Chicago White Sox

Does Hilary have any chance at this point?

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Nov 8, 2016 -> 07:42 AM) I think that Benintendi and Devers is fair. Add SWihart. Plus Kopech and another arm. That probably gets it done. I'd do Benintendi, Devers, Swihart, Kopech, & Rodriguez. Look at what Hamels commanded, really not that much more considering the difference in surplus value.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Nov 7, 2016 -> 10:46 AM) I think that's far too high for Adams. Also think it overstates on Call and Fisher a bit, but not a huge argument. The 2016 draft was sure a nice boost. Who would you rate ahead of Fisher and Call?

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Nov 7, 2016 -> 12:33 PM) Then that doesn't make sense, because Sale and Eaton together would already need Schwarber, Baez, Soler, Almora, Edwards, etc. No need to add Heyward. That I agree with

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Nov 7, 2016 -> 12:24 PM) Whoever suggested Sale and Eaton for Heyward and two prospects doesn't seem to understand the value of Eaton... or Sale.... or both. Both in a package would warrant an absolute monstrous return. He was arguing that taking on Heyward's contract would improve the return.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 7, 2016 -> 12:23 PM) If the rebuild works, they will come back. And I tend to think the season ticket holders we currently have are loyal enough to stick around through a rebuild if they've been loyal to this point. I'm sure most will, but you never know. Regardless, with ticket sales accounting for less and less of the overall revenue picture, I'm not sure it's that much of a risk.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Nov 7, 2016 -> 12:22 PM) Eaton > Heyward... easily. Who is arguing otherwise?

QUOTE (Charlie Haeger's Knuckles @ Nov 7, 2016 -> 11:38 AM) Serious question: How exactly does a fanbase "support" a rebuild? By attending/watching games when the team is bad? The team is already bad, as-is. Whatever base of fans they'd lose to staging and publicly acknowledging a rebuild have already left. The White Sox have literally nothing to lose in a rebuild. The only risk IMO is the potential loss of season ticket holders. A lot of them may jump ship if a lengthy rebuild is on the agenda and you may never get some of them back. But that's a risk we need to take, because the half-ass going for it plans haven't done anything to keep these fans either.

This is exactly why going for it one more time would be foolish, it's going to be a crazy seller's market this offseason. The 2017 trade deadline or even next offseason might not be as strong, as more teams could become sellers. Right now there are only a handful and none of them have the trade chips we have available to move. For once we need to take advantage of market conditions and sell like crazy.

The 2005 offseason was different because we were able to fill a significant amount of needs through free agency both cheaply and productively. Dye, A.J., Iguchi, El Duque, & Hermanson combined for nearly 10 WAR but only cost a total of $14M. That's $1.4M/WAR which is insane and would be nearly impossible to pull off again, especially in this market. Unfortunately, given where our payroll is at, that's the type offseason we'd need to be competive next year. Does anyone really think that's likely again?

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 6, 2016 -> 08:36 PM) It seems like the odds have increased in the past 5-8 years or so. Perhaps better scouting, more info, more video, etc. That's part of it. It also helps having huge bonus pools that allow you to grab multiple impact prospects each draft.

QUOTE (SonofaRoache @ Nov 6, 2016 -> 08:26 PM) Eaton, Melky, Anderson, Lawrie, Abreu, and Frazier has enough talent to get a team to postseason play. Sale, Q, Rodon, Shields have enough talent to do it as does our closer We need to fix CF, DH, and C to compete for the playoffs. We also need a competent manager since Robin was one of the worst in baseball. How do you expect to fill those three holes? Plus Shields is likely to be a huge problem in the #5 spot plus there are serious bullpen and depth concerns as well. It's not as simple as filling three holes in a deep free agent class while we sit on boatloads of cash. If we go for it, we'll most likely be bargain bin shopping again and we all saw how well that went last offseason. Is that really what you want?

