caulfield12

Apparently, we should just disregard WAR numbers completely in evaluating players... When's the last time we took a position player off the "scrap heap" and turned him into a productive player? Coached him up? Alejandro de Aza? Palka, I guess, for one year. Narvaez. Who we, in turn, believed in so strongly that we traded him for a "fairly-paid" reliever that any team could have had his comparable equivalent for just salary in Free Agency.

Stammen was really overused last year...faded in the second half. Not sure what he has left in the tank. That said, would trust him in a heartbeat over Herrera.

Twins. Equally jaded about FA spending against big boys.

Well, that’s all this offseason amounts to right now. Names. More names. Endless conjecture. Nothing concrete happening. Ryu, Bumgarner and Keuchel will be too expensive. Bargain bin diving these next two off seasons, or, at best, trading and extending Robbie Ray.

Well, except the Nationals. Sure, they can go with the whole KW “let’s wait until the trade deadline and see where we’re at” approach...maybe things will be clearer, some prospects will have raised their market values, etc. We’re approximately where the Royals were in 2013. .500+, but not a postseason team, either.

They are all waiting to see the fallout when 2 of the Angels, Yankees and Dodgers lose out on Cole...then things will happen quite quickly.

https://sports.yahoo.com/hero-or-snitch-baseballs-mixed-feelings-on-whistleblower-mike-fiers-140043341.html

That didn’t quite go as planned...but we shall see with those next three.

We need to hire whoever the Rangers used to evaluate Lance Lynn and Mike Minor, who were 6.7 and 4.0, respectively. Charlie Morton had a 6 fWAR last year and was available to everyone in baseball last offseason. Sonny Gray, 4.5, another example. Marco Gonzales at #75 overall and 3.7 fWAR, even though everyone keeps saying the most you surrender for him is Collins or Stiever. Matthew Boyd at #100 and 3.3 fWAR. Heck, Frankie Montas was 3.0 fWAR. With Semien (7), Sale, Escobar, Tatis, Jr., Quintana, Tim Anderson, Montas...we produced 7 out of the top 120 players in MLB. Going by averages/statistical probability, every team should have roughly four. Of course, six of those guys are with other teams. 24 Moncada, 29 Grandal, 31 Giolito, 92 TA FYI: Wheeler 28, Ryu 30

You just cleared the decks for them to keep Betts. No way you're going to be giving up anything bigger than Collins or Stiever, at most. We would be doing THEM a huge favor in being able to compete against the Yankees again...rather than "retooling" the next 2-3 years before making another extended run. Without Betts, it becomes unrealistic, as Bogaerts and Devers are your core building blocks on the position side and lots of question marks in the starting rotation.

Betts or BUST!!!!!

He's the obvious candidate to explode in value like Wheeler did this past year. Maybe I was a bit over the top having him already at over $100...but Zack started out in the $60's and 70's in most valuation systems 2-3 months ago and climbed all the way into the $120's (supposedly).

You can guarantee whatever prospects they trade away from a farm system already lacking in much quality depth after the very top (3 of these guys will be graduating soon) will be a bone of contention because just paying money in FA has been an option beginning last off-season (when we spent money just to seem like we were doing something.)

The "optimistic" side here is that Wheeler's a ticking time bomb with his injury history...2 1/2 year recovery track from TJ surgery...and the fact that his arsenal relies so much on 97+ MPH fastballs. A major injury to him would have been 3X worse than Kopech going down. In all likelihood, it's a bullet dodged...although you obviously don't ever want to see anyone get hurt, it wouldn't be a shocker...not anymore than Sale experiencing health issues at this point in his career, or Kershaw's stuff declining.

Robbie Ray. God knows what his market for a long-term extension would be...and how much the DBacks would expect in talent/return. It's a logical name because he's younger than most of the big name FA starting pitchers on the market next year...but that's about it.

I'm not the one who tried to convince everyone that Todd Ritchie was a #2 starter. The Rays are never going to trade him for something that's not a complete evisceration of our minor league system...and then it's only going to be based on their projections that 2019 is much more the norm for him (going forward) than 2018.

Todd Ritchie for Wells, Fogg and Lowe all over again...

You're not taking into consideration that it's pretty obvious most of the deep-pocked owners decided that opening up the treasure chests right now is their best protection against union charges of salary suppression in the next set of negotiations. They're awash in money (always were/always have been), it's just that they were allocating it a lot more carefully the last 2 years than at any time in recent history.

If this was San Francisco and the three most expensive houses in Mountain View were off the market at record-setting prices...you wouldn't expect houses #4/5/6 to also increase in value, comparatively? As long as there are bidders who see value in buying those assets (which obviously don't appreciate like houses, they're more like automobiles)...why wouldn't they also be pulled up by 15-25% as well?

How confident are you today that Keuchel will only get $45-50 million, Ryu $54-60 million and Bumgarner $70-80 million??? Those were the universally-expected rates coming into this off-season if you aggregated all the predictions from different outlets.

"I learned in my time at Kellogg, Ann Arbor and Cambridge NEVER to react emotionally or make moves just to make moves. It's just as true in the stock market as it is in professional sports. So the White Sox are never going to be an irrationally exuberant organization from an economic standpoint, and that's always been our historical pattern. But we are going to be exuberant about supplementing our young core with the "best fit" veteran players at the correctly-assessed valuations, allowing us the comfort zone to make generous contract extension offers to Nick, Luis, Lucas and Yoan."

But what number WOULD have worked for Wheeler, assuming he ever was serious about coming to Chicago and not using them for leverage? $130 million? $135? $140? At a certain point, once you reach your valuation and go well over it by 10-15%, you have no choice but to walk away...especially if the guy's coming to a place (Chicago) where he's already anticipating not being happy. Why would you want that attitude on your team...or his wife/fiance bringing down the other Sox wives? I'm kind of joking about the last part...but we've spent months concerned about Bumgarner not necessarily being a great fit with this current clubhouse and coaching staff. It's obviously a consideration at SOME level, for both sides.

Hahn deserves MLB Executive of the Year if he can recover from Wheeler to sign Ryu AND Keuchel, fix RF, supplement the bullpen from the RH side AND pick up one last piece as insurance for Collins at DH (see Gennett, Smoak, Cron, Adams, EE, etc.)

http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/profile.asp?ID=170991 Courtney Hawkins put up an 811 OPS in the CAL League last year...only 91 K's in 348 at-bats.

He could have taken it a lot further....some jibe about Strasburg having to pitch 250+ innings with 15+ victories and 300 K's for the final option year to kick in.