3 hours ago, fathom said:

Agreed about not liking Roch at 2nd. Still think he ends up at SS and Colson at 3b. I keep saying that in a perfect world, having 7 of your 9 starters locked in with Mune (1b/DH), Vargas (1b/3b/dh), Colson, Roch, Antonacci (2B/LF), Bonemer (LF/2B) and Teel is an amazing start.

Braden?

2 hours ago, KennyPowers said:

There’s a world where Braden is the best of all of them. IMO

If dude learns to hit the ball in the air more regularly, look out.

4 hours ago, DirtySox said:

I can't imagine what this scenario would have looked like if Hahn/Williams were still steering this ship. Kudos to Getz and his team to being so open and transparent in this process. It's an awesome look.

Yes it's good to see they are open and not super insular. Props to Getz.

This was a great article.

24 minutes ago, CBJ03 said:

They didn't agree on the financials until Saturday morning. They were still unsure about the final price.

Financials have nothing to do with what I’m trying to say. Roch said the Sox told him he would be their pick on Thursday. The first paragraph of this article says the Sox weren’t fully decided as of Friday afternoon. Something doesn’t add up.

12 minutes ago, SoxBlanco said:

Financials have nothing to do with what I’m trying to say. Roch said the Sox told him he would be their pick on Thursday. The first paragraph of this article says the Sox weren’t fully decided as of Friday afternoon. Something doesn’t add up.

"They expressed Thursday night that they wanted me to be the guy, and they knew I wanted to be there, I felt like things definitely got a lot easier," Cholowsky said.

Not that this isn't all theater anyway when you allow this type of "access" in a hyper-insular and competitive environment but it does make this particular detail pretty funny.

3 hours ago, fathom said:

Agreed about not liking Roch at 2nd. Still think he ends up at SS and Colson at 3b. I keep saying that in a perfect world, having 7 of your 9 starters locked in with Mune (1b/DH), Vargas (1b/3b/dh), Colson, Roch, Antonacci (2B/LF), Bonemer (LF/2B) and Teel is an amazing start.

It's amazing they have hit on all these controlled young position players.

At some point things are gonna get crowded as Mune and Vargas get closer to FA and Bonemer and Cholowsky are up.

There's also the Antonacci/Meidroth issue at 2B. With Colson likely moving to 3B due to back issues at some point, there's a crunch where at some point they will need to sell high on someone because there's only so many spots when Bonemer/Cholowsky comes up. Beni coming off the books after next year will help but there still will be a crunch.

With regard to Peters while there almost certainly will be offensive regression, he provides so much defensive value (OAA etc) there's still a good chance he is a long term 2 WAR player there even if the vast majority of it comes from D and given Getz emphasis on premium defenders up the middle even with a fall off offensively I don't think he is going anywhere especially since he will be cost controlled until he hits his early 30s so if they can get a premium defender for a long time without having to worry about an extension, I don't think they are gonna mess with that and it was nice to see them get another potential premium defensive CF in the draft, who even though the bat is a big project, we have many years to wait for that now.

They really have done a great job with the trades/drafting for position players and development. And if Wikelman Gonzalez becomes a key piece of the BP, they could potentially get close to 10 WAR a year from those 4 players in the BOS trade which is insane.

Edited yesterday at 09:33 PM1 day by SoCalChiSox

I find it fascinating that people think you can play 3rd base with a bad back but not SS. Last I checked, you can't play baseball with a bad back.

11 minutes ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

"They expressed Thursday night that they wanted me to be the guy, and they knew I wanted to be there, I felt like things definitely got a lot easier," Cholowsky said.

Not that this isn't all theater anyway when you allow this type of "access" in a hyper-insular and competitive environment but it does make this particular detail pretty funny.

Yeah, I think “theater” is a great way to put it. I feel like these conversions actually did happen over the past week, but perhaps they recreated them for the ESPN access.

Not trying to knock the Sox for it, but it’s kind of funny. Either way, I enjoyed the article because the thoughts/opinions expressed by our staff were still real.

3 minutes ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

I find it fascinating that people think you can play 3rd base with a bad back but not SS. Last I checked, you can't play baseball with a bad back.

Worst case scenario he can DH although he would lose much of his value but still there's always room somewhere for someone who is likely to hit over 30 bombs a year from the left side and can also provide probably league average OBP (that's where he was at before this recent slide when it dipped).

6 minutes ago, SoCalChiSox said:

Worst case scenario he can DH although he would lose much of his value but still there's always room somewhere for someone who is likely to hit over 30 bombs a year from the left side and can also provide probably league average OBP (that's where he was at before this recent slide when it dipped).

In my opinion, if anything baseball related is causing the back issue it's his violent swing. Not playing defense.

21 minutes ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

I find it fascinating that people think you can play 3rd base with a bad back but not SS. Last I checked, you can't play baseball with a bad back.

I have been wondering that as well. I don't think 3B will be any better on one's back than SS.

3 minutes ago, Bob Sacamano said:

I have been wondering that as well. I don't think 3B will be any better on one's back than SS.

As someone with a bad lower back, playing any defense with a bad back is tough. I've never had issues swinging even with the bad lower back, but defense and base running is always what made it flare up. I think there's less lateral movement needed at 3B so it might be a bit easier on the back than SS, where you have to cover more ground and maybe extend your back a bit more to reach for grounders. I can definitely see Colson's recent bad defensive play on mostly routine grounders as some kind of pain tolerance issue. Where reaching down might bother him and it's causing him to lose focus on routine plays he usually makes.

