The Ultimate Champion

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jun 23, 2014 -> 02:13 PM) Yep, those are our middle infielders. Replacements in AAA: Marcus Semien, Carlos Sanchez, Micah Johnson, Tyler Saladino. As far as Beckham's return: I'm not sure; it's an interesting question. No one is dumb enough to ignore his last four years, but he has the tantalizing pedigree that makes you think he might be on the Alex Gordon development schedule. I guess it'll depend on how many buyers are in on 2B, but if it's 2-3, I'd think we could get something decent, though probably not "exciting." In our system "decent" probably is "exciting" as long as there is legit upside involved. Especially if we target pitching, that's our bread and butter. In reality I think Beckham is our best deadline trade chip in that, of all the guys certain or almost certain to go, he will bring the best return. I think Alexei would have been that guy had Abreu signed elsewhere, but since Abreu is here, Alexei has greater value to our franchise specifically IMO, many of those reasons being non-baseball/on field reasons, and so he's longer a sure thing to go.

Hahn needs to acquire someone with some actual ability to throw out there. Carroll has shown he can't work in the rotation 2nd and 3rd time through the order but he can work very well out of the pen. So it's not broke, go ahead and fix it according to Robin. If Rienzo has to go immediately you can bring up Surkamp or something. If you just want a new face in there to take a whipping then we've got plenty of those guys in Charlotte. I imagine Hahn will pick up another project somewhere along the line here soon.

Honestly wite & I agree a lot, we shall agree more on things. Now that I am over Dunn and how deeply he hurt me. I still want that f***er gone though. ASAP.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Jun 23, 2014 -> 09:14 AM) TUC and Wite just had a bro hug moment I tried for the smooch but he turned away. I held him tighter, I said "But baby..." "I can't," he said. "I just can't. It's not time yet." And so I left, pausing in the doorway, not daring to turn back to look. But I thought of him all the way home.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 23, 2014 -> 08:48 AM) His upside is a good relief arm. If you use him as a starter, you're doing it wrong. I agree. That's what I thought he would be with us when he came up, turns out the Pads wanted him to start. I still remember Hawk toward the very end of the 2008 season on air saying he would pitch Richard against the Rays over the vet Javy Vazquez. I don't blame Ozzie for going to the better pitcher, the vet, etc. but that was one of Javy's schizo years or mental vacation years, whatever you want to call it, and lo and behold he Javy'd it up big time. Anyway as a LH reliever, in theory he's the perfect type of player. You can use him vs. one LH batter, you can pitch him a full inning, you can even go 2-3 with him if you haven't overused him recently. I'd love to have him back, but again, I think he would prefer to start while other teams might look at him as a 5-6 inning per game option at the back of the rotation. It's interesting though, when you look at guys like Matt Thornton and Jeremy Affeldt, you can make pretty good money in a lefty setup role whereas often the 5th starter types just get cut when the team has to pay him. Maybe his agent will try to route him into that kind of career path? If so, and he's healthy, sign me up. Also I think Downs blows. I feel like I've said this before.

Okay so who does Toronto have that is a big RHSP arm but needs work, either A+ or below and/or reclamation project? And who do they have as far as LHRP spects? We need that. We get an electric A ball arm and a serviceable LHRP & Rick Hahn can dress up the old lady & they can dance the night away.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Jun 22, 2014 -> 04:00 PM) Why would Diego want Towers back? Was Towers really all that bad? I can't really remember anything significantly bad he did over there. He made some great deals for them. It all comes down to the org itself. The Padres have been cheap as s*** for decades, gave him nothing to work with, couldn't use FA, couldn't go Red Sox/Yankees with overslots in the draft, etc. Then the owners changed hands and the new guys are also cheap as s***. The ballpark is great for attracting reclamation project pitchers but that's really it, hitters don't want to play there, they're never really thought of as serious contenders, can't throw big money at anyone... that's a situation that will make a lot of GMs look bad regardless of whether they actually are or not.

QUOTE (JoshPR @ Jun 22, 2014 -> 04:40 PM) No! Enough of gambles and cheapness LOL we're paying Scott Downs to spray gas all over the mound something like $4M or so IIRC? And Robin's been using him so much his option is about to vest, meaning we can't even trade the guy for a scrap or two because no team would want to be on the hook for that. Never turn your nose up at potential quality LHP. Even Veal's still here, not on the roster but he's still in our org. We need lots of help.

