caulfield12

Except their payroll is about 3X higher...funny Disney won it all on a budget and Moreno cranked up spending to compete with the Dodgers and look where they are now. To top it all off...Pujols and Ohtani both ended up at Chavez Ravine.

Burger has held his own, especially compared to where things stood in 2020...he fought his way back and made a big league future for himself. Romy Gonzalez was a very solid part time contributor to the Red Sox last year.

Team India! Great marketing opportunity, Brooks! But could we please accrue some outfielders rather than a plethora of 2B who probably can't play SS or if they can play SS can't hit much better than Esteban Beltre or Mike Caruso?

Mark Hampton... Pujols deal with LAA ARod/NYY Josh Hamilton/LAA Zito Giants Sandoval Red Sox Ellsbury Yankees Chris Davis Orioles https://www.hummbabybaseball.com/documentaries/the-worst-10-mlb-contracts-of-all-time-unmitigated-disasters

The next Luke Keaschall?

Correction 75th pick last year was here...might be costing SD around $1.6 million in total to sign Pivetta (including $500k in intl bonus pool money) 75 Athletics $1,043,900

"The Pivetta contract structure helps a Padres team that is trying to keep costs down for a second straight offseason and was already running a 2025 payroll of about $194 million, roughly a $30 million increase from where they were on Opening Day last year." ... "They Padres are projected to be a couple of million over the lowest luxury tax threshold and that might well be the target, so I wouldn't expect much in the way of additions the rest of the winter." Oops!!! https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/43780926/2025-mlb-offseason-winners-losers-free-agency-dodgers-mets-braves-padres

Depends if the Dodgers Mets Yankees win the next two WS...

Fegan interviews Venable, Gonzalez, Davis Martin https://soxmachine.com/2025/02/white-sox-open-camp-emphasizing-environment-over-expectations/ "Gonzalez had three hits and three RBIs apiece in that game in Montgomery, using a new leg kick as a loading action to keep his weight back, after offseason work to maintain his direction at the plate forced him to rework his timing through a season where he slashed .238/.307/.343 across two levels. It was only a small handful of games that Gonzalez was able to try out the move with a swing that’s been remodeled in multiple ways at this point, but the initial results encouraged him to keep working on it through the winter."

Congrats to WestEddy for making the Padres look semi-sympathetic for their Icarus-like small market getting too close to the sun act... You would think JR was a complete idiot for ever considering another "big" FA contract due to the risks it might go wrong...which usually happens about 2/3rds of the time paying aging players for performance at their peak.

He's #40 in most publications around there

Witt Jr. was always unquestionably one of the three best prospects in the entire sport...whereas Keith Law has Montgomery outside his Top 108 right now.

Hyperbole. About the best anyone would realistically expect at his age coming off last season would be a 1.0 fWAR, 1.5 would be REALLY pushing it. That's off by at least 8-9 fWAR from the likes of Judge and Witt, Jr.

So she wouldn't have been HAPPIER with 6 years and $156 million in Houston, or the 6 years/$171+ offered by the Tigers? Because he's not going to get another contract like that again at age 33....even with relatively big offensive numbers induced by 81 games played at Fenway.

And White Sox fans in 2025 care about 2005 right now SO MUCH that they're still buying season tickets? At best, that buys you five years of good will from fans, according to market research. Rays, Brewers, Guardians, Rockies, Mariners fans should basically just give up? And Marlins' fans should come out now to support their team because of 1997 and 2003...something that happened over twenty years ago?

