Sarava

I'm 50, so I'm moving in to the old man's club. I joined Soxtalk around the start of the rebuild. I used to post on the White Sox official message board until they discontinued that. And I just never heard of Soxtalk. I used to wonder why there wasn't a good Sox message board.

Eh, you had a better argument with the Royals actually. But they're a small market team. The Braves only had 3 down years and never loss more than 95 games. They weren't even close to what the Sox, Cubs, Phillies, Tigers and others did.

I think the Astros and Cubs were blatant tankers that clearly worked. I'm not sure I would include the Braves or Royals in there. And there's many others where it hasn't worked out obviously. But I'll put it another way to show the money that is pocketed or saved. Let's go back to Rick Hahn's famous quote: "The money will be spent." Now, he actually has some Sox fans tricked in to thinking they did spend that money. Obviously they didn't. They haven't even brought their payroll up to where a Chicago payroll should be, let me alone spend the money that was hoarded over the last 5-6 years. I just went through the team payroll since 2016 - the year they officially started to tank/rebuild. What would one say is a fair expectation for the Sox payroll - 10th in baseball? Despite how they are often operated as a small market, this is one of the premier markets in baseball and the payroll ideally could reflect that. Here's 2016 and onward, comparing the Sox payroll to the 10th payroll in baseball, and highlighting the net difference in each season: 2016 - Sox payroll 115.9 mil, 10th team payroll 147.9 mil. Savings of 32 mil 2017 - Sox payroll 109.5 mil, 10th team payroll 162.3 mil. Savings of 52.8 mil 2018 - Sox payroll 72.1 mil, 10th team payroll 161.0 mil. Savings of 89.9 mil 2019 - Sox payroll 91.3 mil, 10th team payroll 159.6 mil. Savings of 68.3 mil 2020 - Sox payroll 53.6 mil, 10th team payroll 73.2 mil. Savings of 19.6 mil 2021 - Sox payroll 140.9 mil, 10th team payroll 171.4 mil. Savings of 30.5 mil Numbers were gathered from sites I googles for team payrolls. The Sox payroll over these years has come to a difference of - 293.1 million from the 10th payrolls in baseball. That's a pretty big incentive to tank/rebuild and draft positioning isn't going to stop that. At least from owners driven more by profits than winning a World Series.

I think there's more to tanking that just draft position. I hate to sound cynical - but does anyone think a lightbulb went off in some owner's heads when they saw some teams starting to tank, and the fans not only accepted it, but in many cases (like here in Chicago for both teams) actually embraced it? They literally can have their cake and eat it to. They still collect the big tv dollars, and they drop 50+ mil off their payroll. Or more. Who wouldn't want a free 50 million dollars?

I'm not a fan of this. My idea all along has been to randomize all non playoff teams in a lottery and where you come up, you come up. The worst team could pick 1st, 9th, 14th, 2nd, etc....same with the best team to miss the playoffs. That takes the incentive away from trying to be bad.

Sadly, the only one who deserves credit for the Kimbrel trade is Jed Hoyer.

Good point. Though they could view it as money they will save back the next year when Keuchel is off the books and the Sox still owe McCann 2/24.

How about something like Keuchel, Collins and Crochet for McCann & McNeil. If the Sox have to add in an extra prospect of the lottery ticket variety, then ok. Bad money is going both ways (Keuchel and McCann). But ultimately - combine this deal with dumping Kimbrel off somewhere, and the Sox have money to sign Conforto, another reliever like Tepera and a #4-5 starter to replace Keuchel.

The Sox seem hesitant to spend money in free agency this winter and people are trying to think outside of the box to fill these holes. As thin as it feels for pitching depth in the Sox system, it's even thinner for position talent.

The Eaton situation isn't exactly Jerry throwing money around. Quite the opposite actually. At the point he was cut - you're going to pay him the rest of his salary, whether he gets cuts or stays. There's no choice. Where the choice was made, likely heavily influence by Jerry, was the previous winter when they decided to go dollar store shopping for a right fielder and signed Adam Eaton. Or you could go back a couple years before that when they decided to not sign Bryce Harper.

