michelangelosmonkey

I like Q because of his history with us, his being a lefty, even when he's not been very good the last three years he was basically as good as Musgrove 2018-20(by WAR not fWAR which I'm still a bit dubious of) and he will only cost money...plus they only need a two year window before I think they will have a number of these young guys blossom. I don't want Musgrove blocking Cease, Crochet, Kopech development. I still think they might get Bauer because I fully believe they will drop $150-200 mill on a contract in the next 12 months...I'm just not positive Bauer is the guy they want to do it for. It's SO early in their window and they have proven to be willing to spend top 5 payroll in the 00's, 90's and 80's if the team is good. The team is good...management has said they will spend...but they are still shopping.

His ERA on September 19th of his "very promising season" was 5.74...he then pitched against an exhausted St Louis in a day game following a night game, their 10th road game in 7 days...and then the anemic Cleveland offense on the second last day of the season after they had clinched a playoff spot and fallen behind by 8 runs by the 4th. Isn't it just possible that we are throwing those two outlier games into a SSS and seeing rising greatness when it is just a mirage? It's pretty easy to get a pitcher to give up 5.5 runs a game without giving up any assets.

Too stupid to argue with

You are the WORST...No one ever made the argument that Bauer is as good as Ty Cobb...except you. I gave half a dozen examples of dicks that won WS from AJ to Ty Cobb to Aaron Rogers to Isiah Thomas. You have offered ZERO counter examples. I think it would not be hard to find one ass in every group of 25 professional athletes so the idea that signing Bauer and his Cy Young award would hurt the team because...chemistry...is just idiotic.

I appreciate your thoughtful explanations on FIP and your defense of Musgrove...though fWAR is the only defense of him being good. And I'm not being snarky...you forced me to study this stuff and it's interesting. . Still maybe it just explains why he is bad and not why he is going to be good. I went back and did another three year window 2007-2010 to try to find that guy that FIP should uncover...a guy from a bad fielding team, bad bullpen, bad luck, whatever...and honestly you get in a time machine with your FIP stuff and you just don't find a guy that's 28 with a FIP half a run better than his ERA that then goes on to be a 3 WAR guy. I'm sure it has happened and it could happen with Musgrove but it seems more likely that we make the trade, throw in a lottery ticket and he turns out to be the best player in baseball.

The argument shouldn't be "should the White Sox trade from organizational depth" it should be when and for whom. I know I'm a broken record but Musgrove Sept 26th, 2020 his greatest game ever by game score against Indians...who had already clinched a playoff spot, bottom 5 offense and Pirates got 8 runs in first 4. Sept 20th, 2020--his second greatest game score of his career against Cards...Sunday afternoon game after Saturday night game and the Cards were playing their TENTH road game in 7 days (three doubleheaders that week). Previous 32 starts 5.28 ERA. You really want to throw THREE assets including a top 6 prospect for that???? Sign Q for money only....let the young players improve their value in minors until trade deadline...see how our young major league pitchers are developing and then trade them for someone actually good from a team that is bad or is imploding...Castillo from the Reds, Bieber from the Indians, deGroom from the Mets or like that.

This is always your way of arguing...you make some fluffy statement backed with nothing but your opinion...people quote you stats countering your opinion...you say the stats are meaningless...then offer no counter data...then typically you demean the person you are disagreeing with and say they are not addressing the argument. Do you think maybe this is the reason SO MANY people on this board have called you a dick? Your position was "clubhouse cancers destroy teams" and so I merely googled most hated players in baseball and quoted you the top five in order. AJ was not an all time great outside of being a great ass and yet he was instrumental in the Sox winning the WS.... Billy Martin's WS teams used to have fist fights in the dugouts. Sure when you have a fringe team like the early 2010's White Sox a couple of bad personalities can make them look terrible but please show me some evidence in any sport (Isiah Thomas was supposedly a monster, Michael Jordan gave out no, no one likes Aaron Rogers). If your revised position is "Bad players that are jerks don't help you win" or "great players that are jerks don't help bad teams win" I will happily agree.

