Eminor3rd

QUOTE (Melissa1334 @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 08:35 PM) He was awful the second half this season. Next Dunn?lol Fortunately, half season splits have been exhaustively shown not to be predictive. QUOTE (Joshua Strong @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 11:39 PM) You're going to give up one of the top pitching prospects in the system who projects as both a solid starter and closer for a stop gap LF? That's a bad move. I'm not sure how you see him as a stopgap. Is it because he only has two years of control? He would be a substantial upgrade to our lineup at a very affordable rate. He adds two wins over Viciedo, easily. Assuming he doesn't come with chronic health issues. Also, I believe pretty strongly that Montas is going to be a reliever. I like the idea of selling him at his peak value, when there's still a chance of him sticking at starter.

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Dec 5, 2014 -> 02:06 AM) Please explain to me why Hamels is so much better than Q and you can't use stats cause those aren't your own words. lol

There, I said it. He's a perfect fit for our LF vacancy, and we still need a left handed bat, and he's still got two-years of control pre-free agency. I feel like we could get him without touching the top tier of our prospects. I would give Montas for him if I had to, though I'd try to aim lower. Anyone think there's any chance we're the #mysteryteam? http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playe...;position=1B/OF

QUOTE (TheFutureIsNear @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 06:52 PM) Is Hamels' contract really huge in relative terms? 4 years 90 million is going to look dirt cheap to trade for after what Lester and Scherzer get as free agents. Hamels is a top 10 pitcher in baseball....Q is very good, but he's not on Hamels' level What? How do you figure?

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 01:15 PM) White Sox TV ratings are also among the lowest in baseball. 4 times as many people watch the Tigers on local TV than the White Sox. Half of MLB is #1 or #2 or #3 in local ratings when they are on in prime time. The White Sox rank #11th. To me, that is a much better argument for an unsupportive fanbase than the attendance numbers.

QUOTE (shysocks @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 11:39 AM) Quintana being nothing more than an honorable mention is puzzling to me, and a big miss on Keri's part. Same. Cameron nailed Quintana, i thought, on his. But there's just no way I can fathom Cole Hamels being more valuable than Quintana in a trade.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 09:07 AM) Probably 20. But that's not the reason I gave up my season tickets after a decade. Going to a game is pricey and sometimes annoying as hell. You will drop 50 bucks on food and beer at least these days and the game experience is ok for the price. However, sitting in front of my or a bars giant HD TV is sometimes just as nice if not better. And it's not like the Sox don't get paid a lot for their TV rights for this specific reason. And as long as people continue to prefer to watch that way, the compensation the Sox receive will continue to rise.