QUOTE (SonofaRoache @ Nov 6, 2016 -> 08:03 PM) Well the Sox won a world series doing it this way. The reality is they cannot afford a rebuild at this time. They can trade sale for some talent but a full rebuild would destroy their finances as I said before. Fans will not watch or go to the ball park to see 4 years of rebuilding baseball. It just wont happen. And with the Cubs being a great championship team non die hard fans will just watch them instead. If they make some tweaks they can compete for a wild card. With two wild cards most competent teams will be interesting for a season. We blew a lot of games this year we should have won and with 3 top flight starters we will be in a lot of games. And if we could sneak into the playoffs Sale, Q, Rodon would be just as good as what Cleveland trots out there. Odds are low they will win it all but odds are also low of them winning it all after a rebuild. Tweaks? Did you watch this team last year? They have massive holes to fill and limited options and resources to fill them. This idea we're always a couple of moves away from competing is what's gotten us into this mess. Right now, our organization is a Chris Sale injury away from being completely f***ed. I've never been a pro-rebuild guy, but we really have no alternatives at this time.

QUOTE (JUSTgottaBELIEVE @ Nov 6, 2016 -> 07:51 AM) I said it back in August, forget about a rebuild this offseason. Ain't happening. The only way I see a rebuild happening is if they are well out of playoff contention come late July. And I'm fine with that. Now if JR is serious about contending time to open up the checkbook a bit wider than the past few years... https://mobile.twitter.com/mjzalewski/statu...2298496/photo/1 Have you seen the free agent list? It's beyond horrific. Doesn't really matter if Reinsdorf finally decides to open the checkbook (he won't though), there isn't much to spend it on. The few quality free agents will get insane contracts. You really think Jerry will outspend all the large market clubs? And we'd have to sacrifice the 12th overall pick even if we did. More likely is several C free agents and emptying our minor league cupboard for a semi-impact guy with one or two years of control. You're right that they may not rebuild and simply do more of the same bulls***, but I can't comprehend how any intelligent fan would want us to pursue that option. Not trying to insult you, but I think Sox fans who want to "go for it" one last time are simply ignoring logic because the idea of a rebuild is so painful to them. A smart GM takes advantage of the market and the opportunities it presents. We have several assets that could be sold off and instantly provide us with an elite farm system. With an elite free agent class coming up in three years, our focus should be on building/developing a young a major league core that with a few free agent additions can be ready to compete by 2019/2020. Let's stop f***ing around with these Hail Mary efforts where everything has to go right in order to be contenders. One of these years, Sale or Quintana will go down with an injury and if we haven't moved them by this point we could very well be f***ed. I say it all the time, but we all know a rebuild will painful to endure, but it's really our only course of action at this juncture.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Nov 6, 2016 -> 02:01 AM) Assange says Trump, "won't be allowed to win." If our country is fixing elections, a dictator is someday possible. What the hell is happening to us? I don't care if Hillary wins if it's fair and square. Very sad. This guy has ALL the leaked info and says Trump cannot win. I am scared for our future if elections are rigged. Everything in this post is just really poor trolling. From believing elections can be rigged, to citing Assange as your source, to claiming you'd be ok with Hilary as president if she won fair and square despite hundreds of posts proving otherwise. How anyone believes you a real person is beyond me.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Nov 4, 2016 -> 01:39 PM) I'd hear stuff out but you're going to have to pay me Sale prices (with a cap S deliberately) to get Eaton away. Well yeah, I pretty much agree. Have to get a haul a for him, which is possible the way GMs are valuing defense nowadays.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Nov 4, 2016 -> 01:27 PM) Eaton is under contract for SO LONG it only makes sense to move him if a team blows you away. There's no reason why Adam Eaton can't be a contributor on the next competitive White Sox team even after a rebuild. Eaton is where Sale was 2 years ago - if you don't screw up the next 2 years, you still have Adam Eaton under team control after a couple years of repair. He definitely can be, but he's also one of our three elite trade pieces. We have to hear out offers on him.

QUOTE (ChiSox59 @ Nov 4, 2016 -> 01:23 PM) But not Eaton? All depends on what's offered for him. By no means am I giving him away, but I am open to moving him if I receive fair value. The reason I don't want to move the other guys I mentioned is because I think they'll all be worth more 4 to 6 months from now.

