caulfield12

I know everyone hates fantasy talk, but I have Yermin, Robert, Musgrove, Rodon and Burnes, haha.

Look out now, but the Royals are somehow in first place. Who'd a thunk it? And the Tigers are giving the Astros all kinds of fits.

Can we save some of these runs for tmrw's matinee, please. GameThread this year probably doesn't know what to do with an easy White Sox victory, so some drama must ensue eventually...that inevitably involves a TLR managing decision.

What do you know, playing Vaughn and Mercedes actually worked out...

Rodon either had a really hot gun last time out, it's super cold or he's just doing the usual "taking it easy the first 2-3 innings" thing.

They're a complete mess...not quite feeling sorry because they have Donaldson coming back.

Who is a better option? Grandal? Robert? Yermin?

Definitely not against the Red Sox, who are in the process of winning 8 in a row and three against the Twinkies, who are suddenly even more of a mess than the White Sox even... Perhaps "fist" or "fisted" is more likely.

Musgrove is right there statistically, but relying more on sliders than dominating pure stuff in the way that Burnes does. The amazing number there is the walk count for a pitcher who flashes all those devastating wipeout pitches.

See Cleveland Indians, Rays or A’s attempting to compete consistently with some of the lowest payrolls in MLB. I can’t even imagine being an Indians’ fan...being $81 million behind the White Sox and $74 million behind the Twins and still giving those teams an even battle. Losing to the Cubs in 2016 after being up 3-1. This has already been their 4th or even 5th rebuild since the glory days of the mid to late 90’s. This is compared to incompetent franchises like the Pirates, Mariners, Rockies, Orioles, DBacks, etc.

As it stands, at least $15 million would be taken up on Lance Lynn alone... https://nolanwritin.com/2021/04/13/dane-dunning-real-deal-texas-rangers/ We are all in now, just like the year (2015?) we acquired Samardzija in his pending FA year...

I just copied the MLB Trade Rumors FA list of every possible player for LF that will be a free agent this winter. Guess it hasn’t been updated to reflect that change yet.

Texas and California will attempt to secede for completely different reasons...Florida is filled with nutty people who don’t want to pay taxes to support the next generation/s, so God knows what they will do. By the way, China now has two mRNA vaccines in the pipeline, one finishing Stage 2. It will likely go out to Brazil for testing on that variant in mid-April. The second one is much farther behind...a number of months to catch up.

JR/TLR apparently. Definitely not Hahn.

Everyone is a better defender than those two, so that’s not much of a standard. And I should have said he would likely end up a platoon player for the White Sox...because TLR. The A’s never make these kinds of trades in the first three months of the season...for another. $6.9 million is money the White Sox don’t even claim to have...or, if they do, they will wait as long as possible when there’s mo other choice. They will make a minor Band-Aid move and then claim Jimenez is their biggest possible addition at the deadline. He had a 741 ops against RHP in 2020. While he was much better in 2019, that looks like his peak performance. And my comment was that every time we bring in a veteran hitter in that age 32-33 range, they immediately forget how to play the game after joining the Sox. In a lot of ways, Canha is one of those guys like Eaton or even Eddie Rosario in the $7-8 million range that are pretty decent but not great players. Complementary. But the way he’s hitting now, the White Sox would have to pay a premium. While it’s possible the Angels and Astros are better than expected, the A’s are usually a second half team and there’s little reason to think they would easily part with him after recovering in the last week from their very rough start. They definitely have the starting pitching depth, if they can stay healthy, to match up all season long with inferior Angels and Astros starting staffs.

At least this makes more sense because the Dbacks are dead in the water...and aren’t in great financial shape, either.

How many veteran hitters have suddenly improved at roughly age 32/33 after joining the White Sox? And, once again, he’s not a positive defender, either. Finally, he’s the perfect platoon or role player for the A’s, who still see themselves as competing for a playoff spot. So what’s their incentive to make the deal other than us overpaying for past production?

Even if we wanted to rebuild, the return would be about the same as in 2016/17, this time for Abreu, Giolito and Anderson. Kopech, Madrigal, Crochet and Vaughn still have way too many question marks attached. Obviously you’d never get anything close to Robert’s potential value...compared to the end of August, 2020. That’s basically Mike Trout/Acuna/Soto/Bellinger. And Moncada’s the biggest wild card of all. So you’d basically just be trading Abreu, Anderson and Giolito and then Lynn and Bummer for the hope that the prospects replacing them would be better by 2025 and 2026? Grandal or Keuchel wouldn’t bring much with their long-term deals. It’s all just too crazy, especially the part about TLR and Hahn/KW working together to execute it in some synergistic way. And you’d lose a good chunk of the fanbase if you didn’t either sell the team or get rid of LaRussa, Hahn and KW.

