caulfield12

Flowers and Junior Guerra (since departing) have contributed roughly the same amount (8) of fWAR as Yolmer, Anderson and Moncada combined. Marcus Semien was good for 3.7 this year, and roughly 9 career-wise. Devenski and Jose Martinez have been worth another 8.4, Eduardo Escobar, 9.5. Etc.

Unless you’re a big fan of Cordell or Medeiros?

Gives Burdi some additional time to get his feet underneath him...Hamilton also won’t be thrown to the wolves prematurely.

Richards only made sense if there was the 2021option...unless we’re whaling off Nantucket. The Padres, fwiw, undoubtedly have the better milb system right now, but they also have a much bigger hill to climb in the Dodgers, Giants, Rockies, etc.

If the Indians were to trade one of Kluber/Carrasco/Bauer, that suddenly opens up a weakness there. (They've already traded their best catching prospect in the Hand deal, and Gomes is on the block because he's one of the few bigger contracts, outside of one member of the starting rotation, that they can feasibly move without doing too much damage to their hopes in 2019.) Are Clevinger and Bieber going to repeat? Of course, they also have Santana lurking. He might actually end up an internal closer candidate, rather than them spending outrageously to fix their bullpen through FA. They have a lot of ? marks, but they do seem to have a plan for the pen. The Sox need to at least threaten the Indians this year...the faster the Twins and White Sox can convince the Indians' owner he can't afford to keep all those pieces together, the better. Another low 70's or high 60's win team won't accomplish that. At the very least, they should be in the upper 70's.

Thinking the Braves and Phillies are passing them by...? That they have to do SOMETHING desperate to reinvigorate their fanbase, especially with the re-rise (or re-invigoration) of the Yankees' juggernaut.

What is Cespedes' health situation? I remember some writers speculating this past summer that he was on a trajectory to end up like Albert Belle...making more news off the field than on it.

A couple of years ago, you would have thought a place like Mexico City would have had a shot, but that's no longer in the cards with the political situation, or even a Caribbean country. Buffalo, Louisville, Charlotte, Nashville and Indy were other names you would hear historically, but as much recently. MLB really seems to be considering the possibility (at least) of going back to MON, but two West Coast teams, that's the most logical play in terms of scheduling and demographics/population growth.

Like getting Cano to leave NY for Seattle?

Except Yolmer SANCHEZ has outproduced his fWAR over the last two seasons. Throw out their outlier seasons in the last three, you have a 4.0 (TA) versus 3.9 total over two “peak” years. Nobody is clamoring to see Yolmer start for another season, well, almost nobody. 2 is more or less “okay” for SS, but he still needs to bump it up to 2.5-3.0 to really be a significant positive contributor.

It’s more the Indians still having at least $50+ million in bad contracts...that’s the only way to create any payroll flexibility whatsoever, to deal a starter or Gomes in a package.

Reassuring that the White Sox are simply snakebitten with every 1st round draft pick besides Chris Sale.

Why would a team absorb all the risk and give us anything resembling his often-stated “potential” value? Dumping Avi and Rodon basically would require the front office being called to the carpet on two more talent misjudgments. If Fathom’s right, between the work ethic, Ptac’s concerns about the repeatability of his delivery and the Boras Factor, it’s yet another blown first round draft pick (especially at 1-3) by the Sox. Someone missed out on two pretty significant red flags. Might as well turn him into Andrew Miller. He’d arguably have more value...except he’s not good at holding runners or limiting walks.

Why would they trade Rodon now, before he’s proven that his velocity is back and that he’s 100% healthy for another 3-4 months? What’s the rush? What do the Sox know that everyone else doesn’t? I would be tremendously suspicious as a rival GM if Hahn actually tried to push him this offseason. Put another way, when’s the last time a team traded a young, still cost-controlled pitcher from the LH side with his stuff? Well, other than Chris Sale...I guess the deals for Archer and Cole, but both those guys were more established than Rodon.

Luis Robert needs to be ready at some point in 2020.

So basically this move makes no sense (at all) unless we're signing a whale. One year of competitive window for a huge chunk of our farm system that hasn't yet defined itself is the definition of sabotaging the rebuild. Not to mention we're already discussing trading a pitcher, Rodon, who's under the exact same amount of control and who still offers significant upside (although not like Thor's).

