witesoxfan

QUOTE (maggsmaggs @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 04:30 PM) I drafted for the Bears with them switching to a 3-4 Defense: Round 1: CJ Mosley, ILB, Alabama Round 2: Kyle Van Noy, OLB, BYU Round 3: EJ Gaines, CB, Missouri Round 4: Anthony Johnson, DT, LSU Round 5: De'Anthony Thomas, RB, Oregon Round 6: Jimmie Ward, S, Northern Illinois Round 6: Aaron Lynch, DE, South Florida That was really fun, ha. I was going all D until I saw Thomas in the 5th round still there. I think Hester goes this off-season, and Thomas can replace Hester as well as add multi-use speed burner on offense. And no way Jimmie Ward lasts until the sixth round. Thomas in the 5th would make a lot of sense.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 04:08 PM) I think he has one more shot. Was looking better before that knee injury. Have to remember that 9 of his touchdowns this past year came against Jaguars, Texans and Falcons. Not exactly a tough test. If I were them and the Texans pass on Bridgewater, I take him. At the very, very minimum, you look into as many QBs as you can to see if any of them are right for your franchise. We talked about them before, but I think that team is really, really close to being a contender for the NFC West, which means a contender in the NFC period.

Ironically, I had the Rams trade for RGIII in Madden 25. Then I moved them and they become the Mexico City Golden Eagles and one of the best teams in the league but they still can't beat me. tl;dr, IM A NERDY MCNERDERSON Also, I think the Rams should really take a QB. Bradford blooooowwws

QUOTE (Harry Chappas @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 03:27 PM) All it takes is an offensive line or QB run and he drops. A good amount of talk and tape on him taking players off and durability issues. Doubt it happens but it could If Clowney is given a clean bill of health, I give it a 99.9% chance he's a top 5 pick. He's Julius Peppers or Bruce Smith or whoever, an absolute monstrosity of a force whose potential some team will not pass on.

It's not impossible - Da'quan Bowers was a mortal lock for a top 3 pick, possibly even #1 overall, and then he fell to the middle of the 2nd round due to injury concerns surrounding his knee and I think hip. If they find medical red flags like that, Clowney could see a similar fate, but I strongly doubt that will happen.

if Clowney fell to 14, I'd eat a shirt

QUOTE (Jake @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 02:00 PM) I highly recommend this article from FanGraphs: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/masahiro-ta...pect-valuation/ The gist of it is that baseball today really, really values prospects and Tanaka is proof-positive of that. Teams are not happy with the whole "pay for past success and hope for some present" system and therefore go balls out when they can throw money at anticipated production rather than past-prime production. My favorite part was when he brings up the idea of what other prospects would get on the open market. How much is Xander Bogaerts worth? He's younger, less injury risk as a position player, and just as highly regarded in prospect rankings. That got me thinking...instead of a struggling team trading prospects, why not sell them? If a small-market team had a prospect that, for whatever reason, didn't fit, why not sell? If the A's had Xander Bogaerts but also great, cheap players blocking him, why not just send a notice to the other 29 teams asking for bids? A small-market team could benefit immensely from selling a player for $100 million. I like the idea, but MLB has very much been against selling their own players, because then it simply becomes a bidding war. Instead of doing that, why not trade him for another blue chip prospect for a team that has a glut of those? Or trade him for a couple good, strong B-B+ prospects? Then you can maximize your assets while appeasing MLB. FWIW, I don't think we are far away from seeing a mega deal like the Sox were talking about needing for Chris Sale this past winter. I doubt it's going to be the Sox, but I don't think it's far off.

And again, I'd be really surprised if the Bills don't tag Byrd.

