caulfield12

Drafting? Who? I hope it's not all based on Anderson, Rodon and Fulmer...along with Adams. Because of this year's first three? Hmmm...

Avi for CF 2017

All you have to do is skip to the final two paragraphs...and/or have an abiding belief they can replicate all the trades Epstein and Hoyer made over the course of 2-3 years.

All you have to do is skip to the final two paragraphs...and/or have a believe they can replicate all the trades Epstein and Hoyer made over the course of 2-3 years.

QUOTE (Hatchetman @ Aug 4, 2016 -> 01:02 PM) Since 1980 Name BB% WAR Garret Anderson 4.70% 24 Mark Grudzielan 4.80% 23.2 Frank White 4.90% 23.1 A.J. Pierzynski 3.90% 23.1 Erick Aybar 4.80% 18.8 Alexei Ramirez 4.80% 16.8 Carlos Baerga 4.90% 15.7 Rey Sanchez 4.40% 14.6 Sand Alomar Jr. 4.40% 13.2 Ozzie Guillen 3.40% 13.1 Starlin Castro 4.90% 11.3 Corey Patterson 4.60% 10.8 Alcides Escobar 4.10% 10.1 Most of those guys also have much higher contact rates....after Anderson. Ironic that Alexei's on that same list, with Ozzie. Lots of ex Cubs and Sox. Almost all AL Central players. Weird.

Royals fighting to box us out of a Top Ten pick without Davis at the back end... Dont know if we can get there or not. That would give Hahn a ton of protection again for not pursuing any top tier free agents...preserving draft picks.

Then nothing is going to matter except leading the AL Central next July 31st....

I would suggest you read The Arm by Jeff Passan...it has a big section on all the reasons Lester signed with the Cubbies coming out of that 2014 season.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Aug 4, 2016 -> 12:33 PM) 2 years ago, the Cubs had some of the lowest ratings in baseball. Baseball viewership ratings change quickly. These contracts teams sign are for a long period of time, and it sort of helps the buyer of the rights to spend some money. The more money they give for the rights, the more money the team can spend on players, the better the team, the better the ratings. So anyone thinking the Sox will sign a 10 or 15 year contract for the lowest rate around, isn't paying attention. The rights buyer obviously wants a deal where they can make some money, but a lowball contract doesn't really do much for them either if it means the team will always suck. So Comcast will overpay to improve the Sox? As a community service, or because of the leverage JR has with the Bulls? Hmmmm... If the Cubs dont start their own station/network in 2019, the argument for paying the White Sox more than they're currently receiving is what? And WGN and WBBM radio already lost out on the Cubs. Think they regret that now?

Dumping Shields and adding Puig will at least sell some tickets this offseason...

http://www.overthemonster.com/2016/8/3/123...trigger-on-sale Red Sox were unwilling to trade Moncada or Betts...

QUOTE (Insp @ Aug 4, 2016 -> 12:29 PM) Horrors, he's down to .669 from .700! This must mean that the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are about to be unleashed upon us!! The point is Anderson and Saladino cant both be starters....at that ops, so they need yet another player.

Somewhere, in the grey middle....is where the truth lies. Anderson looks like a solid 3 war player but not the savior or future face of the franchise. At this point, having a Benitendi to look forward to would be more exciting, but maybe he'll just turn out to be another version of Jeremy Reed for all anyone knows.

The best news today is the Anderson x-rays are negative (so far) without a bone scan being done...the bad news is he's down to a 669 ops. Granted, he would have had a single 98% of the time on that ball Iglesias robbed him on up the middle last night.

QUOTE (dpd9189 @ Aug 3, 2016 -> 09:05 PM) If the Sox do a total rebuild, they need to trade both Q and Sale. These two guys will bring back the best packages in both quantity and quality of players/prospects. If you look at what is in the Sox organization right now, who are your starters in 2018? Frazier and Melky are UFA's after next year, they have no centerfielder, catcher (I know Zack Collins is a catcher but he might be a better fit at DH) or 2B right now. Abreu is a negative WAR player now and the jury is still out on Tim Anderson. This organization needs to start acquiring/drafting/developing everyday core players which right now they severely lack. Also if the Sox do a total rebuild, the next few years will suck but if they do it right then they can be good for a long time. People often complain on how long it took the Cubs to rebuild, however it only took them 3 seasons. Epstein took over after the 2011 season so 2012 was the first season of their rebuild, 3 years later they were in the NLCS. So rebuilds can be done if a short amount of time if they're done right. Hopefully the Sox follow suit and do this right. If they do, then I'll fully support it. Beats watching a 75 win team year after year. Sure, but then you need to be able to trade for Arrieta, Rizzo, Russell and McKinney and get all those players without trading Sale or Quintana in order to pull it off.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Aug 4, 2016 -> 10:58 AM) Where do you see us having the lowest rating? TV ratings last year. You can find it easily enough with a simple Google search.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Aug 3, 2016 -> 08:04 PM) What? You said the money owed to Puig was a nice chunk of change when we owe more than that to Shields.