I'm cool with him coming back as a fill-in guy. He excels in that role. But if he's our starting 2B, then we have a pretty significant downgrade from Nick Madrigal.

Wasn't Gallo considered a flop with the Yankees? They probably want to move on to literally anything else.

At this point bringing Rodon back would somewhat salvage what has so far been a terrible off-season for the White Sox.

His bat would fit beautifully in to the Sox lineup. Probably better than anyone else that is left out there as an option. And he does have a cannon of an arm. Just not sure he has the range to play adequate defense out there.

I'm not sure how true this is. Players have a finite # of years to make their money. If they lose a season, that money is gone and is not coming back. While the owners also lose that money, they can be in the game for decades (like JR owning the Sox for 40 years). And generally, they are wealthier and therefore can absorb financial hits easier.

I do agree Jerry has spent money in the past. But you're going an awful long time my friend. We can go even further back and I can't tell you how flipping excited I was when they signed Albert Belle. Or Carlton Fisk when Jerry was new to the Sox.

Probably about 1/3 of that time - 3 or 4 years out of 10. Less than half. But that's part of my point. Through that time of the very low payrolls, they promised the money would be spent. So.... on top of having an expected payroll for a team in Chicago (expecting top 10 is reasonable IMO), they should have a few hundred million dollars to play with on top of that. Remember - the money they hoarded during the rebuild years is going to be spent? It hasn't been spent yet. Maybe it will be at some point. A Bryce Harper signing would of satisfied that promise nicely. Manny Machado. Marcus Semien. There's a lot of signings that would of qualified. But some people moving the goalposts and acting like moving up the 15th payroll, or even if they slightly nudge in to the top 10 in 2022 satisfies that. I'm sorry, but it doesn't even come close to satisfying that promise. There's still time. but my ultimate point was they aren't sniffing Verlander and a 2 year 50 mil deal, and I think we all know that is true.

You're probably right. And this is part of the problem we face with Reinsdorf. When they make a bad signing (Keuchel should of never been signed, but that's on Hahn/KW, not Jerry), it limps the team for the duration of that contract. That shouldn't be the case in a major market. The Sox are in Chicago, not Kansas City or Oakland. They should have a top 10 payroll every year. Here is the White Sox team payroll rank the last 10 years (opening day payrolls): 2021 15th 2020 18th 2019 26th 2018 29th 2017 24th 2016 20th 2015 15th 2014 20th 2013 8th 2012 11th 1 year of the last 10 in the top 10, and it was 9 years ago. The 'cheap narrative' looks pretty accurate according to this list.

The Sox had the 15th ranked payroll last year. Mid-winter salary's don't mean much, especially when they have $34 mil tied up in salary's that will or should be dumped (Kimbrel and Keuchel) before next season starts. I'm not implying they are Pittsburgh Pirates cheap. But they promised over and over that the money would be spent and it's been underwhelming to this point.

Even if this does fall through. It's probably safe to say that he won't fall in to Jerry's dollar store range. So he's not coming here.

It's feeling like the Sox are doing their shopping at at the dollar store yet again this winter, just like last year. The Rodon signing did work out in a big way. Obviously Eaton did not. But it's not over yet...we still could be surprised by a Ray, Schwarber or Castellanos signing.

Oh we still may hear that they had a seat at the table with Max.

Man, all these guys are flying off the boards. And it's just crickets with the White Sox.

Whoa there. The Sox don't have a history of major free agent splashes. Well there's Albert Belle - who absolutely performed to his contract. Carlton Fisk too. Man we have to reach too damn far back.

Are we pivoting to a bottom of the rotation guy, because TOR starters don't just grow on trees in the trade market. And Segura doesn't help the Sox power outage against RH pitchers. I mean, ok they can do these things. Coupled with the likely loss of Carlos Rodon, I would say the team will of taken a step back in 2022 compared to the 2021 team. I think some of us thought this was the off-season where the Sox would go for the throat.