Chicago White Sox

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 1, 2018 -> 04:05 PM) Ryan Pace extended through the 2021 season. You have got to be bleepin me. I want a job with the Bears. Wow, that is pretty ridiculous. When was his contract up anyways?

QUOTE (ChiliIrishHammock24 @ Jan 1, 2018 -> 03:41 PM) Finally finished Mafia 3. Big fan of the story. I liked how you could choose your own ending. Trying to dig in to WatchDogs 2, but man, there are SOOO many buttons and controls that I am terrified to even engage in fights because I can't remember all the ways I'm supposed to get through the level/puzzle. Wow, I put a good 10 to 15 hours into Mafia 3 before I just gave up on it. The story was phenomenal, but the gameplay was beyond atrocious. Hopefully it was all worth it in the end.

I have not been a fan of what Pace has done so far, but he deserves two more years to build a winner around Trubisky. If Mitch ultimately flops or this team isn’t a serious playoff threat by 2019, then Pace needs to be shown the door. With a handpicked QB & coach and tons of cap space there is simply no more excuses for him. After competing ignoring the WR position last offseason, I have my no doubts in him.

Reading a Brad Biggs article, it sounds like the free agent market for WRs could be pretty ugly. The big names right now are Watkins, Landry, Robinson, & Richardson. Also sounds like a not great draft for WRs or at least top end talent. IMO, we pretty much have to sign Watkins or Robinson if we want a legit deep threat next year and I wouldn’t be against signing two of these guys. I’m not giving up on Meredith just yet, but we can’t rely on him filling a big role next year.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 1, 2018 -> 07:51 AM) Fox is officially gone. Great news. Pace better have some candidates in mind (hopefully offensive oriented) that he’ll be aggressively pursuing, because there are going to be a ton of teams looking for new coaches.

QUOTE (Quin @ Dec 31, 2017 -> 08:23 PM) Ok, everyone acting like the FO is terrible because the players took off and two of the Butler pieces are killing it is reaching. That or everyone here knew Dunn and Lauri would be playing like they are, Portis would play well and Niko would go MVP mode. The front office will be terrible if they do nothing and allow their draft position to be compromised. I’m greatly concerned when I see posters I respect around here get excited about this hot streak and make comments like the “talent accumulation phase should be over”. If smart, intelligent basketball fans can ignore the real threat of NBA hell, then the casuals will be completely oblivious to this risk and the front office may simply cut corners and look to build a semi competitive team as quickly as possible. We’re in year one of a rebuild and our only goal should be acquiring (or developing) potential star caliber talent or assets. Winning meaningless games because potential sidekicks & bench pieces are playing well doesn’t move the needle in the right direction. We need to get the stars first (or at least one) and then worry about the complimentary pieces later. If our front office can trade guys like Niko, Lopez, etc. for long-term assets (preferably future picks) while at the same weakening our current team then maybe this all works out fine. Just not sure I trust GarPax to actually do that or at least do it proactively enough.

I know there are still games to be played, but what are we looking at puck wise? Just not sure how the tiebreakers shake out.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 30, 2017 -> 01:40 PM) Uh, god no. This team has zero superstar potential players on it. You aren't winning a damned thing in the NBA without at least two of those guys on your team. This team would be the very definition of NBA hell just like the last decade. 2nd round playoff team at best. Free agents don't come to Chicago anyway, they sure aren't coming here for this trash, when they have other way better options. 100% this. Failure to land a star in this next draft will have epic consequences for us long-term. We need to draft & develop one ASAP and then find a way to acquire a second one using our cap space or other assets, which will be a challenge for our front office. With the approach GarPax took with the rebuild (trading Butler for solid players but not getting a single potential star back), time is of the essence because we have enough talent (especially once Lavine is healthy) to quickly blow our draft position and enter NBA hell for the foreseeable future. And the scary part is I wouldn’t be shocked if Michael Reinsdorf was ok was with that as long as we were consistently a 7/8 seed and got him some playoff revenue.

