caulfield12

Odorizzi probably belongs there as well, although he had one terrible start in his recent stretch. The Wood love is fading just a bit, but pitchers coming back from injury deserve more time to make assessments. I think most of us much prefer a Wood/Wacha type of player who does present some tangible upside compared to Nova yet again.

Except was it a lasting change? For some reason, RFer's (thinking guys here like Eaton, Garcia and Hunter Renfroe) really get a huge boost when they pile up double digit assist numbers from that position. Eaton got that huge bump when he moved from CF (where he struggled both defensively and staying healthy) to RF, which led directly to his one big fWAR season and the Gio/Lopez/Dunning deal. Of course, eventually it normalizes when opposing teams stop challenging them...I'm sure there's some obscure stat about the number of runners going from first to third or second to home on balls hit to them. I remember Podsednik was actually improved the second time around with the team, fwiw.

But the perception was that they invested 80-85% of their time into the Machado pursuit and were "leading the field" with offers at least twice and asking for a commitment. There were at least two days/nights during the hunt that the Machado to Sox story was the headline at ESPN, for example. Did we ever have a better offer on the table to Harper than he signed with the Phillies?

Then why was he available for just Chris Carter? If it’s so easy to find future MVP candidates, why have the White Sox had such a difficult time either filling corner outfield spots or 1B/DH? Those SHOULD be easy, right? Eaton, fwiw, was also highly regarded as a prospect but couldn’t stay on the field. So it you’re not going to consider either of those two as “finds” from other organizations...you have to go back to Alexei Ramirez and Quintana on the pitching side and that’s basically it...because everyone already knew about Abreu. DeAza would be third...but I suppose Taylor St. was claiming him from the Marlins the day he was put on the waiver wire.

So basically we have no example of a White Sox coach turning an outfielder into anything resembling a solid defender when they started out well below average...

What is the ChiSox coaching staff going to do to work on his arm strength/coaching? This seems more like a specialization of Rusty Kuntz working with Alex Gordon (who already possessed a true 3B's arm)...than anything we've ever seen in a puff piece about Daryll Boston's coaching acumen. In fact, I don't ever recall a puff piece from Merkin about Boston.

LOL. Oh boy. Stone, Farmer and DJ need their own seminar at SoxFest where they get pummeled and pillories with "sabes" questions, that would be almost as good as Bill Walton Friday night.

And yet their biggest "finds" from the last decade plus have been the likes of Eaton, DeAza and Quentin, all coming from National League backgrounds.

https://www.opportunityatlas.org/ You can zero in on any neighborhood/street in the country and get a predictive score for future "mean" salary earnings... https://medium.com/the-atlantic/the-economist-who-would-fix-the-american-dream-b2f88bece15c The 25-30 minutes of reading that go along with it, fascinating stuff. This guy's apparently on the fast track for a Nobel Prize in Economics/Sociology at age 40.

Machado and Cano were at totally different points in their careers... An opinion piece from the NY Daily News is not going to be able to quantify the benefit of Bryce Harper "hustling" around the bases on a grand slam.

They have the big names in Trout, Ohtani and Pujols, but their overall roster sucks after the first 5-6 players.

Well, obviously you have UNC, Duke and NC State...but, as an individual state, Kentucky is all about thoroughbred horses and basketball (Louisville/UK).

Dan Wright's 14-12 season in 2002 says hello...

Sure, but every team in baseball in "win now" mode is probably thinking the same thing about Grandal...especially with his second half slide, it makes him theoretically affordable to any team on a single year basis, like the Brewers are doing with him and Moustakas. You'd have to blow away the rest of baseball by 10-15% and offer longer years than anyone, exposing you to the downside risk at the back end of the contract when he's nearing his mid 30's in the very middle of your supposed contention window. No easy answers at the catching position, certainly. (It all just depends on what they ACTUALLY think about Collins' long-term potential.)