As a LHSU guy I think there's a lot of upside there. That's exactly the kind of player you want, someone who could turn into something that you can acquire for a low base plus incentives. You don't have to pay him if he sucks. Great. I bet someone would look at him as a starter though. As a RP we should definitely be interested if others pass.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 04:18 PM) I do. This is America. In America you talk with your stomach and your ass. Ship in resources, chew them up, s*** them back out into the landfill and let the poor people root through it. And it's called 'Merica thank you very much. And we like to fite too. And watch the teevee. f*** yeah.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 03:33 PM) With all the respect due to an ultimate champion, I could not possibly disagree with a statement more. What you just uttered is antithesis to the Enlightenment values that propelled our race into the Industrial Revolution that gave rise to global economy, food surpluses, and advances in medical technology that has increased the quality and length of life of billions of the world's denizens. I shall pray to the pantheon of Abrahamic god figures that, for as long as you hold the belief you just described, you NEVER take up gambling. Well I could argue at length about the artificial nature of food resources and the like, and how fragile the economy really is and how devastating some of these things can be on the majority of the world's citizens who were not fortunate enough to have been born into a first world country propped up by third world labor under deplorable living and working conditions and so on... but I'll choose to stick to baseball and your & wite's belief that John Danks is going to become a bad pitcher because he gives up a lot of flyballs currently - if that's what your point is I guess. I can't believe you would honestly believe that billions of people on this planet live and work under desirable conditions but whatever, baseball...... I think the right way to look at John Danks is this: going into the year we had 2 questions, 1) is John Danks going to return to the old John Danks, and 2) If not, will he still be able to become an effective Major League pitcher? The answer to #1 is no. #2 we're waiting to see how this all turns out. Can John Danks generally become a 30+ start, 200IP+ starter with an ERA roughly at 4.00 or below on an annual basis? I don't know. It's been done before, but nobody really knows. He's been giving up flyballs but he hasn't been giving up many runs lately. He's been, by his own admission, rededicated to the finer points of pitching and spends a lot of time studying hitters and hitter tendencies. Rather than look for a reason to be pessimistic I would look at his recent success as a reason for optimism. In a vacuum, can John Danks give up flyballs forever and not have bad starts because of it? No. But what do the flyballs look like for one, how is he getting them for two, are the hitters coming close to squaring the ball up off him and just missing or is Danks doing a much better job of keeping them off balance? Further, again, the outs are what is important. He needs to keep getting outs, and yes, he will give up HRs but that means it's more important he keeps the walks way down. Will John Danks continue to put up an ERA of 1.50 or whatever it was that Balta posted re: his last 5 starts? No, he's not Sale. But ERA below 4.00, 200IP, can he do that? Let's not be Negative Nancies around here please? No dark clouds here, just at WSI.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 02:53 PM) Well, yeah. Meaning don't get too wrapped up in their predictive values, because they are still ideal results.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 02:44 PM) The problem is when your fastball averages 87 MPH. There are hitters good enough that you can throw that pitch at their eyes and they'll hit it out of the park. I also don't mind the idea when pitching in a bigger park - use the playing environment to your advantage as best you can - but USCF is a bandbox in the summer and guys that get jammed can end up putting balls out of the park. Flyballs are not the worst thing, but I'd prefer those balls stay on the ground. Danks will certainly have to take the conditions into consideration just like everyone else does, from the coaching staff to the catcher, the relievers, etc. Danks has said he has been spending a whole lot more time going over hitters and scouting reports this year than in the past and has been overall paying much more attention to the pitching aspect of the game. If the scouting report on someone says he'll pop such and such a pitch up, give it to him, just be careful to hit your spot and don't take chances with the wind blowing out, etc. Also any hitter in the Majors including Leury Garcia can nail a 87mph FB over the fence. Also any hitter in the Majors including Leury Garcia can nail a 93mph FB over the fence. Danks needs to keep hitters off balance, keep them guessing, and if he does that I don't see why he can't continue being successful. But he can't really have his fastball be a "go-to" pitch really anymore as far as relying on it to get him out of a bad count, he'll have to have more weapons on a per start basis. But I do believe that in some situations he'll be able to reach back and hit 91-92 when he needs it, he was doing that in Spring, and he just seems a lot stronger now than last year. So he can still surprise the hitter with some velocity I think, but he can't be like "Here, hit this." anymore.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 02:26 PM) The problem with making these assumptions is that Danks's stuff has gotten worse in the last 6 years, considerably so, and he really needs to have good command to continue pitching well. The blowups (or at least inconsistency) will happen if 70-75% of the balls he allows in play remain in the air. It's just not feasible to keep limiting people like he has. Over his last 3 games, his HR/FB is at 3.4%, which is well below his career average. For his career, that number is 10.6%. He's not producing many infield popups. It's just a razor thin line he's walking right now and eventually he's either going to have to start producing more ground balls, more swings and misses, or he's going to start allowing more runs. FYI, the last 3 games, here are his balls in play 17 ground balls 29 fly balls (3 infield fly balls) 12 line drives 13 strike outs I think oftentimes too much is made of flyballs. Flyballs are just perfectly fine as long as they result in outs. Hard hit flyballs are different but flyballs themselves are often just a product of using more of the strikezone, i.e. the upper parts. You don't need a blazing FB to effectively pitch up in the zone. As long as the hitters are off balance I really don't care where they hit the ball, in the air or on the ground.

