BaconOnAStick

If it's within the next 10 years they are no longer the Chicago White Sox.

They would have to latch onto a broader development goal in order to pull it off.

I'm literally walking around with forks stuck in my eye sockets from imagining this.

It is not a risk the Sox have to take by any means. Personally, I'd rather have Viciedo out there on arbitration pay than a 4 year sentence of Melky Cabrera we will be waiting out (EXACTLY LIKE DUNN). If you're gonna waste 4 years on Melky you might as well trade Anderson and get Justin Upton and pray you can lock him up.

It could be Finnegan, Manaea or Zimmer in KC. Right now Zimmer faces an innings limit, so he's probably out. Finnegan they may want to wait on, I just have been reading Manaea. Truth is we really don't know about KC or Minnesota.

Buying guys in the winter to flip at the deadline might have just jumped the shark.

Pitching! #1 Starter: 1. SOX- Chris Sale 2. Cleveland- Corey Kluber 3. Detroit- David Price 4. Kansas City- Yordano Ventura 5. Minnesota- Phil Hughes Usually putting the reigning Cy Young winner 2nd in his own division would stir some controversy but I doubt I'll get much here. Even take away the contract situation, would you take Kluber? If Sale and Kluber both had 1 year left before free agency (and both were sure bets to leave) would you trade Sale for Kluber? No. Nobody would. Kluber is still really good though. Yordano will probably pass Price halfway through the season, and I doubt Hughes goes anywhere but down. That is still one fantastic set of pitchers though, not many divisions have that many guys who are aces or are about to be aces. #2 Starter: 1. SOX- Jeff Samardizja 2. Cleveland- Carlos Carrasco 3. Detroit- Justin Verlander 4. Kansas City- Jason Vargas 5. Minnesota- Ervin Santana Two horse race between Samardizja and Carrssco that I give to Samardizja for reasons you already know. But the two are really, really close. I don't know why, but people are sleeping on Cleveland's rotation this year. Kluber - Carrasco is a pretty nasty 1-2 punch, probably the second best in the AL. Verlander is getting worse, not better. Vargas is a guy. Ervin Santana continues his tour of disappointment in a place where nobody will care. #3 Starter: 1. SOX- Jose Quintana 2. Detroit- Anibal Sanchez 3. Kansas City- Danny Duffy 4. Cleveland- Danny Salazar 5. Minnesota- Ricky Nolasco I am not being a homer, this is just how it is. Q is probably better than all the #2's in the division (incl Samardizja). The Sox come back down to earth soon, don't worry. I've never been big on Anibal Sanchez and really he's the only thing close to Q right now. Duffy could be better than solid for KC. Salazar is not the same guy the Sox enslaved early in 2014. Minnesota obviously isn't really trying this season. #4 Starter: 1. Detroit- Alfredo Simon 2. Minnesota- Kyle Gibson 3. Cleveland- Trevor Bauer 4. SOX- Hector Noesi 5. Kansas City- Sean Manaea There's actually some potential in here if you squint. Gibson isn't that bad a player and neither really is Bauer. Manaea has big potential though this call to the rotation seems a little rushed (from what I read though, he's their guy). Noesi slides in low, but showed enough to put him ahead of a rookie coming from A+. Alfredo Simon isn't very good, but he's slightly better than the rest of this. #5 Starter: 1. Detroit- Shane Greene 2. Kansas City- Jeremy Guthrie 3. SOX- John Danks 4. Cleveland- TJ House 5. Minnesota- Mike Pelfrey Wow. Talk about bad. Not much to even say. Pelfrey is coming off injury and wasn't very good to begin with, but the Twins have a lot of guys waiting to take that spot. Same goes for KC. Detroit, Cleveland and the Sox however do not have that kind of imminent help. Bullpen! Middle relief: 1. Kansas City 2. Minnesota 3. Cleveland 4. SOX 5. Detroit This is the hardest thing to grade out since nobody really knows. Kansas City does not just get #1 for incumbency's sake though, they have a parade of arms coming up that are all well suited for bullpen roles. So does Minnesota, who will probably stash their 6th starters on the ML roster doing relief work until someone fails/gets hurt. The Sox aggresively strengthened their pen while the Tigers have not, both could be just as bad though. Set up: 1. Kansas City 2. The Rest This is part laziness, part truth. Wade Davis is on a different planet and everyone else is just doing things. Closer: 1. Kansas City- Greg Holland 2. SOX- David Robertson 3. Minnesota- Glen Perkins 4. Cleveland- Cody Allen 5. Detroit- Joe Nathan What a difference $46 million makes! It still shocks me that Detroit is going to move forward with a player they know is a failure. Why Nathan, seriously? Even the Sox, who aren't suffering from a rapidly closing window lime Detroit is, did something there. They've done nothing about closer. Everyone else is where you'd expect them to be. Maybe KC trades Holland and Wade Davis becomes #1 on this list?