Edited 23 hours ago23 hr by chw42

4 hours ago, fathom said:

Agreed about not liking Roch at 2nd. Still think he ends up at SS and Colson at 3b. I keep saying that in a perfect world, having 7 of your 9 starters locked in with Mune (1b/DH), Vargas (1b/3b/dh), Colson, Roch, Antonacci (2B/LF), Bonemer (LF/2B) and Teel is an amazing start.

Peters and Braden aren't bad candidates to round out your 9.

Carlos Rodriguez and Barfield weren't quoted...but they were/have been cited by Shirley and others during those All Access Fri interview nights.

10 hours ago, Tony said:

This really was a great article, and props to the Sox for letting Jesse have that kind of access. That takes a very willing organization to be OK with that, and credit to the FO office and the marketing team for allowing that to take place, otherwise we obviously don't get this piece.

The org is doing things the right way process wise for the first time in a long time. Maybe since the late 90s, including the media side of things and fan service.

4 hours ago, SoxBlanco said:

Financials have nothing to do with what I’m trying to say. Roch said the Sox told him he would be their pick on Thursday. The first paragraph of this article says the Sox weren’t fully decided as of Friday afternoon. Something doesn’t add up.

Telling him and keeping the door open for a last minute change are not mutually exclusive

6 minutes ago, SkokieSox said:

Telling him and keeping the door open for a last minute change are not mutually exclusive

The article wasn’t about “keeping the door open”. It was about the discussion that took place to determine who to select.

It’s not a big deal. I just thought it was amusing. Like I said before, I’m not trying to knock the Sox in any way. I thought it was a very cool article.

I cant believe the Sox granted permission with no restrictions to report on this. Not sure I've seen anything like that before in sports given the situation. Love it though.

10 hours ago, bmags said:

I really would like to know the sports performance convo around Thome.

Jerry told Getz that he's drafting Thome or he is gone. As simple as that.

4 hours ago, SoCalChiSox said:

Worst case scenario he can DH although he would lose much of his value but still there's always room somewhere for someone who is likely to hit over 30 bombs a year from the left side and can also provide probably league average OBP (that's where he was at before this recent slide when it dipped).

4 hours ago, chw42 said:

As someone with a bad lower back, playing any defense with a bad back is tough. I've never had issues swinging even with the bad lower back, but defense and base running is always what made it flare up. I think there's less lateral movement needed at 3B so it might be a bit easier on the back than SS, where you have to cover more ground and maybe extend your back a bit more to reach for grounders. I can definitely see Colson's recent bad defensive play on mostly routine grounders as some kind of pain tolerance issue. Where reaching down might bother him and it's causing him to lose focus on routine plays he usually makes.

I’ve thought for awhile, if it’s really a back issue, that Colson might end up at 1st, not 3rd. Less straining to field, straighten, and throw.

12 hours ago, chitownsportsfan said:

The org is doing things the right way process wise for the first time in a long time. Maybe since the late 90s, including the media side of things and fan service.

I agree. Not sure if it was Getz, Ishbia, or someone else, but something has seemingly snapped them into doing things that are relevant to the decade they are actually in, and it's very refreshing.

13 hours ago, chitownsportsfan said:

The org is doing things the right way process wise for the first time in a long time. Maybe since the late 90s, including the media side of things and fan service.

19 minutes ago, Tony said:

I agree. Not sure if it was Getz, Ishbia, or someone else, but something has seemingly snapped them into doing things that are relevant to the decade they are actually in, and it's very refreshing.

Getting rid of both Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn was the important first step in the process. The organization had fallen flat on its face under their leadership, which was made worse by them being in conflict with each other. That was a total shitshow.

12 minutes ago, 77 Hitmen said:

Getting rid of both Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn was the important first step in the process. The organization had fallen flat on its face under their leadership, which was made worse by them being in conflict with each other. That was a total shitshow.

The real change was waking Jerry up. For the first time in his life, he is willing to spend on something outside of the major league roster. There are all kinds of stories out there about other people in the org hinting that they wanted to do more, and acting like they were doing more, which ended up being complete lies sold to us by a compliant local media, including even Getz himself talking about how much freedom he had to do anything he wanted. Hopefully this continues.

18 hours ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

I find it fascinating that people think you can play 3rd base with a bad back but not SS. Last I checked, you can't play baseball with a bad back.

It's less physically demanding to play 3000+ outs a year at 3rd than SS. In a sport where guys get injured jogging to first base, you might want to take some precautionary measures to preserve your superstars' careers, particularly when you have good alternatives. We've seen Colson's defense take a dip after sitting with a 'strained back' last month, his OAA has dropped from +9 to +5 in that time. He's 24-years-old now, how is that defense going to look when he's 29 and how is the strain going to affect his bat or ability to even play games?

I'm still of the mind that Colson inevitably ends up at 1B and I think it's more fascinating that people are writing off Carlson/want to trade him prematurely when he's the best defender in the system with a potentially non-useless bat.

4 hours ago, nrockway said:

I'm still of the mind that Colson inevitably ends up at 1B and I think it's more fascinating that people are writing off Carlson/want to trade him prematurely when he's the best defender in the system with a potentially non-useless bat.

It’s simply a matter of prospect capital IMO. In our revised top 10 we have one fringe level starting pitcher but we also have 6 shortstops / infielders.

Pretty obvious that we use our position of strength and match up with another organization that is similarly deep with pitching options.

May it be Carlson or someone else, the only truly untouchable guys in our lower ranks are likely Roch and Thome. I could see them dealing anyone else, including Bonemer, if the right offer come along.

It’s rare an arm would present itself that requires him… whereas I think it’s more likely that we match up with a team who is offering a pitcher that has value to match Billy better.