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 11:33 AM) Meh, you'd start with Longoria first as far as hitters. His contract is no longer nearly as team friendly. It's still up there, but it's north of $100 mill now

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 11:10 AM) It's the primary reason why trading Hector was a bad idea. Our pitching depth has been GROSSLY overstated on this board, particularly when you consider how durable and fortunate some of guys have been, though it's sort of reversed itself the last couple years. Once you have a pitching premium, you keep it, because that premium can can turn into a depth problem in about 1 day. On our current depth, probably looks about right. I'm not sure Paulino is ready or not. And Leesman is probably number 8 as it stands. That'll likely change. The problem with this ideology is that you are making the assumption that the depth and future of CF was strong as well. The risk, reward, and marginal utility for Eaton is far greater than it was for Hector for the Sox going forward, which is why he was traded. The Sox have shown capable of producing MLB quality pitching, but this is simply not the case with offensive players. The same can be said for Addison Reed too - he was absolutely a great reliever, and the Sox bullpen depth is overstated too (I'd put it on par with the rotation), but the Sox have proven capable of identifying and acquiring quality relievers over the last 5 years, whereas a guy like Matt Davidson has upside like no one else in the system does [at 3B]. Beyond that, they did have more depth in both aspects of the pitching staff compared to the offense. I think that's why these moves make sense. Yes, I do agree the depth for the entire pitching staff was overstated, but there still IS depth there. The offense is just now beginning to assimilate some sort of depth, which is necessary in today's game, whether to fill in for injured players or to acquire others at a later time.

He needs about 426 out of 567 to get elected. At this juncture, he needs 329 out of the next 460. That's 71.5%. Baby steps.

Jeff Sullivan at FanGraphs posted an interesting article today... http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/revisiting-...e-man-rotation/ basically suggesting that the importance of depth is incredibly important in today's modern game, particularly in the rotation. I think his methodology is a bit off - he removed the 5 pitchers with the most games started for each team, but he admitted to being open to researching further in the future - so his study included Dylan Axelrod as a regular rotation member for the White Sox, but the point is valid. I hadn't considered this in the past due to the durability of the White Sox rotation in years' past, but this past year, the Sox got 34 starts out of pitchers that weren't the "top 5." Now, I still think the Santiago trade was absolutely the right move - they needed to get an influx of offensive talent into the system - but this is also why I think it's wrong to even think about trading any other starters and why, beyond that, adding a starter with the #3 pick is frankly a smart thing to do. Now, consider the Sox depth rotational depth within the system...where do we have guys slotted? 1) Sale 2) Quintana 3) Johnson 4) Danks 5) Paulino 6) Rienzo 7) Surkamp 8) Doyle? Stewart? Bassitt? Beck? Snodgress? in the organization? First and foremost, I think this is why that Surkamp addition was important too - if nothing else, it added an arm that can be used in the rotation. Beyond that, I think this idea more than any other is why it's so important to keep adding to the system in all areas, rather than looking to deal prospects away (not that anyone has suggested that to any drastic measures). If Ramirez or Beckham gets hurt, the Sox can look to play Garcia, Elmore, Semien, or perhaps even Johnson (if he continues to produce). I think the Sox are doing this. Third, I think this was a very big flaw under the Williams White Sox - so much of the Sox success during those time periods was due to the Sox top guys producing and staying healthy, and so often that simply did not occur. I think with the way Hahn is setting up the organization now, he's focusing more on depth than at any time in Sox history.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 09:23 AM) The theme is pitcher, pitcher, pitcher, and pitcher. I think the theme with that trade was actually money. They traded 4 guys who were essentially Joe Blows and took on a boat load of salary. San Diego wanted to rid themselves of that. Also, while it's true that they do mostly trade pitching, some of that has to do with the fact that they haven't been able to develop offensive players, which is an indictment on the organization. Teams don't want prospects who look like they're going to fail.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 09:39 AM) That's not true. It's not sad to see Tyler Flowers suck at baseball, he's just not good. It sucks to see Konerko struggle so much after seeing how good of a player he was for so long. Honestly, if he is THAT bad, I don't see him sticking with it. He believes he can still do it, but only in a part time role.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 09:30 AM) LOL, what a meathead. I think the fans have it way worse than the players do. The players go in the locker room before the game and at halftime. They have heaters on the sidelines, and probably some of the best thermal gear money can buy. It might hurt way more to get hit when it's that cold, but that's still better than just sitting in one place for 3-4 hours. Nevermind that fans are probably drunk and losing body heat throughout the course of the day.