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/mark-canha/11445/stats?position=OF Because he’s had one really good season in his entire career...? He peaked at thirty and has been in a decline the last two years. He does fit the incremental upgrade definition, but would he really provide a better performance than Vaughn?

Polanco hasn’t been close to a decent OPS in years and you have the Pirates holding on tight to money...JR prefers cash to keeping his prospects typically, and the Pirates would undoubtedly prefer a team that’s willing to take on 50-75% of his committed salary.

Naquin already has five homers. It would be like trading for Yermin. You’re paying a much higher price based on less than a month’s worth of games. They (Tyler and Winker) both have 200+ OPS numbers. They will trade Aquino, they almost had to let him go out of spring training due to a roster crunch.

2015 Last 4 teams between #10-19 (Royals, Cubs, Blue Jays, Mets) 2016 9 of 10 playoff teams in Top Ten of payrolls (Cleveland the lone exception) 2017 3 of Final four in Top 8, Astros the anomaly at #18 2018 Three of final four teams in Top 11, Brewers the clear anomaly at #26 2019 Final four teams all in Top 8 of payrolls 2020 Dodgers and Astros #2/4, Braves #13, Rays #28 So basically 7 out of the last 24 NLCS and ALCS teams (29%) were in the bottom 15 teams in payroll. 17 were Top 10/11 payrolls (71%). Right now #10 is the Cardinals at $164 million and #11 is the Cubs at $153 million. So the White Sox realistically have to increase spending by roughly $20 million to have a more realistic shot of a deep playoff run.

Yes, that's how desperate we are to get a LEGIT big league bat in that spot. Because you have a feeling Yermin and Collins will definitely go through their own set of ups and downs...and Vaughn will be shipped down to Birmingham or Charlotte on May 1st to get everyday playing time against RHP.

You've just made my point. The Padres will likely win the wild card missing starting catcher Austin Nola, Tatis, Jr., Grisham (out first week), Adrian Morejon (#4-5 starter will likely miss a big chunk of the season), Clevinger (out for season with TJ surgery) and Cy Young contender Dinelson Lamet (out for most of the first month.) Starting OF Tommy Pham was nearly stabbed to death in the offseason and still is struggling mightily out of the gate. They can't overtake the Dodgers with that many injuries. But they have Profar (LF/2B/CF), Cronenworth (2B/SS/1B/OF), Kim (2B/SS), Caratini and Weathers/Gore/Lamet to cover any pitching injuries. Even if Pham never gets going, they have Profar, Grisham and Myers to cover the outfield, so there are legit/viable back-ups at every single position. The White Sox are without Jimenez, Engel and TA will be back soon. I guess you can include Jace Fry or Cordero, if you want to get technical. But the width and breadth of losses between the two teams are not even remotely comparable, and yet nobody is counting out the Padres and saying they aren't "all in" even without Tatis, Jr. The margin of error is just too thin with the White Sox always needing everything (almost) to go exactly right with injuries/performance. We've actually been fortunate to "discover" Yermin or we might be 4-7 or 3-8 with how badly our defense, manager and bullpen has performed (not to mention the majority of hitters we're actually counting on in the first 6-7 spots of the line-up.) “J.C. Bradbury, an economics professor at Kennesaw State University, found that winning more increases revenue exponentially. “Going from 85 wins to 90 is worth more than 80 wins to 85,” he says. As a result, while it might cost more per win for a team that wins 90 games than 85, it makes financial sense because the revenue reward will be higher as well. This leads to a self-perpetuating cycle. Additionally, fans of teams that win frequently expect them to continue winning, and management pays more to do so. For a team like the New York Yankees, paying 10 percent more than anyone else for a second baseman who is only 5 percent better than his closest peer is worth the money (and they can afford it).” https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/dont-be-fooled-by-baseballs-small-budget-success-stories/

1. LAD 2. NY Yankees 3. NY Mets (we'll see) 4. Houston 5. Philadelphia Phillies (have under performed expectations) 6. LAA (looking good so far in attempt to get Trout his first playoff win) 7. Boston (retooling, looking surprisingly good out of the gate, waiting for a Chris Sale return) 8. SD Padres 9. Washington Nationals (underachieving since World Series title, questionable Strasburg deal, lost Rendon/Harper) 10. St. Louis Cardinals $164 million 11. Chicago Cubs $153 million (will likely trade Bryant, Baez and Rizzo or Contreras) 12. SF Giants (no idea what the hell they're doing) 13. Toronto Blue Jays $140 million 14. Atlanta Braves $139.2 million Teams in bold were considered preseason playoff contenders. You can argue now about the Angels (versus the A's/Astros), Red Sox and perhaps the Cubs being contenders. The Nationals or Giants would be the biggest surprises out of this grouping.