Leaderboard

https://twitter.com/JRFegan/status/1298042605490536452 apparently Madrigal is going to pull a "Henry Rowengartner" and come back with elite power.

Yes, depending on how much he struggles. But 1B/DH next year is pretty clearly Abreu/Vaughn, and I don't think they're going to spend on a temporary DH so that Vaughn can get ready. If he can put up a 90 wRC+ or better this year, let's say, I think he'd start up in MLB next year. That said, I don't expect him to struggle, he's just too polished and talented. I think he's going to blow everyone away, and I think he has been MLB-ready since the day he was drafted.

For those interested - Vaughn would accrue about 95 days of service time if he debuted Tuesday and stayed up through the end of the season. To not exceed a full year of service time between 2020 & 2021 he would need to stay in the minors close to 80 days in 2021.

In a normal year this would have been his A to AAA season even if he had hit out of his ass anyways. The kid has a total of 245 MiLB ABs, none above A ball. In no sense of the words are the Sox "holding him down", even if he debuts next May or June.

Hopefully he pitches on Tuesday

I don't know who that was, but if Stiever was hurt so bad that he had to switch to pitching lefty that's a bad sign.

I don't think Castellanos is a trade candidate.

Yes, someone who will not have even appeared in a game above A ball going into 2021 is going to lead the Rays to a World Series title. What is old about the Dodgers? They have a top tier farm system with an elite MLB product.. No idea where you see them falling off. They literally have no where for Garvin Lux to play currently and you're calling them not deep ha

I never understand why most people defend the Chapman trade. Why do people assume the Cubs couldn't win the WS without him when they were already the best team in baseball before they got him. Even more stupid is the fact that he blew 3 saves during the playoffs yet people think he was essential just because he pitched some scoreless innings. Chapmans performance could have easily been replicated by other bullpen arms they had. Chapman rental was not worth trading away the career of someone like Gleybar Torres.

The infatuation with Castellanos has become a parody of itself. This team already has 5 DHs on it.

Sad, I'm putting u on ignore. Hate to do it but I must. The others I've put on ignore have helped me be more civil. I've now got 3 on ignore and life is better.

Not that there is anything wrong with that.

@Jose Abreu hitting bombs on Soxtalk as well as the diamond. Vaughn is ready to run now. Big paws on a puppy.

Lol who would give anything for him, are you guys serious

You're making a different point. I'm not saying "winning trades" is more important than winning the World Series (who would ever say that?) I'm talking about the question of whether, in retrospect, the Chapman trade was strictly necessary to win the World Series, i.e. could they have won without him. Maybe yes, maybe no, we'll never know -- though it's interesting to debate.

Mhmmm. I was not ready to throw in the towel on Rodon this past offseason, but I am now fairly certain his days as a Sox are over after 2020. If we get a little bit of use out of him in the pen later on this season, great. But he's a definite non-tender following 2020 at this point.

Thank you. This “well, they won so it worked” story is too-easily-accepted conventional wisdom.

If the Sox already know that Mazara and Encarnacion won’t be part of 2021, then DFA both now, and bring up Madrigal and Vaughn. They’re in the playoffs either way in an asterisk season. Vaughn is a special hitter. He was drafted 3rd as a righty 1b for a reason- he can mash.

Hard pass on trying to acquire Castellanos. Guys, we need to play defense. Eloy and Castellanos are two of the worst in the game. Just say no - our defense would be locked in horrible through 2023.

FWIW Stoney has tweeted lately he doesn’t think they will be looking to trade any of the prospects.

If they do anything, it has to be a positive for 2021-23. If it’s not, do nothing.

Meh. 2 top 20-30 type prospects in the game? Close-ish to what Sox got for Sale, though obviously Moncada a little more elite. I think if the third piece was someone like Dalquist, it could definitely be enough. Not sure I'd do it, though.

Also you should rarely trade for a hitter that plays in Texas. The field is like a concrete parking lot and balls race through the infield. Great hitters park. Trade for Texas pitchers that have to pitch there that are pretty good.

Is there a poster named ron?

Welcome to FriarTalk

Abreu hits HR in 4 consecutive at bats. Ron: Abreu is the first Sox player ever to fail in his attempt to hit 5 consecutive HRs.

I like how Jose — a ROY, 2x Silver Slugger, and 3x All-Star — having a good season is so unfathomable to you that you have to interject steroids into the story line, yet you believe a career minor leaguer at age 27 is some super slugger extraordiare.

What a ridiculous post. You should be ashamed. Gmafb.