QUOTE (scs787 @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 02:15 PM) It has lead to "blow ups" twice this season. I have been Danks biggest fan here but I'm sure those games will pop up now and then, but I think more oten then not he'll be what we saw his last 5 starts. His velo, I believe is about the same as it was last year, I just think he's "learned how to pitch", and that is making the difference. They said on the radio that his CH speed is lower now than before, putting more of a velocity gap between the FB and CH. The FB looks to be up a tick, not old Danks by any means, but a tick. The ball looks just a lot crisper than last year too, the breaking ball is better and if the gap has widened a bit then the velocity separation really helps. Basically Danks this year just looks more like a lefty whose offspeed arsenal was built around his fastball whereas before it looked like he was a fastball pitcher with a s***ty fastball and an offspeed arsenal that didn't match up properly. Fangraphs backs this up: http://www.fangraphs.com/pitchfxo.aspx?pla...=P&pitch=CH but it shows his FB velocity as being down? I'm not sure about that at all, it looks to me like he has a bit more on the 4-seamer but if the readings are lower then I'm guessing he's throwing more cutters/focusing on movement and the readings aren't considering that stuff, i.e. they're calling cutters and s*** 4 seamers or something. He definitely looks to have more there on the FB at least to me. But WTF do I know, mostly I listen on the radio and haven't watched all his starts.

QUOTE (DirtySox @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 01:02 PM) I sure wish he was at his 2008 velocity. If he could pull off a Mike Mussina then that's just perfectly fine. There's no way around it: Danks has been getting the job done lately. With the lesser stuff it takes more time for people to become believers, but he IS a veteran lefthander with good enough offspeed stuff and control otherwise to where you have to at least allow for the possibility. He definitely is in the right situation re: coaching and health/strength/injury prevention.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 12:31 PM) I don't think Noesi has established any real value yet. Agree and not sure why we'd want to do that anyway. Even in his bad starts there has been a silver lining somewhere. The ability is there and indisputably he's been at least a serviceable MLB starter with us. Given the 2 large rotation holes we had just a short while ago I'm not sure why we'd want to trade him. If he continues to improve even if it's only to the point of a #4 then we have a guy who is controllable and can help us until we have to pay him, at which point we'd have to re-evaluate the situation. Alexei is really our big chip. 2nd is probably Beckham, 3rd Belisario. Dunn and DeAza are scrap heap stuff/salary relief. But still it would be possible to get value out of both Dunn and DeAza if we take on someone's lost cause or something like that, or an injured prospect ala Carlos Santana with the Dodgers in the Blake deal. It would be a major long shot but hey, 1 in a million, so you're saying there's a chance? There's a chance. Also a Viciedo deal is definitely possible, but I don't think we're "shopping" him per say. He's the kind of guy that could bring in someone talented with issues. I proposed Viciedo for Turner a couple different times on this board, and I wonder if that's out there? It would seem that Turner would be on the block for the Marlins, they always want Cubans, the Sox won't just give Tank away, and they do need a RHSP. If Cooper's game and the Marlins are interested I'd pull that trigger. But only if Coop thinks it's a good idea.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 11:06 AM) This^ Also, I think that all wite is saying is that he likes the thought process behind how Hahn is handling this rebuild. That means he DOES like moves like Paulino, because the risk/reward made sense at the time even though it didn't ultimately work out. This is in contrast to a lot of the moves under KW, which received a lot of criticism at the time form those of us who couldn't see the upside and thought the cost was too high -- like Hudson for Jackson. That Hudson ended up hurting himself and having no career doesn't absolve criticism for the move at the time. You can say it was too much value for an upgrade that didn't seem like it would move the needle enough, and it ultimately didn't. But, iamshack's point is important: the situations were not similar. And to TUC's related argument, there's a reason that KW got "promoted (read: demoted)" and not fired -- I'm not sure that JR found much fault in his decision-making. He had different task, made moves that ownership supported, and when it didn't work, it was time to move in a different direction. It's entirely possible to think both that Hahn can be the better guy for this