Cubs. Perfect fit. They will suck and I can hate him even harder.

Good company. Add CHC and BOS and you've got the entire Axis

Yes, the thank-you letter I sent to MLB today said this very thing. I frankly don't think I deserve April games anyway.

When you get a little older you'll learn that it's faster to say "for more than half my life" ?

Ditto. Makes it easier that my instinct says a shortened season will help the Sox.

You mean they of the 72nd largest city and 21st largest metro area?

This is true. I wasn't really commenting on the relevance of city size to the size of actual baseball markets (i.e. "staying on topic.")

Other than the meaning and scope of the First Amendment and historical/geographical crime rates, can't think of anything that gives rise to more common misconceptions than city size. Most people who haven't looked at a current list of the largest U.S. cities have their minds blown quickly (San Antonio is 7th and Miami is 41st?! San Diego is 8th and Cleveland is 54th?!) Anyway...I need baseball to come back

Yes -- everyone has fretted all offseason about how we are going to get Kopech through a full season on an innings limit. Well, that may be solved for us.