Nardiwashere

I wish they would have brought in someone else (or at least interviewed outside candidates)... but I'm willing to give him a shot. I'm not sure how much I blame Getz for the prior front office's failures. I definitely am giving him a shorter leash than someone who has no ties to the previous front office... but I'll give him at least a year or two. I've liked a lot of what he's done this offseason and I like the idea of Bannister doing what he's doing.

I don't mind this trade at all. We didn't get a super high end guy but it seems fair. Everyone was saying 2 top 100 guys plus a lotto ticket seemed reasonable. They ended up with one guy who is a definite top 100 guy and two borderline top 100 guys plus a reliever they can flip in a few months. To me, that feels equivalent. Kind of like a hybrid between a quality and quantity trade. It sounds like its entirely possible that all 3 guys end up being top 100 in near future... and that isn't even counting what you get from Wilson. If they got Kjersted, Ortiz, and a lotto ticket in December everyone would have been content (including myself). From all accounts that deal was never possible. I kind of prefer what they ultimately got... at the very least, its a wash. That deal had the risk of being being two 26 year old who end up as a 1b and a utility player. Even though we don't have anyone coming back as highly rated as Kjersted, I think this deal is more interesting. I cant remember a time that the team had so many viable SP options. Usually they have a few high ceiling prospects and 4 other dudes. There's like 15-18 guys I can see being in the rotation in the next 2 years (although not a ton of ace potential guys). Would I have preferred a highly touted can't miss LH slugger who is a lock to stick in the corner OF? Yeah. But I can't understand anyone saying they will be bad for 4-5 years in this thread and on twitter. A large segment of the fanbase is just pouting because the Hahn rebuild failed. Its over. That pisses me off too... But move on. They have a lot of money off the books (or coming off the books) and the bones are there for the next good team in about a year and a half.

So you're saying they originally planned to get ISFA money to help build at the racetrack but since a significant portion of the board is appointed by the Mayor of Chicago, they would not get those funds unless they stayed within the city limits? Were they unaware of this when they purchased the Arlington site? Still.... if you're only moving next door and not getting new revenue streams, why bother building a new stadium at all? Seems like a waste of time and resources.

Here is what I don't understand about the Bears- The reason they would want to move to Arlington Heights is because they would own their own stadium and surrounding land and be able to profit off of the new development surrounding the park (hotels, bars, etc.). Let's say they do build a stadium next door on the existing parking lot.... they remain merely a tenant and there can't be any new commercial development on the lakefront site. What's the upside? Spending a billion dollars for a domed stadium with a little more seating capacity that you use a dozen times a year (at most)? If the new stadium hosts a Super Bowl or has more events, why would the Bears care? They aren't making anything off of that, right? The current soldier field is only 20 years old and seems fine to me every time I go. That isn't even taking the fans' complaints about difficulty of getting to the stadium into account... those issues would still exist.

I'm willing to give Getz and the new front office the benefit of the doubt on these deals for a little bit. I assume they are clearing out guys they don't love or targeting guys they like. Its not like they are trading Montgomery for a bullpen arm. To me, it seems like its a swap of similar guys. We obviously like Horn better and the Cubs needed space on their roster.

Planning to build a stadium and the construction takes years. Are they only allowed to begin the process when they are over .500? What if they started this process back when they made the playoffs? When they got bad, should they have scrapped the whole thing? For all we know, the team will be awesome when this park is completed. They have an expiring lease. Its ridiculous to say they can't figure out where they will be playing because the team has been disappointing the last couple of years.

You could have a couple 100 seater boats make trips before and after the games and move a decent number of people, no? If they were Sox branded boats, that would be really cool haha.

Prices are already silly and people still go. In recent years, I've been to games in Philly and Miami. The prices in Philly were no different than Sox and Miami was actually shockingly cheap. When I went to Citi Field, it was a little pricier but that's probably mostly because its in NYC. Its funny... I never hear these people worry about keeping payroll down so blue collar fans aren't alienated when prices increase due to increased expenses.

The new one I'm seeing is that moving parks will drive away the blue collar fans. No idea why this would happen.