QUOTE (soxfan2014 @ Nov 4, 2016 -> 12:38 PM) You mean if they dealt: Sale, Quintana, Abreu, Eaton, Melky, Lawrie, Frazier, Gonzalez, 2 or 3 of: Robertson, Jones, Petrick, Putnam, Jennings? They would definitely need to re-sign a lot of stop gaps. Whatever is left would probably lead us to the #1 overall draft pick in the 2018 draft haha I'm open to trading pretty much anyone. Only "core" guys I would be hesitant on moving are Rodon, Anderson, Saladino, & Jones. If we go full rebuild, I think you keep Jones and let him be the closer for four months and then deal him at the deadline. I definitely don't expect a full rebuild though.

QUOTE (BigHurt3515 @ Nov 4, 2016 -> 10:23 AM) Who out there would be considered young catcher of the future? I can't imagine many teams wanting to give up one of those. I'd be looking at guys like Kevin Plawecki, players who have struggled in the majors but have strong minor league track records and possess a signicant amount of upside. One of the benefits of rebuilding is you can give someone like Plawecki 450 plate appearances and not bat an eye.

QUOTE (shipps @ Nov 3, 2016 -> 08:52 AM) Dont you feel just a little bit happy for them? I actually feel a weight lifted that they finally got their WS win and this whole thing is over with. It may change the relationship between the fanbases for the good but I am probably just naive to think that is a possibility. What do you mean by "change the relationship between the fanbases" and why would you want this?

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Nov 3, 2016 -> 01:22 AM) It's going to be that way for some time. They kept the same non productive scouts, minor league director, coaches, everything that is not productive. They can't scout at all. I may go into Sox fan exile. There are other teams so there is no reason to lose interest in a sport you love dearly. I do admire what Ricketts has done. This is such a dream come true for him. I wish some other organization was interested in Kenny Williams. I hate the Ricketts, but they did everything right from an ownership perspective. Jerry Reinsdorf and his partners should be absolutely embarrassed that a new ownership group was able to come in, blow everything up, and win a championship so quickly. And yes, I'm aware the Cubs are a completely different animal than the White Sox, but the point here is that Tom hired the smartest baseball guy he could and gave him complete control of the organization. He didn't meddle in the club's direction and say rebuildings are off limit and he didn't force Theo to keep a bunch of people in the organization because of loyalty. I'm not a classic Reinsdorf hater by any means, but he is the single biggest culprit for our recent struggles. His will to win but refusal to back it up with the financial means necessary is a huge problem, resulting in half-ass offseasons that find us routinely coming up short of the underlying goal. More troubling is his unwavering loyalty, which has created an organization filled with group think and a complete lack of accountability. I say this all the time, but the fact that Buddy Bell is still around, let alone has been promoted to assistant GM position is clear evidence of this problem. Unfortunately, it's hard to be optimistic of this organization at the moment. It definitely feels like it's time for a new ownergroup come in and completely clean house. Short of that, hopefully Reinsdorf sees what the Cubs accomplished and finally allows for a rebuild. I know it will be painful for all of us, but I don't think there's an alternative. Another half-ass offseason without clear direction and execution could have grave consequences for us.

QUOTE (Chet Kincaid @ Nov 3, 2016 -> 12:49 AM) This God forsaken baseball season is finally over. I can't remember there ever being a worse ending to such a bad season. I'll always be a White Sox fan though... I'll never EVER switch over to that other team up north who I still refuse to name. Our FO really needs to get their s*** together. I'm sick of being bad. I'm sick of losing. I'm REALLY sick of being ignored. Same here, I'd never switch my allegiances, but if this front office and ownership group continues f*** up on a regular basis, I'm simply going to lose interest in a sport I love dearly. These guys really make it hard to be a White Sox fan right now and they have no one to blame but themselves.

The only way this Cubs championship will help our organization is if it leads to significant changes. And by that a mean a full rebuild. No more half-ass "going for it" offseasons. Take advantage of these next two offseasons, which should both be sellers' markets, and bring in an influx of talent into the organization.

Unf***ing real, even Miller is flopping tonight.