Alright! That sure was busy, 'wudnit? Probably more moves coming but it's time to look at these teams and how they compare to each other... let's go! (These rankings are totally subjective and may not be correct. b**** about them in reply). Cleveland is doing what Cleveland does. I tried to figure it out, their guys will play everywhere. Designated Hitter: 1. Detroit- Victor Martinez 2. Cleveland- Carlos Santana 3. SOX- Adam LaRoche 4. Minnesota- Kennys Vargas 5. Kansas City- Kendrys Morales Pretty obvious. Carlos Santana does more than DH (he plays 3rd like he doesn't know how) but this is where he slots. Cleveland rotates their DH, and I like that rotation more than anything in this division aside from Victor (personally I like it more than Vmart, but I'm suspending that belief here). Vargas is a guy to watch, I liked what I saw of him in 2014. Morales is a bad, bad option for Kansas City. Catcher: 1. Kansas City- Salvador Perez 2. Cleveland- Yan Gomes 3. Minnesota- Kurt Suzuki 4. Detroit- Alex Avila/James McCann 5. SOX- Tyler Flowers Detroit is going into 2015 with an open competition at the catcher position which could extend past Avila and McCann. It is likely the winner of that competition will still be better than Flowers. Not that there's anything wrong with Flowers, though. In order to get the Sox out of the basement at this position they'd have to spend more than would make any sense. First Base: 1. SOX- Jose Abreu 2. Detroit- Miguel Cabrera 3. Minnesota- Joe Mauer 4. Cleveland- Brandon Moss 5. Kansas City- Eric Hosmer Cabrera is showing some cracks while Abreu broke into the league like few have before. This might be a little aggressive but so what, Abreu is a monster and that's awesome. Mauer still is not a bad player and Moss upgrades the Tribe significantly. Hosmer could keep improving, but no power is bad power. Second Base: 1. Minnesota- Brian Dozier 2. Detroit- Ian Kinsler 3. Cleveland- Jason Kipnis 4. Kansas City- Omar Infante 5. SOX- Carlos Sanchez/Micah Johnson Yea I'm taking Dozier over Kinsler! And I'll tell you why: Kinsler is about to capital 's' Suck in 2015. I can't rank him any lower than 2 because it's not like the rest of the division is even trying, though. I'll take a Kipnis rebound over Infante. Sox get what happens when two "I guess" prospects compete for a big league spot. I hope Sanchez wins. Shortstop: 1. SOX- Alexei Ramirez 2. Detroit- Jose Iglesias 3. Kansas City- Alcides Escobar 4. Minnesota- Danny Santana 5. Cleveland- Jose Ramirez Lindor is coming to shake this thing up, by the way. Alexei is far and away the winner here, but look out for Danny Santana. The guy was awesome last year for the Twins and could make a big push very quickly. He hasn't played much SS though, so I have to keep him low. If he can prove defensively competent he's #2 right now, maybe even #1. Third Base: 1. Minnesota- Trevor Plouffe 2. Cleveland- Lonnie Chisenhall 3. SOX- Conor Gillaspie 4. Kansas City- Mike Moustakas 5. Detroit- Nick Castellanos Well if that doesn't make you feel better about Gillaspie I don't know what will. Plouffe is pretty good. The rest? I got no idea, I'm reverse ranking how bad they are. Right Field: 1. Kansas City- Lorenzo Cain 2. Tigers- JD Martinez 3. SOX- Avisail Garcia 4. Minnesota- Oswaldo Arcia 5. Cleveland- David Murphy Big potential in the (G)Arcia pair, but it's not near the level of Cain, who I assume will be in RF because of Dyson. I could be wrong there. Murphy is absolutely terrible. Center Field: 1. SOX- Adam Eaton 2. Kansas City- Jerrod Dyson 3. Detroit- Anthony Gose 4. Cleveland- Michael Bourne 5. Minnesota- Torii Hunter This is dependent somewhat on Cain in right and Brantley in left, if theyre in Center it's a dogfight for #1 and everyone moves down. Other than that none of these guys are anywhere near Eaton until proven otherwise (looking at you, Gose). I like Dyson, I don't know what Minnesota is doing. (Nyjer Morgan is gone, by the way.. so Cleveland's nothingness is better than Hunter). Left Field: 1. Cleveland- Michael Brantley 2. Kansas City- Alex Gordon 3. Detroit- Yoenis Cespedes 4. SOX- Dayan Viciedo 5. Minnesota- uhh, you can't play Willingham there. What is this? Viciedo is better than nothing! I guess!? The drop off after Cespedes is a cliff. It's pretty awesome what the rest of the division is doing keft, really hurts the Sox to be so bad. Next: pitching

