Chicago White Sox

Quintana getting anything less than an A is ridiculous. He was amazing this year.

QUOTE (shysocks @ Sep 28, 2014 -> 08:47 AM) I don't even know if you can expect 80% of his current production. His OPS is 100 points above his previous career high. Then add in the aging curve. I would not prefer to wait for the magical core; I want things to happen this offseason. I just don't think he's the right answer. Fair enough, I obviously understand the risks that would come with signing Martinez. I just think we need be aggressive this winter, because we don't know how long we'll have a healthy Sale/Quintana/Rodon to build our team around. We need to add as much as talent as possible this offseason without hurting the farm, which means taking some chances in free agency and/or acquiring a guy(s) with an overpaid contract.

QUOTE (shysocks @ Sep 27, 2014 -> 04:18 PM) Beltran was two years removed from anything resembling a season like the one Victor is having now. I agree that signing him at that price would be a good call. And when it's that easy, you can bet he'll get more money. Also, notice how Beltran had his worst season ever this year. The risks of signing a player that old are very real, guys. If he's going to cost way more than I suggested then don't sign him. I'm just saying if the risk is limited to three years, I'm willing to give him $15M per and lose a 2nd round draft pick. As I said before, it's possible he falls off a cliff, but so could any major league player. Adam Dunn was one of the most consistent players in major league history before we signed him. Do we just stop signing players over 30 years of age like Balta would do if he was GM? Hell no, you always take calculated risks if the reward can be significant. The offensive environment is way different today than it was a few years ago and Victor Martinez at 80% to 90% of his current production is still an impact bat. We have money to spend and a huge need for a left-handed bat. Keep Victor strictly at DH, give him a day off every couple of weeks and I'm feel pretty good about his odds of staying productive over the next three years. What I find amusing is people are so risk adverse against signing older free agents, but would prefer to wait for this magical core to come up through the minors and fill all our remains holes. IMO, the biggest risk we can take right now is wait much longer to supplement Sale, Quintana, Rodon, Abreu, Eaton, & Garcia while they're still young, cheap, and healthy. Fills needs now as best you can and not waste the surplus value these guys are currently providing.

I don't see Martinez getting much more than 3/$45M. That's the exact contract Beltran got at basically the same age. If so, that's a no-brainer for us IMO. I'm perfectly aware that's he not going to repeat his current season and there is some chance he suddenly falls off a cliff, but he's such smart/pure hitter that I think he's got a good shot of remaining well above-average with the bat over the next three years. A 1-2-3 of Eaton-Semien-Martinez would make Abreu even more dangerous.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Sep 26, 2014 -> 04:14 PM) I don't think anyone would argue his stuff was good this year. The question is why, and no one seems to know. But when a guy's stuff just disappears like that, I'm not ready to say he's just not good. There's likely an explanation. And if it is something that can be addressed, I like his chances of contributing. 100% agree, which is why I like his chances of returning to form more so than Davidson's. Contact issues are very difficult to overcome once you reach the high minors. I think some people bought too much into the Baseball America hype and refuse to let it go. Hope he proves me wrong though.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Sep 24, 2014 -> 06:41 PM) Not only that, but I got him with the 9th waiver position. Ridiculous. The league is almost half women. Settle down Hawk!

I think the Sox are planning on Tim Anderson becoming our starting shortstop by 2017. So unless you can get something of significance for Alexei, you might as well hold onto him through 2016. If this team is serious about competing over the next four to five years, I can't think of a better way to maximize our SS production. Also, Luery Garcia has no business being a starting SS in the pros. I don't care how special you think his defense might be, his bat is beyond horrendous and would simply destroy the bottom of the lineup.

QUOTE (Charlie Haeger's Knuckles @ Sep 22, 2014 -> 10:15 AM) Destiny is an awesome game. The reviews baffle me. Its as if the reviewers played the story mode and stopped playing. The game doesn't really "start" until you get to level 20. I think the reviews make complete sense. The shooting mechanics may be near-perfect, but the story is boring and the mission structures are incredibly repetitive. The competitor multiplayer is also lackluster IMO (compared to Halo or CoD) and completely unbalanced when you first start. Don't get me wrong, I'm enjoying the game right now, but the endless grinding won't do it for me in the long-run. I'll be switching over to the Master Chief collection for my shooter needs as soon as it's released.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Sep 20, 2014 -> 03:59 PM) Gillaspie is an offensive black hole against LHP though. I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility that Davidson has an .820 OPS against LHP at some point either. This year has proven Gillaspie is a platoon player, but when you're the left-handed half of the platoon you can still provide a ton of value. We need someone to take Conor's ABs against RHP and we should be able to get above-average production out of the position. I don't believe that player will be Davidson though, more likely Semien or possibly Saladino.

QUOTE (scs787 @ Sep 20, 2014 -> 01:43 PM) 9 of those are at 3B. To me he's either A. the 2nd basemen next year B. Lexi is traded and he's the SS (Albeit in extremely limited time there he hasn't been bad there) or C. trade bait. I've expressed my concerns with him, so I'm kinda hoping it's C. What were his splits this year that got you so down on him?

