1 minute ago, Chicago White Sox said:

But they have waves upon waves of prospects and nowhere to play half these guys.  Assuming Holiday is at SS and Henderson is at 3B, what are they doing at 2B?  If it’s Westburg, then where does Ortiz & Norby fit in?  Ortiz is going to be 26 next year and hasn’t proven a damn thing in the majors.  They also have an OF prospect in Stowers who turns 26 in a month and is ready for a shot but will not see one given there are three major league starters in place and two high end prospects chomping at the bit in Cowser & Kjerstad.  They simply don’t need all these guys even if they have financial limitations.  Cash in some of them and fill holes while you still have these young studs under team control.  Ruschman is as good as gone after the 2027 season and they need to be a bit more aggressive if they want to fully take advantage of this four year window.

Feel like they gotta open with Ortiz at SS, if he isn’t part of a trade package for a SP.

3 minutes ago, Bob Sacamano said:

Feel like they gotta open with Ortiz at SS, if he isn’t part of a trade package for a SP.

I think they go with Westburg at 2B, which makes Ortiz and/or Norby very expandable. 

33 minutes ago, fathom said:

Or they let the veterans go knowing they have cheap replacements on the way.

But that doesn’t help their thin rotation. 

38 minutes ago, fathom said:

Or they let the veterans go knowing they have cheap replacements on the way.

That doesn't get them the pitching they need tho. 

No one is trading anything of value at the SP position for Santander or Hays. Both are projected around 2 WAR, one of them is actually gonna prolly earn around 12m in 24 in arb so there's little SV to use as a trade chip.

 

 

 

3 hours ago, fathom said:

Reds are supposedly out, as they found the asking price to be insane 

That often means a deal is getting close.

41 minutes ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

Right.  They won 101 games last year and still have a young up and coming team.  They don't have to do a damn thing.  

They don’t, but then they will have to be content with another ALDS exit because their pitching is not playoff caliber, let alone World Series caliber.

1 hour ago, Tnetennba said:

Santander is a fan favorite and is likely worth more to them than he is in trade. Even good young teams need to have veterans around. They can't trade away every vet and expect to fill their holes with talent equal to their prospects.

The Rays do and it works for them. 

If these teams are going to be cheap they need to use the Rays as a model. Never trade prospects, keep trading vets in arb 2 or arb 3 for prospects. 

As long as the players are paid much less than vets then this is how it's going to work. Leave the vets for the Dodgers/NY teams. 

Edited December 23, 20232 yr by baseball_gal_aly

Maybe the Sox realize they actually need to keep Cease to avoid one of the worst records in baseball history. You gotta admit that pitching staff is really bad even with Cease. Without him, cmon do the Sox wanna win in the 40s to low 50s?

30 minutes ago, greg775 said:

Maybe the Sox realize they actually need to keep Cease to avoid one of the worst records in baseball history. You gotta admit that pitching staff is really bad even with Cease. Without him, cmon do the Sox wanna win in the 40s to low 50s?

With our without Cease, this roster is brutal, but it's not going to lose 120 games. It's a 90-100 loss team.

36 minutes ago, baseball_gal_aly said:

The Rays do and it works for them. 

If these teams are going to be cheap they need to use the Rays as a model. Never trade prospects, keep trading vets in arb 2 or arb 3 for prospects. 

As long as the players are paid much less than vets then this is how it's going to work. Leave the vets for the Dodgers/NY teams. 

The Rays are a fucking unicorn. How many other teams successfully do what the Rays do?

Cleveland trades away veterans when they are about to get expensive. How often is Cleveland a legit threat to win anything but the shitty AL Central?

How has that worked out for AZ, Colorado, Cincy, The Marlins, The A's, etc etc over the years?

3 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

The Rays are a fucking unicorn. How many other teams successfully do what the Rays do?

Cleveland trades away veterans when they are about to get expensive. How often is Cleveland a legit threat to win anything but the shitty AL Central?

How has that worked out for AZ, Colorado, Cincy, The Marlins, The A's, etc etc over the years?

The A's seem to have made the playoffs a number of times though haven't they?

19 minutes ago, Lip Man 1 said:

The A's seem to have made the playoffs a number of times though haven't they?

While true, I wouldn't say they operate with the same success as the Rays.

51 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

While true, I wouldn't say they operate with the same success as the Rays.

