Chicago White Sox

You keep blaming velocity but his issues were related to general command and the changed shape of his slider. His reduced velocity was still 10th amongst qualified starters. His fastball was 3rd overall in Stuff+ despite the reduced velocity. However, there was a material change in his extension vs. 2022 and it’s very sensible to believe that he was dealing with some mechanical issues that altered both the shape of his slider and his ability to command it. Other teams with competent Analytics and Biometrics departments can see all this and probably already know what tweaks are needed to make a return to form. Will he ever post a 2.20 ERA again? Probably not. Will teams pay up for the 2022 version of him? Almost certainly not. But your theory he’s as valuable as Giolito was just a few months ago is plainly absurd.

Rosenthal isn’t Bob Nightengale. He reports out what he believes to be true and isn’t simply a proxy of a single biased team source. I know you want us to fail miserably in terms of a Cease trade, but this is a ridiculous reach even for you.

His slider in 2022 was the best pitch in Statcast history. That’s why he was so good in 2022 and I don’t know why people would expect that pitch to go away forever. He just needs to make some adjustments to get the shape of it back to what it once was.

I don’t think they took on $25M to $30M if bad money to then flip Kelenic for a cost controlled Cease. This is them buying a potential cheap LF solution for the next five years and making it easier to deal Grissom for SP help. I just don’t know how I’d feel about Grissom. His bat is somewhat interesting, but he has no ideal defensive position. Perhaps he can get better at 2B, but he was dreadful there last year. As part of larger package I’d take a shot on, but not sure I’d feel good with him being even the second most important piece.

He’s 8th in fWAR over the past three years. I don’t understand how our own fans are underrating him. Yes, he wasn’t his 2022 form in 2023, but he played behind a s%*# defense (-11 OAA behind him) and seems like he was dealing with some mechanical issues. The stuff was still elite and get him in a competent organization and his slider shape likely returns to form and he’s a substantially better pitcher in 2024. I guarantee teams don’t view 2023 as the norm moving forward.

Nothing against you, but of course Balta liked this post

Exactly. What are we ultimately going to be pay in free agency for a guy to provide us with #5 stater innings in a lost season? $5M to $6M minimum if not more? Gonzales wouldn’t be substantially more than that. And White’s salary write-off is like $7M per year. That’s like going with Sosa or Popeye over 1.25 Leury Garcia’s for reserve infielder role.

He might outlive us all.

For Yu-Min Lin and a lottery ticket?

Kelenic is the main course here. The Braves are effectively buying him from the Mariner’s to help their payroll situation. You just rarely see trades like this and it’s rarer to have the team buying the player to be one with a super high payroll already. If clubs are willing to make trades like this, the Sox should be all over it because we need some warm bodies as placeholders and desperately need more young talent in the org.

This is a salary dump. But for a like us that needs innings and has nothing better to use the rotation spot, he could have been a good use of bad money for us assuming we got something else.

Oh you meant Alex Colome, was really hard to follow there.

To think we couldn’t take on this level of salary is absolutely laughable. I’m not even a huge Kelenic fan, but he’s the exact type of talent you take a gamble on if you’re the White Sox though. We need SP innings so Gonzalez could fill a spot for a few months and you simply just release White and eat his contact.

?

I don’t buy they prefer Norby over Ortiz unless it’s a pure age. A RH bat first 2B just doesn’t seem like what Getz is prioritizing.

I’d be very disappointed with Norby as the 2nd piece in a trade. I love Kjerstad but think another team would be able to beat that offer.

Agreed. I just think I see a path of we luck into a competent pitching staff with the mix of minor leaguers we have and a few free agents. I don’t think we can luck into useful positional guys unfortunately.

They also don’t have enough positional prospects that we can hope will be first division regulars. We’re literally talking about Montgomery, Ramos, & Quero. After that you’re looking at Gonzalez, a bunch of high variance guys (Popeye, Veras, etc), and couple younger prospects a few years out (Burrowes, Wilkow, etc).

Why does he have to make a trade during the Winter Meetings? As much as I’d love to see a deal take place this week, that doesn’t mean he won’t be able to make an impactful deal after the meetings. In fact, if we’re being realistic, we shouldn’t a deal until after Yamamoto, Snell, & Montgomery sign. I’m not sure I follow your logic here.

You literally just convinced yourself there is no market for Cease but a crap Braves offer and that Getz has gotten every single major MLB insider (including Rosenthal who doesn’t get used very often) to claim the market for Cease is intense because they all gain from this non-exclusive info for…reasons.

You’re really hoping we get s%*# for him

Was basically thinking the same thing, which wouldn’t actually be a bad package from a pure value standpoint. Just not an exciting one and I’d personally rather get a potentially more impactful positional guy to headline.

Out of curiosity, what would you need from the Braves to make such a trade?

Which Acuna are you referring to?

A Braves trade would be very unexciting and I’d question the logic of acquiring 8 or 9 players from one org in a single off-season. Are you hearing anything about what we may be planning to do? Seems like Eloy is as a good as gone. Could that happen this week in Nashville?