Babe Ruth's first few games in the majors have shown exactly what we should have expected from him: An interesting pitching prospect that really can't hit. As I write this Ruth has been involved in 17 chances and yielded only 3 safeties. His thunderous swing has created 7 dust storms and but a single free pass. He'll always have trouble with the old uncle charlie. Mr Ruth has shown proclivity to tossing the old horse hide and he needs to set aside the lumber to concentrate on throwing a hammer because he will never be able to hit it. Ridick Ulace Conclusion theoldtimeidiot.com (note...baseball reference is amazing...game logs from 1914??? It is the greatest sport).

The guy has been a professional since we signed him. He's done nothing but hit with shitty teams and no protection around him. Everybody complained about the extension, and he's as good as ever this year with some actual talent around him. Keep it up, Jose. You've been great. P.S. Suck it, Ron.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/29727051/slugging-white-sox-ready-eclipse-cubs-chicago

How about trading for Castellanos and getting him to agree not to opt-out?

I know Mazara is "only" 25 but his also in his 5th full year in the bigs. He's had over 2000 ABs. This is not a guy going through a sophomore slump, and even at his age 4 straight years of identical stats is pretty close to "he is what he is" territory

Checking out Degrom's odd contract makes him MUCH more desirable imo. I actually think Vaughn and Kopech IS worth it for a top 3 pitcher that would put the sox in contention THIS year. If they could trade him without having to pay any of the signing bonus money from this season he has almost zero payroll impact this season and next season is very manageable. Obviously the deferred money would need to be planned for, but Jerry will be dead by then anyways and we will have a new owner. If they move Vaughn, Eloy slots into long term DH situation and your needs then include looking for a RF and LF long term, but the rest of the team is absolutely set until 2024 and beyond if they are smart. Degrom / Gio / Keuchel / Cease / Dunning/Stievers is definitely a championship caliber staff and Crochet/Kelley would be reinforcements come 22/23. A BOLD win now move to me makes so much sense to nail the 21-24 strategy and it can start THIS week.

.

Update: the last 2 weeks the sox have been second in mlb in wRC+ at 140 behind only the mets and they of course lead the AL. Their K% and Bb% rank got even worse (13th and 14th) but they have been leading ISO by 50 points over the second team and Homers by 5. Interestingly their babip was down to .295 but if you hit Homers left and right that doesn't hurt so much. That of course means the offense is very dependent on power which makes it more susceptible to streaks and fluctuations but the power potential is clearly there in that team. I think Vaughn will stabilize that to a degree when he is up next year and he can improve that k to bb rate a little. Madrigal will also help in the k/bb department.

At least they traded him. The Tigers ditched McCann with 2 years of control and half the price, so he must really suck. I would give this guy a break. He is 25 years old, was sick and fell behind. He isn’t alone struggling. He obviously has power but hasn’t shown it yet. It will eventually.

No matter the outcome of today's game... 1) They won 2/3 vs the Cubs and the 2 wins were lopsided. Furthermore, today's was winnable. They had a division winner and one of the better NL teams by the nuts for all but 3 out of 27 innings. 2) It's fun being pissed about a loss again. It's fun expecting a sweep. Let's go win 4 of the next 5, while we're at it. Cheers, Soxtalk. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. Be smart and be safe. Health and wealth to you all

The other theory is he might not be good.

The short answer is that if they cut this corner, we won't have enough data to know if the vaccine is safe or effective.

I am guessing you are just joking, because if not, this is one of the most classless posts of all time.

Mazara - 219 hours EE - 397 hours *note... each player obtains 34 additional hours per home run and 6 minutes per ball taken. Any strikeout leads to a deduction of 14 seconds squared to the nth power of pi.

For a game that's designed around being a marathon, it's amazing how little patience baseball fans have now. It has to be a generational thing.

Sadly in 2020, "man of faith" and looking down on gays is actually very fungible.

Man of faith. Not who he is. Then why oh why did he say it while at work? He didn't seem to apologize to any of his co-workers who would have heard it. But once he found out it went out on the air, and people were calling for his job, oh so sorry. Everybody screws up. I just hate these cookie cutter "apologies". What he was sorry for was being caught. I'm sure it's not the first time he's said something similar. I don't really think this should cost him a career, but it should cost him his job and maybe his Fox football job. Let some other person "of faith" take over. I'm guessing they won't say what he say. He can do the faith thing for a while. Get some sensitivity training, and then look for a new gig, and if he's the best person for the job, the next team or network should have no problem hiring him.

Yes, you're right about the freedom thing. Yet, wearing a mask at certain times, and social distancing at certain times has nothing to do with the freedom thing. Funny how people talk about freedom and rights, but they don't care about discrimination of all kinds, and don't appear to worry we are moving toward a police state. Those things don't bother them a bit.