QUOTE (thxfrthmmrs @ Dec 4, 2014 -> 01:31 AM) Reading an Andrew Miller speculation article, it was mentioned that the record contract for a non-closing reliever is held by Jeremy Affeldt at only 3 years $18 million. With Miller's new salary hitting the $40 million range, it's crazy to think how much more expensive it is nowadays just to acquire bullpen arms. Part of is inflation, but part of it is that the makeup of the bullpen is different than it used to be. Harold Reynolds can pay it as much lip service as he wants, it doesn't change the fact that GMs see greater value in leveraging splits/matchups with a diverse bullpen of specialists.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 09:12 PM) Their attendance has plummeted so much, there have been 4 seasons the White Sox drew more than the 2014 Cubs. 1991,1992,2006,2007. Think aboit it, no White Sox playoff team has ever outdrawn the 2014 Cubs. White Sox fans as a whole, suck. They always have some excuse. In 2012, the line was they didn't go to games when they were in first place for a few momths because they "knew" they would fall apart. I don't understand why anyone is surprised at this attendance disparity, lol. The north side of Chicago is a f***ing treat. It's a fantastic place to live and hang out. The South side of Chicago is the butt of all of America's murder jokes. The best argument anyone has to live in Bridgeport is "it's cheap" and "it's really not that bad anymore." People have way more money up north, they have way less money down south. There are cheaper, more effective, more convenient ways to follow the team. The Cell is a f***ing bore. There's nothing to see. Even if there was, they don't let you on the main concourse unless you have a ticket in the bottom bowl, lol. There's hardly even anything to buy in the team store. It's the worst team store of any major league sport I've ever seen. It's not 1965 where you had to either go to the game or listen on the radio. You can follow the action ten times better on the TV, and it's cheaper too! If you want people to spend $50 to come somewhere, you have to make that place worth $50 to go to. The Cubs have an entire neighborhood filled with dozens of bars, restaurants, dance clubs, and trendy retail amongst a culture of attractive, affluent people. The Sox have a f***ing highway and a huge parking lot. Oh, and Bacardi at the Park, lol. Is that even still open?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 08:59 PM) It is. It absolutely is. Cub fans go to games, when Sox fans won't. That is completely different. And Cubs attendance last year after something like six straight losing seasons is still higher than Sox attendance in every other year but 2 in their entire history. It even went up a tiny bit last year. And they are now reaping the benefits by getting to go after literally any free agent they want to go after. It's because it's fun to go to games there. It's easy to get there, you can hang out all day. Winning is only a component of what makes it fun to show up. When I lived in Chicago, I would go to 4-5 games per year, whether they were garbage or not. They could go undefeated and I'd still got o 4-5 games per year. Why? Because it's generally a lot more fun for me to watch them on TV ~100 games a year. Am I a bad fan? I'm consuming their product via a channel they made available to me which they get paid handsomely for. If they want me to choose a different way to consume the game, they need to make that way more attractive. And then they also have to deal with lesser revenues from the incumbent way. It's the same challenge every team faces.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 08:27 PM) This is exactly why the Cubs were able to do the rebuild they have done, and why we can't. We have to spend all of our revenues on major league players, because our fans don't have the patience to wait on prospects. Kenny Williams was the perfect GM for White Sox fans. No, Cubs fans go to games because it's a social event. It's a completely different situation. If you've spent any time in Bridgeport and Wrigleyville, it's very easy to see that. Also, Cubs attendance has declined substantially over the past few years.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 08:22 PM) But baseball isn't a business!!! It's uniquely protected by Congress, anti-trust laws, the national pastime, etc. Would communities all over the US build restaurants for McDonald's or Subway? Would they issue municipal bonds or increase hotel/tourism taxes? Right, further evidence that these people have no right to more of our money. They have to earn it.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 06:51 PM) Spin it like you want to. If fans don't go to games, they don't get to complain about the payroll. Of course they do. If you're a business, you develop a disireable product, then expect it to sell well. If your product sucks, you don't expect people to buy it anyway, in hopes that the company might use the profits to develop a better product you can buy again later.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 11:09 AM) Let me ask something else though...if Coors is really that different than other ballparks, and Rockies' players play 81 games a year there, isn't it conceivable that their production could actually suffer more on the road than other players, since there is that big disparity between Coors and all other stadiums? If there is more of a variance to overcome, it seems as though that would only feed into the disparity between Coors and away from Coors. Did Matt Holiday have extreme splits when he played for the Rockies, and has that continued since he's been in St Louis? Matt Holliday career away: http://www.fangraphs.com/statsplits.aspx?p...0&split=1.2 Matt Holliday career home: http://www.fangraphs.com/statsplits.aspx?p...0&split=1.1 2010 was his first full season away from Coors, it does look like his Home numbers got worse and his away numbers got better.

QUOTE (TheFutureIsNear @ Dec 3, 2014 -> 10:59 AM) No, there is something seriously wrong with the wrc+ #'s for coors...or something just really weird in general is going on. Either way wrc+ isn't a good stat to use for Rockies players. Really interesting read about it below http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2014/05/...or-the-rockies/ That's evidence that players may have a hard time adjusting to the change in environment, not evidence that park factors are miscalculated in wRC+. Quote straight from the article: "While it is tempting to believe that the stat is not accounting for Coors Field properly, RIRF shows that the Rockies’ home wRC+ doesn’t differ terribly from the league average at home on a season-by-season basis." If anything, that would suggest that the splits would normalize when the player gets into a more typical environment. Regardless, it doesn't change the fact that wRC+ does not provide an inflated number based on environment. It is specifically adjusted for environment.

