Balta1701

I know, let’s bring in Martin Maldonado, that dudes a winner.

36-117.

Oh yes that’s also a part of it, but it’s not all of it. Plenty of terrible teams don’t do this. The As last year played 1 game above their expected record and they were the worst team, if they played 7 games below they’d have won like 42 games. The Royals had the 2nd worst record last year and they played 8 games below they’d expected. In 22 the Nats were the worst team and they also played 1 game below expectations. The team far below that year was the Rangers, who were 8 below, added Bochy as manager, and won a title. The White Sox may be unusually toxic, but more so than the As last year?

Hopefully this is just the positivity we need for a 2-7 streak.

I think about AJ Hinch here, he managed a bad Diamondbacks team for 2009-2010, was fired, went to be a scouting director for the Padres for several years, and got back into managing when the right opportunity came around and he found a team where he meshed. The next manager probably won’t last a full contract, but for an assistant coach it’s likely a good boost in money and experience that you can leverage later in your career.

It is worth noting that the White Sox have underplayed their pythagorean record this year by a lot, their expected record based on run differential right now is 43-110. While that's not particularly good, it's 7 games better than their current record, and no other team in MLB is more than 5 games worse than their expected record. It's not impossible, the Cardinals are 7 games better than their expected record so 7 games better/worse happens, but just having this move back to 0 would be a major improvement. Whether that is luck, the effect of a really bad bullpen, or the toxic environment around the White Sox I will not surmise. If it's luck, it's fixable next year just by chance. If it's an effect of the toxic environment...

I think what would need to happen in that case is for an expansion ownership group to come forward, say they had the money for an expansion team, and to say that they'd put up money for the stadium that JR wouldn't. For reference, I still think that it's' a good business decision for the White Sox to put up $1 billion+ on a stadium at the 78 site if they had the city/state chipping in a few hundred million more than the tax credit zone that's been established so far. I think that is a good deal all around, I think the city and state would go for it based on economics and I think that the White Sox and Related would have their franchise values go up from doing so. I don't think Reinsdorf will do that, because I think Reinsdorf has clearly shown that he will only do this if he can soak the taxpayers in the process. So, an ownership group coming together and saying "We want to do this" as an expansion option does still sound possible to me, if MLB has the appropriate TV rights reserved.

The only way I think the owners would block things in 2028 is if they were staring an almost certain expansion plan in the face and Reinsdorf was somehow going to block that.

Today? Oh yeah Reinsdorf dropping "We're moving to Nashville in 2029" today would have the owners screaming. That would take away their expansion fee options so it would take money out of their pocket, and they'd legitimately be able to say that the White Sox owners were acting irrationally and hurting their brand as a whole in the process. Reinsdorf announcing anything today would clearly be him saying FU to the state and White Sox fans, and the owners won't hurt the league like that. It would be completely arbitrary and out of no where. The owners held onto their power for a reason, they have the power to say no and they'd use it. The White Sox have to let this play out through negotiations, and they know that. It's almost certainly why Reinsdorf started things right now, in 2024, because trying to negotiate for years and getting no where will be part of building support among the owners for allowing him to move. Whether it happens or not, it will make the threat of moving real, and JR clearly thinks he needs the threat of moving to Nashville as part of his negotiating strategy based on the fact that he's already threatened to move.

I believe they would probably block it today, but that watching these stadium sagas drag out will change the equation just as it did in Oakland. I think the owners will act as a break on anyone moving a team irrationally, I don't think they will block it in general just because a team has been in a spot for a century once every option for public-funding has been exhausted.

See that's the thing, if the White Sox genuinely can say "We tried to get a stadium deal done for 4 years and the city and state would not play ball", is MLB going to tell the White Sox no? Are the other owners? They want to be able to leverage the threat of moving for their own stadium deals, if MLB were to block that, it reduces the leverage of every other owner in the future when they make crazy demands of taxpayers. If they were arbitrarily trying to move this year, fine right now there's no stomach for it, the league would say no today but there's literally a gulf of $1.5 billion between the two sides. I don't see how we are anywhere but right here in 2028, with the White Sox telling the league that they tried for 4 years and their stadium deal is expiring, and the league saying "fine if you have money elsewhere we won't block you".

I can't find all the details because Google is now terrible, but Oakland gave the A's a serious offer for a new stadium as a partnership with a whole bunch of public money involved.

I don't see a way that this gets resolved without the same sort of brinksmanship that it took to get the deal done for new Comiskey. Reinsdorf isn't going to offer up his own money if he can threaten to leave, and the only thing that might make the state offer anything is a 100% serious threat to leave. And if the politicians don't fully cave with a massive offer for him like last time...I don't know how this ends other than the A's approach.

I believe they should retire his throwback jersey.

Given our history with this ownership, presumably this is an effort to find and fire the leakers rather than to improve the identified issues.

“No one wants to win more than Reinsdorf” is one of those things he loves hearing about himself, which is why the yes men around him repeat it constantly.

January of 2020.

You have to remember, he also surrounds himself with guys like Chris Getz, Rick Hahn, and Tony LaRussa, who tell him that things are great and they love his feedback because they know they can have high paying jobs forever with no accountability, so they become yes men forever, or in one case they’re just completely nuts. If everyone is telling him he’s doing a great job, why would he need to change? And meanwhile, he’s terrified about being told that he’s made a mistake, so he won’t even interview GM candidates outside the organization.

We have a 50/50 player.

...So they've been using the same plane for at least 10 years?

…not Getz though.