caulfield12

Alonso could easily get to 550 PA’s. Renteria won’t screw him over if he’s playing well. You can also practically guarantee if Nova or Santana pitch well in 2019 the extension money goes to them instead of a Verlander or Greinke from outside the organization.

If they want to completely demoralize the fanbase, sure, wait another year while Cleveland is vulnerable...wait for them to trade Lindor and Ramirez when/if they refuse to sign team-friendly extensions. The only way no FA additions will be necessary... Jimenez ROY Cease with a sub 3.50 ERA in August and Sept Robert and Madrigal come up late and show they belong in 2020 Collins rounds into a catcher who can start at least 120+ games defensively at the big league level No hiccups with Kopech rehab White Sox clearly have best bullpen in division...which would mean Herrera and Colome for 2020, but why if you’re not actually trying to compete? Alonso and Abreu have their career seasons offensively. Giolito, Nova and Santana hold their own or even pitch better than expected

It’s simply suicide to wait that long. Rodon will be gone after 2021. Moncada after 2023. Anderson is a complementary player at this point, although he has just as much opportunity as Yoan to break out into the 3-5 fWAR range. At best, they’re looking at a 3 year window by waiting another year, and completely invalidating the additions of Herrera and Colome to shore up the pen, not to mention Yonder Alonso. They’re also guaranteeing the loss of another 15% of the remaining fanbase, unless Jimenez is a Rookie of the Year and Cease hits the ground running and not like Giolito. This is the path to perpetual rebuilding...

Well, then the Sox need to provide some reasons to be optimistic. What are they this spring, exactly? Mendick becoming a utility player to eventually replace Yolmer or Leury? Alonso has looked good, but most of the board wants to limit his playing time to keep his option from vesting, or even trade him now. Robert is the man, but he has to stay on the field. Fulmer looks even worse than before, if that’s possible. Fry looks like a mess, too. Young players can’t get their brains beaten in every time out like a veteran...it starts to undermine their confidence. Also would like to see more of Collins and Madrigal....since everyone we trot out at 2B and C isn’t part of the playoff-contending future.

Guess just personal preference. Same reason didn’t like Amber Heard and Patrick Wilson In Aquaman. To each his own...

We really have to watch how Vaughn fares against Top 25/top weekend starters. Not a fan of Abrams from watching his videos, feeling he's more in CF. Rutschman and Witt, Jr., continue to be the crown jewels. Hard to imagine the Royals passing up on Adley...especially with Perez out for the year and it being impossible to transition him to 1B/DH. Feels like they will trade him in 2020/21 and then bring up Rutschman...to be the core of the rebuild and new captain of the team.

Captain Marvel was good, not great. Deserves its 79 Rotten Tomatoes score. Felt like it dragged in places, loved the action scenes (especially as the movie advanced) but it wasn't one where you didn't ever look down at your watch waiting for something interesting to happen. Some sharp humor from the Skrulls...loved seeing the backstory of Fury and Coulson, but not enough direct connections to the upcoming Avengers film for most fan-boys (have to stay for the end credits I guess, they kick you out of the theatre in China cleaning for the subsequent show.) Not huge fans of Benning and Jude Law being in this film...loved the 90's music references, particularly Garbage, No Doubt, Hole and Nirvana.

Some of the projections have Frare, Covey and Fulmer making the team, Banuelos, depending on how Santana's health goes (Ervin's first appearance is likely to be this upcoming Friday, March 15th). For the bullpen, we know that Colome, Herrera, Jones and Fry will definitely be there, and likely two lefties (total). For the bench, it's looking like Delmonico will be the first "odd man out," especially after the concussion. Tucker will likely be eliminated in favor of Guyer. That leaves McCann, Guyer, Rondon and Leury Garcia for now as the final four bench pieces. Eventually something will have to give when Jimenez comes up (unfortunately, it might be Palka's time, because we already have Alonso and Jay and Leury who will stay at the big league level or be waived/released, in the case of the latter two).

Uh-oh. I have to refrain from many further social commentary...just "uh-oh!" will have to suffice.

Happy to oblige. There's going to be some really ugly April/May/September numbers this year, especially pre-Jimenez on weekday/weeknight games or bad weather.

Since I was pretty much going insane without Jimenez/Robert to watch...I, unsurprisingly have adopted the Padres as my NL team, just to stay in touch with NL players for fantasy baseball and because they would obviously look like the White Sox with Machado, Tatis Jr., a ton of money spent in Latin America across 15-25 minor leaguers and a nice/newer stadium. Observations: They have six outfielders (Jankowski out for 2-3 months) cuts them down to W.Myers and Margot as the surefire starters, with Reyes/Cordero/Renfroe all competing for the third/starting spot on one corner, likely RF. They have a ton of pitching prospects, but Lucchesi and Chris Paddack are the only really impressive ones...and Paddack might not even break with the team. The later is quite similar to Kopech, very cocky but he backs it up and has that "swagger." Jose Pirela is essentially their version of Yolmer...solid, hits well enough but not for much power, not super fast but you can plug him in at multiple positions across the diamond and get a 1-2.5 fWAR, a bit like Marwin Gonzalez but more a natural 1B/corner OF than 3B or CF type. Francisco Mejia is going to be a monster...he's really short, only 5'8", but I've been really impressed with his offensive approach this spring and he possesses all the raw defensive tools as well. Austin Hedges has his work cut out holding him off as the starter. Urias has been hurt the last week, but he's the likely starter at SS with Kinsler at 2B and Hosmer at 1B. Conclusion: If we had the right scouts in place, we should target one of their 4 RF'ers (assuming we don't bring in Castellanos/Puig/Ozuna) or Austin Hedges (assuming we don't join Grandal bidding.) All four of them have their pluses and minuses. Now pulling off ANOTHER deal with San Diego/Preller, good luck Hahn. We'd probably get tricked into taking Wil Myers' deal and sending them Bush and Fulmer, with Fulmer blossing into another Walker Buehler in the NL West.

