caulfield12

QUOTE (gatnom @ Jan 11, 2012 -> 01:23 AM) Correct me if I am wrong here, but weren't the Astros very similar to the Sox in that they retooled and went for it every year? If so, are they in a terrible situation because they are rebuilding or because of the decisions they made beforehand? As far as your last statement goes, we very much would become the Astros if everything were to go wrong, not that I think it will. Carlos Lee was probably the biggest mistake....which eventually led to their dumping Oswalt, Pence, Bourn, Berkman, etc. Bagwell, like Frank Thomas, got old or "de-PED'ed" fast. Lidge pretty much just blew up on them. Obviously Berkman still had some life left in that bat of his. Wallace never worked out there, and Chris Burke totally played himself out of baseball. Luke Scott ended up in BALT. Plus, they had a lot of injuries to their pitching staff...kind of like a perfect storm of things going wrong, not unlike the 2011 White Sox season (albeit they were relatively healthy).

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_ylt=AtKx...n_astros_011012 For the complete rebuild backers out there, look at the LASTROS. Similar comparison organizationally...in terms of media market, revenues/attendance, past history of winning or competing most of the time, etc. We do not want to be where they are, that's for darned sure. At least we have a decent chance to win the division if everything goes right for the Sox.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 10:29 PM) I don't really see how our bonus skimming scandal would affect us in Cuba. I think the fact that we signed Viciedo months after firing Wilder is proof of that. Not sure why you think it would. As for signing Cespedes, we're talking a near major leage ready 5 tool talent. Guys like that aren't available in the draft, so I don't see how bringing up our lack of spending there really makes sense. You don't think KW would be willing to take a chance on a potential superstar? He's gambled on much less in the past. Agree with everything you've written 100%, except for your generic handle, haha.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 10:56 PM) Wow, I am glad I didn't notice this discussion when I was at work today...I would have gotten nothing done whatsoever! Great discussion guys, especially Russ...I think you're right on in a lot of your thinking, even though we probably differ a bit in terms of ways to build an effective organization. I agree with a lot of things that people on the "development" side of the fence are saying, but I still maintain that there are blatant inefficiencies in that method which remain unmentioned and unaccounted for. Additionally, there are inefficiencies in the free agent marketplace (due to a tremendous swing towards the develop-from-within philosophy) which can be capitalized upon to the advantage of a team that can sustain an above-average payroll. I guess my questions, which I have consistently asked but not really received input on, with the possible exception of qwerty, are the following: a) Have there been studies published which show the economic impact of "A" rated prospects which bust? b) Have there been studies published, whether using anecdotal evidence or historical salary data, which predict the optimum levels of capital allocation across the different levels of a MLB organization? c) Can a MLB franchise using the development model sustain attendance in the top third of the League when it will consistently lose homegrown players to FA or trade them away? I know some of you will raise the point that by winning with the development model, you thereby draw more and thus become able to sustain higher payrolls. However, I think this is a dangerous unintended consequence of the develop from within model, as homegrown players become fan favorites, forcing teams to spend to keep them or risk fan alienation, i.e. Joe Mauer. I'll be very interested moving forward to seeing how the Twins fanbase reacts with what might be an underperforming team combined with the luster wearing off a new stadium. Anyways, just some of my thoughts in regards to the discussion that I never really see mentioned. I'm sure it's out there somewhere. In general, you'd have to think that any team that wasn't able to push their payroll up in the $90-105 million range, at a minimum, would have serious trouble sustaining itself for more than a 2-3 year run. There are only 10-12 markets in the majors that can produce that kind of revenue and spending, regardless of the team's win/loss record. I think the Brewers are one of the few examples of a small/mid-market club that have really done exceptionally well...and their fanbase has increased exponentially as a result. Obviously, the new stadium helped significantly, but so did producing/drafting stars like Fielder, Braun or Weeks and trading for Greinke, etc. The point about alienating the fanbase by not signing a Mauer or Fielder is a very good one. The Cardinals, same situation with Pujols...White Sox with Buehrle, because of 3-4 bad contracts. The Twins put all their eggs in the Mauer basket and it has already forced them to part with Nathan, D. Young, Cuddyer and Kubel. Probably Liriano as well, sooner or later. They kind of got hit by a double whammy with Morneau's possibly career-ending medical problems on top of Mauer's issues. Mariners, another comparison with a declining Ichiro sticking around (because the revenues he generates offset the value of his contract from a cost/benefit standpoint)...or the White Sox, with Konerko. 15-18 teams, they would be in a position where they would have to dump Konerko, Thornton, Floyd, Crain, AJ, etc. We, fortunately, are not. In the end, the A's and Rays couldn't sustain their success because of ballpark/financial reasons. For every example like that, there's the Brewers and Rangers to examine. Or look at the Tigers as well, because on the surface, we should be able to dominate our division more consistently...and yet we're getting outspent from a payroll standpoint, outdrawn and outmaneuvered by a more bold and daring ownership group and GM combo. In Cabrera and Verlander, they have two absolute studs that nobody else in the division can measure up against. Maybe the DBacks this year would be another organization to look at, although they've struggled to put fannies in the seats ever since the glow of the 2001 World Series championship wore off. It will be interesting to see how much an extended run of success will reinvigorate their season ticket base. The MAIN consolation in our particular division is that the likelihood of the Royals or Indians being able to keep their "waves" of talent intact and affordable in order to make that extended performance run....at best, 25%. In the end, that's the biggest single issue facing AA...no matter how well they perform, if they're still considered the second tier to the Yankees and Red Sox and can't ever get over that hump once or twice, then the acquisition of all that talent in their system will have been for naught, because they'll eventually have to blow it apart and sell off the spare parts.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 10:57 PM) Filipinocupid.com keeps popping up on the ad banner at the top of the site Technically, it should be filipinAcupid.com, Filipinos are males from the Philippines, the -AS ending denotes female. Like Russian women, kind of, father's name is Sharapov or Kournikov, daughters end an A at the end of their name. Or Spanish, where the A usually denotes feminine and the O masculine at the end of a word.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 11:02 PM) Ok, so why in the hell are you two friends again? In a nutshell, she is married to a foreigner. The husband can't get her pregnant (sterile). So...she thought it was best that her child be "bi-racial" so that other Chinese people would accept more easily that he was the father...didn't want to do adoption or sperm bank/donor/scientific method. Says there's "no feeling" that way. Didn't want to adopt...not interested. Wanted to have a child that was her own. Tricky situation.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 08:58 PM) Greg will be there, you know it. No, he will say he has no desire to support an organization that kicked out his favorite manager of all-time, one who will undoubtedly go on to win at least 2-3 more World Series titles in the NL.