I don't know how snow removal has been in the Chicago metropolitan area, but it's been awful here. We've gotten somewhere around 1-2 feet of snow and our street was plowed once. The main streets have been plowed 2-3 times at most. Most streets are nothing but ice and compacted snow, and intersections are incredibly dangerous. Traction is barely possible in some spots. Of course, the sub-zero temps have made it far worse. Forecast high of -17 for Sunday right now.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 09:17 AM) I mean every game where he gets the honor of starting against a lefty, he gets to pop out weakly when they put a righty reliever in against him in the 7th inning. When the Sox are down 7-2 anyways with the only two runs coming on solo homers by Konerko, so he's done everything he could in the game already.

I'm not saying I think their philosophy or scouting is wrong, just that it still hasn't produced results. Frankly, I haven't given up on any of those draft picks either, not even Mitchell or Walker yet. I don't think the outlook is good, but Mitchell was a different person in Arizona and perhaps he figured something out down there. Also, Clayton Richard seemed to be the big piece that went to San Diego in that trade (other than salary relief). Poreda and Russell were expected to be relievers at best, while Carter was a low level prospect who bombed. Pretty similar, in fact, to the first Roberto Alomar trade 10+ years ago.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 09:15 AM) This makes sense when they ban bullpens. It's not going to affect the bullpen. The only thing it will affect will be the bench, and by all accounts, they are going to have the necessary pieces to be able to play someone at every position on any given day.

I loved scratching those bad boys off as a kid. Felt like I was doing scratch lottery tickets, but they were free.

QUOTE (DukeNukeEm @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 01:29 AM) Its snow, not plutonium. Quit whining and go to work. Edit- to expand, my first day back since my trailer basically fell apart on me in Boise some idiot in WY with PA plates nearly spun out into my bumper on black ice. He tried hitting the brakes over the ice (oops). The ditch caught him pretty well, he was all right. Car a bit f***ed up but it ran so I gave him a bottle of water and took off. So yea, snow and ice. Bad for your 4 wheeler on all seasons with like 800 lbs of traction on each wheel. Yep, that's exactly why snow sucks so much. That's why people are whining. Bad winter drivers make it worse. It's not something to be messed with.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 08:08 AM) I think you are way overanalyzing here, and you're off-target. Pretty sure wite was alluding to people saying the Sox should take a pitcher, or any other specific position, and repeating that they should take the best player regardless of position. I'm fairly certain he wasn't trying to get people to "shut up". Yep, pretty much this. I gave my pessimistic/realistic/optimistic projections of Trea Turner. Frankly, it is a similar scouting report to both Manny Machado and Christian Colon (the name alliteration is entirely coincidental). If the Sox think Turner is that guy, then they should take him, but Beckham is fresh in the memory of Sox fans (not even mentioning Mitchell, Walker (though not a 1st rounder, he was the first pick), Hawkins, and Anderson) while Sale was the last pitcher they drafted and he has turned out to be incredible. Of course, the last pitcher the Sox drafted in the first round before Sale was Poreda, so who knows if they know what they're actually doing there and in the developmental portion of the minors. Bottom line, they should draft the best player available. I have no idea who that is and the discussion is incredibly entertaining.

QUOTE (Chilihead90 @ Jan 2, 2014 -> 06:09 PM) This Cutler deal now gives me the chance to laugh at all my Bear fans friends who laughed at me when Romo got paid. Romo's deal nearly looks like a bargain compared to Cutty's deal. How are the contracts structured? Can the Cowboys easily get out of Romo's deal after 3 years like the Bears can Cutler? Honestly asking here, but I have my doubts.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 08:28 AM) Seriously, you'd rather watch applause for a veteran and a 65 win team than a playoff race? I don't think he's saying that. However, having the opportunity to knowingly say good bye to an icon and one of the best players in franchise history is still pretty cool. If you are implying that the Sox are a playoff team without Konerko, then you're crazy.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 3, 2014 -> 08:23 AM) I would be shocked if the number isn't closer to $50 than $30. That too. Meanwhile, the Sox will be paying a total of like $30 million for Sale to (hopefully (knock on wood)) put up $100 million worth of surplus value.