michelangelosmonkey

Hypothetical. Getz doesn't receive an acceptable offer for Robert. Now it's All Star break and Robert has been healthy, playing Gold Glove CF and has 25 homers, 25 steals and a .900 OPS. Farm pieces are all developing positively. Do you sell or does he become cornerstone? I think the case for keeping him long term is better than it was for Crochet. You'll have team control through the 2027 season and a GG CF with power and speed seems ultra valuable. I think that is also where we thought he would be at the end of the 2023 season. If that is possible...don't trade now for a B prospect.

Wow...what a dick response. I was going to counter with a list of top 50 prospects in the last 25 years that failed in the majors except no one wants to see a list of a thousand names. I'm not even sure what your list is...6'6" lefty pitchers who at 25 were top 5 pitchers in baseball, had pitched less than 200 MLB innings in their career and had already recovered from TJS? I just did a stathead search (wow...what a cool site). 1980 to present, Lefty pitchers over 6'5", who threw over 140 innings, with more than 12 strikeouts per 9 and a FIP below 2.7. Here's the list: Garret Crochet. That's it. In 45 years there is one guy like him and we want to trade him for some team's secondary prospects? (note: If you change the rules to 10 K per 9 and FIP below 3...you add one name, Chris Sale). Steve Carlton won 27 games in 1972 for worst team in baseball. It took years to get back to the WS...but ultimately he made 6 playoffs and 2 WS. I want to be that patient team and not the feeder system for the good teams.

I feel like you are ignoring the fact that Crochet is 25 and was one of top 5 pitchers in baseball. That is the kind of player you should build around. Teams can win WS with three aces...even if the rest of their team is mediocre. The 2005 WS team was built that way. 90's Braves, Diamondbacks WS team, Phillies from ten years ago. 70's Orioles. Mid-80's Mets. I think this is a real path. Let's say they keep Crochet until the trade deadline. He repeats first half of 2004 season but longer stints. Medical says he's built like a bull. Give him 10 year $300 million deal. Our payroll is basically nothing so even front loading it might make sense. You have Roberts + 3 top 60 position prospects + plenty of payroll to fill in. Honestly if they trade Crochet and get a 4th top 60 position prospect and a top 100 I will still rout for the team. I think offensive baseball can be more fun to watch. But watching Crochet, Smith and Schultz pitch can be a lot of fun too.

I wrote this many times but Sox payroll goes up and down with attendance...sadly (intelligently?) Sox base of fans that will go to a game irrespective of its talent seems to be about 17,000...in good years that's 30,000 (For reference Dodgers base looks to be about 40,000, Yankees and Cubs maybe 30,000...extra 13,000 per home game at $100 revenue is $100,000,000 in extra payroll) . JR seems to use attendance for his payroll budget...which honestly seems reasonable. I think more than any team the Sox were destroyed by COVID. Attendance went to 0 in 2020 and 60% of what it should have been in 21 and 22...thus the tight budgets You talk about failure to develop...I think Moncada was really one of those people struck with long COVID. At 24 he put up a .900 OPS and 5 WAR got COVID the next year and was just never the same. Maybe the same with Tim Anderson 19-20-21 he was a 4 WAR a year player and then just fell off a cliff. Eloy hit 45 homers in his first 177 games at 23 by 2020 then just never the same. Minors were shut down so Vaughn and Crochet lost key development time. Kopech took the year off. I don't know...with the White Sox getting historically crushed by the new draft lottery rules...I just think maybe it's the baseball gods. 2019 was the 100th anniversary of the Black Sox, The BG let us build up an amazing team and then just destroyed us in every way possible.

2011 Phillies starting five rotation was worth 30 WAR. Honestly if we go with the premise that the White Sox will never spend money for their roster (top five payroll in 90's, 00's, 10's and top 7 in 20's). Will never pay a top of the market pitching contract (Danks in 2012, Wheeler in 2020, Liam, Lynn $18 mill per year extensions for older pitchers) and that a young pitcher is worthless after TJS...sure. Trade your ace for a future because he is "depreciating". Chris Sale is about to win Cy Young at 35. Snell won at 30, Verlander at 36 and 39, Randy Johnson won 5 after he turned 30, Clemens won 4 after her turned 34. Scherzer 3 after 28, Elite pitchers can do it for a long time. You BUILD around elite. Trading blossoming elite for some teams second tier prospects just seems foolish to me. We were the worst team in history and yet we saw Reylo, Sale, Cease and Rodon all pitching in the playoffs for other teams. We just let our talent walk or trade for prospects....that's how you become terrible.

Concentrate on pitching?? How about this...we trade him for a 25-year-old, with two full years of very cheap control, low mileage on his arm, already had TJS but two full years removed and in his first full year as a starter was one of top five pitchers in the majors? How about we get that guy.