I'm not sure why wins & losses is the only way to evaluate a manager around here. Clearly they can't make up for a lack of talent, so saying "look at how bad the Rays were when Maddon started" is completely pointless. The talent will always make the manager look better or worse if you're focused on the team's W-L record. If you want to evaluate a manager, look at his in-game decision-making. Review his strategies in close games. Try to get a sense of the team's effort, especially during times of struggle. How does he handle young players? Does he give bench players and relievers enough playing time to keep them fresh? The point I'm getting at is to evaluate managers on the things they can control, not the things can't like talent. IMO, Robin is a poor manager regardless of the talent level. He may have been a childhood favorite, but as a manager I think he fails in a lot of the areas I mentioned above.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Sep 20, 2014 -> 11:33 AM) Top 100 prospects who can't hit over .200 in the International League usually lose their status as a top 100 prospect. Davidson has fallen straight on his face this year after having what was an average year in the Pacific Coast League. Lining up Eaton's stats next to Davidson's really illustrates that point. 100% agree with this. People are acting as if Davidson struggled in his first season as a major leaguer, not in a repeat season at AAA. Dude was absolutely horrendous for Charlotte despite AAAA type players like Jordan Danks, Josh Phegley, & Andy Wilkins putting up strong seasons. There is nothing to debate here, Davidson sucked balls in 2014 and lost all prospect status as a result. He's going to have to rebuild his value from scratch next year and hopefully he was hiding an injury this year, because his fall from grace was quite epic. Despite all this, I was a fan of the trade at the time. Wasn't a huge fan of Davidson necessarily, but loved the concept of dealing a closer that's about to get expensive for a top 100 type prospect. Again, the trade clearly hasn't worked out for us and Hahn should accept some blame for Davidson actually regressing before even making the majors. That doesn't mean he should be ridiculed for the move, but a sound process alone shouldn't negate him of all blame.

Acquiring a 2B would be a terrible use of resources.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Sep 18, 2014 -> 09:46 PM) Fortunately, the Sox have several more options than Andy Wilkins or "spend 50 million this offseason, do everything they can to win a playoff spot, be "all -in" again, and be saddled with 3-4 more losing seasons afterwards if things don't work out." I know you're the resident "rest all the players once a week guy" but I am not sitting Abreu for Wilkins simply because Wilkins is left-handed. Sure, Abreu will need days off but he should still play 150-155 and get plenty of starts at DH. We don't need to carry an extra 1B unless they have the ability to be in the lineup everyday a la Dunn this year. As far as you thinking Wilkins can have an .800 OPS in MLB, I don't even want to touch that. Unless he's going to slug close to .500 that's not going to happen and if the Sox had a guy on the bench with an OPS of .800 would he stay on the bench? This team surely needs players on the rookie contracts to perform but that doesn't mean we give any guy who's had success in Charlotte a role. Hell, let's just make Garcia the DH and have Jordan Danks and Stephan Gartrell round out the outfield! In any case, I don't know what your fascination is with the payroll and all the arbitrary numbers being thrown around but one thing that is certain is the Sox aren't going to come back with a smaller payroll next year. Whether the plan is to compete next year or in 2016, I would take any wager saying the Sox payroll will grow in each of the next two seasons. This year is probably a lower-end starter, a few bullpen arms and maybe a hitter. I think Hahn will address the left-handed hitter void via trade and he will most likely be an outfielder. To be clear, I do hope they have a rotating DH, I just don't want Wilkins to be any part of it. Fortunately, for me at least, the front office isn't going to pencil Wilkins into any 2015 role. I'd rather see the DH be occupied by Abreu, Garcia, left-handed bat and anyone needing rest. Ideally, they bring in two outfielders, one being a left-handed bat with thump and the other being a strong defender. Great post. Agree with everything here.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Sep 18, 2014 -> 07:09 PM) I read the studies and they make sense, but I'm skeptical as to the controls and just how you separate a kid that gets spanked frequently with one that gets spanked sparingly or infrequently. One would think frequent spankings are also correlated with lower income, educational level, potential alcohol and/or drug abuse within the family, all of which probably correlate to weaker parenting skills. I just wondering if we're talking about the kid who gets his ass kicked a few times a week or the kid who gets whacked maybe once every three months for kicking the family dog. Or both. Edit: Balta, feel free to comment on your studies. This a great post. Seems like there is a misunderstanding of correlation vs causation here. Balta seems to believe that spanking children directly results violent outcomes later in life. However, while spanking and future violence may be correlated, I seriously question that there is any cause and effect to the relationship. In fact, I think you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned bad parenting skills, which is likely the true cause of future violence, not the spanking specifically. I will argue with anyone that spanking can be a useful tool for parents if used appropriately (mildly) and infrequently. Obviously it should be used as a last resort or in extreme circumstances, but to say it automatically makes someone a bad parent or that their kid will be more violent in life is beyond ridiculous.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2014 -> 06:06 PM) You're right, that was poorly phrased. Both are extremely bad, neither produces good results, both lead to kids who are more violent and the exact degree to which that occurs probably is obscured by other factors. In either case, Adrian Petersoning a kid and spanking a kid both lead to children who grow up to be more violent, more likely to commit violent crimes, and there is likely a variance between the levels that I cannot see is statistically significant. Is that more clear? Yes, but I'm still going to call BS on it. First off, your comments imply spanking always leads to negative outcomes, which can't possibly be true. Second, there is no way in hell that full-on physical abuse has anywhere of a similar impact as light spanking. It's just a ridiculous suggestion and I would question the credibility of any article you post that suggests just that. And can you please explain in a bit more detail what you mean by violence? Are we talking about violent crimes here? Getting into fights at school? Willing to use violence to defend yourself or your loved ones? There are varying degrees of violence and grouping them all into one bucket seems like a pretty convenient way to support this "spanking is evil" argument.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2014 -> 05:46 PM) Spanking or other physical contact is not that different from full on physical abuse in the end result, in either case it really does bad things to the outcome of the child. Wait what? You're honestly trying to tell us that light spanking and full-on physical abuse lead to similar outcomes in life? If so, I'll call BS on that and any "scientific" study you have that claims this.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 16, 2014 -> 07:57 PM) And yet, it appears to have been surprisingly accurate for predicting the 2014 white sox. I'm not sure what you're getting at here, but coincidences do happen in life. That doesn't change the fact that WAR is NOT a predictive stat and IS context neutral. WAR is a great tool for comparing the value varying players provided over a set period of time, but the stat is routinely misused and this right here is a great example.