I guess I was confusing him with deGrom in terms of remaining contract years. Well, if we were willing to trade Robert, Cease and Madrigal...something like that would be the asking price. I'm assuming they would ask for Jimenez first, and Hahn would nix that idea. With pitching longevity being so up in the air these days, trading "plus" position players for pitching seems a recipe for trouble, especially in the position the White Sox are in, trying to lock in their starting line-up of the future in 2020.

Adding Thor (with limited years remaining before FA) to the ticking time bombs we have in Rodon, Giolito, Kopech and Cease seems to be the definition of insanity, not only because of the talent we'd have to give up...but, most importantly, the likelihood he'd either get injured, or that Cooper would have him throwing at a more comfortable 94-96. If we're doing that, might as well trade even more for deGrom, sign Harper and roll the dice. Odds are we'd still end up being short unless we spent another $150 million (over two years) on free agents to supplement the line-up and bullpen.

Trying desperately to sell more season tickets?

This Is Why Poor People’s Bad Decisions Make Perfect Sense We know that the very act of being poor guarantees that we will never not be poor. It doesn’t give us much reason to improve ourselves. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-tirado/why-poor-peoples-bad-decisions-make-perfect-sense_b_4326233.html In the end, that article “earned” her over $60k at GFM.

The White Sox ALREADY have the 12th biggest t.v. contract, despite the fact that the last five years have in-arguably been a complete debacle. So let's go with the worst-case scenario...a Mariners (who spent BIGLY with their Root Sports windfall, only to see it fail to payoff) or Pirates-style franchise implosion. Only 4 ways to avoid it: 1) Our Top 50 prospects become the perennial All-Stars they were projected to be, at the very least, 3-4 of them. 2) Sign Harper or Machado (and Harper's the ONLY one, arguably, who has the power individually to elevate the t.v. rights deal beyond basically an extension at roughly a 5-10% increase)...put another way, why would our CURRENT broadcast partners have any reason to significantly invest (or increase) their investment unless any of these 4 events were to occur before the 2020 season? 3) Trade for Arenado and get him to sign an in-season long-term extension (extremely low probability event, unless he also has a Sox family connection.) 4) The perfect combination of "under the radar" veteran acquisitions at bargain prices, international free agents over 25 and trading prospects for major league ready talent (the equivalent talent injections of Floyd/Danks/Ramirez/Quentin). Also: note the current pressure on the Mariners, Rangers, Tigers and Giants to live up to their t.v. contracts. All those franchises are under duress, particularly SEA, TEX and DET.

Dodgers $204 M 25/$8.35 B 2014 2038 100% LINK Angels $118 M 20/$3 B 2012 2031 25% LINK Yankees $98 M 30/$5.7 B 2013 2042 20% LINK Red Sox $80 M 2006 80% LINK Mariners $76 M 18/$1.8 B 2014 2031 71% LINK Cubs $65 M 2004 2019 20% LINK Phillies $60 M 25/$2.5 B 2016 2040 25% LINK Astros $60 M 20/$1.6 B 2013 2032 No LINK Rangers $56 M 20/$1.6 B 2015 2034 10% LINK Tigers $55 M 10/$500 M 2009 2018 No LINK Giants $54 M 25/$1.75 B 2008 2032 30% LINK White Sox $51 M 2004 2019 20% LINK

In the end, it feels like a pretty dubious plan (overall) when so much is riding on the unlikely signing of Harper/Machado/Arenado or the projected health of Cease/Kopech.

If you have to spend $50 million (combined) per year on Moustakas, Donaldson and Brantley, the rebuild never had a chance, either. The only way this works is not paying full freight but hitting on at least 4-5 unquestionable “bargains” like we did with Dye, AJ, Contreras, Jenks, Hermanson, Pods, Iguchi, etc. It certainly can’t be overpaying like the awful 2014 cycle again.

In the end, we would have been “luckier” to get Brady Aiken in that draft year, if we could have actually followed it up with Bergman/Tucker/Cameron (since dealt) and NOT drafted Carson Fulmer. That would have addressed two HUGE holes in our lineup on the cheap. Instead, it created two more question marks in the rotation.