Con te Giolito

The Sox will probably still be better on paper than a few of the tanking NL teams by virtue of Rodon, Abreu and Anderson alone. BUT, the Sox wont face an NL schedule. Sox are in the ultra-competitive AL where the only other teams that could even be considered rebuilding are the Twins who badly want to start winning, the A's where Beane is up to god knows what and the Yankees who still hand out $80m contracts while they rebuild. The Reds and Brewers have to play each other 19 times a year, and they have series against the Braves, Padres and Phillies to boot. When these horrible teams play each other someone has to win, that's what keeps these AAA rosters from breaking loss records. The bilge of the NL is kind of like a self-sustaining organism that keeps anyone from losing too much. No such thing in the AL. The rest of the AL is going to run train on the poor White Sox without mercy. Especially the division where the Twins want to forget 2016 ever happened, the Tigers are going to make another run at it with this core, the Royals are still in their window and the Indians are coming off losing game 7 of the WS in extras. That's 76 games and it is going to be a bloodbath. The loss record is in sight if the Sox keep making trades. I for one hope they dont make history but #1 overall in 2018 sure would be nice.

Start thinking about the Sox starting rotation without Quintana and there will be plentttyyyy of innings to go around in the bullpen. But yea, that's a valid point. Personally I'd be more on the side of getting your Ken Giles deal now for Nate Jones and holding Robertson for a rebound. Jones' health still worries me.

Yea Plaschke for one has been saying for weeks it was BS. I token of appreciation for Fisher putting up with the move and all the upheaval. I'm a little surprised they didnt wait until the offseason to "go a different direction" and instead just humiliated his ass with only a few weeks to go, but that game against Atlanta was ugggly. Seattle at home, pissed off on a short week with a new HC is going to be another beat down too but at least they'll have an excuse for that one.

Just hold Robertson. I have a feeling he's got a rack up a ton of garbage time innings where teams just want to go home after already pasting a hapless Sox starter (assuming Q is dealt) and have nearly the same value the Yankees duo had this past season. If Rizzo has malfunction and actually offers Robles for him sure, go ahead and make that deal but barring an unrealistically stupid offer there's no point in dealing Robertson right now.

Not surprised. That extension thing was never for real.

I really dont see the point in doing that with Diaz or Burdi. For one that 5% chance that NSS alluded to feels even less than 5% when it comes to those two. I also dont know how much better they can get at locating 100 mph fastballs, their primary asset as players, if they are racking up starters pitch counts in the minors. I dont see much room for them in the rotation in Birmingham or Charlotte anyways.

I still think Frazier gets dealt, but man the Dodgers had a lot of very interesting prospects at many levels, many positions and many points on the value scale. There were a lot of different kinds of deals the Sox could've made with the Dodgers that I would have liked. I dont feel the same way about the Cardinals or Colorado.

Also Kwiatkowski has more than held his own and Deiondre Hall was drawing rave reviews before getting hurt. Even the 2015 draft has given the Bears two starters and a change-of-pace back. I mean White and Grasu both seem like busts but that happens. The free agent signings have been terrific. Usually dont get the kind of play out of the free agents that the Bears have from Freeman, Hicks and McPhee.

Yea but there have been reports out of Japan that "it is about game" and that he'll come over anyways. http://sports.yahoo.com/news/shohei-otani-...-195230684.html

The Giants had interest in him until they signed Melancon. Other than that his market appeared to dry up and he went back to the Dodgers. I know he's 31 and WAR isn't perfect but he did put up a 5.6 fWAR in 2016 and now he's "only" getting like $18m per. Teams just aren't out there looking for 3B right now.

OK that makes a little more sense than just hunting for value to the detriment of a guy's future. I'm guessing this practice is going to get out of style a little more as there are a lot fewer places to put these guys into starting rotations than there was a week ago.

I dont know what this guy's market is anymore. There may be teams interested but they wont be fighting with each other over him and without the Dodgers the Sox dont have a desperate buyer to leverage. May have to wait until injuries hit during the season and sell him then.

If anything the AL may be a better landing spot for him because his bat can play DH on off-days. Or maybe the NL is better because of double switches and pinch hitting. Or maybe Otani cant pinch hit. Or maybe he cant hit at all and this two-way player nonsense is just the same "mysterious talent from the orient with an historic, one-of-a-kind gamebreaking skill" myth that the gyroball was. The issue isn't money, they most he can make from the Sox is $4.75m (and Sox will not be players at all in LatAm for a year). Most he can get from anybody is $5.75m from the small market teams. So he'll go where he just wants to go.

Pace has actually done a pretty good job in the draft and FA why the hell would you get rid of him already?

So the Dodgers wanted to keep Hill, Jansen and Turner and it looks like they'll do just that. You think they decide to get a little aggressive now that they've accomplished their goals? Maybe jump into the Quintana derby? Just pure speculation by me but bringing back the same team as last year while the Cubs and Nationals get better doesn't seem like a recipe for breaking through and winning the pennant.

I like the Victor Diaz stuff. Pretty cool to have two 100 mph RHP in the minors that soley project as relievers. I've always maintained that a chief problem with the Sox in the last half decade has been their manic development of pitchers. Montas who wasn't durable enough to start was forced to keep starting games because that's where the value is, whereas someone like Fulmer who at least deserved a crack at starting was rushed the bigs as a reliever. And all of it was subject to change at a moment's notice depending on the needs of the big league club. This issue conspired with the total lack of pitching depth and the bullpen became an absolute mess. You can tell the Sox realize this with Hostetler's comments about keeping Burdi and Diaz as relievers and the admission that they rushed a lot of guys. I doubt strongly we see anyone called up before Independence Day regardless of minor league performance.

So the CBA wont be modified for him but he seems to be coming anyways. Interest level here should be high, and it'll be weird to see who he picks when money cant be the deciding factor.

Joel Sherman has it sounding like the Turner deal is all but done. No idea what is going on with Jansen. Looks pretty likely that the Sox will not get a crack at any of the Dodgers farm system.