caulfield12

I can understand the Dominican issues with Wilder and Santana, but the ONE huge miss has always been Venezuela. We never took advantage of Ozzie Guillen as the manager for a decade, Magglio Ordonez, the Sox history with Aparicio, etc. The ONLY obvious benefit was getting Freddy Garcia and that extension signed because of the family relationship. Of course, now, with all the political issues and the majority of MLB clubs pulling up stakes in Venezuela, it hasn't hurt quite as much...as scouting that pool of talent has become less of an issue of "boots on the ground."

Paddy and KW are as good as anyone at identifying talent. It's just matching up that evaluation with the A-OK from Reinsdorf on the spending side. To Reinsdorf's credit, he was smart enough to take the risk and pull the trigger on Robert, knowing the rebuild was at least one future star short at the time.

Let's put it this way, what MLB team has a higher return on investment in terms of Latin America? Between Alexei Ramirez, Jose Abreu, Tatis, Jr., and Luis Robert alone, does anyone even come close? The real problem for the White Sox has been the lack of high quality depth on the pitching side, the lack of outfield development from those 4-5 oft-discussed prospects (including Basabe there,) and then favoring "MLB-ready" college talent as an organizational focus, for example, guys like Collins/Sheets/Walker, etc. Otoh, the Padres have been pretty smart about reading the current market and realizing they can still get away with these "quantity over quality" deals and preserve their Top 6-7 prospects. If you look at all that investment in LatAm about 5-6 years ago, they've only lost Luis Patino and still have Morejon, M.Baez and even Anderson Espinoza, who was once their most ballyhooed pitching prospect before injuries sidelined him. Not to mention retaining Gore (who was never going anywhere) and Weathers, which is pretty remarkable starting pitching depth. Additionally, they've been able to move Eric Lauer, Kyle Davies and now Lucchesi, and actually get above-average returns for those pieces.

It depends which Pham you're getting...coming off a number of issues this off-season. If he's healthy and motivated, he can be a Top 10-15 NL outfielder. Myers was insane last year, so nowhere to go but back down. Grisham was perhaps the biggest surprise of the season, along with Cronenworth. How repeatable are either of their seasons? The actual key to that offense taking off was those two, along with the addition of Nola at catcher over Hedges. Hosmer is Hosmer. Of course, they've also got that top KBO middle infielder as insurance now, but the loss of Profar stings a bit (for now.)

Quintana and Richards are similar to Musgrove? They're twice as expensive and twice as likely not to perform well. Musgrove really turned a corner last year.

But the 28th or 29th media market...otoh, losing the Chargers and their NBA franchise consolidates sports marketing/sponsirship dollars as well as frees more fans for choosing ticket packages across just one sport versus three.

That's why Croenenworth, CJ Abrams and the Korean infielder will be so valuable.... positional versatility.

But what did the Padres really give up? More minor league depth, and Lucchesi is much more valuable to another team as a 5 than a long man. They're actually better off not paying him and giving that spot to youngsters with more ability. He's actually one of those guys like Davies that you put in the final slot and he won't kill you but he will keep any good offense within shouting distance.

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/padres-acquire-starter-joe-musgrove-in-three-team-trade-with-pirates-and-mets-per-report/

Julio Franco is still a free agent, lol. He actually could be one of those rarities like Minoso that could hit in 5 or 6 decades and not be a complete travesty. Who was the last hitter at age 39 or 40 who came close to those numbers in the last couple of decades....just Bonds? Looked it up... 10 players who hit the most home runs after turning 40. (USA TODAY Network) ... Barry Bonds — 79. (Phil Carter-USA TODAY Sports) ... Carlton Fisk — 72. (Bob Rosato-USA TODAY Sports) ... Darrell Evans — 60. (USA Today Sports) ... Dave Winfield — 59. (USA TODAY Sports) ... Carl Yastrzemski — 49. ... Stan Musial — 46. ... Ted Williams — 44. Hank Aaron/Raul Ibanez--42 Craig Nettles Also, are we 100% sure it's not something about Oscar Colas and the next IFA signing period?

But if you include 2018-20, you're getting two really strong years of Bauer and one not so great, yes? How would those numbers line up ($35 vs. $10 million) if you just aggregated the numbers? (All that said, with the Indians' offense hurting without Lindor and the only big offense in the division to contend with in MIN, it seems like the right bet, but maybe not until 2022. Of course, the potential value of Bauer to a starting playoff rotation as a TOR starter in Game 1/2 is pretty darned high. But still not having any certainty about revenues makes that too big of a bet, at least for Reinsdorf, on a one year deal until Covid-19 has passed and the stands and parking lots are full again.)