QUOTE (MuckFinnesota @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 09:31 PM) No, I have a Kenny Williams sucks club with myself. Don't associate me with Greg. Okay, (for Greg). I vow (New Year's resolution #3) not to bring up Lawrence or KC again before the season starts. Only THE SHADOW. LOL.

Surprised Ozzie hasn't already signed Juan Pierre for a final go-around with the Marlins.

Surprised Ozzie hasn't already signed Juan Pierre for a final go-around with the Marlins.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 07:22 PM) Ozzie. Guillen. Quit. Is that Morse code? Telegraph? Stop.

QUOTE (TaylorStSox @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 07:26 PM) Wasn't Glavine the only guy that came through their system? Maybe Avery too. I don't remember. Smoltz was from the Tigers, the infamous Doyle Alexander deal. Steve Avery, definitely. Jason Schmidt came through their system, as well.

QUOTE (MuckFinnesota @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 07:55 PM) "Bud, what would you say about the mess our organization has been put in, having spent money on long term contracts for underachieving ball players? Is there a way to cleanse the organization of bad leadership (who canned the wrong man in Guillen), maintain payroll and still be a competitive team?" Do you and Greg have an Ozzie Supporters Forever FB group?

QUOTE (DirtySox @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 08:01 PM) It's okay though. We won't need prospects when our powerhouse rotation that rivals the Braves of the 90's comes to fruition. WAVE 1=Sale, Stewart, Axelrod WAVE 2=Molina, Santiago, Castro, Petricka, Leesman, Er. Johnson, Rienzo, etc. TSUNAMI ALERT=oodles and oodles of prospects galore back from Gavin Floyd, Matt Thornton, Crain, etc.