This may be true for bad teams. I just looked at Bleacher report's "25 most hated players in baseball history" In order...Ty Cobb--3 World Series, Pete Rose-- 6 World Series, Alex Rodriguez--1 WS, Barry Bonds--1 WS, Roger Clemens--6 WS...so that's your top five biggest A**holes in baseball history and everyone went to the world series and combined they went to 17. I'm pretty sure talent trumps attitude. I remember when AJ came to the White Sox and the chorus sang that he destroys clubhouses and everyone hated him. It's possible that the company picnic won't be as fun but hating Bauer's politics isn't going to stop Eloy from hitting 50 home runs or Robert's range in CF dropping.

ok...I always relied on BR because they have. such a great sight...and their WAR says Musgrove is a journeyman. Your argument is that if you use FG and their FIp vs ERA and fWar instead of war we can see Musgrove is undervalued. I liked your argument so i researched FG. Fip should be predictive...so i went back 10 years and used the years 2010-2012 to wash out randomness...and then looked for pitchers with fip half a run lower than era...to find the gems about to break out. it did a great job with Greinke...but he was already a star with BR War of 10 onw year. but the other guys were Luke Hochevar and Jeff Francis and our guy Gavin Floyd. Gf was 29 and never put up a 1.5 war after. This was not an exhaustive study but i sure didnt find any 28 year old journeymen that then became 3 War guys. Im sure it exists but the problem is mostly ERA=fip (which makes sense) but isnt it possible that FIP is subjective? Arent we looking at what should have happened over what did? I dont know...if you flip a coin a 1000 times and it comes up heads 70% of the time...arent you questioning the coin ?

I think thats all reasonable. Sometimes you have to take a chance on an ex-Pittsburgh pitcher. Im just nervous and miss lefty Q and fear giving up valuable assets on a maybe.

Cherry picking is taking two games in May and two games in July and a game in August and September and excluding them...which is wholly unfair. But Im looking at 32 consecutive starts over two seasons and OK....I used shorthand...Ill accept 5.28. You know who had 33 starts with a 5.38 ERA in 2019 but against the DH league...yup Reylo. Im fine with trading assets but Musgrove had no success before 2019 and his success in 2020 was not some build to a crescendo...Im not excluding 25% of the year...he had two good starts at the very end of the year and four good starts at the very beginning of the previous year and for the next year and a half he was Reylo and if that doesnt give you pause nothing will.

Honestly...32 of last 34 starts his ERA was 5.50...thats not cherry picked its 32 of last 34...and the two good starts were against Clevelands anemic offense and an exhasted St Louis team after all those double headers at the very end of 2020. 5.50 Real improvement and fip and zip and filthy stuff all you want...it should be concerning to give up Stievers.

How is looking at game logs manipulating stats? Reylo had an AMAZING game against a much better Cleveland team in late September of 2019. Maybe we should trade for him.

Yes for Konnor Pinklington not Stiever. Quintana is free and I suspect Q + Stiever is better than Musgrove over five years.

Im not sure its a "trick". Its a trick to just look at a single number and say "truth". I dug into his individual starts and his last two starts in late September were stellar...but before that and through all of his non-April stats in 2019 he was bad. Thats 32 consecutive starts...and smart people on here are always saying beware of end of season anomalies. And while you cant ignore the great April of 2019 or the great late September of 2020...shouldnt the bad in between be a point of interest?

If you use fWAR he looks better. WAR says about 1 per year...and the peripherals look good but i keep asking this...Musgrove May 1, 2019 to Sept 20, 2020. 32 starts, in NL with a 5.5 ERA.  Would we accept trading a major asset for a guy that will give up 5.5 runs a game.

I agree about Stievers range of accounts. I just cant understand holding that reasonable position at the same time as having absolute confidence in DD greatness inspite the very thin actual evidence. And Musgrove has been a 1 WAR pitcher his whole career...fWar is 2...expecting 3 WAR going forward is wonderfully optimistic. His actual game by game evidence over 2 years is hard to deny unless of course you choose to not look.

