Chicago White Sox

Just to mess with fathom, another New York “insider” says Machado to Yankees:

I have no clue what this means. Our TV revenue is fixed and could be worth $150M or more once our local deal is in place. You’re really over exaggerating our financial woes.

The Mets & Angels are large market teams, so I’m not sure what you’re getting at that there. Right now, we are realistically a mid market team with the upside to be a low end large market team with some star power and an extended period of success.

Why is it an either/or type thing? Adding a star via free agency allows us to overcome one of those guys not hitting their ceiling. If they all reach their potential plus we add Machado or Harper then great, but we shouldn’t make decisions today assuming all our young guys are going to work out. Also, how quickly does Robert become an impact player exactly? He may not be up here until late 2020 / early 2021 and could take a year or two before he finds his stride. Meanwhile, we burn through Moncada & Jimenez’s service while we wait. Adding a legit star or two takes some pressure off our kids needing to come out of the gate guns blazing to be competitive.

Calling us a small market team is absolutely ridiculous.

If you’re afraid to take risks, then you’re setting yourself up for mediocrity IMO. I get the Astros developed most of their core on their own (although they’ve since augmented), but that’s simply not very realistic for us. We will have to sign a premier free agent or two at some point (ideally while our core is still cheap) if we want to maximize our chances of putting together a championship caliber roster.

Yeah, gotta disagree with your thinking here. With our prospect depth, 2 to 3 win players shouldn’t (hopefully) be hard to come by. Developing stars will be the challenge and the first prospect we’ve called up with that type of upside didn’t make a convincing first case that he’ll ever reach his ceiling. Banking on us hitting on all three of Moncada, Jimenez, & Robert seems like a dangerous proposition.

Exactly, we only have a handful of guys with 6 WAR ceilings. Not using our financial flexibility to add one via free agency puts an insane amount of pressure on hitting big time on most (if not all) of those guys.

That is just embarrassing reporting but par for the course for a hack like Cafardo.

Look, I’m as sick of losing as anyone, but at the end of the day you got to stick to the plan if you’re unable to land the whales. Spending big money on mediocre free agents is the worst thing we can do. That being said, I’d look into Kikuchi as well as Ottavino to be the closer if I could get him on a two year deal. If we miss on those guys, I’d look at one year deals for potential flip candidates like Pomeranz & Allen. I’d also be open to signing one of the 2B free agents (preferable Dozier) to a pillow contract if the market dries up. Hell, I’d be ok with bringing Avi back if we could dump Alonso. Those of the types of moves that make sense to me. Save the rest of our money for a shot at Arenado, Rendon, & Bogearts next year.

I 100% agree with this, there is a ton of untapped potential with the Sox. I’ve said it many times, but it’s going to require our ownership group to actually invest in the team and build a product that demands attention. Signing a whale would be a great first step in that regard.

Let’s hope the Royals aren’t the model unless you like 10 year rebuilds.

Just to maintain some optimism, good ole Jim Leyritz also reported Cole to the Yankees was a sure thing last offseason.

What other smoke are you referring to? Simonetti Source?

I guess I don’t get how Twitter works because I don’t see that in his feed. That being said, never trust a man that tweets in fragmented sentences.

I mean, he kind already is. Most Orioles think he is full of shit based on his track record, mlbtraderumors won’t even run his “report”, and one the most respected journalists (who local ties no less) has blocked him. I guess I don’t see a lot of downside for him, but maybe that’s just me.

Gotcha, didn’t realize you were speaking from a general perspective.

Hopefully Manny announces his decision soon after New Year’s, because this shit is painful as fuck.

Who in this thread is standing by WSD’s tweet?

I’m not sure getting this wrong will have any impact on his career. He can simply say his source (who he already revealed to be a friend / former teammate) misunderstood the certainty of what Machado told them. Meanwhile, he’ll have gained some Twitter followers which long-term likely results in more clicks for his blog. Sure, his reputation will take a hit in the short-term, but look how many of you beleive hik despite all his previous misses / cover-ups. To me, there is nothing but upside for him here.

You are really all in on this Dan Clark report huh.

This in regards to Andujar, but weird phrasing given how certain he is that Machado is signing with the Yankees:

The dude is a total joke whether he’s right about this or not.

And Basabe is a FG top 100 prospect as well.

I just saw the bow tie tweet...I personally think this guy is full of shit or at a minimum exaggerating what he heard, but I know I’m in the minority on that.