JUSTgottaBELIEVE

How so? The Sox have never spent more than $70M on a single player in the open market. In the past, they weren’t picking from the Tier 2 free agents, they were picking from the Tier 3, 4, 5... free agents. If they are unable to pick up free agents from the Tier 2 group in the coming years (JDM, Goldy, Rendon, Grandal, etc), then I would agree with you. Until then, we will have to wait and see.

Sure but it’s not happening under this ownership group so the front office has to deal with the imposed constraints. It is what it is.

That’s where we’re at. Team isn’t ready yet and probably won’t be next year either (unless Cleveland completely falls apart). 2021 is the year but obviously still a lot work to be done between now and then. I just don’t see adding Machado or Harper now as the only path to competing in 2021 and beyond.

I’d bet my house that they will have more than one by the 2021 season, the year I expect their contention window to start.

When you are operating like a small to mid market team like the Sox, this is the exact reason why you wouldn’t want to expend so much of your financial resources to a single player. Hard to build quality depth on the MLB roster with additional veterans when you are allocating 20-25% of your team payroll on one player.

Sure but this isn’t a black and white thing. People act as if losing out on Machado means the rebuild is destined to fail and there’s no way to build a WS contender from here. That’s ridiculous. Contenders come in all shapes and sizes (Royals title team was built much differently than last year’s Red Sox, for example).

Why is having a 6 WAR player a requirement to being a WS contender? Dodgers (not including half a season of Machado, esp when he was well short of a 6 WAR pace in a dodgers uni) , Yankees, Cubs, and other contenders didn’t have one last year.

Surely a playoff contender if they signed Manny lol

Madrigal will be up next year at age 23 if he succeeds this year in the minors. How is that rushed? Same for Robert, except Robert is 5 months younger so maybe he comes up summer 2020. How long do you want to wait on these guys if they are performing in the minors?

I wouldn’t say they’ve rushed anyway at this point. Moncada might be the only one you could argue, maybe, but who else has been rushed? If anything they’ve done the opposite of that (see Eloy).

The first wave yes but not the second (current top 5 prospects) and third waves (#3 pick this June, top 5 pick next June, prospects acquired via trade next 18 months, INT market, etc).

Agreed. #3 pick this June and a likely top 5 pick again next June combined with hitting the INT market again and dealing the last few expiring veteran contracts over the next 18 months (Rodon, Abreu, Colome, Herrera, etc) should inject another nice round of minor league reinforcements as Kopech, Jimenez, Cease, Madrigal, and Robert start to graduate.

Because you’d be spending $65M for the first two years of a contract in which the team has basically little to no chance of making the playoffs. We still don’t know if the young core at the MLB level is good enough. However, what if Moncada proves to be a solid 3 WAR 3b and Madrigal comes up next year as a solid 2-3 WAR 2b moving forward but the Sox still can’t seem to figure out how to adequately address other positions like catcher, center field, SP, etc? Now they’ve tied themselves to a $300M contract to fill an area that is no longer a weakness and limited their flexibility in addressing areas of true weakness. Bottom line is we still don’t know what we have with this collection of young players (both in MLB and minors). That’s why it felt premature.

And this is why a big FA splash this winter felt premature. I know a 26 yo HOF talent never hits free agency blah blah but we don’t even know yet if the Sox have assembled a young core that is capable of carrying this rebuild to sustained success. They are still very much in the stage of accumulating young, cheap talent to determine who comprises the core moving forward. Having said that, I’d say the rebuild is straddling Phase 1/2 at the moment. At this point, I only want to see them start Phase 3 next winter if the core of Moncada, Lopez, Gio, Jimenez, Anderson shows up in a big way this season. If not, continue with Phase 1/2. Eventually, the cream rises to the top in spite of coaching and player development shortcomings.

Q absolutely WAS a TOR starter, key word was. He alone was evidence that a controllable TOR starter (even if not elite) has more value than what Eaton had at the end of the 2016 season. Eloy+Cease had more value than Gio+Lopez+Dunning at the time of the respective trades. Eloy was already a top 10 prospect and Cease was breaking into the top 100, both with major helium. Gio and Lopez were top 100 prospects at the time but Gio’s shine was fading fast after his rough MLB debut and Dunning was a borderline top 100. Lopez was considered by many to be a future reliever and was the only one that most Nats fans were disappointed to give up in the deal.

4.5 would have made him the #12 starter in MLB last year. That’s elite. I guess I’ve always thought of TOR as a top 30 guy (a top guy for every MLB team if every team was creating a roster from scratch today).

I think it’s a bit premature to say we got 2 busts and one back of the rotation guy. This won’t be decided until another couple years at least. Lopez showed last year he’s already a capable mid rotation starter with TOR potential (2.0 fWAR in first full season, not too shabby), Dunning is still a top 100 prospect, and Gio is still a wild card.

Also the 2018 list from fangraphs was based on qualified starters only. If you sort by all starting pitchers regardless of innings pitched the #30 starters were Hendricks (TOR and #1 starter for the mighty 95 win Cubs) and Happ. Both accumulated a fWAR of 3.2 last season. Again, if Lopez is that starting this year and for the next five years, the Eaton trade is absolutely a win based on that production alone.

You’re talking about two of the best starting rotations in baseball. Who were the top starters last year for the Brewers, Cubs, Rockies, Dodgers, A’s (actual good teams)?

Great point regarding his injury history Caulfield. There was always elevated injury risk with Eaton due to his style of play. Give the Sox credit for selling high on him.

Ah you’re right. I did. 2.75 not nearly as impressive. Just goes to show how difficult it is to find reliable starters in today’s game though. Point is, he’s pre arb and to be a top 30 starter in baseball is extremely valuable. Plus, with the direction they were headed in terms of the rebuild, Eaton did not fit their competitor window whereas Lopez still may.

So yea, top 30 is impressive and extremely valuable for a guy still in his pre arb years.

You’re looking at 2018 only. #30 qualified starter over the last 3 years (Cole Hamels) accumulated 11.0 fWAR (~3.7 per season). I’d take that for the next 5 years with ridiculous flexibility and affordability associated with pre arb and arb players than Eaton and his contract entering his age 28 season and basically a 3.7 fWAR player if not for the outlier 2016 season.

Oh yea but I’m trying to be realistic for the naysayers. Guys you mentioned are tier 1, although I think some may be realistic targets for WS since it’s a deep FA class.

I define TOR as a top 30 starter in MLB. I don’t consider a #1 on a 100 loss team a TOR necessarily. A top 30 starter in MLB with another 5 years of cheap control would be more valuable than Eaton’s worth at the time of trade (not even considering the injury).