Im just not sure about fWar...When i see Meada as better than Giolito...Hendricks better than Scherzer...it doesnt feel right.

Im not disagreeing with you...this thread started with people trading three of our top ten prospects for a guy thats about as good as Quintana. If it was Stiever, Rutherford and Adolfo for Darvish....interesting. But you dont throw all your chips in for someone that is questionable and Ive thrown a lot of stats supporting Musgrove as being very questionable.

Listen you have some good thoughts in here but you keep using hyperbole in the wrong way and it makes your posts sound silly. You also seemed distracted by multiple arguments so just explain Musgrove May 1, 2019 to Sept 20, 2020. 32 starts, in NL with a 5.5 ERA. Dont give my xFip or Zips or fWar...would we accept trading a major asset for a guy that will give up 5.5 runs a game.

If Musgrove was a free agent I'm fine with that. I think Quintana makes way more sense because he doesn't cost anything and in almost every season of his career he's been better than Musgrove. But I think giving up your #6 prospect for a guy that has never had an actually good year and yet comparing him to a 3 WAR starter is crazy talk. I honestly still think they sign Bauer and I believe the JR is cheap is nonsense...we had a top 5 payroll in mid 2000's when the team was good, a top 5 payroll in the 1990's when the team was good...and mid 80's when they signed Carlton Fisk to a huge contract. I think Sox will spend $175 mill (top five budget now) when the time is right...and them being judicious shoppers now is sensible...they will make a big splash...the off season isn't done and maybe trade deadline is a better time to shop.

So Lance Lynn is a 3 WAR pitcher. Ignoring last year where he was 6th in CY YOUNG voting and had an ERA of 2.50 and pitched the most innings in baseball but gave up 9 ER in a meaningless last start of the year that skewed his stats? And still he had 2.2 WAR which = 5.9 in normal year (162/60=2.7 multiplier). So LL has put up in career order WAR of 2, 2.1, 3.6, 3.4, 3.2, arm trouble year, 7.6, 5.9 and you see what??? And Musgrove is a 3 WAR pitcher in spite HIS career WAR which has been 0.5, 0.1, 1.3, 1.8 and 1.3 (using the 2.7 multiplier to be fair). And Dane Dunning is going to be a 3 WAR guy next year based on TWO good games against the worst offenses in baseball...and lets ignore all other data as that would be cherry picking. And Stiever is nothing because at 23 he only had ONE good game in the majors and one bad start...and we can ignore the 6-1 K/BB rate prior and all the scouts and evaluations because, oh shut up. OK...really not a lot of room to argue with this. I feel soundly defeated.

The only actual argument prior to this that I can find from you in this thread is that Lynn was not a top ten pitcher in 2020 (6th in CY voting....ERA of 2.53 with the most innings pitched in the majors before last start in late September) and if you use a reasonable time frame of 2 years (FG 5th in WAR) or 3 years (FG 8th in WAR) he is clearly a top ten pitcher. And let's get this out of the way upfront...I don't care about "future stats" whether they come from inside your head or Zips or Steamer or whatever...you are taking what someone thinks might happen in the future as the foundation of your arguments and at that point it would be better to say something like...my gut tells me that Lynn is going to fall off the mountain...and I can accept that...I argued strongly here last year that EE was a terrible idea for the same reason...stats said he would be good but my gut said he was ready to fall off the cliff. As for Musgrove your argument about him being worth more because he is controlled for more years suggests that this is a good thing ignoring my point which is from May 1st 2019 to September 19th 2020...which is his most recent 32 starts excepting his last two starts in late September in the COVID year...his ERA is 5.40. And yes his FIP was better...but he committed four of the errors himself. And most of that was against DH less NL and playing in the low pressure environment of Pittsburgh. You can throw all sorts of stats at me but he has not been historically good, he's 28, he's been traded twice by smarter teams than Pittsburgh and you want to give up actual assets to get him. Your next argument is that it's fine to give up Stiever for the not historically good Musgrove because Stiever isn't that good and not nearly comparable to Dunning. I like Dunning and I think it was a fair trade. I showed you scouting evaluations from the most recent season that they pitched without COVID crazy and they were basically rated exactly the same...and almost all rating sites had them as #5 and 6 in the Sox system. Further age is a HUGE variable in rating prospects and Stiever is much younger than Dunning. In fact the whole board was super excited about Stiever after his first mlb start where he gave up 1 run in 3 2/3 and struck out 3 and we were polishing up his hall of fame plaque and then he got shelled against the Reds and suddenly he's worthless and we can't get rid of him soon enough (and oddly ignoring DD giving up 8 ER in his last 7 innings). Stiever is an exciting pitching prospect and I'm fine with giving him up someday but not for a guy that has not really shown that he is anything but a failed prospect. (which is where Lopez discussion came in because we have our own failed pitcher with great stuff). Finally your argument about Dunning being basically as good as Lynn based on future stats??? Dane pitched a great game against KC and a great game against Pittsburgh in September. Outside of that he gave up 6 runs a game and was walking 4.5 a game in his other five starts. (And gave up 2 hits to four hitters in the playoffs). So this great crystal ball machine you base your arguments on sees a guy coming off of major arm surgery...that pitched two pretty good games against the two worst offenses in baseball in September of the COVID year but other than that he was pretty close to garbage...and next year he is going to be nearly as good as 5th best pitcher in baseball over the last 2 seasons? Maybe...could happen.

