ChiSox59

Its like $70M prearb, not $90M.

Just ran through it and it should be right around $100M including all arb plauyers with generous arb 1 raises for Moncada, Giolito, Lopez, Bummer and Fry. This also assumes EE, Herrera and Gio Gonzalez are gone, Mazara is non-tendered and Rodon tendered for $7.5M.

I don't think Betts is "realistic", but I think Sox should have better than 1/10 shot. Assuming they don't sign NC to a 3 year deal in the next couple weeks, the White Sox will be one of a handful of teams that will definitely be in the bidding for Betts. Will they land him? Chances are they won't, but its a lot easier to drop that kind of cash on 1 player when you don't have a bunch of other holes to fill. 2021 payroll should be right around $100M after arb, so its not like they don't have room and RF and perhaps a pen arm or two are (hopefully) going to be the only big holes to fill next offseason. Punting any ability to play in the RF FA market next offseason just so we can run a DH out in RF for the next 3 seasons that is only a slightly above average hitter against RHP is so so so so so shortsighted unless it is a 1 year deal.

BA released their top 100 today. Anyone with access care to share?

A little surprised a tanking team didn't put in a claim.

Mazara is a slightly below average OF. Castellanos is legitimately one of the very worst defensive OF in the game. Big difference.

He was previously Outrighted? Don’t recall that.

I believe that is wrong. When has Covey been previously Outrighted? edit: sounds like maybe he was in 2018, don’t recall that.

Cleared waivers. Outrighted to Charlotte.

Meh, just such a desperate move. Honestly, I wouldn’t complain. But we could still really use a legit stud bat and signing Castellanos removes all doubt. His defensive shortcomings are too much to ignore. Still just hate the fit. 1/$20M and it’s hard to argue as you’re basically just choosing NC over Mazara. 2/$40M you’re committing to two terrible OF for 2 years and you’re robbing yourself of any ability to play in the RF FA market next winter. I get why some Sox fans love the idea, but it’s just such a classic white Sox move and this offseason starts to look just way too much like the same old bs. Obviously he young studs we have are what makes it different, but just show some patience.

Minor league signings not previously mentioned/made public: RHP: Drew Anderson, Brady Lail, Alex MCrae LHP: Brought back Jacob Lindgren and Matt Tomshaw. Added Adalberto Mejia. IF: Brought back Matt Skole OF: Jaycob Brugman The others had all been made public previously.

Madrigal 2nd on 2B list. Didn't see that posted here.

If you're willing to pay for Arenado, just pay a little more on an AAV basis for Betts in a year who fits MUCH MUCH better and we don't need to fuck with our best player again, or move elite prospects.

If something like 1/$20 is possible at this point, I'd roll the dice. Otherwise hard pass. This. And as long of a shot as it may be, there is the potential that RF will be the only position we need to address next offseason, and Betts would be the finishing piece. A little easier to drop $350M on one guy when you don't have a shit load of other holes to fill. In the meantime, we still have the chance for Mazara to have his best MLB season to date, or Adolfo to stay healthy and explode. Definitely don't want to commit to NC longer than a year as that is committing to essentially punting team defense which is stupid.

Any would work, but I’d probably prefer Miller, Holt and Zobrist as top 3 options.

FIFY: Robert CF, Moncada 3B, Betts RF, Eloy LF, Grandal C, Abreu DH, Vaughn 1B, Anderson SS, Madrigal 2B

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/mitchbr01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-

Per Rosenthal. Minors deal. 29 YO RH reliever. Numbers are not strong.

If Tim got hurt, the top minor league SS is Laz Rivera who hit .248/.287/.318 in AA last season. Then maybe Yolbert Sanchez who hasn't even played stateside yet. So yah, I'd say he's SS insurance in Charlotte.

Well I guess thats some SS insurance.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/01/angels-hire-dylan-axelrod-as-pitching-coordinator.html Yes, that Dylan Axelrod.

They tried last offseason. He wasn't interested.

No doubt. Sox rotation is no for sure thing (to be clear, I didn't say it was, and wasn't really comparing the Twins to the Sox at all in that post). But at least we have a stable of young MLB ready SP. Obviously losing Gio would most likely kill the Sox 2020 chances as well....but to my knowledge he didn't struggle with elbow issues last year. Twins also don't really have anything similar to Kopech and Cease. Graterol is interesting and will likely pitch some for the Twins in 2020, but he is more than likely a pen arm.

I mean, if they lose Berrios, their pitching is really bad. That may be big if, but he had elbow issues last year and lost a ton of velo. I wouldn't be shocked if his misses time this year, and there is some internal concern about his arm. I don't think "all hell needs to break lose" for the Twins to be a .500ish team. Father time finally catches Cruz. Berrios gets hurt. Polanco, Kepler and Garver regress to the mean. They get close to nothing out of Dick Mountain and Homer Bailey. Luis Arraez was a flash in the pan one year wonder. Buxton is unable to stay on the field for more than 80 games. Obviously all of those things aren't going to happen, but its not too much of stretch to believe half of them will. Basically everything went right for the Twins last season - chances are lightning doesn't strike twice.

Donaldson is good. He makes the Twins better in 2020. He is also 34 years old, and the Twins will most likely be paying him $29M in 2023 in his age 37 season. The backend of this deal is going to hurt them - likely quite a bit. Its a strange allocation of resources for the Twins, but frankly, at this juncture in the offseason he was the guy that made the most sense to the spend the money on. There is no SP left worth paying. The Twins allowing it to get to this point is what is strange. This may be a bit of a kick in the balls to the Sox 2020 ALC chances, but this offseason was never about building a WS contender for 2020. Its about the beginning of a 6-7 year window, and this Donaldson move really does very little to negatively impact the White Sox long term outlook. And if Donaldson is unable to stay healthy the next two seasons - the only two in which you can reasonably expect him to earn his money - this deal is really going to hurt the Twins. Twins fan are excited. And they should be. Their previous forays into expensive free agents have pretty much all failed. The most expensive position player free agent in franchise history prior to Donaldson was a 3/$24M deal to Jason fuckin' Castro. So of course they're going to be excited. This move also improves their IF defense quite a bit by getting Sano off 3B, but I remain unconvinced that Donaldson is anything more than an average 3B at this point, though is 2019 defensive metrics were fairly strong. Everything will be OK Sox fans. Twins weren't just going to standby and make no moves in what is the tailend of their window. 85 wins isn't going to win this division, so let's go out and get 90 wins and see where the chips fall.