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I mean I can confirm that the Sox have interest in Conforto. I wouldn’t have tweeted about it otherwise.

I trust James on this one.

Guys like Eduardo Escobar cost chump change at the deadline. I think you underestimate how bad an Eloy + Vaughn/Sheets would be in the OF. Vaughn is bad and Sheets is straight terrible out there. The pitching staff will be livid with that outfield.

Man, I wish we could have pulled this off. Probably wouldn't have signed Keuchel.

Fire up Lebrons tiny violin lol

In thinking about this, I checked on Conforto's supposed market value. SPOTRAC has him at $19.1M/per, with a 6/$114M contract being their guess. MLBTR guesses that he'll get 1/$20M, but as he'll cost a pick, and that his agent is Boras, I doubt that a pillow contract is in the works. Today, FANGRAPHS published the ZIPS projections on Suzuki. The juicy bits are him being projected as a 125 wRC+ hitter, 23 HR, and 2.5 fWAR. ZIPS also suggests that his market value is 5/$69M; MLBTR has him at 5/$55M. A midpoint between these two is ~$12.4M/per. Now, I bring this up because, while I believe that, in isolation, Conforto and his lefty bat is the better choice for RF. But, that would ignore the gaping hole at 2B, and the SOX 's position relative to the luxury tax. That said, I think I'd rather sign Suzuki at ~$11M to $13M/per, because that would then make it possible to also add a cromulent 2B at ~$3.5-$5M/per. This would also allow for some "oops room" under the luxury tax. IOW, while Conforto would be a better gamble than Suzuki, the 'stars-and-scrubs' era White Sox taught us that Suzuki+Villar would be better than Conforto+Leury, if Conforto will command a $19M-$20M/per price tag. In any case, Levine knows fuck-all about non-cubs baseball, and he's the source for this thread. And no one's linked us to Suzuki, so it could be that neither find their way to the rate this year. We'll see.

Free agency starts in one month.

DeMar's historic scoring streak Good news on AC returning to action Signing Tristan Thompson, which means the east runs through Chicago (also, just an upgrade in every way over Bradley/McKinnie) Zach seems to be doing OK after docs checked him out Pat and Lonzo are both coming could come back in early-to-mid March. Bulls going into the break as the #1 seed despite everything. Everything's coming up Millhouse.

He'll join an existing culture with strong leadership who will take him by the hand (figuratively) and point him in the right direction. Or drive him to O'Hare if he biffs up.

Silver lining to having guys out is how these guys have all been developing and making big contributions. You feel good about any one of those three being in a closing lineup or playing crunch time minutes.

Man I can't wait till this team is whole again. Ayo, Coby, and Green are all starting right now, but they'll be getting bench minutes when everyone is healthy. That 2nd unit is probably going to be one of the best ones in the league. The silver lining to all the injuries is that Ayo and Coby have had the opportunity to develop.

Bradley played really well tonight actually. Really good defense on Sabonis and even ran some pick and rolls.

The Bulls just need to go play .500ish ball the rest of the way to get to 50 wins. I feel like that should be enough for them to avoid the play-in tournament.

