wrathofhahn

Hopefully we play both these dudes off each other. Machado is the better player at the position of need.

John Danks Mike Squires Gordon Beckham (yeah I said it) George Bell Mark Teahen Missed the cut but still couldn't stand: Nick Swisher Brett Lawrie Gavin Floyd Richie Zisk (not his fault really) James Shields (mostly his fault)

The market is trying to low ball them? The market is the market. If you goto McDonalds do you say shit you are only charging 1.99 for those McNuggets you should at least be charging 4.99 here is a 5 dollar bill. Like wtf? And the Cano contract was unmovable they had to attach assets, eat 20 million, and take on a bad contract. Fielder is another guy who comes to mind Boras dealt with Illitch directly guy was older knew he wasn't going to be around long and paid his prices regardless of what the market actually was. How did that work out for them? Samson was being interviewed who used to work for the Marlins and when the contract of Wei was brought up he said Boras specifically goes after older owners and tries to bypass GM's he called it disgusting. Well some would call what Loria did disgusting but I digress. In any case Hahn will know what the market is better then anyone let him call the shots as soon as I hear Jerry Reinsdorf being involved my ears start to perk up like Oh thats interesting and maybe you'll get your wish. Maybe Harper will get 10/400 eventhough the Yankees and Dodgers both have said they are not interested in a record breaking contract.

I just saw a heart warming story about Charles Barkley befriending some dude he met at a bar and staying friends for decades. I mean who knows. Maybe he has connections.

I mean I can't argue with your logic mainly because there is none.

Of course he does it affects his pocketbook. You give him a longterm deal and he'll be fine with it. Pujols hated to DH when he was in STL before signing that big deal. Hell now he says he prefers it.

That or it could be agents trying to extract more dollars from other teams. Like we all know the game the whitesox have a low payroll and the feeling is around the league is they have money to spend. If you were a player why wouldn't you pump up their interest as much as you could.

It was actually 10/284 after accounting for deferments but while I agree it sort is interesting as a starting point for us as fans that doesn't mean he'll even get that offer in FA again and it's unlikely the offer is even still on the table. It wouldn't be the first time Boras has turned down a big offer only to see his clients sign for less. Do I think that will happen in Harpers case? No. He's probably getting a 300 million offer from someone. But 400 million? I don't see how unless more teams other then reported become interested. Right now the only two teams with legit interest are the Phillies and Whitesox. The Yankees have 0 percent chance of signing him as their outfield are set. The Dodgers are tapped out and flush with OF. The Cubs are tapped out. The redsox are tapped out. The nationals have all but said they have no interest after signing corbin. So where is the market? Owners have done a better job rebuffing Boras advances and letting GM's handle negotiations. Unless ownership gets involved directly with Boras like Illitch used to do I don't see any GM just giving record shattering contract without more teams becoming involved. I'm not sure he's even viewed as our number one target we seem to be keyed in on machado.

Roensthal has said the same thing. There is so much lunacy in this thread basically people are just taking Boras demands as given I could easily see a scenario where we wouldn't break records to sign either player. I think Stanton is the current record holder at 13/325 million. You offer that contract you probably get at least one of them to take it. Yankees have said publicly they aren't going over 300 million. Redsox don't have any interest. Dodgers and Cubs would need to move payroll first. Nationals are probably out after Corbin. It's really only the Philles and Whitesox at this point.

He doesn't hit we can cut him. He doesn't have to hit much just be respectable like 2017 to have value since he's so good defensively. 2.5 million isn't much and he'll only be playing 50-60 games anyways.

If he plays 50 games and gives us 1 WAR as a backup then I will be more then thrilled but not sure his bat has as much upside.

Or it could be a Landry Fields - Steve Nash situation where we are stuck with Alonso for two years and Machado signs with the Yankees/Phillies anyways.

My earlier price? Of course there would be thats a sign that the price is reasonable. If it's only one then you overpaid but inregards to the 10/300 there will be very few teams. But that is besides the point with the leaked offer we have a starting point. None of this crazy 10/400 shit. When Stanton signed his deal he got 13/325 and when he got traded he basically had 10/295 left on his deal there were like three teams in all of baseball interested. Stanton at the time was coming off a 7.3 WAR season. Harper is coming off a 3.5 WAR season via fangraphs. Machado 6.2 via fangraphs. BRREF is much harder on both players. So a season later two players who are by all objective measures worse are all of sudden worth 10 million extra AAV? I don't get it. But the FO will do what it wants I just hope if ownership decides to go stupid they don't open their checkbook half way because this team isn't a Machado or Harper away from winning and I hope we haven't been sold a rebuild just so we can mortgage the farm for a 2-3 window.

