witesoxfan

Agreed. That was the worst trade we made last season. Scho came in and stunk the place up. Atleast the Angels don't have anything to show for it either.

I would prefer the future one too. We get Jackson, who will almost undoubtedly help us in the future, Mota, who will help us now, and Gutierrez, who will also probably help us in the future, all the while saving about $13 mill which can be used for other positions. There are quite a few good starters that will be non-tendered(many already have, like Jason Johnson, Damian Moss, Tony Armas, Orlando Hernandez....probably Freddy Garcia too)....sign two of those guys and you have your rotation(and that would take all of $5-6 mill to sign two of them). Then we trade Kong and Koch for whatever we can get for them(maybe include Kong in the trade to LA and get Miller or Loney or whatever), and Koch to the Mets for Weathers or whatever they want to give us, and then, I think the pitching staff is set. We'd have a bullpen of Marte, Wunsch, Mota, Weathers, Grilli and then Diaz/Wright, which seems to be an OK bullpen, along with a rotation of Loaiza, Buehrle, Garland and then two FA's that will be nontendered. At that point I'd hope that we could get Juan Gone and then have Frank play 1B, Juan DH, and Carlos playing LF with Harris in CF and Rowand in RF, and from there we could make changes to other positions as we need it(like, for instance, I would not mind signing Todd Walker to play 2B....I think he'd be a pretty damn good pickup). Next year, the s*** changes again, and we get to have some more fun.

Yeah, he had an incredibly good first half of 2002 and then tanked in the second half. Carlos did not tank....so we don't know what will happen.

I think you lost him at the word 'EMPHASIS'. You need to translate it into his language.

He'll be around. He and his agent actually think before they act and he'll realize that the $8 mill he'll get next year will be WAY better then anything he gets anywhere else. I figure that, at the VERY best, he'll hit .280 50 130 this year....and that is at the VERY best(mainly because he only cares about home runs now). I expect more around .260 35 110 or so with a good OPS.

Two good years. In 02, he drew walks like no other and really helped us out quite a bit in doing so. In the second half of that year, he was very, very dangerous at the plate. If he can have that kind of patience at the plate while hitting the s*** out of the ball and stealing a base every now and then, you are worth $7.5 mill a year. Good signing. And I gotta figure that it almost guarantees that possibly all our other big contracts are gone(being Maggs, Koch, Kong, and Manos, probably traded in that order too if I had to take a guess)

Him and Armas are two guys I would not mind seeing signed. Both have injury concerns, but when healthy, produce pretty damn well.

Agreed very much. We signed this guy because there is a possibility he could be the 5th or 6th reliever in our bullpen, not because he's going to be our savior. We didn't sign him to be the messiah.

Personally, I'd much rather non-tender Scho and sign Damian Moss and Tony Armas Jr. Use Armas in the #3 or 4 spot and Moss in the #4 or #5 spot, and put Garland in the one not taken. Use Grilli and Wright out of the pen along with Marte and Wunsch....and then I suppose we hope the ARod deal gets done and we get Williamson....gives us 5 pretty good relievers in the pen - OR we sign a reliever and use Diaz or someone else out of the pen from the right side.

I personally felt that Garland was the kind of guy that took on his manager's attitude....I look at JM, and I see a very calm guy, with really little fire(except every once and a while he'd have a burst), and when crunch time came, he choked and made the wrong move about 75% of the time it seemed, and from there he got lost. I see almost the exact same thing in Garland. Add to that the fact that Manuel made atleast one very horrible move with Garland that it was really probably kind of hard for Garland to do much of anything. I remember a game against the Royals that was on ESPN(the game we lost 13-9), we were up 5-3 or 6-3 after 5 innings, and Garland let the first two get on in the top of the 6th. What's dumbass Jerry do but take him out and shatter any confidence the kid had. The next 2 or 3 starts out he sucked ass, almost undoubtedly because his confidence was completely shattered. I just hope he becomes a better pitcher with Ozzie as manager...but I'll have to see. I think he'll be a decent pitcher someday....probably a guy that can get 15-18 wins at best with a 3.50 ERA...but I see more of a 14-16 4.00 ERA kind of guy. That's a solid #3-4 pitcher.