He's 3 days younger than Crochet who put up a 4 WAR in his first half a season as a starter. If the days are over where you get a top hitting prospect...why are we trading him????

Just because they haven't offered a pitcher top of the market contract (actually twice in 12 years) doesn't mean they won't. Sign Crochet

Getting a 3 WAR platoon player for Crochet would be an unmitigated disaster. He stays (my preference) or what he can bring are the keys to the future. I think we would consider ourselves fortunate to get the equivalent of what we got in the Sale trade.

Vaughn is better than Torkelson and we think he's a bust. Korey Lee is better than Dingler and we think he is a bust. Jobe = Schultz. By almost every metric Crochet was a top 5 pitcher in baseball in his first season as a starter and he's 25 with almost no tread off the tire. If we trade Crochet for Vaughn, Lee and Schultz and say just getting Schultz is a win...really? Montreal traded a power lefty pitcher at 25 and for the next 12 years he averaged 7 WAR a season and then he got better. We love prospects too much and what's even worse is that by all accounts...we won't even GET a team's top prospects for Crochet just secondary prospects. My point about Holliday and Mayo is that we write off our SSS guys like FG top 60 Ramos because he didn't do it in the majors but then say other teams SSS failure are just an illusion.

I know that is the narrative here...but they signed Liam 3/$54. Lance Lynn 2/$36. Both old guys. Jon Danks 5/$65 a dozen years ago. They offered Wheeler 5/$120. Plus their payroll right now is at near $0. To say it is impossible...with a new GM? We don't know.

I'm talking about 2026. No matter how you slice it 2025 seems a rebuilding season. But I think by mid season you could have Hagen Smith and Schultz pitching in the majors. Quero as your everyday C. Montgomery as your everyday shortstop. Ramos as your everyday 3b. Sosa everyday 2b. That could be a really fun young team to follow. I'm not writing off Thorpe...His first 7 starts he had 3 wins and a 3.0 ERA for a terrible team. He was untouchable in the minors. Having a right-handed control pitcher surrounded by 3 lefty flame throwers seems perfect. And yes, Cannon, Martin, Burke, Adams, Taylor, Iriarte, Eder...lots of good young arms...even if you want to throw Thorpe in this mix...that's 8 guys for your 4th and 5th starters.

Yes? Why do we hate our prospects and love everyone other teams? Fan Graphs had Ramos as the 60th best prospect in baseball at the updated 2024 chart...and we write him off because in half as many MLB at bats as Jackson Holliday he performed about as well? They had Montgomery and Quero at 16 and 40. Sosa put up a .930 OPS in Birmingham and .840 in Charlotte about what Marcus Semien did for us at about the same age....and he was never considered much of a prospect until he became a star. And honestly...2024 White Sox were an apocalyptic wasteland. Roberts, after a 5 WAR 2023 got in a funk and one can imagine the depression of going to work. Positive new coach, new hitting approach and a bit of luck...we all thought 7 WAR seasons would be his average. The bullpen had ten pitchers that contributed -7 war. 9 players contributing -9 War and a manager that lost the team. Merely replacing the garbage with 16 guys contributing 1 WAR and you have a 32 game improvement. One cannot overstate how bad the bad was last year.

He's 25! He has two full years of control and for half a season, his first real season as a starter, he was arguably the best pitcher in baseball. He's 3 years from TJ surgery, low miles on his arm and seems to have an easy repeatable delivery. By many accounts we have the best two left-handed pitchers in the minors. I think in our quest for a "super team" we miss how easy it can be to get to the playoffs with Skubal and Tyler Greene and a bunch of replacement level guys or Bobby Witt JR and four good starters. So my plan is 2026 Crochet, Schultz, Smith, Thorpe and Eider. Robert gets his career back on track, Quero, Montgomery, Ramos, Sosa, Vaughn, $100 million free agent RF, Benni. Bullpen from all the good young arms. Good new manager. I think you can win with that team, and I think if you get to the playoffs and Crochet is Randy Johnson...nothing is out of reach.

Yes as could Grant Taylor. The point is you are trading a fairly sure thing for three maybes. Sorry I'm broken...2021 we had Moncada-26, Vaughn-23, Robert-23, Zack Collins-26, Eloy-24, Madrigal 24, Kopech-25. 1st round picks, top 100's recently, all in the bigs contributing to a playoff team. All Star core in my mind at 1b, 2b, 3b, LF, RF, C, Ace and then...bust, bust, bust, bust, bust, bust, bust. Prospects are so often fool's gold.