Yup.. the increase in time to get to the new site isn't significant. I live near the new site and if I jump on an el or take an uber, I can get there door to door in 10 minutes or less most of the time. Here's another thing. I imagine a ton of Sox fans live along the orange line route. I had a paralegal who worked for me and she would go to like 10-15 games a year with her family and friends and roll like 25 deep each time. People like that are going to be able to easily jump on the train instead of being forced to drive. The only thing this park wont have is the tailgating, which essentially became popular because there was nothing else to do near the current park. If you gave Cub fans the choice of wrigleyville or tailgating, do you think they'd prefer tailgating? Last time I went to get drinks after a game I was just standing on the sidewalk outside of Turtles/Cork and it was pathetic. We ended up just taking an uber to Weathermark Tavern, which is kind of near the new site.

Sox fans are a weird bunch. Practically my whole life, people bitched about the current stadium. Now, they are planning to build a ballpark that looks like it would be one of the premier sports venues in the entire country and a large segment of Sox fans suddenly fell in love with the current park. Today on the radio, Laurence Holmes was making a huge deal that it only takes him 8 minutes to get to the Sox game now. The new park will take him 18 minutes he said. This was supposed to be damning evidence against having a beautiful new stadium. The new site is near all the major highways. It will have access to a metra, red, green, orange CTA lines. It will be accessible by water taxi. It will be walkable for a whole bunch of people who live and work nearby. And yes... it will have parking. It will be built in an up and coming area. It will have great views. It will be near a ton of bars and restaurants. It will include a super cool park/green space for people to hang out. The park will undoubtedly have better seating. It will have better bathrooms. It will have better food options. It will also end the "Will the Sox move to [insert mid-market city]?" discussions that pop up here every once in a while. It should inject some life into the organization and allow them to invest more money into the club in the future. Most importantly, it will most likely be a much more enjoyable place for fans to go for a game. I love going to New Comiskey... but come on, this is going to be so much better.

I'm shocked I keep seeing guys on twitter upset that this doesn't have a roof. Who the hell wants a roof?

Anyone else remember after the ballpark shooting when he was tweeting the name of the poor accountant that set up the LLC associated with ballpark security because he was listed as agent on the Secretary of State website? After implying that guy bore responsibility for security, he had to backtrack once someone told him that being listed as agent of an LLC doesn't mean what he thought. He's constantly jumping the gun and pretending to be an expert in things he knows nothing about. There is no way these professionals and the city have gotten this far and just forgot to account for parking or traffic. A few cool renderings with no further context don't tell the whole story. Will parking ultimately be adequate? Who knows... but any freakout is premature.

Nelson and PNoles are unlikable weirdos. Its not just negativity. Its the whininess and the arrogance and the fact that they try to be negative no matter what. If I want to read Fegan, will I need to give those dopes $ thru their Patreon?

Hopefully the Cards understand they have agreed to provide daycare services in perpetuity for Middleton's children and any children he has in the future.

What a pathetic return.

Do you guys think underground parking is possible here or is it too difficult with the river? When I was at Miami's new ballpark a year or so ago, they had parking garages. I feel like that would be miserable to leave a game and then be stuck in a parking garage when everyone is leaving at the same time.

Holmes wasn't making much sense. First he acts like, "its only 2 El stops away, what's the big deal?" and then acts like moving 2 El stops north is abandoning the south side. This is just on the other side of Chinatown. He also said he was uncomfortable how fast this was moving. How does he know how fast it has moved? For all we know, they have been discussing this forever.

Didn’t these guys have Montgomery #2 at the end of last year?

That's the river. Then across river, those are more train tracks.

I wonder if McDonalds or Walgreens are so big and ubiquitous, its not worth it to purchase the naming rights to a stadium. My favorite was the period of time when the park was named US Cellular but you couldn't get US Cellular in Illinois because it like left the market or something.

I absolutely love that a predictive stat is not relevant to predicting which 4th starters will be better next year and the most important thing to look at is whether they were a qualified pitcher last year.

I agree with Sports Guy. That list didn't account for all the teams with #4 starters better than him but #1 and #2 starters worse than him.

Poor @Squirmin' for Yermin spends an hour on that only to be gaslit.

Its really the perfect spot for it. Suburban fans can come in on the metra and take a water taxi on a nice summer day. Its super easy for people working in the loop to go to the game after work. You have the Roosevelt CTA station nearby and they will put in a new red line stop around Clark and 15th/16th. I assume they'll figure a way to make car traffic work. When all is said and done, the riverwalk will extend all the way down to Chinatown. Let's say a tourist is in town for a convention... it would be a real easy thing for them to head over to the ballpark. Plus, my balcony overlooks the site.