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Reliever Anthony Bass: After struggling as a closer during the first week of the 2021 season, Bass has thrived in a setup role this season (1.74 ERA in 31 games). Bass — who’s earning $3 million this season — has a $3 million team option for 2023; the Marlins must pay a $1 million buyout if they decline the option Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/sports/mlb/miami-marlins/article262859613.html#storylink=cpy Of course, the White Sox have been connected to/speculated to this guy, yet another RHR. If at first you don’t succeed, try try again?

109 wins still possible?

So why discuss either trade since the likekihood for the Sox is 3-5% at best…and God knows the odds on offering the biggest contract in baseball history? Seven times bigger than the Grandal deal, really?

No, that was Shane Riordan’s “look at me” speculation that TLR was DONE with managing the Sox. Pages and pages spent discussing someone ostensibly trying to make a name for themselves by guessing right… with nothing to back it up.

But there’s also a possibility the Nats’ new ownership group will decide to keep him and build their roster/franchise around Soto…especially if the offers are underwhelming like the Red Sox/Betts deal (compared to the Lindor trade to the Mets).

The goal is for the White Sox to be great. Period. It is now the All-Star break and two weeks from the trade deadline. Since I didn’t feel the need to list all the reasons the Mariners and Guardians are competitive this season, since everyone is quite familiar already…there was no need to list all those offseason transactions since all the focus is on what teams are doing NOW.

Once again, why are we all thinking that Soto won’t require even more headliners, despite his limited baserunning and defense.

Leury is on pace for more appearances than Bummer at this rate…

Last year at the All-Star Break. Most importantly, they couldn’t get Hosmer off the roster and the clubhouse went south due to a roster logjam and too many combustible personalties. Don’t forget Tommy “World’s Best Citizen and Teammate” Pham was on that roster as well.

That’s what he was always billed as. And you can’t put it past the White Sox with the Crochet and Bummer injuries to try something totally zany from the left-hand side as he was clocked at 95 and that was 4-5 years ago in Japan…

They didn’t make a deal for pitching last year and it bit them. Frazier was about as good as Hernandez/Kimbrel, talking about a huge regression. Of course, they have played 3 1/2 months without one of the 5-10 best players when he’s actually in the lineup (see Robert, Luis as well).

Then you take the risk of dealing Kopech…since you are replacing him with a pitcher in Ohtani. Or Vera. Of course, this all depends on your belief in Michael magically rebounding to that 96-100 mph pitcher he was originally billed as early as next May or June. If you think he is that guy, then no trade. They obviously can’t afford to deal Cease, despite the proclivity for 5+ inning outings.

The greatest political parlor trick of the last forty years. How to get the middle and lower middle class to sympathize more with corporations/aka billionaires and job creators than their neighbors. The American Dream is alive and well conceptually, even if only 15-20% are actually experiencing it.

Why would Ohtani cost more with slightly lesser contract extension demands and one less year of control than Juan Soto?

The Padres are in pretty much every article because 1) Preller is KW Jr. wheeler/dealer reputation-wise and 2) their outfield ship is in danger of sinking. The White Sox, otoh, really need a Rodon replacement to balance out the rotation, for the post season, and LHH RF is what we’ve been talking about going on 2-3 years now.

Dodgers seem to be more focused on Luis Castillo despite Bellinger slide and Taylor injury…

Solves RF and LHB and LHP issues in one fell swoop. The timeline with 1 1/2 years vs. 2 1/2 for Soto is a bit off…I think you can only make this move you’re willing to shell out something like 3/$150-180 for 2024-26 or some of the suggested 4-5 year deals rather than 7-8 year timelines which don’t fit the window. Then again, that means a lowered cost of acquisition and you also have the Angels potentially salivating about Andrew Vaughn as well due to the Pac-12 roots and maybe Eloy Jimenez plus all the prospect names thrown around in the Soto discussion are the two centerpieces. Of course it also depends if they want to keep Vaughn at LF/RF/DH forever, where his valued is tamped down.