There's a fairly strong precedent that shows that draft pick compensation affects the price of low-end free agents drastically, but doesn't affect the price of high-end free agents much at all. And it makes sense the more you think about it

QUOTE (Dam8610 @ Dec 1, 2014 -> 04:57 PM) Fixed it to reflect an accurate comparison. Here's a relevant article that both argues that Markakis is way overrated at hs current asking price AND happens to mention that he's similar to De Aza in likely overall production: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/what-are-we...-nick-markakis/

QUOTE (TheFutureIsNear @ Dec 2, 2014 -> 06:37 PM) I don't think you (and everybody else in this thread) are quite grasping how much Coors affects hitters. And I'm not taking the ball traveling and HR's. Look at the park factors from this year http://espn.go.com/mlb/stats/parkfactor those #'s are insane. Every single year Coors field is #1 in park factor and more specificly the hit factor. And then there's the fact that the Rockies WRC+ as a team is 17 points lower on the road than at home since the year 2002. Is that a big enough sample size for you? The next biggest disparity in the league is Arizona (#2 on that park factor list) at -9. And I could keep going about the foul territory and how Coors has the least amount of foul ball outs too. So yeah, if you believe it's merely a coincidence that Cargo's splits are so drastic then I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you as well. But all of that is baked right into wRC+, so you can see that he is still really good after you account for the Coors effect. Since he broke out in 2009 (excepting his injury-driven lemon last year), his has fluctuated between 114 - 147. He's a star level bat even with the park and league adjustment. The question is, of course, is his health. Will he ever be healthy again? The high AAV on a short term deal is not at all outrageous if you think you're getting even a 125 wRC+ OF that plays good defense.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 2, 2014 -> 04:45 PM) The issue is that Cargo's H/R splits are both bigger than most people's and bigger than most people who play in Coors. Is he a guy who puts up a .900 OPS at home if he leaves or is he a guy who puts up an .800 OPS at home if he leaves? That's the issue you have to figure out, and I wonder if such extreme H/R splits genuinely makes him untradeable. The Rockies wouldn't give him up for nothing, but teams won't trust him outside of Coors with those kind of career splits enough to give up major talent and take on that kind of money. Also, I think the bigger impediment to his tradeability is his down year. The reason the Rockies probably won't trade him is because they don;t HAVE to. They can let him try to rebuild his value, which he'll probably do if he can stay healthy.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 2, 2014 -> 04:45 PM) The issue is that Cargo's H/R splits are both bigger than most people's and bigger than most people who play in Coors. Is he a guy who puts up a .900 OPS at home if he leaves or is he a guy who puts up an .800 OPS at home if he leaves? That's the issue you have to figure out, and I wonder if such extreme H/R splits genuinely makes him untradeable. The Rockies wouldn't give him up for nothing, but teams won't trust him outside of Coors with those kind of career splits enough to give up major talent and take on that kind of money. They are bigger than normal, but the issue is substantially smaller than people paint it because of the default home/away effect. Also, the Cell is also a bandbox.

Curious non-tenders, considering how badly we need bullpen depth. I'm guessing this was more about clearing the 40-man than about money, which hopefully means a trade/signing is on the horizon.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Dec 2, 2014 -> 04:21 PM) As I mentioned in a different thread, there are much worse ways to spend a bench spot and $4 million than on Dayan Viciedo. The ONLY one I can think of is upside, and that's less likely to show up in a part-time role. The $4m isn't really the issue -- it's the use of a 25 man roster slot on someone who doesn't help you win. A guy who can add value defensively is much better. Viciedo doesn't add value defensively OR offensively. I'd tender him a contract as a backup plan for starting LF. But I'd DFA him in a second if I got a real option in LF.

QUOTE (TheFutureIsNear @ Dec 2, 2014 -> 03:39 PM) Cargo 2012 Home- .368/.437/.609 Away- .234-.301/.405 Cargo 2011 Home- .331/.402/.597 Away- .252/.317/.440 Saying "Coors or not" doesn't work...not even close. Now look up the home/away splits for other players. Turns out most guys are better at home.

QUOTE (Chilihead90 @ Dec 2, 2014 -> 02:04 AM) So did Chris Coghlan, do you want him too? Over Dayan Viciedo? Yes, absolutely. Who wouldn't?

Upton does not seem like the type to sign an extension when he's this close to free agency. This would be a rental or turn into an overpay, IMO.