Also, can we not forget Kerry Wood's playoffs(with the exception of game 7 of the NLCS)? I'd put $10 bucks on Garland NOT being able to put up anything CLOSE to the dominance Kerry Wood had against the Braves and against the Marlins(again, aside from game 7). Kerry is a money pitcher, Garland is not.

It's a possibility. However, there was a very good reason KW picked up Esteban Loaiza's option, mainly because if we wouldn't be able to win with Buehrle as our ace, we will with Esteban.

I doubt the Mariners do that deal. Why would they want to take on about $10 mill in payroll anyways?

I would have to agree. That has been my favorite one of the season so far. Man, I could watch that one over many times. The last one with Raisins and Butters being a freak for that girl is one I wouldn't watch over.

Percival makes $7.5 mill. I make the deal if they take on Koch. I don't want two relievers who could possibly be making a combined total of $13.5 mill. How stupid would that be? I would rather have Maggs rather then Koch and Percival. If they also took on Konerko, I'd take Darin Erstad as well. They want to move him to 1B anyways, so we may as well. Get's us a solid LH hitter and Konerko's and Erstad's salaries cancel out, gets them another solid hitter. I don't suppose there is any way that we can get Bartolo Colon from them with them also taking on $20 mill of his contract by chance, is there?

If you keep Maggs, you get nothing in return, unless you trade him at the trade deadline. However, if you make the trade, you get Williamson for a year or two, and you get a compensation draft pick for Nomar(because we almost undoubtedly would offer him arbitration). The very best tcase scenario is that he signs a long term deal, the other worse best case scenario is that he accepts arbitration, worst case scenario is that he doesn't accept arbitration and we get a couple of draft picks from whoever signs him next year. If we offered Maggs arbitration, we would be dumb sons of b****es. We would be giving him $15 mill. We didn't offer Everett arbitration this past season for the exact same reason, that is, we did not want to pay him $9 or $10 mill this year.

You are right. I was just so excited about the potential trade and the Sox actually heading in the right direction that I put some rose-colored glasses on. I'm not sure what the hell happened to Nomar's numbers this past year on the road. Whatever he did wrong on the road really killed his overall numbers, hitting only .243 on the road. However, in 2002, he hit about .295 on the road, so it's not as if he has sucked on the road since his wrist got messed up. Regardless, he wouldn't be a bad pickup. If it were Maggs alone for Garciaparra and Williamson, I'd want the deal done immediately, and then hope that the Valentin and Konerko deals get done. Then maybe we sign Burnitz to play RF, he pans out and plays pretty damn good(maybe puts up .270 30 110 type numbers, though he'd strike out 125-150 times) for $2-3 mill, and we have better numbers between Burnitz and Garciaparra then we would with Valentin and Ordonez at a much cheaper price(approx. $15.5 mill tops in the Nomar-Burnitz combo, about $19 mill with Ordonez-Valentin combo)....I just think it would be the better move in the long run. And like I said, even if we were to lose either of them, at the very least, we would get something for Nomar....if we offered arbitration to Maggs and he accepted, we could very well be paying him $15 mill in 05. Do you know how crazy that is? At the very least, if we offer Nomar arbitration, either he accepts it and we have him at $12 or $13 mill, or he signs elsewhere and we get a couple draft picks. That would happen or we'd trade him for some killer prospects. Then again, the possibility of signing either long term comes up, and we have a much better shot of signing Maggs long term then we do Nomar. But anything can happen over the couse of the season, and maybe he would like playing for Ozzie and playing in a more fan-friendly environment would be good for him and he'd start putting up his pre-2001 numbers again. Anything can and will happen in all aspects of this game, which is what makes this sport like no other sport on the face of the planet.

Since Maggs best season of .320 40 135 is so much better then Nomar's second best season of .357 27 104 where he only struck out 39 times in 135 games, or Nomar's 3rd best where he had a .323 35 122 season where he struck out only 62 times in 140 games(though he only walked 35 times), and I should not forget to mention Nomar's 2000 season where he hit .372 21 96 in 140 games. I should note that in 2000 his K-BB ratio was under 1, and he walked 60 times. The least Maggs has ever struck out in over 140 games is 55 times or so in 1998. He also hit .280 15 70 that year with 30 walks. The only time his K-BB ratio was ever at or under 1 was in 2001 when it was exactly 1. Nomar is a better player, and this is a hell of a good baseball move no matter what happens.