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ Sep 16, 2014 -> 07:19 PM) the problem with using WAR to project is that WAR is a description of what happened, not "what's going to happen". And context neutral, so using 2014 WAR to predict 2015 wins is unlikely to be very accurate.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Sep 16, 2014 -> 03:52 PM) I totally agree. This is why I HATE that people use WAR to actually calculate win totals for a season. An average bullpen could improve our win total tremendously. So very true. Context does matter and it's completely ignored by some people because it's difficult to measure. And before someone says, "no one is calculating win totals using WAR", I see certain posters repeatedly take our current record and then add the WAR of potential additions and say "that only gets us to ## wins next year". Hell, Balta does this in about 50% of his posts regarding offseason moves.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 14, 2014 -> 03:10 PM) I see. So it's a terrible thing to jump to conclusions, but hey, obviously the person is undeservingly entitled. I mean, that's just a fact right? Otherwise you'd look like quite the fool responding to me saying that I was jumping to conclusions while ignoring the people who are absolutely certain that this is an entitled, cranky, complaining kid. I responded to your post because I'm sick of people copying and pasting random internet articles and regarding them as fact. I never called the girl entitled, but she sure as s*** broke a school rule and didn't accept the corresponding consequence. That's a fact, the rest is pure speculation and I don't see why you'd give her side of the story more weight than the school/police here.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 14, 2014 -> 01:05 PM) Because her mom was on the other end of the phone at the time and whatever was being talked about related to her mom's medical condition, which probably means her mom actually wanted her to stay in touch. Because entitlement. A truly strong kid doesn't care about their family's health conditions. That's the lesson a real American needs to learn. Sounds like you really know this girl and her family. Glad you're able to be a character witness for them and prove to us that the girl who broke a rule and refused to accept the consequence was really just a good ole American hero coming to the rescue of her mentally-ill mother. Good thing people never lie when they get in trouble or else we may need to hear both sides of the story before we jump to conclusions.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Sep 13, 2014 -> 12:26 PM) Outdoor sports don't seem draw well in Florida. When the Dolphins under Dan Marino were in the post season you could walk up before game time and buy a ticket. I'd like to see the Sox move out of state if only for more revenue but at the same time the community is so much better than when there was Comiskey Park. I'd prefer they stay as oppose to have that area get run down. Why in the world do you think they'd make more revenue outside of Chicago? Even with s***ty attendance last year, we were about 14th or 15th in the league in revenue. I can't think of one city without a baseball team that would be more attractive than being the second team in Chicago.

QUOTE (GreatScott82 @ Sep 13, 2014 -> 08:11 AM) I'm just grateful they didn't move to Sarasota back in the late 80's. The Sox are still here, us fans have a nice stadium to watch a game at and we can tail gate One thing that I do occasionally think about is the fact they were pretty close to building the new park in Addison, IL. I wonder how that could have changed things? Now that I live in Elmhurst & work in Bloomingdale, the idea of a Sox park in Addison sounds pretty amazing. But back in my city days, driving to the west suburbs to watch a Sox game would have sucked balls. I think the Sox would get a pretty different mix of fans if they moved out to the burbs. Taking the L to and from the game is just such a convenient and cheap form of transportation for younger, city-dwelling fans. I think they would have lost a ton of those fans by being in Addison.

QUOTE (Joshua Strong @ Sep 5, 2014 -> 01:20 AM) The guy who bats second gets the most plate appearances. Is this is a riddle or something? The guy that bats leadoff gets the most plate appearances.