QUOTE (Butter Parque @ Dec 30, 2017 -> 10:50 AM) Steamer and Zips have both made me more optimistic about Delmonico. I already know that his defense stinks, but if he can modestly outperform Steamer's usual down-in-the-dumps projections, the team would probably be able to hide his glove in order to keep his bat in the lineup. While I think there is no hope for him at 3B, I think he has the chance to be ok in LF. The position was basically brand new to him last year and he’s a decent athlete. Got to give him some time though.

QUOTE (BurlyMan56 @ Dec 30, 2017 -> 08:10 AM) The Luis Robert Instagram feed is now unwatchable. I had to unfollow. Never seen a man take as many selfies and videos of himself doing absolutely nothing but admiring himself in a mirror. Total narcassist. As long as he can keep himself in freakish shape and transposes those physical gifts onto the field, I have no problem with the number of selfies he posts on social media.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 29, 2017 -> 03:57 PM) My biggest issue with your whole comment is that it lists 10 guys who you project to be better and doesn't project anyone to implode. That was the game I was playing with these projections to convince myself in 2015 that this team would be better than they were on paper, and I realized what I was missing was "you can't project all your guys to be better than the computers think they will be". Someone's going to get hurt, someone's going to implode and wind up back in the minors. Moncada might have his "2017 Anderson" year. Maybe Leury or Sanchez pull off a 2017 Saladino. Abreu could get hurt. Whatever. If you predict "these 10 guys will all be better than their projections", somewhere a couple guys will seriously disappoint. Just to lay the facts out there: Player/2016 Actuals/2017 FCST Abreu - 4.2 - 3.5 Moncada - 0.9 (1/3) - 3.5 Avi - 4.2 - 2.0 Sanchez - 2.1 - 2.0 Anderson - 0.2 - 2.0 Leury - 1.1 (1/2) - 2.0 Delmoncio - 1.0 (1/4) - 2.0 So I’m expecting minor regression from Jose & serious regression for Avi. I’m expecting some improvement from Moncada from his FY extrapolated numbers because I believe in his insane tools and saw improvement down the stretch. I’m expecting more of the same from Leury & Sanchez if healthy (which is a fair criticism of my projections). I expect Anderson to look like the player he was in the 2nd half of the season and the not the one dealing with a horrific personal issue, which ZIPS can’t account for. And I have always been a huge believer in Nicky’s offensive abilities and saw enough from him last year to believe he can be a passable left fielder. I really don’t see how my projections are that aggressive other than the injury risk which I acknowledged above. So shave off a couple points and bring the overall projection down to 14 WAR (~18% decrease). That still tells me the ZIPS estimates are way too conservative, which makes sense given that some of these players have personal issues impacted their recent numbers (Timmy/Jose), other guys seemingly came out of nowhere (Sanchez, Luery, Nicky), & another guy has otherworldly tools that may not be easily quantifiable.

I’m less certain of how our pitching staff will do next year and clearly there are some major holes on that end, but the projected positional WAR is way too light IMO. I feel pretty good about Abreu & Moncada being around 3.5 WAR players. I think Sanchez, Anderson, Leury, & Delmonico will combine for 8 WAR or so in some fashion. If Avi is around, I see an easy 2 WAR from him. That would be about 17 WAR excluding our catcher spot & DH and not including any potential benefit from Jimenez coming up mid-season. ZIPS seems way too conservative on almost all of these guys.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Dec 29, 2017 -> 02:44 PM) Bad. Very very bad. True, but I think those projections are really off for several guys.

https://www.google.com/amp/comicbook.com/ga...uty-swat-death/ This country is so f***ed up...

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Dec 29, 2017 -> 12:08 PM) Pretty shocked Davis signed with Colorado. He had Cubs culture for a year. Funny how offering the most money works. Good god man, no one (or almost no one) has argued otherwise, but please arguing against this fake claim...

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Dec 28, 2017 -> 07:24 PM) It cost Chapman nothing. ? He was suspended 30 days, which cost him about $1.7M.