KW is not out of the loop. KW is just saying things to the media because that's what KW does.

Yea that sure sounded like GM speak for "we want to trade Viciedo and find a new LF." Also, that's enough Laurence Holmes for the next year or so.

At 6:00CT

Whew.

I wouldn't be shocked if one of Shark/Sale/Q goes a little backwards, but all 3? Yea dude, that's a little pessimistic.

Because he wasn't pitching in the same capacity the White Sox have him pitching in.

In those 6.1 innings Noesi gave up an insane amount of runs. His ERA was lime 40 if I remember correctly.

I don't need to buy Moustakas or Hosmer to buy the Royals. That OF is really, really good. Alex Gordon is a stud in left, Dyson is so much more than just a pinch runner/defensive replacement and Cain is quickly becoming one of the best overall OF in the game. The bullpen is still nails and the rotation is not going to feel the loss of Shields as much as most people think. Yordano is an ace in the making and Vargas/Duffy/Finnegan/Zimmer fills them out pretty well. Escobar at short and Perez behind the plate are damn good at what they do too. If you're looking for a team to really fall apart it's the Tigers. The cracks started showing last season, I don't think they've done nearly enough to caulk that roster.

Is Diamond still around? The Sox would have the rotting hulk of the DVD combo for maximum let downs.

Upton would be quite the get.

Cuban, shown a couple flashes, power pretty good. If he had been playing in Atlanta for the last 3 years we would be all over it. We're in town stupid on Dayan Viciedo.... to an extent.

He's not as attractive at the deadline as he is now. He's a big buy low candidate. If the Sox traded for him from another team we would all be very excited.

There's a lot of people who think Viciedo will be something one day. I'm one of them.

At least Hahn gave us 24 hours to calm down before going back at it again.

If you want the Sox to be competitive in 2015 (and you better want that after the deals last night) you're gonna have to grin and bear it while guys like Montas and Rodon are rushed to the majors to fill bullpen needs and others like Micah Johnson contribute off the bench as a pinch runner. Even with Duke and Robertson the bullpen is still overall pretty bad. I don't trust Petricka, Surkamp, Putnam, Webb or Guerra to be anything. If all of them flopped (again) I would not be surprised. What then? Do the Sox just punt 2015, let Shark walk and "aw shucks" the whole season because it's more important to be delicate with a few prospects than win at the MLB level? That's stupid. I hate that line of thinking. Right now, as constructed, the Sox are on the lower end of the playoff bubble. Barring a big move that standing won't improve all that much. If it's all hands on deck to get that win here or win there that eeks them into the WC or even division then so be it. You whine and moan about not getting maximum value by handling the guys withe kid gloves in the minors, but really (especially with pitchers) you occasionally have to get whatever you can out of them right now.

I think that's a overly simplistic way of looking at it. Not every blown save results in a loss, some of those blown saves would've undoubtedly happened with Robertson anyways considering the other guys the Sox had in the pen. Conversely, I don't think WAR tells the true tale of how colossal an upgrade this is for the team. If he has a year like he had last year and this year's Sox team is more or less equal to last year's team elsewhere the Sox improve much more than WAR would indicate. Maybe 80 wins? Maybe some of those demoralizing losses go away and the team avoids some of the tailspins they went through last year? Still not all the way there to get into the postseason, but definitely closer.

Both of the teams in the World Series this year got approx 20 HR out of their 2B- SS and 3B in 2014. Giants maybe a little over because Crawford has a little pop.