rebuild and that KW did a fine (or at least passable) job during his tenure. I just think we have to remember that all of the player decisions these guys make come with the probability for success and for bust, and the GMs know it when they make a move. It isn't fair to expect guys to be able to scout so well that they should be 100% right about 100% of players. When you think of Paulino, you should think of it like this: $1-2m for a lottery ticket that has a 5% chance of being a 2-3 starter, 15% chance of being a 3-4 starter, and 80% chance of being a reliever or useless. Don't knock Hahn because it landed in the 80%, knock him if you thought the gamble wasn't worth a million bucks in the first place. Same thing goes with KW: JR should judge him on the moves, not necessarily the outcomes. I agree with all of this but the bolded. First, nobody gets "demoted" to VP. It's Hahn's decisions now and KW is going to allow him to make his moves without overruling. If for some reason KW wanted to overrule him I am not sure he could, my guess would be that JR would be brought in if things got bad, but I'm not sure that even happens. Kenny didn't want to keep doing the same thing, and I think he wanted to move out of that role as much as anyone. He's said enough publicly to where it seems that was the case. Secondly, look at the roster of the 2010 team when the Jackson deal was made. Peavy had gone down but he came back the next year. Danks, Floyd, Buehrle, all under contract through 2011 at least. Beckham was just up, Alexei and Quentin were there, Rios was having a great year, etc. That 2010 season IIRC had like 2 really long winning streaks, something like a 11 game and a 13 game or whatever that was, where the team had a lot of life. EJax was a 2 year solution, Dunn would come later, etc. Kenny made that deal within what was considered his contention window and acquired an MLB ready 2 season piece. That 2011 team, no matter how you slice it, had a lot of talent, and if Kenny is allowed to ditch Ozze back then, bring in his new hitting coach, etc. and we also get the 2010 versions of Alex Rios and Adam Dunn, who knows, maybe we take the division that year. We *were* considered AL Central favorites out of ST that year for a very good reason. The EJax deal was another example of good decision making and timing, and a move that just like Dunn and others didn't work out as planned. But a better 2011 season and EJax, who DID win a WS with the Cardinals that year, may have helped get us to the playoffs. It's worth mentioning again that around baseball, the talk was that most people thought Hudson was mid rotation at best, more likely a back end 4/5 starter. His value then around July 2010 would have probably been very similar to the trade value of Erik Johnson over the last offseason, i.e. similar upside consensus, Hudson with the better change and FB, Johnson the better slider and with cleaner-looking mechanics and more of a pitcher's body. Neither one of these guys gets you an ace, and it is IMO wishful thinking to believe that Hudson would have got us more in the offseason. I think if you have the benefit of hindsight you keep Hudson midway through 2011 and trade him at that deadline for something that pisses off SoxTalk 1,000X worse than the EJax did, but you end up smelling like roses afterwards because you got a great package then. But that's all hindsight, we can't use that. In reality KW made a good baseball decision at the time that didn't really work out. Same as with the DBacks side of things, good baseball decision that looked genius for a little bit but really didn't work out the way they had intended either. That's baseball.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 10:45 AM) Williams always wanted to go for it. I think the reason they went to Hahn at that point in time was because they did realize they wanted to rebuild and did not want Williams at the helm. Williams never had the patience as a GM to build for the long haul, and he had plenty of opportunities to do so. Except Kenny said he *did* want to rebuild but Jerry selected the plan that led to the "all in" team. This is not nor was it ever Kenny's team. And Kenny lacks patience? Think Hahn wants to lose? JR doesn't want to see garbage baseball, neither does KW neither does Hahn How the f*** did Kenny have opportunities to rebuild when his owner wanted him to do otherwise? The guy couldn't even fire a f***ing manager and a hitting coach on his own. Please stop trolling.