Marty34 is fun to read.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 05:46 PM) I disagree, most of the pitchers and starting lineup came from trades or were in our farm system. I agree Loaiza wasn't. Karchner wasn't but Garland was 18 or 19 when we got him so he learned here. Jenks was 1/2 year but the sox turned him into a releiver. PK was here but it is still a product of the sytem (cameron) which got him here. Everett was a trade. No matter how you look at it most of the team was a product of the farm system or was acquired by a product of the farm system. Not everyone but most. even the great theo got really lucky that a twins castoff decided to start taking PEDs to laed boston to a Series. But that year, the "over the top" moves weren't farm related... AJ Iguchi Dye Hermanson El Duque

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 06:14 PM) If Sale and Molina are top of the rotation starters, Reed is a top tier closer, Morel is an everyday 3B, and Beckham develops, that's pretty good production from one of the worst rated farm systems over the last three years. Don't forget Viciedo. Humber and DeAza aren't rookies or our organizational products, but they essentially are for all the money we spent on them. Same with "producing" Sergio Santos.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 06:16 PM) Out of that list, the contributions from the "Farm system" are pretty minimal. Loaiza wasn't a farm system product. Matt Karchner was a 30 year old journeyman we'd picked up from the Royals a few years earlier. Jenks spent 1/2 of a season in the Sox Farm System after the Angels tired of his act. Thanks, Doc Rock. Saved me some typing. And Konerko had been around a LONG, long time before 2005.

•A source says Cespedes' eventual contract will be in the range of four years and $32MM, writes MLB.com's Joe Frisaro. "Several teams have backed away" from Cespedes' original goal of an eight-year, $60MM contract. Frisaro says the Marlins are among the teams still very interested in the Cuban prospect. •Also from Frisaro, Cespedes is tentatively expected to establish residency in the Dominican Republic on January 15, and then the outfielder will petition Major League Baseball for free agent status.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 05:00 PM) Or people can stop being silly and realize Tampa was a freaking expansion team run by the great Chuck Lamar. 2005 onward for Tampa is the model everybody should want to emulate. Minus that one small, tiny, minute detail of the Rays, Twins or A's (the 3 most commonly-cited) never winning it all. We have this conversation over and over. We should look at teams like the Giants, Mariners, Rangers and Cardinals for comparisons in terms of market/financials/media, etc. Maybe the Braves. And that Braves' model still has a patent defect, the lack of enough potent offseason to survive most of those postseasons after 1991-1996.

QUOTE (SOXOBAMA @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 04:50 PM) What kind of team would you like to see next year? A team exemplifying "sustained excellence" as a strategic model, which polls well in the Heartland and finally, just wins, baby! By the way, what were the Blue Jays' attendance numbers over that last decade...? Just as important as their draft position/s. Pretty bleak, compared to the SkyDome rocking in the 80's/early 90's.

And the White Sox don't have to compete in the AL East, our division is much more wide open, historically. Looking at the 2005 roster, almost none of it was built internally, with the exceptions of Frank Thomas, Rowand, Crede and Buehrle. I guess you could count Jenks and Konerko, but not really. 20008 again proved that four well-timed acquisitions (Ramirez, Danks, Quentin and Floyd) can propel a team to the division title. Even though the 2005-06 teams were not homegrown, they had as good a chance as any the Blue Jays or Rays produced to have success for 3+ consecutive years at the major league level...because of that pitching staff. The problem is that Contreras and Garcia were never really the same (Jose for April/May 06 and then poof) and Garland had peaked with us. But we also had Javy Vazquez, on paper...things looked pretty much set and that didn't last another full seaosn before it fell apart. Injuries so often play a huge role. Based on the talent in our farm system from 1998-2001, we should have won at least one World Series. But that great farm system had almost nothing to do with why we eventually ended up winning it...the key players in that group, Rauch and Borchard, were total flops with the White Sox.

Paging Richard Allen to the courtesy Sox Financials booth.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jan 10, 2012 -> 02:04 PM) Nice rebuttal. Or Mike Pepperoni Piazza. The Sox best guys over a decade (developed internally) were Ordonez (FA), C-Lee (FA), Durham, Buehrle, Crede and Rowand. Not so many Top 10 draft picks in that group.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ. How many fourth or fifth place teams have we had since 2001? 2007. And that was followed by the 2008 playoff team. Someone needs to take a valium.