Of course, what I did not mention is that Williamson was the best reliever who is not a closer in all of baseball. Sure, Maggs could do the same thing. But if Nomar had his best season ever, it would probably involve numbers similar to .350 35 130....and that wouldn't even be his best average ever either. If he had his best average ever, he would hit something like .375 or so....if he had a .375 25 125 season, I would prefer that over anything that Maggs would do with us, because odds are, his numbers plus the new RFers will be better added together compared to Maggs's added with Jose's numbers. Add to that that we are getting Williamson, and we are getting the better deal. If Maggs had another .320 40 135 year, I wouldn't mind him....but he won't have another year like that with us. He'd probably hit something like .310 30 115, and that is not worth $14 mill. Meanwhile, Nomar will probably hit .310 25 110 while playing a much harder position, AND we get Williamson. IMO, Williamson is actually the key to the deal. Also....Maggs for Nomar and Williamson is not the only move you have to consider. You also have to consider a Valentin for Guillen trade, and possibly a Konerko for Perez trade. We get so much from this deal. Without it, we are very much screwed.

Jas, I've actually heard that the Mariners-Mets deal is off, because Seattle wasn't willing to take on enough of Cirillo's salary or something to that extent. Not sure if it's true, but if it is, it kind of throws a kink in it.

You're not calling USCF a pitcher's park, are you? In 2002, which was a much more accurate year, the park factor for hitting was 103(over 100 favors hitting). This past year it was slightly less because we had no offense. USCF is a hitter friendly park. It isn't in April, but come June and July, the balls fly out.

WHO THE HELL CARES IF THAT'S WHAT HAPPENS? Nomar could also be driven by money and wants to have his best season ever, does, propels us to a playoff birth where Buehrle, Loaiza, Livan Hernandez, and Tony Armas Jr(who we acquire for prospects from Montreal) all get hot, and watch Jon Garland come through from the pen and become one of the best setup men in the game as we once again see him struggle as a starter, get into the playoffs where Nomahhhhhhh and Frank light up the Red Sox in the first round, sweep them, then slaughter the Yanks in 5(where the Yanks got a lucky win in the first game like they did against the Angels in 01), and then play LA in the World Series where we go down 3 games to 0, win the next 3 in blowout fashion, send Buehrle out as the game 7 starter, have him throw a shutout through 8 and be tied 0-0 after 9, go into the top of the 14th, watch Jon Garland(who has since been nicknamed Mrs. October from all the Judy Garland signs seen earlier in the year after he sucked as a starter once again) give up a home run to former White Sox player Paul Konerko, go into the bottom of the 14th, see Willie Harris lead off with a hit and then all laugh and cry after Nomahhhhhhhhh hits a walk-off homer way out of here off of the unhittable Eric Gagne, and then signs a 5-year, $45 mill deal with us and is here for the rest of his career. Odds are very, very, very good that that will not happen next year. But NO ONE KNOWS. Settle the hell down. To win in baseball, you have to take risks. That is exactly what KW is doing.

To answer for him, I believe both are Jeremy Reed.

I don't see Maggs staying more then 1 year either, and atleast we could get a compensation draft pick with Nomar, which we would not get with Maggs(because if KW hypothetically offered Maggs arbitration, I would have slapped him)

No. I'm not even sure it will get us into the playoffs. But more people will want to come out to watch him, and there's a chance that we could win the division(IMO, a better chance with Nomar and Williamson then with Magglio) and once you get in the playoffs, ANYTHING can happen. And Nomar will get to play about 80 games against Minnesota, Kansas City, Detroit, and Cleveland, and doesn't have to face New York, Toronto, Baltimore, and Tampa Bay 80 times....or in other words, he hits against much s***tier pitching in the Central then in the East. We will not actually know what the major effect of the deal would be until the season is actually over. Maggs faces much tougher pitching in the AL East. However, he is in a much better lineup and would get better pitches to hit. (I won't take credit for this point....just re-iterating what Brando said first and was overlooked)