Read this today in the comments section at medium.com, thought it was worth sharing with a fellow teacher "I'm a teacher. It's bad. But it's not just bad for teachers; it's bad for students as well. Each day, I stare out at a bunch of cold, dead faces, like zombies from an apocalyptic movie. I ask them about their lives, what they are thinking, what they are doing in their spare time, what kinds of things get them out of bed in the morning, to connect with them, to try to build some rapport, because this is my workspace, the classroom, and I prefer my workspace to be minimally affable, for my own sanity, and I get dead, empty space in return. The students turn their backs, stare at their phones or computer screens, wishing I would just stop talking and give them their required work for the day. There is no discussion. There is no energy or even life in that room . . . in all of those rooms, just cold, dead, empty eyes staring back, thinking the whole business of education is a joke, because their culture, and some of their families tell them this: be suspect of education. They think it's just another ruse, because when will they ever use English or communication skills, when will they need critical thinking skills, because all of this is just too hard to bother with -- just give me my grade, my course credit, and get out of my face, this is what they say. It's not just teachers who don't want to be teaching, it's also students who don't want to be learning, to be in school, because they find zero value in it, other than the job they hope to get at the end of all of it. It's Friday morning, and I am sitting here thinking: I can't do it; I can't face them again. It's the end of the work week and all my special reserves are exhausted and I have nothing to give to this battle, no armor or ammunition left. I don't smile either. Not anymore. I can ignore climate change, or the other social problems that are so immediate and so depressing in our society, ignore them for a minute or for a day, but I cannot ignore my job, those dead-eyed students, not even for a second, not even in my sleep, which is troubled, always, with trying to find some way to make this profession bearable, to make a student care, even just a little bit, about learning, and if they can't care about learning, to care just a tiny bit, an angstrom, about me, or other teachers, as people, just like them, trying to do some good for society, just trying to make it through, but it never works, no matter how hard I try to tap-dance in front of them, entertain them, inspire them, get them out of their zombie-like state. And, it's not getting better, only worse, year after year, as I see more and more good teachers retire early or leave the profession altogether, which is what I have resolved to do, because life is way too short, not to smile once in a while. And, please, while well-intentioned, do not respond to me with: hang in there, because hanging in there is what I have been doing for a decade, trying to figure this problem out, to find a way to make teaching bearable, and there is no way. We have failed. Education has failed, just as intended, just like the Post Office, a planned demise of a once proud and storied institution. We are devolving. The arc of history does NOT always bend towards progress, justice, or improvement as we once so foolishly and naively believed. The arc of history bends towards demise, and education is only one example of this." 

31 for Coby 35+ for Demar again. Simply incredible. Also Sabonis is trash.

Excellent. Looks like the squad will assemble in mid March. Also, looks like LaVine's knee is fine and he'll probably be load-limited. Probably no back to backs.

If MLB continues their petty squabbles over money, at some point the fans are going to become indifferent to the sport, and that bigger piece of the pie that they are all fighting over, will no longer be there.

Pfft... Newbs.

When you're talking the difference between the SOX and Seattle, even in 1st Class its 25000 fewer miles, fewer time zone changes, and less wear and tear on your body. Every little bit helps.

It's a good thought. I'd be interested if it made a difference to anyone. It's not like they are on buses. First class air travel.

A glove first 2B shouldn't be hard to find or cost much. With a lineup from 1-8 that is completely stacked, you can live with one ok bat hitting 9th. There is zero need to compromise your OF defense any further with a platoon of 1B pretending to be RF. RF is the hole to spend your $$ / trade assets on, not a 2B.

Imagine thinking we'll have baseball in 2026 with future covid outbreaks

Someone needs to say it. Let's be honest here, with LeBron's history of ditching teams, what is the incentive to blow up your franchise long term for him? He could be gone at anytime, and you inherit the mess minus James.

Look at it from the other side. If you're his agent, who needs him the most? Whose a biggish market team that could give him to dollar?

It is fairly lazy to make assumptions based on message board thread title from a tweet gathered from listening to a radio interview in order to create reasons to get upset about.

Here is the thing about Levine. He gets inside info on a regular basis. For whatever reason he rarely discloses it. I am guessing the reason he said something here was to signal either to fans the Sox had plans, or to signal to Conforto's camp that they want to talk quickly once all of this is done. The reason I feel like Bruce gets info is if you listen to him talk AFTER news comes out he supplements that news with information that could have only know if he was in the know ahead of time. He has details that weren't previously public. But as is most of the Chicago media, he is well trained to keep his mouth shut until it is time.

Anderson SS, Moncada 3B, Robert CF, Abreu 1B, Eloy DH, Grandal C, Vaughn LF, Conforto RF, Leury 2B is a heck of a lineup. Sign a good defensive 2B and push Leury to supersub where he belongs and its absolutely stacked. You can mix up the order a bit if you want, can pretty much roll them out however you want 2-8 and its going to be good. Certainly not the best defensive team out there, but not much you can really do about that at this point. Its why we need at least an average defensive RF and a good defensive 2B tho.