This is where you're in preposterous territory. Andrew Vaughn has never had even a 1.0 fWAR or above in his entire career. Xander Bogaerts was at 4.6 fWAR, 6.0 fWAR, 4.1 fWAR and 6.0 fWAR in the four FULL seasons before he signed with SD. 20.7/4=5.2 average The gave him too many years, but that was the market at the time...his SS skills were eroding as he aged, we all know that FA's at age 30 or beyond are riskier based on regression in the post-steroids era, especially players that rely/relied upon their speed to create value. He has been worth 6.6 fWAR so far to SD. He was also hurt for much of the 2024 season. 6.6 fWAR over $51 million for 2023-24=7.7 fWAR per million, just a slight overpay He would have to average closer to 7.0-7.5 fWAR the next 9 years to make it "neutral," but at best he's only likely to do that the next 3-4 years. They're eventually going to have to eat something like $125 million, like the Tigers' contract for Javy Baez, essentially. Do most of their fans prefer that they signed DeJong, Nicky Lopez and Jacob Amaya/Josh Rojas instead of signing Bogaerts? MAYBE???? At best, Bogaerts should have been offered a 6-7 year deal, but FA forced them to overspend by 2-3 years since they'd already missed on FA targets like Aaron Judge prior to that. Cost of doing business. Name one GM who has signed almost ten $100+ million contacts in the last 4-5 years that has never made a single mistake with any of them. (And yes, 1B Erik Hosmer was yet another bad contract.)

That's all Dodgers' fans had to show for 12 straight post-seasons and 11 NL West championships (106 win team finished second to SFG) until COVID year and then they barely made it past SD this past season or it would have been 1/12, and 2020 would have come with an *** asterisk. Should they have discouraged their ownership group from competing at that point?

So your position now is that owners spending money is somehow bad??? Or just the way the Padres have spent? Because it seems to me there's a very high correlation between payrolls and attendance numbers since the start of the 2019 season when Machado joined SD. 2017 MLB Attendance=18th 2018 Attendance=18th 2019 Attendance=14th (arrival of Machado/Tatis, Jr.) 2020 COVID 2021=3rd 2022=5th 2023=3rd 2024=4th

Thanks, Mr. Jurickson Profar (by the way, his brother signed with the White Sox)...the fact of the matter is that almost everyone in the world but Blue Jays and Padres fans expected him to sign with the Dodgers from the very beginning. And the exact same thing will likely happen with Murakami next season unless he has a terribly disappointing year with the Yakult Swallows.

2024 NL Division Series Los Angeles Dodgers Lost, 3-2 NL Wild Card Series Atlanta Braves Won, 2-0 2022 NL Championship Series Philadelphia Phillies Lost, 4-1 NL Division Series Los Angeles Dodgers Won, 3-1 NL Wild Card Series New York Mets Won, 2-1 2020 NL Division Series Los Angeles Dodgers Lost, 3-0 NL Wild Card Series St. Louis Cardinals Won, 2-1 (13 post-season victories in the 2020's including 4 series wins, versus 2 for the White Sox, 13-13 overall record)

5 years/$118 million was the original contract at the time the Phillies and White Sox were both vying for his services, ultimately signing with Philly. $23.6 million/year

"Signing Pivetta will cost them only one pick -- their second highest of the 2025 Draft -- plus $500,000 from their international bonus pool." 52, Padres, $1,762,500 (that was last year) You're also forgetting the Padres signed the top-ranked international prospects in 2022 (Salas), 2023 (deVrieze) and finished second on Sasaki. Pretty confident they can do better with their international pool than the White Sox have traditionally done with their second picks... Also, they're only paying Pivetta $4 million this year...basically the same as Mr. Josh Rojas for very consistent 2.0, 1.9, 1.5 and 2.3 fWAR production...keeping in mind that the defense behind him and the run suppression at night time Petco likely means even better numbers like it did for Cease and King leaving the White Sox and Yankees, respectively, for SD.

Look at his 2021/22/23 statistics. Look at his 2024 statistics with the Pirates. Look at his age, for a speed-based/defense-first player whose highest HR total has been 21 but is usually at least ten lower...

Marketing opportunities are that much higher in Boston versus "flyover" territory? Seems to be a bit like the Wheeler decision where the wife strongly preferred Philly.

WestEddy is hiding today after taunting me for over a week about Padres' anticipated spending levels... Waiting until the last second ended up in number of bargains last year (Profar especially)...looks like the same type of cheaper makeover happens this time around. $4 million for this season is crazy. And they still might trade Cease King Suarez Arraez to free up more money and get back prospects. Plus they have Musgrove back from TJS in 2026.