The A's model seems to be lose for 4-5 seasons, win for 2. Starting in 2008, the Rays had 6 winning, 4 losing, and are on 6 winning, again. 

33 minutes ago, WestEddy said:

The A's model seems to be lose for 4-5 seasons, win for 2. Starting in 2008, the Rays had 6 winning, 4 losing, and are on 6 winning, again. 

Before being run into the ground by ownership, the A's seemed much more random in their up and down years. Outside of the Moneyball era, they can't hold a candle to how the Rays operate. That's my general point. Few teams can pull off what the Rays do year after year and remain relevant in a tough division.

4 hours ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

Right.  They won 101 games last year and still have a young up and coming team.  They don't have to do a damn thing.  

How very 2022 White Sox of them!

3 hours ago, Tnetennba said:

The Rays are a fucking unicorn. How many other teams successfully do what the Rays do?

Cleveland trades away veterans when they are about to get expensive. How often is Cleveland a legit threat to win anything but the shitty AL Central?

How has that worked out for AZ, Colorado, Cincy, The Marlins, The A's, etc etc over the years?

Brewers...at least until now.

58 minutes ago, CWSpalehoseCWS said:

How very 2022 White Sox of them!

Orioles 2X or 3x as deep at this same point in their respective windows.

Sox used almost all vets relievers and bench players to get over the finish line and it was a total disaster.

In the process, they traded or lost Rodon Anderson Hendriks Dunning Madrigal Heuer Giolito Burger, etc.

Edited December 24, 20232 yr by caulfield12

4 minutes ago, caulfield12 said:

Orioles 2X or 3x as deep at this same point in their respective windows.

Sox used almost all vets relievers and bench players to get over the finish line and it was a total disaster.

In the process, they traded or lost Rodon Anderson Hendriks Dunning Madrigal Heuer Giolito Burger, etc.

Doesn't matter how deep they are. You don't win if you don't supplement outside of your organization. No farm is perfect.

4 hours ago, spiderman said:

With our without Cease, this roster is brutal, but it's not going to lose 120 games. It's a 90-100 loss team.

Wow, 90 losses isn't that bad with this roster. Not nuff for me to renew my mlb.com though. I'm turning into a fair weather fan. I'll pay close attention if our record tells me the Sox are a .500 team. If we go 2-10 to open the season, I, like most of the once great city of Chicago will be tuned out 100 percent.

4 hours ago, spiderman said:

With our without Cease, this roster is brutal, but it's not going to lose 120 games. It's a 90-100 loss team.

They lost 101 last year and look worse. That’s before a Cease deal.

4 minutes ago, Bob Sacamano said:

They lost 101 last year and look worse. That’s before a Cease deal.

Sure, that's possible, but it's really hard to be that bad. The White Sox appear capable, but I would guess that they will be somewhere north of 90 losses, but probably not back to back 100 loss seasons. The roster does look very bad though so I don't rule out underestimating the bad here.

Trade Cease and sign Bauer.  Media hellstorm but it makes the team better.  The fans are already pissed off.  Maybe you can flip Bauer at the deadline for a similar haul

7 minutes ago, Nokona said:

Trade Cease and sign Bauer.  Media hellstorm but it makes the team better.  The fans are already pissed off.  Maybe you can flip Bauer at the deadline for a similar haul

Didn't work well getting anything for Clevinger despite his being the best pitcher.

5 hours ago, Tnetennba said:

The Rays are a fucking unicorn. How many other teams successfully do what the Rays do?

Cleveland trades away veterans when they are about to get expensive. How often is Cleveland a legit threat to win anything but the shitty AL Central?

How has that worked out for AZ, Colorado, Cincy, The Marlins, The A's, etc etc over the years?

I'm gonna beat this drum to death, especially since Glasnow said it, but the Dodgers are just the Rays with cash. And it makes sense since Friedman put both systems in place.

They didn't sign free agents for their sustained run until Freeman. If the Rays actually extended players, they'd be the Dodgers.

Reinsdorf thinks that this is a bad model, for some reason.

10 minutes ago, Quin said:

I'm gonna beat this drum to death, especially since Glasnow said it, but the Dodgers are just the Rays with cash. And it makes sense since Friedman put both systems in place.

They didn't sign free agents for their sustained run until Freeman. If the Rays actually extended players, they'd be the Dodgers.

Reinsdorf thinks that this is a bad model, for some reason.

With the exception of the insane revenue that allows LAD to sign seven hundred million dollar contracts.