There are seven categories of free agents (at least the way I'm organizing it) for next year. Instead of putting it into age or lifetime fWAR (which I'll write later)...I put them into tiers of likelihood. My assumptions in doing this exercise were that Moncada, Anderson, Madrigal (2B), Jimenez (LF) and Robert (CF) were going to be the starters in April/May 2020. And a rotation of Rodon, Lopez, Kopech, Cease and multiple question marks (Dunning/Banuelos/Covey/E.Santana) as well. In order to compete next year, they need to do THREE of the following, and ARGUABLY, FOUR. 1) 1B/DH Abreu (QO), Alonso being locked in with 550+ PA's and some combination of Palka/Guyer/Rondon/Delmonico 75% 2) FRONT-LINE STARTING PITCHER 50% Since it's the White Sox, we can forget about Sale/Cole/Verlander...for various reasons. That leaves Z.Wheeler, Porcello, Bumgarner and possibly Keuchel (signs one year deal, or one+ option not exercised) 3) BIG-TIME HITTER (regardless of position) JD Martinez, Goldschmidt, Rendon, Didi Gregorious, Donaldson, Bogaerts, Khris Davis, Scotter Gennett 25% 4) RIGHT FIELDER (this is more about marketing than need...especially if Basabe/Rutherford/Adolfo struggle) N.Castellanos M.Ozuna Puig (more about marketing at this point, although he's been a solid 2 fWAR player and potentially 2.5-4.0, watch weight gain/loss of fast-twitch muscles) 25% 5) Catcher/Yasmani Grandal (will be competing with every team in baseball, and one gets the feeling from the front office that they're "all in" in terms of forcing Collins and Zavala into this position, come hell or high water) 10-15% 6) Closer/Craig Kimbrel 5-10% This means that Herrera, Colome, Nate Jones and Burdi are all basically disasters...and Fry has a sophomore slump instead of progressing. HUGE REBUILD fail, as we were led to believe that drafting all those college relievers (Hamilton and Burr being two of the leaders) would start to pay dividends. 7) Zach Greinke This is the other place (besides Japan and Korea) to look for a front-line starting pitcher. Of course, it's going to come with a $96 or $64 million (2020/21) pricetag, but it wouldn't cost any talent and would limit the "7-10 years down the line" liability with one of the long-term deals they rejected. In the end, they bring back Abreu/Alonso (they're not going to deliberately screw him over PA's unless he hits like he did for CLE in the 2nd half again, ONE pitcher (list of 4) and ONE legit middle of the order hitter (list of 5). They end up spending $250-300 million doing that, instead of putting it all in the basket of one individual superstar/star player. Other than the 3 young RFer's that are FA's, it also risks THIRTY-SOMETHING VETERAN FAIL (see 2009-2018).

Not fault...just doing his job...whether the team feels he burned Kenny or not, they basically have to accept all the free column space or airtime they can get, because they’re certainly not in a position to lose what scant coverage they do enjoy.

But, are you actually allowing anyone to see your Big Board?

Well between J.Williams, Brand, Duhon, Deng, Boozer, Dunleavy Jr. and Carter, that augurs well for another Dukie in Zion falling into their laps somehow and putting them back on the roadmap to relevancy again.

The Rangers are picking it up on their feed. Oops, guess you’re right, earlier today it showed MLB.com on the Texas side and now it shows just their radio affiliate. Guess I will have to watch Padres at Dodgers. Looks like old friends Shuck and Melky are starting for Pitt today against Philly. And still waiting for a Cease sighting. Finally, looks like DVS hasn’t been totally cut off from access to the club after making KW look really bad.

They got the new media deal from ROOT Sports and went out and almost immediately spent the money on Cano and Cruz. The problem is that Felix, then Seager and especially Ichiro were already trending downwards....they had what looked to be future TOR studs in Walker and Paxton, and developed Haniger and Zunino as well, but it still wasn’t quite enough to get them over the hump. Too much time on the DL, or fighting the aging curve/s.

So roughly 88% so far are blaming Reinsdorf in some way, shape or form...sounds about right.

Yeah, it was only those drunken Ligues who could pull off the opposing team’s base coach attack...

Mike Trout was only worth 0.7 fWAR his first cup of tea in the big leagues, OPS of 671.

You might have to change your member name to whatever is the opposite of swarm...smattering or trickle. At any rate, good stuff!

With your sarcaustic (a new word) humor in rare mid-season form, you would be a compelling candidate to replace Benetti in the booth around July when his act really starts wearing thin on everyone. Also, apparently KW or Rick are posting anonymously at yahoo.com now, at least until the final sentence...”The Sox are just not a attractive destination for big time free agents, they will always play second fiddle to the Cubs in Chicago. They are better off without either of these two taking up the majority of their payroll. They should have set their sites on free agents the next tier down from these two and signed multiple players to shorter contracts.Then they would still have the money to extend contracts of their young talent when the time is right. The American Central is prime for the taking, unfortunately this year’s plan has set the Sox back another year.”

Then he can personally accompany you into the clubhouse and flip the postgame buffet spread all over you and your friends (insurance waivers not included.)

Not to mention nearly unlimited autographs and genuine interaction with the players, coaches, broadcasters and front office staffers.

I think part of him revels in the idea of going back to DC 9-10 times per year and having boos rain down on his head like Barry Bonds. There would certainly be nothing like it from the massively-underattended AL Central fans for 76 games per year. Gets to play in NYC, Miami, Atlanta and DC, those are all great cities for visiting players.