You just KNOW it's going to stop Cruz at some point, meaning Father Time. The other reason you MIGHT be hesitant is because of all the time missed LAST season in terms of hitting reps...and then the rustiness of starting late again in 2021. All that said, Josh Donaldson's getting close to being in the same boat, and the Twins will really be hurting if they lose both Buxton and their best starting pitcher to free agency. Not to mention the ghosts of Jim Thome and Kenny Rogers/Jose Paniagua from 2010 and 2003. Go for it!!! Worst case scenario, you've got Vaughn waiting in the weeds.

That must have been like watching the Iowa Hawkeyes on offense for the better part of two decades (except on turf)...it works, to a point, but falls apart against elite athletes/higher competition. Short passes like that can work if you have the likes of a Tyreek Hill or Kamara on the receiving end, but certainly not three interceptions. Too many are just waiting to jump those shorter routes on him now.

NY Times is already reporting at least 100 pardons being announced on Tuesday, and four close to the the Trump orbit (including Dowd and Guiliani) are receiving fees is the $50-100,000 range (starting out) for bringing them to The Donald's personal attention...and one would think the total flowing to Trump-connected entities will be the teens (of millions of dollars) by the time that history sorts these last 2-3 months of the Trump presidency out. He already has that $200-250 million fundraised but not spent to fight or contest election results.

Yet, going Lynn/Keuchel doesn't feel like an automatic win, either. I guess that recency bias of what happened this past fall is going to be used against Keuchel after being so strong for most of the year. The offense and bullpen is going to carry this team, especially if we can keep Crochet healthy and he emerges as a multiple innings guy.

If they don't sign a starting pitcher, they're REALLY relying heavily on Cease/Kopech/Lopez and that what looks to be Top 3 AL bullpen... Can't imagine the price would be any cheaper than $10-12 million for Cruz, though. If not $13-15 million, since it's quite likely to be prorated like last year.

I think you mean that ball over towards the right sideline? Yeah, that last offensive series was quite strange...maybe if Hunt catches the ball in rhythm he picks up 3-4 more yards, but Mayfield had the hot hand and was converting in every 3rd or 4th down situation.

You’re referring to the first half? Because the only obvious point the second half was punting there on 4th and 9. And letting Chad Henne of all people get out of contain in a third and really long situation.

Henne was actually doing fine until that interception. Browns finally have a chance to take the lead. What a momentum shift. KC D gets a huge stop, wise not to go on fourth down and see if they can get another miscue from Chiefs’ offense.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/mypillow-guy-presents-trump-china-015719953.html Seems the MyPillow guy’s conspiracy theories were even considered by the WH as too ridiculous...

World peace/peace in the Middle East, starvation/hunger. Find proper balance between Sabes and old school.

Jared Kushner and his posse of PPE experts/Ivy frat buds are in trouble...

The two for one special is probably going to be off the table when he realizes he’s lost 60-65% of his customers...

The question is how many American workers are 1) willing to work hard enough for degrees in those areas, 2) willing/able to take out loans or can borrow from their families, and, mostly importantly, 3) work 9/9/6 schedule, which basically in China means from 9 a.m. through 9 p.m., Monday through Saturday? At least 72 hour work weeks...and we're not talking about earning a partnership in a law firm, we're talking about the competition at the bottom and mid levels of a Top 10 worldwide technology company (at least the more "gladiatorial" competition here in China, compared to the US). We'll see soon enough in Texas. If schools like UT-Austin, Rice, etc., can produce enough talent to feed into the industry there like you have Stanford, Cal Tech, Berkeley, UCLA, USC, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, UC-Santa Barbara, UC-Davis, UC-San Diego in the UC system as well as a community college system with many or a majority of those students aiming for Silicon Valley jobs upon graduation.

Something like 90-95% of those who applied for loan forgiveness over the last decade for doing public interest work (especially teaching) never got the promised benefits because of paperwork/bureaucracy/fine print/red tape/bank and loan consolidation....and it REALLY got bad the last 4 years under DeVos, because her goal was to collect every penny for both the banks and for-profit/online universities. I did a program similar to Teach for America where I earned a second Master's degree (and certification) while working during the day as a teacher (and getting paid a regular salary at the same time, instead of having to go through one semester of student teaching, which was done over the summer before we started full-time). They provided a significant discount off the tuition at University of Missouri at Kansas City. I also did AmeriCorps National Service for two years/terms, so each year, we accrued $4,725 in scholarships (not so practical because the stipend, not pay, was set at the Federal poverty rate back then, around $8,000 per year.)