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 10:39 AM) Except that I actually have history on my side. How many times did Ken Williams trade and/or sell 4 pieces in one season? History says Williams would have hung on to Peavy and Rios and gone for it next year, instead trying to shed salary elsewhere or not spending nearly the amount that Hahn has on the draft and/or international free agency. Could Williams have sold those pieces? Sure, it's possible, because anything is possible, but I do not believe it would have happened. Meanwhile, all you do is make one point and then go into random ridiculous narrative about how you're going to do this or that or whatever and it's usually quite irrational and absurd. History says? Jerry Reinsdorf wanted to win. If Jerry Reinsdorf decided he wanted to keep contending under Hahn then Hahn would be doing the same thing as Kenny. What don't you understand? Hahn doesn't own the club. Kenny even said he wanted to do what Hahn is doing now earlier, but did the best he could to try to win. Also ignoring the CBA AGAIN is very convenient for you. I strongly doubt we draft Rodon under old CBA rules, Hahn or Kenny in charge. And either way, we don't pick 3 very often obviously. Also I'm not sure why you bother with a message board if you don't want to discuss things, just troll.

IIRC one of the first people MB called after his first no-no was David Wells. They apparently still or at least did maintain correspondence well after Wells' Sox tenure. Buerhle credits David Wells for teaching him and helping him to develop into more of a pitcher. And re; "vision" this is Jerry Reinsdorf's team, not Kenny's, not Hahn's. When Hahn becomes Chairman of the Board then that will be a different story. They all share Jerry's "vision" i.e. direction and they're both in on the decision making process. It was Kenny's choice with Hahn's input, now it's Hahn's choice with Kenny's input. Both target similar players (Soptic for Gillaspie vs. Miles for Uribe, same type of pen arms, etc.) and both prefer not to spend heavily in FA and would rather trade for and develop a pitcher or extend one already under contract than buy one in FA. The big differences are simply related to the draft rules under the new CBA and the dismissal of Wilder and the scouts involved. Really, that's it. Sox will try to win here in another year or so and watch what Hahn does. I mean Jesus I like Hahn too but it's not like he came in here and waved a magic wand. El Duque, Contreras, Alexei, Viciedo, etc. pretty much our entire recent Cuban heritage group was acquired by KW and KW was the one personally scouting him. Also there were a number of other teams involved and had someone else stepped up and offered Abreu a lot more than we did then guess what, no magic wand.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 09:59 AM) tl;dr Pretty much everything you're suggesting is conjecture and speculation. There's no point in arguing it anymore. You don't read anything, you just pick out points of a post and then make weak, easily refuted arguments against them. Then, once refuted, rather than come to an agreement on something you either pick out a new point and start the same process over, or you just ignore it and try again later in another topic. Next time I go out hunting for walleye I'm going to come find you, kidnap you, fill your stomach with that Crappensteiner, put you out on the water and then turn you upside down and use electrical tape to secure you to the boat. And I'll do that because you are a human trolling motor, and so I will put you to your greatest use, but for once it'll be for my own benefit, and that's because I like to live the High Life.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 08:29 AM) I compare 2007 to 2013, and while some of the moves in the offseason would have been similar, history tells me Williams would have been more aggressive about getting a winner on the field in 2014 rather than looking towards the future. Since I mentioned it above without even reading this, I think Hahn would have traded Dye, Pierzynski, and whoever else rather than signing them to extensions. He may have still acquired Quentin, maybe not. Maybe not. It's pretty impossible to tell. My problem with this scenario you're presenting is that you're ignoring history and precedent. You think Kenny Williams, after being gambler Kenny always trying to put a team that can win the division rather than struggle for a few seasons and put together a solid group of players, would have made the same international signings and the trades to look towards the future that Hahn did? I call bulls*** on that, buddy. (I loved Kenny Williams and everything he did and continues to do, but if you think he and Hahn would have had this same vision towards the future, you're motherf***ing crazy) Take your own advice. KW went to Jerry Reinsdorf every offseason and asked what he wanted to do. JR never wanted to do a full rebuild again, remembering what happened here last time. Good for him, good for us. Kenny put talent on the field that didn't win, oh well, that's baseball. Rick Hahn would have done the exact same f***ing thing. If Jerry wants to go for it, Hahn will make moves toward that direction. You seem to have this idea that KW was all about acquiring and extending vets while Hahn is all about young players. This