Roughneck

From the little I heard of him, he seemed very knowledgeable of the game, but too soft spoken to be interesting enough to call a 3 hour game. I don't think he has the voice for it.

No. His father said that the Dodgers and Yankees had offered, but I think he was confused and both team have merely had discussions with Manny. Nobody has mentioned the Pirates previously. Also, there is never a mystery team and this is a ploy to drive up final bids on Manny.

I feel the same way. He has a good voice, but a lot of his talk seems unnatural or forced. Hopefully he improves as time goes on. Rongey was terrible. Nothing was ever the team's fault. Everyone calling was a moron and didn't understand baseball (which was only true about half the time). And he's massive scumbag to boot. For as much of a self-important pseudo-intellectual as Rongey is, you'd think he was writing influential investigative journalism and not performing verbal analingus on a horrible baseball franchise.

I agree. With the BS mystery team showing up this weekend, I think we might be near the endgame for this saga, with Manny trying to get the last few dollars out of the Sox. But it sure seems like we'll get zero news or anything of substance for several days or weeks and then suddenly it'll be Bam! Manny signs with Sox.

Of course. I believe they all can. I'm just saying that none of them are established major leaguers at this point, but their success it extremely important to this team's success. We can bring in Machado, Pederson, and another starter, but if Giolito puts up an ERA over 5, Yoan hits .220, and Eloy hits like Yoan, this team isn't going to be in the wildcard hunt.

I agree, but I think you only make this move if you're making several other moves and you're definitively going for it this year. I don't think the Sox should "go for it" quite yet.

If Pederson was a free agent, I'd be all for the Sox getting him. But I don't like trading a nice prospect like Bush for him when he only has 2 years of control left and likely won't be here when the White Sox World Domination window is open. I think this move only makes sense if they are getting Machado and also landing Kuechel. But even then, us winning still requires Yoan to rebound, Giolito to rebound, and for Eloy to tear it up from the start when called up.

I bought a few of the 2016 caps sans NE logo on clearance after that season. I am stocked up and don't plan on ever buying another game cap ever because I hate the logo on the side. Fine for a replica, but looks so bad as part of the uniform. And come 2020, we're going to have Nike's swoosh on the chest of the jerseys, so none of this is ever getting better. Probably 5 years until we have "modest" advertisements on the sleeves and maybe another 10 years before it looks like NASCAR or soccer.

Machado's father is either taking liberties or doesn't know the whole story. We've heard from a handful of sources that the Yankees never actually offered a contract. The Dodgers have a 3B and a SS, interest in Harper, and not enough money to spend. I don't doubt they made a crap offer to Machado, but if they were serious, we'd have heard of it by now. Either way, he just said vague stuff which could point to pretty much any team other than the Yankees. And who knows if he has any actual info?

Actually, the New Era logo now appears on all official game hats. Has since the 2016 playoffs. And it still looks awful and out of place.

But *do* we really know he wants to go to the Yankees? There were lots of reports that he loved the Yankees as a kid, but I think everybody just assumed he still loves them and wants to play there. But I agree with the rest of your post. He will go wherever he gets paid.

If he dies, the team wouldn't keep paying his contract to this family. He only loses on the 1 year gamble if he makes it out alive.

Fixed

Wow. I knew about him quitting, but just attributed it to him being nuts. This is messed up.

Yeah, that first quote sounds awful.

Do tell. If he really thinks he could get a contract for $325 next offseason, he might do it. Leaving $135 mil or so on the table this year to potentially get a contract worth $150 mil more than this next year? I wouldn't bet on it, but I could see it.

Yes. I am also triggered when people have beliefs and views I don't hold. Horrified, even.

Is he crying poor or saying that they can't spend additional money because of the luxury tax? Because the first would be stupid, but the second is a legitimate issue. I don't pay attention to the Cubs so I don't know their situation, but reading all this stuff via the Manny/Harper situation, it's easy to see that the new luxury tax is disastrous for the players and just lets the biggest owners keep more of their money. The Yankees/Dodgers/Cubs could all easily spend more and just laugh at the additional tax if it was under the old system.

Honestly, what the hell is Levine talking about? He needs a nap.

That would be the worst thing they could do, both in confronting him and taking the offer away. He didn't accuse the Sox, and they don't want to look like they have a guilty conscience here. And Manny will get massively paid somewhere, even if the market collapses and he does have to take $175 mil. He will have other suitors. The Sox have no other Manny Machado. The Sox need him a hell of a lot more than he needs them.

I don't think it necessarily means they're "more serious," or in intense negotiations, just that their offer is much higher than the $175m figure.

For the NBA, it's not just the cap but the max contracts. What could Lebron get in an open market with no caps or max? $80 mil a year? $90 mil? But he can only get $40 or so, which means he's losing a great deal, but mediocre or bad players are gaining more. And I don't see how a cap would help he Yankees, other than their pocket books. I think a cap would be basically a more formal version of what we have had of late - teams would spend big for top talent, and it would essentially come down to what percentage of their finite payroll certain teams would be willing to give to a superstar player. But the current system is a disaster for the players. It is effectively a cap, but with none of the revenue-sharing increasing their salaries annually. But I agree with the rest of the stuff you said.

But if they actually did offer $175 million, which seems absurdly low, they risk pissing off Machado's camp and not even getting a response, let along being given the chance to beat higher bids. If the Sox really offered $175 million, would they really expect Lozano to come back at them asking them to beat an offer of $275 million? I'm no negotiator, but I wouldn't expect a reasonable party would want to increase their offer by 60%.

Absolutely. If that was the best offer, then he's right in the ballpark of signing with the Yankees (for potentially a little less). It's not. It sounds too low to have been the Sox opening offer, too. We know that barring collusion, the Sox don't know what other teams have offered or will offer. Everybody coming in to this offseason thought Manny would get upwards of $300 million. The Sox had no way to know that the market would have collapsed this hard for Machado, and if they made an absurdly low offer, they risk having the agent not return their calls. I hope we get specifics once this ordeal is done, but I don't think there's any way the Sox went in at $175 mil with the intention to raise their bid by over $125 million to where the bidding was expected to be.

My eyes rolled so hard I went blind for about 30 seconds. The mass of MLB players aren't going to vote to go on strike and lose their own salaries during their limited earning window just because Manny can only buy 17 palaces and not 30. Also, this report is puzzling, but clearly false. Rabbit, WSD, Bucket, other people with sources have said continually that the Sox are offering BIG money here. This report wouldn't have qualified as huge money since like 1999. Every day we get another false report, yet people keep going nuts over them. Y'all just looking for reasons to be mad.