Are you drunk? Lance Lynn the last three years by any metric is a top ten pitcher in baseball...though in fairness I didn't use the 2021 stats that you see in your head. It also seems you prefer to use the last two starts in September of the COVID year as the entire basis for comparison of pitchers and if we can all agree that this is the way to do it...you win....Musgrove is WAY better than Lynn. As far as me not understanding Milb levels....wow...there are LEVELS in the minor leagues??? That's why I come to you for insight...you not only see the future but you also have keen insight into arcane knowledge like "AA" and "A" baseball. Maybe my problem in analysis is I stuck to age, Pipeline scouting stats, athleticism, track record, and multiple rating sites showing DD #5 and Stiever #6 in Sox system when I should have used your 2021 "vision" stats and the last two starts in COVID year (though please ignore DD's last two starts and concentrate more on his 2021 stats) to come to my hyperbolic claim that Stiever isn't garbage. For you convenience here is the actual definition of hyperbole as you seem to be so very confused: Hyperbole: 1) obvious and intentional exaggeration. 2) an extravagant statement or figure of speech not intended to be taken literally

Ok the only absurd comment made is "Lopez could be the worst starting pitcher in baseball next year". Of course Lopez could be...or Musgrove or Kershaw...we don't know the future until it happens. What Lopez is, and it has been said over and over again...is a once exciting pitcher that seems to be failed. What Musgrove is is a mediocre pitcher on his third organization that is a year older than Lopez, has about the same career WAR and outside of two end of the season starts in late September of COVID year had a 5.5 ERA the previous 160 low pressure innings (Pirates bad) he's pitched against the non-DH league. And still NO ONE HAS SAID Lopez>Musgrove...people have been saying Musgrove is not so much better that you give up a top 6 prospect...let alone top 6 ++. And it has also been said that Quintana for free is better than Musgrove for a 3 assets. As for your weird take on Stiever vs Dunning...why? Here is 2019 MLB Pipeline scouting grades Pitcher A Fastball: 60 | Curveball: 55 | Slider: 55 | Changeup: 55 | Control: 55 | Overall: 50 Pitcher B Fastball: 60 | Curveball: 60 | Slider: 55 | Changeup: 50 | Control: 55 | Overall: 50 Pitcher A sat out 2019 with Tommy John Surgery Pitcher B pitched 145 innings in 2019 and had nearly 10K/9 and a 6-1 Strike out to walk rate. Pitcher A is three years older than Pitcher B Pitcher A threw 34 pretty average major league innings last year Pitcher B threw 6 pretty bad major league innings last year. And your position is that Pitcher A is worth more than a top ten pitcher in baseball and Pitcher B is worthless? Interesting.