Jack Parkman

No, but they are desperate for SP and they really don't have anything to trade. Their farm system is 2013 Sox bad.

Eloy will never have crazy high fWAR numbers unless he is a DH. He is bad defensively, bordering on 2017 Schwarber bad.

You talk about Lee like he sucked as a player. In his 20s he was really good. He fell off of a cliff after age 31-32 or so. He was really good with the Sox and Brewers. Astros Lee was meh. He was an offensive stud but his defense really drug his fWAR down.

I don't understand why the M's don't toss the Sox a semi-interesting A baller for Shields. They could really use his innings eating at the back of their rotation, and maybe going to a pitcher's park in Safeco would help mitigate the HRs Shields gives up.

While it would be nice if he is as good as Manny Ramirez, I think El Caballo is the more likely outcome. Both offensively and defensively. I loved Carlos Lee. I wish they didn't have to launch him to get Podsednik.

Scott Boras. Boras clients go to the highest bidder. The Sox have given out exactly 2 long term contracts past 3 years on impending FA pitcher, and the one time they went over four years it backfired horribly on them. The other was Buehrle. Remember the whole John Danks saga? He's the only pitcher they've ever gone 5 years on. I don't agree with Reinsdorf on many things regarding how he runs the team, but going 5+ seasons on a FA pitcher is one of them. Sale doesn't count because they bought out 2 FA years and signed him to a 7 year deal 2 seasons into his career. In reality, that was a 2 year deal that they ended up trading anyway.

He's also a Boras client and you have to assume they are going to FA under 99.9% of circumstances. 2021 is his walk year, which is also the 1st year the Sox should be clear contenders. The poster that said he doesn't fit the window is 100% correct. Hahn would be dumb not to at least listen to offers. I'll be shocked if Rodon keeps pitching well if he's here in August 2019.

Reyes hasn't pitched since 2015. Hard pass.

The same is true of Abreu. Neither Abreu nor Avi are going anywhere today.

No worries. I've always assumed that subjectivity was used when not having enough information to make a rational conclusion. Yes, the world would be boring if we all thought and acted the same way. I completely agree with that statement.

I maintain they had two chances to rebuild much earlier, the winter of 2009-10 and 10-11. They went for it both times and got burned. Imagine if they had a bunch of other players to build around Chris Sale. Who knows if they still end up with Quintana in that case, but he really doesn't matter. They should have cashed in on players in the 2009-10 offseason and again the following one. It's ancient history though and really doesn't matter anymore. What's done is done.

I wasn't complaining about Engel, I was complaining about Sanchez giving himself up to move the guy over. I thought there was a high likelihood that the next two hitters would either pop up or strike out. I have no problem with Engel bunting because he is speedy and otherwise useless with the stick.

Stop fucking bunting. It has been mathematically shown to decrease the likelihood of scoring. Thank you, Chicago White Sox Fans.

I hate to say this, but Lourdes Gurriel looks way better as a hitter than Moncada.

I 100% agree. I'm more concerned about lack of hits. He makes too many outs. He walks plenty for his K rate to be ok at 20-25%, Also, a guy with his speed should be able to leg out more IF hits but he doesn't. It is kind of baffling. He has a .310 OBP and walks a ton. We all complained like crazy when Alexei Ramirez used to have a OBP that hovered around .310. Having a .310 OBP when you walk as much as Moncada does is really bad. His OBP should be .360+ with his walk rate.

The fact that he's probably going to set the MLB record for strikeouts in a single season isn't alarming to you? I don't think he's having a horrible season, but there isn't a lot to tell me that he's going to get any better either. He's average to slightly below at this point. He needs to prove that he's better than that. I still have hope that he is, but it is dwindling. He's not there yet, but he's on the precipice of becoming one of those enigma players that oozes talent but can't put it all together to become anything other than slightly below average. Think the hitter version of Javier Vazquez. That is my concern currently. It doesn't change the fact that the 3 main rebuild pieces that are with the big club are only in Chicago because they have 1 option remaining. If Giolito, Lopez and Moncada had an extra option, they would have probably not been called up last year, and would be coming up just now. And if they did come up last year, Giolito and Moncada would have been in Charlotte long ago, and Lopez about late June.

I think they're holding off because they think that if there is hope that Crawford is still a top 5 goalie, STH won't cancel en masse. If he's not ready toward the end of training camp, and there is still no issue, they will have all of their money from STH and then they can announce what is wrong and how long he's going to be out for. They have to get paid first. I know that STH couldn't give their tix away, my best friend and his dad have them. I truly believe that it is bad, he's probably not playing again during the remainder of his contract, and they're squeezing one last year of the cup run STH gravy train before a lot of them choose not to renew. If what I believe to be correct is correct, in 2019-20 there will be a lot of empty seats at the UC. The fact that Anton Forsberg is still on the roster tells you a ton about the situation. He's waiver eligible, and I think a team would have taken a flyer on him via trade with how many teams needed goalies this offseason.

I don't think so. Moncada was a centerpiece. I'm going to start a new thread about the disappointing first wave

The launch angle revolution has turned sinkerballers into an endangered species. Fangraphs had an article early in the 2018 season that from 2015-present the sinker is actually the pitch that gets hit the hardest and most for extra bases. Any low strike is now a meatball. They get hit HARD, and most of the time there is a batted ball on a low strike it goes for extra bases. High hard is better than anything low, unless it is out of the zone. What has been figured out is the following: 1. Hitters have changed the plane of their swing such that low strikes are the preferred pitch to hit. There are now two parts of the zone that can be considered meatballs: Low strikes and those right down the middle. 2. Umpires are more likely to call low strikes than high strikes, therefore it is easier to lay off a high strike because there is a much higher likelihood that a high strike will be called a ball than a low strike 3. Because these hitters are more likely to hit a low strike hard, it has made pitching that much more difficult. Having a high velocity fastball with a high spin rate is what is needed to be successful. The way to get hitters out has changed. You're more likely to get a swinging strike on a chest high 96 mph fastball than with any breaking ball. Fastball/Changeup are the two most powerful pitches. Breaking balls, while necessary, don't matter as much. I'd argue that a hard cutter(89+ mph) or hard splitter (87+ mph) will be more effective than your standard curveball/slider. What is needed now is to miss bats with pitches that move AND are high velocity, outside of changeups. They look like a fastball longer and move less. Whatever you know about baseball is wrong. Grounders are bad, because they're being hit harder and are more likely to find holes. Low pitches are being launched into orbit as more and more hitters move to classic uppercut swings. How do you battle uppercut swings? high fastballs with a high spin rate. Breaking balls aren't fooling hitters with location and break, they're more de facto changeups.

Moncada might set the record for Ks in a season. 141 and it isn't August. Woof.

Agreed. He should start in CF for a while

I'm just starting to become frustrated because there are exactly 3 important players (Moncada/Giolito/Lopez) with the big club this year and you can't pencil in any of them in the lineup/rotation for the foreseeable future, and the sample size is approaching statistical significance. At this point they're in "prove it" mode.

I thought he'd figure it out and start being able to fight off close pitches and not swing and miss in the strike zone. That hasn't gone away. He seems to have a game or two in a row where he goes 2-4 or 3-5, followed by 5 games of 0 or 1 hit.

I'm beginning to question Moncada. This is from someone who absolutely loved him up until recently. I don't know if he's going to be anything other than average anymore. When even the conductor of the Moncada hype train comes to this conclusion, something is wrong. Maybe his contact issues are way too severe.

As evidence mounts to the contrary, even the most ardent of supporters can't deny that a player is struggling and might not be as good as one thought. Please change my user comment back to "Doing that little shimmy"