The Big Sick is a near perfect movie IMO.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Dec 25, 2017 -> 10:00 AM) I don't either. It's possible that Pittsburgh just wants another position as a headliner. If if they trade McCutchen, they'd still have Polanco/Marte/Meadows. I could see them wanting pitching and Miguel Andujar from NY. It does make sense though that the Sox would be in as a 3 way type deal possibly. I truly think Hahn probably "checked" in because it's his job. Something like this could work possibly though. Pittsbugh Gets: Reynaldo Lopez, Justus Sheffield, 2 more prospects NY Gets: Gerrit Cole White Sox Get: Clint Frazier Who is giving up the other two prospects and what caliber are they?

QUOTE (Tony @ Dec 23, 2017 -> 06:10 PM) They clearly were trying to push the envelop, get some additional press, but they probably went too far. At the end of the day, they've created a great product. They capitalized on an out-dated market and gave consumers an affordable, user friendly product. I'm a fan. I can agree with this, the guy should have probably toned it down some, but to boycott the product over this one dude’s comments is pretty absurd to me. Me on the otherhand will happily $4/month to gain ad-free to their great stable of writers & local content.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Dec 23, 2017 -> 04:57 PM) I agree. Anytime you get 3 pitching prospects (1 really good, 1 good and 1 flyer) in a deal, for one player it's a pretty good deal. They are cutting payroll to rebuild and acquiring young pitching is the way to go. This just seems like a very oversimplistic way of evaluating a trade. The best prospect in the trade profiles as a reliever to most experts. That’s really not going to move the needle much even if he’s dominant. I personally think it was a pretty bad package due to the lack of a higher end centerpiece.

QUOTE (SoxPride18 @ Dec 23, 2017 -> 02:13 PM) @MaxWildstein 25m25 minutes ago Source: #Pirates have been receiving calls from other teams on Gerrit Cole, besides #Yankees, maybe #WhiteSox and #STLCards, so he’s expected to eventually be dealt. First: @jcrasnick. Lol...now that makes no sense.

QUOTE (ChiliIrishHammock24 @ Dec 23, 2017 -> 11:46 AM) Because typically acting like a blood thirsty c*** isn't well received. Their content might be awesome, good for them, but those c***y comments about how everyone else sucks and they want them to all die turned me off of ever supporting them. It’s called business. I can’t really see how anyone would be offended by this unless they worked for Bleacher Report or one of the sites he ripped. Whatever, it’a your loss as the content is beyond incredible.

QUOTE (ChiliIrishHammock24 @ Dec 23, 2017 -> 12:52 AM) Quotes from their co-founder... “We will wait every local paper out and let them continuously bleed until we are the last ones standing,” Alex Mather, a co-founder of The Athletic, said in an interview in San Francisco. “We will suck them dry of their best talent at every moment. We will make business extremely difficult for them.” and about blogs... “In a city like Chicago, there are 100,000 die-hard fans,” Mather said. “That is a very lucrative subscription business. There are over 100,000 die-hard fans of Chicago teams outside of Chicago,” he added, and he says they aren’t served well. “Bleacher Report is empty calories. SB Nation is empty calories. The newspapers are doing nothing.” If you follow SouthSideSox on twitter, you will have seen their username was "Empty Calories" for a while. How is that bad press? Isn’t he simply explaining his business model?

While I would have loved trading for him if the price was reasonable, at least we made it clear through the media that we really want this guy. Hopefully that’s worth something come next offseason.

I really do wish there was market for Avi because the OF situation is going to get messy once Jimenez is ready. Maybe the crossover over period between a Jimenez call-up and Avi trade is small however and the problem sorts itself out quickly. I just think it’s vitally important to see what we have in Delmonico & Luery and to a lesser extent Cordell. The good news is all those guys have some positional versatility, so we can probably get them some time in the infield and it’s not like Davidson has the DH spot on lockdown. But it would be nice to use next season to help determine if either Delmonico or Cordell can be a long-term OF solution and try to turn Luery into a nice little trade asset.