SoCalChiSox

What kind of move tho? Savage move or throw a few million for another scrub (*cough Merrifield or trash pitcher *cough) move?

When are we getting left handed savages from BAL or LAD?

Yeah thats kind of my hope. Just a stopgap for most of a lost season and by 2025 we Jacob Gonzalez, Joey Ortiz or Michael Busch will be the 2B. Or maybe Getz is dumb enough to believe Lopez/DeJong gives them "leverage" in trade talks. "Yeah, I don't need to take your deal bro, I can just play Nicky and Paul and we're good" "Good for what, Chris? 55 wins...you got me bro" LOL

Please be a backup.

Yeah I think if it's 3-5m a year or even a little more that would be no problem even in a tight budget and certainly by framing the issue as "cheap labor" as you suggested this might be the magic words Getz needs to persuade JR. I think some of the premium eggheads with PH.Ds in math or stats will require well over 100k even if starting out, but still even at like 250k, in the big picture it's not that much esp if the payroll gets cut drastically as it seems it will. This is why it is imperative to get a trade done with LAD or BAL for Hjerstad/Cowser and Ortiz OR Pages and Busch. These are legit answers for 2B and RF that will be cheap rather than paying 10 million for crap like we do every fucking year. If we could add these guys and with Montgomery and Ramos coming aboard soon I would actually be excited about our lineup.

As John Madden would say..."Boom!"

We need more nicknames for the last two. Bald Vaughn is one...what about Merrifield? Limp Dick Beni also is good...at least until he can Crack 10 HRs.

I agree infrastructure is better investment but JR is gonna say thats not a one time deal its a continuing investment. So if you are going to forego signing a 8-10m scrub like Merrifield and put it into operations by hiring say 12 more data analysts, buying better analytic programs and maybe 10 more development staff, that's a continuing expense year to year. It's not a one time deal and to keep it up he will have to deduct from each year's budget which could vary wildly. IMO, it's still certainly worth it but it may not be as easy for Getz to do as a simple one time expense, especially if JR is going to hide behind the high payrolls the last few years with no reward and the need to get some profits to antsy partners.

I suspect even if there is somewhat of a market, we might have to eat some money to get a meaningful return. Re: Merrifield, he's old and broken and right handed...which likely explains why the FO is so enchanted with him (along with the whole Royals thing). This is so fucking stupid. Your 2B is Joey Ortiz OR Michael Busch not some retread past his expiration date. Get a fucking deal done and address your RF and 2B needs in one shot.

Thanks. Each package has issues. A combination of the names might be better than those options....ie Busch, Pages and Knack if they won't throw in a Top 100 pitcher as the third piece. Push comes to shove....main compensation should be bats. Knack is a good third piece.

Ugh....thats discouraging insofar as trade targets goes.

Jimmy outside of the Cease trade compensation is there anything remotely decent to look forward to in this offseason?

BTW, since BA came out with their new rankings I noticed Busch is ahead of Rushing. Did they post updated scouting grades? I'm assuming either this means Rushing won't stick at C or Busch's hit/power tools now grade out as higher than just 55/55, or maybe they are saying he sticks at 2B, which is somewhat doubtful.

Yeah I kind of prefer the Os too depending on what we can get obviously. Ortiz can be a ++ SS and he has a playable bat too so u don't need to force Monty there if it's not working and I think either LHH outfielder from them is great. Just get the two bats and Povich unless the Dodgers are willing to part with Busch, Pages AND a Top 100 SP.

We need position players bad IMO. We got Nastrini, Eder and Bush and we've been told at least one of Soroka or Shuster will be in the rotation. Presumably before they traded for Nastrini, Eder or Bush they talked to our Farm Director (now GM) to get his thoughts on these minor leaguers since his "expertise" if you can call it that is presumably the minor leagues, so I think getting 2 SPs back as the main pieces for Cease is overkill. How bout we fucking develop the guys we apparently wanted and traded for? Since 24 is lost, why don't we just get position players and come 25 see whether one or more of Pallette, Mena, Thompson, Schultz is ready to be in the rotation? Schultz was destroying Low A hitters and I bet if given the chance he would have destroyed High A hitters if he didn't get shut down early as a precaution. We need legit bats. You got Quero fine....how bout RF and 2B? Maybe Pages and Busch? Or Cowser/Hjerstad and Ortiz? The SP prospect can be the third piece....yes they will be flawed, but even the Dodgers other SP prospects in the top 100 are flawed. Just get the damn bats and go with a close to MLB ready 4/5 low ceiling SP prospect as the third piece.