Rutherford is far from a sure thing after this season...most of those projecting his stats would peg him as a 4th/5th outfielder type along the lines of a Ryan Sweeney that a regular everyday player. The fact that he doesn't put up huge power numbers and he's not an elite defender doesn't help his cause. In fact, Walker and Adolfo are both likely viewed (at least internally) as the more likely solutions, although both are far from can't miss prospects at this point.

Except he was a basketball coach for 10-15 years in the only state that cares more deeply about basketball than Kansas...Indiana (well, KS is probably third after Kentucky.)

Doesn't that also make the fact that we DIDN'T go after Harper look somewhat dumb/er in retrospect? If Hahn/front office had so much confidence in Moncada (and Anderson at SS), then why invest so much time and effort/energy, 2-3 months' worth, when Harper should/would have been the logical target the whole time?

Notable free agents for 2020-21 Catcher: J.T. Realmuto, Mike Zunino, Yadier Molina First base: C.J. Cron, Yuli Gurriel, Ryan Zimmerman Second base: Starlin Castro, Jason Kipnis, Cesar Hernandez, Marwin Gonzalez, DJ LeMahieu, Daniel Murphy (mutual option) Third base: Justin Turner, Zack Cozart, Jake Lamb Shortstop: Andrelton Simmons, Jonathan Villar, Marcus Semien, Jurickson Profar Outfield: Mookie Betts, George Springer, Yoenis Cespedes, David Peralta, Michael Brantley, Joc Pederson, Jackie Bradley Jr., Jay Bruce, Giancarlo Stanton (opt-out) DH: Edwin Encarnacion Starting pitchers: Trevor Bauer, Robbie Ray, James Paxton, Masahiro Tanaka, Jake Arrieta, Marcus Stroman, Jose Quintana Relievers: Blake Treinen, Jeremy Jeffress, Alex Colome, Brandon Morrow, Andrew Miller (club option) Once again, like Grandal this offseason...only ONE option on the market. There's no reason why they can't go ahead and sign him to a three year deal for $20-25 million and then continue to work on improving the position with Collins or via the trade market. The year after, that 2021, more garbage (because Perez's defensive skills have likely eroded with all the time sitting out with TJS) Catcher: Salvador Perez, Wilson Ramos, Yan Gomes

Why didn't those same (supposed) steroids rub off on Jay, Castillo, Alonso, Herrera, etc.?

From what they're saying so far, it's more of a "repetitive" use issue and being termed as "soft tissue" soreness, which resulted in spasms in that at-bat. He's going to be reevaluated the first week of September. Surely, he'll be pushing the Padres to let him come back at the end of the year.

Pretty sad that’s still better than Eloy’s current throwing velocity from LF. Gonna have to address that somehow before next season.

He should get a lot more than Jay’s salary...he’s already earned that much respect in less than one full season. His “leadership” is just as critical as Anderson’s or Abreu’s. Ron Gardenhire pointed out how underrated that part of his game was...how much they didn’t realize they’d miss until it was gone from their clubhouse. Part of that's fluff, but it’s certainly something to take into consideration.

Except the rebuild matters now a lot more than team record to most fans. If it was Matt Skole or Goins or Castillo...at any rate, Benetti had his 15 minutes of fame on Friday and nobody will care at all about Sat/Sun except hardcore Sox fans. And the guy Saturday night was fine, albeit he doesn’t have that warm, rich stereotypical broadcasting voice.

Most of us would be shocked if they spent $300 million, combined, over all the new additions... I would estimate the over/under on FA spending (if there was such a thing) would be right around $125 million or so. There’s simply not enough young/er talent that fits with our current depth chart, outside of pitching...which is where the White Sox have parted with money about as easily as my SS-dependent aunt from Dubuque at Christmas time.

I love how what was looking closer to 4 (projected 38 games from now) is now moved down to 3.0-3.5 by the day. At any rate, we could say he’s only 2.9 by bWAR but that puts him as the 9th best 3B. We might as well say Leury Garcia is at the same level positionally (CF) as Machado or that both guys are well ahead of Abreu. And that means well...absolutely nothing. Context matters. Actual player availability and age also matter, especially with the plethora of extensions signed the last calendar year.