ChiSox59

We won't miss ya!

The Sox did have a terrible offseason. No doubt. But pointing to Abreu and the fact that they didn't hit for power last season as the main reasons displays a lack of understanding of the larger problem with the roster construction. Key players staying healthy, getting better defensively and getting more left handed were far more important than paying a declining Abreu $19M AAV, or whatever it was, to block fixing the defense and left handed issues. Love Pito; wish he was a Sox for life. But it was the right decision.

Not having money doesn’t stop them from claiming a guy like Justus Sheffield who they passed on today and would almost certainly be at worst the 6th best SP in the org if we’re not counting Clevinger.

Seems like a step in the right direction. Searching for positives these days.

There was never a doubt. Glad to see this done. tho. Has Jason really been doing this 8 years? No way that's right. edit: started in 2016. Man, time flies.

Yep. He decided to give it a go with his boy Tony. Seems once that failed, he decided to pull back. I personally dgaf about this stupid bar, but the rendering looks terrible and par for the course. Not to be morbid, but the man is 86 years old. There is light at the end of the tunnel.

Yah, I mean re DFA him in a couple days and try slip thru waivers if you have to…just to try to get some SP depth. Just really don’t get the lack of aggression on that front.

Strange.

The money wasn't really dropped into 2024 though. The $4M buyout was either going to be paid in 2023 when they bought Clevinger out in November, or never paid because they exercised the option. You can do all the mental gymnastics you'd like about budgeting and reallocating $s from year to year to fit your negative narrative, but when you need to find an everyday OF and a SP that needs to make 20+ starts because you have zero SP depth after your top 4 and the owner gives you a very limited amount of $ to do so, there aren't exactly a boat load of options to make that work. Now, much of that shitty situation was Hahn's own doing. But its pretty obvious that earlier in the rebuild process ownership told him there would be more $ to spend that ultimately was available. Maybe Covid had a role in that; certainly TLR driving the team into a wall was a contributing factor. Hahn himself did more than his fair share of burning needless cash along the way, and for that, he should have lost job. Not sure that KW, Chris Getz or Jeremy Faber would have made things any different tho, and if Hahn is gone, 99.99% chance one of those 3 are running the show. Why's that? Jerry Reinsdorf.

I am not defending Hahn at all. He should have lost his job this offseason. Clevinger for 1/$12M was fine without knowledge that he was a domestic and child abuser. I am just saying the perhaps Clevinger was fine with the structure because he knew that MLB was investigating him and that the buyout was getting paid regardless of suspension. Not exactly sure how that’s outsmarting anyone when it wasn’t public knowledge, but whatever.

We've been over this. The Sox were 2 GB of 1st place on deadline day. 2 games back of.....the Minnesota Twins. Selling off pieces at the 2022 TDL was not a realistic option.

This may have also been a tactic Clevinger wanted to employ because he knew this was pending.

Justus Sheffields DFA period is up today. Hopefully he made it to the Sox.

Now do Cueto, if you're concerned about statcast metrics, since that is the guy you're lobbying for instead. Like I said, Clevinger was actually a really useful SP for most of last season. As was Cueto! Clevinger wore out towards the end, which makes sense all things considered. Putting aside the character and off-field issues that have arisen, I have no problem betting on the guy that is half a decade younger.

Well, we now know why.

Clevinger was actually really good last year until like mid August. His xFIP was in the mid 3s. He clearly ran out of gas late in the season, which makes sense for a guy that didn't pitch in 2021 coming off his 2nd TJS, and his workload was appraoching the most he'd pitched since 2019.

Yes, with the benefit of hindsight. Choosing Clevinger over Cueto was the right idea for baseball reasons in 2023. As most things have gone for the Sox the last 2+ years, it aged really poorly. If we all knew Clevinger was going to be suspended in 2023, of course signing Cueto would have been preferred. This isn't rocket science.

Cueto can't either. He hasn't done that since 2016. In hindsight, of course Cueto looks pretty good right now. BUt moving on from Cueto, who frankly was pretty bad since that 2016 season and is 37 years old, made a ton of sense. Cueto was great for the Sox - legitimately like finding a $100 bill on the ground. There is next to 0% chance he repeats his 2022 season.

As would Ramos, if you care to include him in the equation. He's probably a 3B or OF though, so I get not including him. Romy and Yolbert are in fact dime a dozen types. I do think Romy has a chance to be a useful super sub, though.

Got it. So basically, as example, let's say that Clevinger gets placed on administrative leave and then the league hands down an 81 game suspension mid-season, Sox would owe him $4M for 50% of 2023, + the $4M buyout if htey released him at that time. Wonder how that buy out is going to be treated. Probably would need to get suspended for over 162 for that to be be void.

Martin is a perfectly acceptable #6...first guy up type of deal. As someone we are actually relying on for 25+ starts...big yikes.

I....disagree on the $ part. Trevor Bauer didn't get paid a dime while he was on administrative leave. If MLB places Clevinger on administrative leave while they determine his suspension, and then he is ultimately suspended he almost certainly will not get paid his entire contract. Only way he's getting paid the entire contract is if it turns out this situation was largely exaggerated by a jilted ex and Clevinger is cleared. I don't see that happening. Releasing him now guarantees him the $. That would be a stupid decision regardless of if the Sox intend for him to ever suit up for them. If he's never part of the clubhouse - which he certainly will not be if he's suspended or on administrative leave - not sure how it can be much of distraction to the team.

Yes, great idea. Let's reward this twat with the $12 million when its extremely likely he will lose a good chunk, if not all of it, and the team we all root for will get the $ back to invest elsewhere. Brilliant idea, I tell ya. That'll really show Clevinger!

I keep seeing people say this here and even more on twitter, but beyond Clevinger just sort of having a rep for a being a bit of a dirtbag, how were the Sox supposed to know about this? There is no police report. Extremely likely that even if they pulled a detailed background check, nothing about this would have come up. The MLB doesn't report to local police departments. The league is quite literally bound by confidentiality on issues like this prior to the player having their day in court and they cannot essentially blackball a guy from the league for allegations. I understand why folks have a hard time wrapping their head around that, but that is quite literally what the legal document says. Go look at @Y2Jimmytwitter page. Are you expecting someone in the MLB offices to break those rules and call up the Sox when the caught wind of the signing? I mean, that is literally what people are insinuating should have happened. That would open up the MLB to all sorts of risk. Now, I can get people saying that Clevinger has always appeared to be a dirt bag and just steering clear of that type of character in general. I don't necessarily agree with that because I think alot of professional athletes are dirtbags and you're just putting yourself at a competitive disadvantage by avoiding all adulterous athletes, but I can at least see it. But to insinuate the Sox knew about this is advance, lied about it in their released statement, and just chose to sign this guy anyway is beyond silly.

That's fair. I too would like to do better, but trying to be realistic. I'd be happy to trade one of JRod or Ramos as the headliner for player that can give a bigger impact with less control.