He's 34th in the league in WAR the last three years.

We have so many spots open right now. Ideally we'd find someone for him to platoon with wherever he plays

Of course he doesn't I'm sure he wants 10/400 but that doesn't mean he will get it. You guys don't understand how much leverage we actually have there are very few teams capable of offering these type of deals period. Then you go down the list to who is willing and the number gets even smaller. You look at last year JD Martinez and Boras held out all offseason angry pouting demanding more money from the redsox. What happened? Boras gave in. Not because they liked the offer anymore then they did months ago but because noone else came forward. Now the Phillies have sniffed around but other then them who else has reported to have interest. Hell that Nats offer isn't even likely on the table anymore after signing Corbin. So if we really are going in on these guys which I wouldn't lets at least be smart. Lets not be one of those ownership groups that asks Boras how much it would cost and then say okay. Let the market decide and use comparable players to come up with a figure that makes sense.

Who are we even bidding against? Here is the Nats offer via Bob Nightengale The Washington #Nats offer to Bryce Harper at end of season was worth $284 million over 10 years when factoring in the deferred money.. #Whitesox owner Jerry Reinsdorf has had two phone conversations with agent Scott Boras but no offers yet submitted. https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/columnist/bob-nightengale/2018/12/12/bryce-harper-scott-boras-las-vegas-baseball-winter-meetings/2294674002/ … So if their offer was worth 10/284 and that has sort of been the highest offer reported why the heck would you go well above that? For all the grief I got the leaked AAV matched mine. Which i wasn't aware of until now. 10 years for me is a problem because I think he'll ultimately be a DH when he gets to his early to mid thirties but at least the AAV isn't crazy like the 10/400 offers that have been posted here.

I know money is fungible to billionaires and zillionaires but I hope so. I hope this isn't going to be like a Hanley Ramirez situation in Miami either where he ran the Marlins. I've read talk from HS coach that he isn't going to think of moving off SS unless he gets paid way more. Like what? This dude has been 15th in the league in WAR the last three years and while he's an allstar but he isn't Arod and even Arod agreed to move to 3rd.

The worry would be in that case we spent 9 million foolishly and made a bad trade. I feel like I am on pluto and the rest of you are on mars. When I look at a deal and see someone making 9 million I want there to be some upside and the upside is like you say mashes and is worth more then 9 million but how likely is that? Aren't there better bets to take in both FA and via trade? If people want to go off in their own little world and talk about this trade and the impact on Machado go ahead. I personally think 17 million buys you a lot more influence so if you are going to just give it away in an effort to get Machado just increase your offer.

So you can't see a scenario either where we may want to play him more then 526 PA and not want to pay him 9 million next year because explaining this point shouldn't be that complicated that we basically are paying 9 million for what is 75 percent of a season (700 PA). As far as the rest goes lets not pretend these situations don't often end in problems. Hanley needed to be released last year because of it.

You might want to run that by the players association first. If he is playing better then the next guy and not playing due to his option then there will be a problem. But you missed the greater point. Alonso had 574 PA last year. He wasn't worth 9 million. If we have to limit his PA that also limits his worth as a player and how the trade should be viewed. You seem to be of the opinion we can just limit his at bats to 526 PA that is not a full season and not take into account 526 PA for 9 million is not good value Noone held a gun to Hahns head and forced him to make this deal. Lets look at this trade logically and see how it might work for us or not.

It's an issue because it's easy to see a scenario where he reaches it and still isn't worth that amount next year and if he doesn't reach it he still gets 9 million. That's lose -lose. Either don't play him and pay him 9 million or play him and 17 million. The only way this deal works is if he becomes a 9 million player again. That is a pretty narrow needle to thread.

There is no need for all this talk about Didi and them needing SS the smarter move would be just to play Torres there and sign one of the many 2B free agents like Kinsler (signed), Schoop (signed), Murphy, Asdrubal, Lowrie, Dozier, Forsythe, LeMahieu, and on and on. 2B is deep this FA. It's why I wouldn't be opposed to moving Moncada to CF

The other poster said it was 526 PA. It doesn't take much to get that amount that is basically Davidson territory. 115-125 ish games depending on how the team hits with him in the lineup.

McCann is a nice buy low bet. If he hits the way he did in 2017 instead of 2018 he'll have value as a backup. If he doesn't we can minimize the - impact with Castillo.