This is my argument from earlier. Let's say we get in time machine and make a trade with 2022 Tigers. We get #4 overall prospect Spencer Torkelson (career -0.3 WAR), #40 overall Jackson Jobe (Career WAR 0.1) and solve our long-term catching problem with Tigers #4 prospect Dillon Dingler (Career WAR -0.3) plus a flyer pick. That's a top 5 a top 50, PLUS Tigers 4th best prospect plus some A ball player we think has real upside??? If we got that package we would have been over the moon. If we get that from some team, in this era of teams not trading top position players, we would be hugging ourselves. The problem is prospects are all risky until they're not. Certainly, SSS but Jackson Holiday with about the same number of at bats as James McCann put up 1/8 of the WAR. Coby Mayo struck out in half his at bats in 17 games. Untouchable. Our 25-year-old ace who's succeeded in the majors...MUST be traded. Sigh

I forgot about the diminished skills clause. JR is evil.

I'm not saying they will go from $38 mill payroll to $240 mill payroll this offseason. I'm saying that there are GM's out there that never have a budget above bottom 10. That's NOT the White Sox. JR will spend money if there is a plan to make the team plus attendance better. I don't think they will ever again get into an open bidding war because if they don't win...it just feeds the negativity beast. But I think Soto at 26, with negative defensive value not getting Ohtani money is not impossible. Sox behind the scenes throwing out a $500 mill offer? Not impossible. Convincing him of charismatic new manager, building a marketing machine to push him as the face of Chicago, Aces on the way? not impossible.

I mean clearly you are right because they didn't get him. Still If I come to you and say "here is generational wealth plus your two best friends will be on the team" and someone else says "here's a little more money" I'm not certain which way I would go. I think it was a serious effort and it failed. Wheeler was the BEST offer and it failed. Sox luck has been bad

I'm not shifting gears??? I'm just the least drunk guy at the AA meeting. I don't think we are doomed to 10 years of 100 loss baseball as many here seem to think. Yes yes yes...the sox did not do things right in the past...that's exactly what I was saying...they covered up organizational rot with big payroll and hot shot young core. Getz seems to recognize that and they are working hard to fix it. Yes Getz was in charge of the minors but seems like maybe what he took away from his time then is Holy Crap we are doomed we need to change things. They've had three or four good drafts in a row. They are taking the minors seriously. Revamping their international scouting. Drafting high schoolers like Wolkow, trading for teenagers like Zavala, signing international guys like Mogollon. In 2022 the MLB team looked great hiding the disaster that was behind it. In 2024 the MLB was a disaster hiding what I think is some coming excitement. Crochet, Smith, Schultz, Taylor could be glorious.

I'm arguing that the "fact" that they won't sign Crochet is just our battered opinions. I have presented the truth that JR will pay a top five payroll, that they HAVE given the highest contract in the game (1997 Albert Belle) and followed that up two years later with Frank getting a $64 mill contract which in 2024 dollars is WAY more than $100 mill...and that Getz is doing things differently. What is a greater disaster...hoping Crochet becomes Randy Johnson and his arm falls off, or trading him, he becomes Randy Johnson and you end up with Yoan Moncada 2.0? For me option 2 is much more painful.

It seems like there were incentives that would bring it to over $300 mill. From going and looking back...the Yankees dropped out at 7 years $220 mill while the WSox had 8/$250 plus incentives plus signing his two best friends. He signed for 10 years $300 million. I just think this idea that they were uncompetitive because of JR's cheapness when they outbid the Yankees is just fiction.

1995 5th highest 2006 4th 2011 5th 2022 7th As I've argued here in the past, JR is a businessman and he recognizes that Sox fans come if the team is good but they don't if the team is bad. Their base attendance looks like 17,000 per game. But when the team is winning it's more like 27,000 a game. 10,000 fans x 81 x $100 is $81 million a year extra between Ok and good. Post WS it was nearly 37,000 per game which is like $160 mill extra revenue. JR spends when the fans come. Cubs base is more like 30,000 per game.

White Sox had the top offer for Wheeler. They had $300 mill plus incentives on the table for Machado and signed his two best friends to be on the team. In spite the narrative that lives here, they weren't trying to bargain basement offer the guys because of JR's cheapness. I don't know why they never tried for Harper. Always thought he was the best fit for the team at the time.

I'm not saying they have a good shot at the playoffs next year. I'm saying a 25-year-old lefty with ace stuff traded for some team's 2nd best prospect and some wild cards has enormous risks. When the White Sox traded Chris Sale and Jose Quintana they were each 28. Carlos Rodon was 29 when they let him go. I think that matters. Montreal traded a tall power pitching lefty with ace like stuff when he was 25. Don't you have some fear we are trading Randy Johnson? Everyone falls in love with some other team's "beasts" that are going to crush MLB pitching and then SO many fail. Yes there is a danger that Crochet's arm falls off but I watched Crochet last year, no one on this board or anywhere else thought he could pitch 149 innings. His last two starts against playoff teams and he threw 8 innings, 5 hits, 1 walk 14 k's no runs. Ugh and we are going to trade him for Yoan Moncada or Eloy Jimeniz