The Steamer projection for him in 24 is 103 WRC+ and overall 2.2 WAR.....which is basically just a hair above JAG status.

Lol....dude no one is going to trade for that salary regardless of what he says. Best thing you can hope for is Yoyo has a strong first half, gets moved at the deadline for something and Ramos or Montgomery seamlessly fits in at 3rd.

Trade what tho? Assuming Robert is off limits, we have only one truly legit tradeable asset in Cease. I'm not sure what Santos would bring. Everyone else is either more or less worthless or untradeable due to salary. You can't trade when you have almost nothing to trade. I think they are stuck here. I dont think the Dodgers are willing to allow Pages to be the third piece even though he got hurt and Chicago may be unwilling to have one of the two main pieces be someone who is hurt because they could end up with a flawed pitcher who isn't really high end and a player who may not be the same as the main pieces of compensation. And from Getz comments about prioritizing defense and athleticism in our bats not just bat only players, I suspect Chicago wants Cowser (instead of Hjerstad) and Ortiz and maybe like Povich and Elias is unwilling to go that far. So now we play the game of leaks and we have a good old fashioned Mexican standoff. Our supplementary pieces to add into a Cease trade to pull it off apparently aren't impressing anyone because they aren't worth dick and people know it.

Ugh.....you are right. There is pretty much no way we are going to pay for even middle tier pitching if this is the market. I was thinking they might nab Manaea and also take a flyer on Flaherty but that's not gonna happen....maybe one at most. Which means the Cease return probably will have to be all pitching which means the lineup is still trash.

Good for ReyLo.....im sure he will do well now that he is playing for a legit organization that can develop players

Lol...I think Bartolo is @Chicago White Sox second least favorite fake insider out there behind only Lion in Texas. On the merits, it's not a bad proposal you get two pitchers plus a RF....only thing missing is left handed savagery. Take out Knack and Barnes and replace with Busch.

Interesting. Someone suggested De Paula...his bat seems to have extremely high potential but is years away. There was the suggestion by several posters to focus on best talent and not 2024 team needs, but remember JR doesn't want another slog of a rebuild, he wants prospects that are pretty much ready to play in the MLB. Rightly or wrongly, they want to refill the seats in 24 and on the cheap too. I don't think they are going to take major pieces that are years away regardless of the logic.

We need to have someone to replace Eloy in the 4 hole. If the trade is with BAL, it's Hjerstad, if it's LAD it's Busch. There has to be someone in the lineup with legit power besides Robert cause Beni doesn't have it, Moncada's disappeared and Vaughn is just meh. The problem is they need to fill 3 spots with good cheap talent (OF, IF, SP) and in a trade they'll likely be able to only hit two. They should throw in Santos if it will get it done but I doubt it will. Pages (if healthy and shoulder checks out medically) + Busch + one of LAD SP prospects is probably superior to Kjerstad + Ortiz + Povich.

Frasso, Pages (platoon with Colas in RF, Busch (try him at 2B, if not then 1B or DH) and Knack. I'd do that deal with LAD. Actually based on baseball trade values it would be almost even and we'd be getting only an extra 6m in SV....so maybe we can throw in a reliever or something. If they balked, I'd also take Stone/Frasso, Busch and Pages and drop the 4th piece. C Cheap FA bridge 1B Vaughn 2B Lopez SS Montgomery 3B Moncada/Ramos DH Busch LF Beni CF Robert RF Pages/Colas platoon

Yeah I have a gut feeling that he's a Dodgers lab created player that would be a JAG anywhere else. IMO, Baltimore is the best match unless the LAD are super desperate.