Great read. That said, it likely wouldn't even cost as much as he suggests to bring in a consultant sports dietitian and a food service team to do it. Or Jake Burger. Perhaps we could have seen what he could have become years ago, had he been given a proper model to take care of his body. That said, the market often dictates these sorts of advancements. Investors are already shoveling cash at top prospects, in exchange for a percentage of their future earnings. TATIS owes an investment fund $27.5M, in exchange for cash to advance his offseason programs a few years back. But there is something of a pareto principle to what BLA do, in that they select the top prospects to fund. MLB orgs would be wise to support MiLBers system-wide. Unfortunately for us, this org seems to be laggards in adopting anything new. If MLB mandated improved treatment of MiLBers, the SOX would be in, but I doubt they'd do it of their own accord.

Fun fact .. over the past month, DDR leads the league in scoring and Vuc leads the league in rebounding.

Want an example of a guy who had a bad offseason conditioning program and then his career completely changed when he improved that? Carlos Rodon. Obviously he also worked with a different pitching coach, but last year was the first offseason where he really was in proper shape by the end. Suddenly a cy young caliber pitcher, after badly struggling with injuries. Imagine that you draft and sign these guys and drop them into a culture where 95% of their teammates are working with trainers and coaches responsibly in the offseason. They’re all what, 18-23 years old? Do any of them pick up better habits? Make some changes in their body type as a consequence? Some scrawny kid starts putting on muscle late and suddenly they’re a 2.5 win RF and the roster saves $80 million? Those organizations that turn out positive minor leaguers regularly, could they have that type of culture? This seems like such a no brainer to me that I can’t figure out why it isn’t at the very top of an organizational priority list without insulting people, because it seems really stupid.

Mark Appel with a good a thread about being a minor leaguer and what they need to be successful re: housing, food, and off-season training. Lays out a pretty decent proposal that makes a ton of sense from the practical perspective, but owners will hate from a financial perspective. https://twitter.com/markappel26/status/1493693618988720137?s=20&t=KaSaeV1eqf_cY7VrDvMcZA

We've all heard stories about Tristan Thompson off the court, but how is he as a teammate? This team just seems to gel so well that I'd hate to see a "Bad teammate" come in and disrupt the chemistry. He's the obvious target should he hit the market.

You make it sound like there is no shortage of money or trade chips. I much prefer Marte to Conforto but am happy to take a chance since money seems to be plentiful these days.

If you won't give him like 4/80-88 or so he won't come here. Conforto makes way too much sense not to happen. Idk what they should do at 2B but if they want to go get Ketel Marte I have no issues.

I really like him. Physically he checks all the boxes. Big, strong, athletic, tools, power. The only box he doesn't check is a track record against quality pitching. Playing at a small school will make it a little more difficult to evaluate him though he did hit on the Cape and some teams weigh that more than the spring. I was told he has a chance to be the best player in the draft and I find it hard to disagree.

Conforto has a 3000 PA sample size of being a well above average hitter. Sheets has a 180 PA sample sized of good matchups showing he's an above average hitter. These two things are nothing alike. One is also a RF, the other is a DH only. Additionally, the Adams have absolutely nothing to do with Conforto, who isn't really even a "slugger" like those 2 were. Conforto is not a superstar. He is a well above average hitter that fits a ton of team needs and all he costs is $.

Look, Sheets could well be a dude. But realistically, again we are looking at a SSS in a rookie year. He's also a guy who is even worse defensively than Vaughn. Sure he could have figure it out and turned into prime Adam Dunn, but I also think TLR protected him and used him in a lot of favorable match ups during his time here, and it is likely we could be looking at some very real regression to the means as well. I would love to see him hit at a high level, but if I have the choice between Vaughn and Sheets, there is literally zero question in my mind the answer is Vaughn.

Yeah. Its insane. Its really only a couple guys here tho, so I am going to try to tune it out moving forward. For some reason, just bugs me. AV is going to be an awesome offensive player, and I was impressed with how he looked in LF throughout the season. Again, no gold glover, but plenty capable. Was he a black hole at times? Yeah, he was. But its to be expected. He's going to improve immensely in 22. This argument also makes it sound like I don't like Gavin. I do. I just don't think we should put our eggs in that basket yet. He's a very useful depth. He does something we sorely need. But he has zero defensive ability, and we quite simply have better bats that need to DH. I am just not sold that his SSS in 21 is going to translate. He's never hit for much power in the minors, and I just don't see him as a high upside piece. I keep using the Brandon Moss comp if all goes well, and continue to think that's pretty much an upper quartile projection for Sheets. Not someone you turn AV into a weak side platoon player for.