is not a realistic view of that situation. Hahn has been in charge 2 years and those 2 years have coincided with a Sox-style, not Cubs/Royals/Pirates/Tigers of yore/etc. style rebuild. As soon as this s*** is over Hahn is going to be making the same kinds of moves Kenny made. Maybe this will be as soon as this offseason. Maybe the 2015 deadline. But it's coming soon. Also the "gambler" stuff applies TO EVERY SINGLE GENERAL MANAGER IN BASEBALL including Hahn. You're obviously not paying attention. Tell me, why in the world would Rick Hahn trade his closer for his third baseman of the future when he ALREADY DID THAT 9 months earlier in a much smaller deal involving Jeff Soptic? Why did he do that? Because he had no f***ing idea that Connor was going to continue to take big steps forward and that Davidson was going to take a big step backwards. This is how baseball works. Hahn will "gamble" just as much as KW ever did because there are no certainties. Hawk last night was talking about how nobody knows this game, and it's true. The moment you think you know this game you're just being egotistical. Hahn doesn't know what will become of any of these prospects any more than KW does, and when Hahn makes moves to make this team a winner again, just like Kenny Williams, he will be 100% unable to tell if the RP he just signed is going to be more of a Lindstrom or a Downs, a Linebrink or a Dotel, etc. and big contract he hands out he's not going to know if it'll be more of a Buehrle extension than a Danks, more of a Jermaine Dye FA signing than a Dunn, etc. You don't know. What's important is that for the most part Kenny Williams made good moves on paper at the right times, coinciding with the wishes and perferred direction of the Chairman. This is all equally true under Hahn and will remain that way forever, no matter who is the owner and who is the GM. A good GM takes a clear direction and makes generally good baseball decisions behind it, and if you want to blame KW for going for it, blame Jerry Reinsdorf as well, and blame yourself also for desiring a higher quality product in the first place. It's very easy to crap on some of the post-2008 Sox teams which was the last year we made the playoffs, but Jerry wanted to win and Kenny put talent out there. Didn't work, oh well, that's baseball. That's every f***ing year for a good number of teams in the league. And also I like turtles.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Jun 20, 2014 -> 12:07 AM) How many of those trades of prospects for veterans actually benefited the Sox? The Garcia trade, when the top 5 prospect in baseball turned out to be crap. Which other trade of prospects for veterans (usually declining veterans) actually helped significantly? Williams did pretty well DESPITE his love of declining veterans....not because of it. The "For Sale" sign should be brightly lit and blinking for most of the veterans on this team. Lots of those deals did, but if by "benefitted" you mean "helped us win the WS" then no, most transactions over the course of this franchise's history didn't work. But prospects went for Javy Vazquez who did well here with Javy being typical Javy, prospects were involved in bringing Thome here, prospects were used for David Wells and Bartolo Colon which worked to some degree, Wells mainly for influencing Buehrle. Most of these deals ended up going in our favor even if they did really "work" as we wanted them to. Peavy was another example, he didn't really "work" here and missed a lot of time here, and the deal with Boston came after we had extended his contract to stay. But that was still another move that went in our favor. And when it comes to moves that hurt us, well, most of these moves seem to have hurt the other team as well. The first Swisher deal is really the one exception. But while we missed the boat on Nestor Molina, the Jays got a hurt guy who is out of options and has to be paid to be ineffective, and the same thing goes for moves like Danny Richar for Aaron Cunningham, both failed, and so on. Anyone who thinks Kenny was an average GM or less is wrong, and he can feel free to go to hell, but first he can stop off here at Baseball-Reference to view the trade history of Kenny Williams just to see how wrong he is first.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jun 19, 2014 -> 02:10 PM) I really don't see proof that this is the case. In the last few years, prospects have become so overvalued that these kind of deals have become more and more rare. And I don't know how many of you have been watching lately, but besides being a horse, David Price hasn't been all that outstanding over the last 18 months or so (he was great in the second half of last year, to his credit). Yeah whichever team decides to give him 7 years+ and $25M+ or whatever completely ridiculous contract that will be.... we'll see what happens there. My guess is it's not going to be good 3-4 years out.