Shohei Ohtani, DH/RHP, Angels No player would instantly draw more attention on the trade market than Ohtani, who is following up his 2021 AL MVP season with another spectacular year. In the past month, Ohtani has four homers, 11 RBIs and an .883 OPS in 21 games – oh, and he’s also gone 4-0 with a 0.34 ERA in four starts. Ohtani won’t be a free agent until the end of 2023, and given the current state of the Angels, this might be the highest Ohtani’s value will ever be. Potential fits: Mets, Padres, Yankees by Mark Feinsand, mlb.com Plus, they already have the “Cuban Ohtani” in Oscar Colas…and they wouldn’t have to absorb the Patrick Corbin deal. Ohtani stands ahead of the pack here in a majority of categories, with time missed & innings per start being his Achilles heel to date. Running this through the algorithm (money/stats/age) spits out a 7 year, $206M contract - for Ohtani the pitcher. #1 AGENT’S TAKE: HE’S A DUAL PLAYER - TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT The simplest starting point is the argument every agent in the world would make: Here’s our player, we expect him to be this forever, pay him accordingly. He’s a $29.5M pitcher, and a $25.2M hitter, and he does both full-time, so that makes him a $54.7M baseball player. He’ll be 29 years old, and thus commands a minimum 8 year contract. Crazy, right? This would be the largest total value contract in MLB history by more than $11M (Trout, $426.5M), with the highest average salary in MLB history by more than $11M (Scherzer, $43.3M). But let’s think about it this way. Shohei Ohtani projects to strike out 239 batters per 162 games. He also projects to hit 44 home runs and steal 24 bags over those 162 games. How much would a free agent who strikes out 239 batters a year be worth to a contending team, $30M? How much would a 44 HR/24 SB free agent position player be worth to a contending team, $30M? ….. Will teams be tempted to offer Shohei Ohtani an over-market-value smaller contract, especially with a short leash on his ability to pitch full-time, and the heightened risk of injury as he ages? (From Above) How much would a free agent who strikes out 239 batters a year be worth to a contending team, $30M? How much would a 44 HR/24 SB free agent position player be worth to a contending team, $30M? What if 3 years won’t cut it for Ohtani (it won’t). Will 5 years at a slightly higher than market value AAV get the job done?

If you waited like the Twins did with Buxton, until the very last possible moment, you’re really taking a chance. What would Buxton be getting this year in FA if if if he remains healthy? Luckily he gave the Twins a significant hometown discount because he’s comfortable there and also to reward the franchise for being so patient with him. Exhibit A. Losing Rodon, and nobody was for signing him to an extension earlier in his career. Now we have nothing to show for him. Not even a compensatory pick. Would the White Sox really be better off with Burger at 3B next year? And if Robert puts everything together as originally envisioned, he’s looking at almost the same amount of money as Juan Soto in FA and good as gone. Odds of replacing him with JR/Hahn in charge? Robert has already been worth 6.9 fWAR, so you’re pretty much getting a bargain there even at 75-80%. Vaughn, who we foolishly lost an additional year of control and Eloy at least are debatable due to their lack of playing premium positions and/or limited defensive upside.

Going by this line of thinking, we never in a million years would have traded for Jose Contreras…picked up Bobby Jenks off waivers, bet on Pods rebounding, taken a chance on a player they’d only seen on tape in Iguchi and certainly never would have signed Dye and AJ with all the uncertainty around them at that time. Nor would Carl Everett have ever been on that team, either. The White Sox are never that team that spends at the top of the market…at least not this century. Michael Conforto would be a reasonable bounce back bet in a world where our payroll flexibility is definitely going to be limited barring some unforeseen trip to the ALCS or World Series. We have to take advantage of these opportunities. We really lucked out with Abreu only have three major suitors in 2013-14. Otoh, we completely blew our shots at Machado and Harper when we actually had the payroll flexibility. There aren’t many bullets left to fire.

Pollock won a Gold Glove in 2017. Grandal was noted for his framing and always graded either positive or neutral. Anderson Moncada and Robert all have the ability to be the best at their positions. How do you explain how all those players, including Abreu, have regressed so much? What did Robin Ventura, noted as one of the worst Sox managers of all time, do to turn the 2012 Sox defense from one of the worst in 2011 to one of the best in 2012 with many of the same players? Why can't TLR and this coaching staff at least get them to be "average"?

Might as well bring back Gonzalez and Yermin while they're at it...

Rick Hahn, however, does not.

So less than we’re already paying Pollock for the next season and a half…

2005 White Sox Everett/Thomas Dye Crede Konerko AJ Uribe and Iguchi average speed, Rowand above average then and Pods the only speedster. That team still is slower than Robert, Moncada, Anderson, Engel, Leury…Sheets and Pollock with decent speed in the OF. And even Burger and Abreu have gotten a number on infield/hustle hits.