Stone was joking today on the Score about Hawk being overexuberant and calling Avi a five tool player after his two homers last night. Said he must be leaving 2-3 of those tools at home.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Aug 3, 2016 -> 06:53 PM) Didn't say he wasn't better than Avi, but his numbers have declined every season, has a bad reputation in the clubhouse and off the field, and is owed a nice chunk of change. I think the Dodgers would take nothing but eating the contract. BTW, Avi has had 30 game stretches of .800+ OPS as well. Sure, of course that same amount of money owed to Shields won't be a hindrance at all this offseason. Then it it will the fair, going rate for a 4th/5th starter, just like Danks.

Team Drake LaRoche vs. KW Sale vs. 1976 Jerseys/Ventura/marketing department Hawk vs. Stone (resolved, hopefully) What next?

The Dodgers putting out "false stories" about him going crazy in the clubhouse when it didn't even happen...just doesn't make any sense to sabotage the value of your own player. The source was solid enough a few of the national baseball beat writers picked it up and had to apologize to Puig and Adam Katz (agent).

The problem is Hahn knew all the payroll restrictions when he took the job, and about KW's status as his superior/supervisor/mentor, whatever you want to call it. During these four or five years, we've been unable to grow revenues and expand payroll....at least not since the blip of the 2014-15 off-season when we foolishly tried to spend our way into contention but didn't really come close. I can't imagine many of the die-hard season ticket holders not ripping up or throwing away anything having to do with 2017 right now. But the solution is VERY VERY simple. They're going to have to trade Sale OR Quintana this off-season AND be willing to up the payroll into the $140-150 million range in order to acquire some of the pieces they can't trade for. You can see them making one of the trades, but raising payroll in the face of declining revenues, in a FA market with a declining rate of return on investment.....yeah, not so much. HEGONE7 said it well. JR has to have a long conversation with the board of directors and decide if he really trusts Hahn AND/OR KW to stick around for this rebuild/retooling. Realistically, they need to start making checklists (Stone said this on the Score today) of 1-20 or 1-50 of all the areas of minor league development/scouting/evaluation (baserunning, fielding, fundamentals, advancing runners, backing up bases, positioning on throws, bunting), etc., and bringing in more "experts" from the outside (see Hostetler or Paddy) who can replace long-time Sox scouts and coaching staff who quite simply aren't getting the job done. At any rate, right now....there's just ZERO hope for 2017. It would have been better had they started the process at the trade deadline, but they still have August and the offseason. Unfortunately, we won't get the advantage of seeing Tilson now because he's injured. We know that Sanchez probably isn't an everyday player. It's just going to be frustrating watching guys like Shuck, Avi Garcia, Morneau and the Navarro soaking up playing time when they're unlikely to be part of the team next year. The same thing happened at the end of 2015, when they almost completely stopped playing Saladino over the last couple of months....because they wanted to give Alexei Ramirez the best opportunity to earn money as a FA???? It just didn't make any sense, and still doesn't. Send Fulmer back to AAA so he can start. Let Ranaudo get some more starts. Play Saladino, and Tilson when he (hopefully) returns from his hamstring injury. Heck, bring up Burdi for awhile and see how he does out of the bullpen in September. Just give the fans SOME TANGIBLE reason to be interested in following this team going forward. It's pretty sad when I was watching the game yesterday and a fellow Sox fan said...well, at least the Twins have Sano and Kepler and Berrios and Buxton (even if they're in last)....and they'll have a very high draft pick next year...so what do we have to look forward to in terms of young impact position players? Difference makers...? Are there any?

It's really more about launching the political careers of Ivanka, and Donald Junior to a lesser extent.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Aug 2, 2016 -> 05:32 PM) What did the Royals do? Why didn't the Angels trade Trout? Decided to hold onto Cain, Hosmer, Moustakas, Volquez, Duffy, Escobar and Davis until next All Star Break. When Hochevar and Davis got hurt, it sort of forced their hand. They'll probably sign Morneau to replace Morales.

Why is Fulmer not starting at Charlotte again?