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QUOTE (iamshack @ Aug 7, 2013 -> 10:47 AM) The A's have traded numerous young, cost-controlled pitchers for prospects, which they have used to rebuild their organization. They didn't kick the can down the road of mediocrity because of it. And they contended the next year. Because they had ready-made replacements and went dumpster diving for reclamation projects that worked out. This is exactly what wite is suggesting as a strategy -- but we don't have anyone that can replace Sale's production next year so we can't trade him and have a shot at a quick return to glory.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Aug 7, 2013 -> 10:31 AM) I don't think I agree with this whatsoever. The A's are not kicking the can down the road right now, are they? But the A's have done precisely what wite is saying we should do. And they only trade their cost-controlled guys when they have someone nearly as good waiting in the minors to replace him.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 7, 2013 -> 10:22 AM) It all came down to that one low, low slider to Delmon Young The pitch is burned into my memory. I remember literally throwing my hands up in the air in disgust and disbelief.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Aug 7, 2013 -> 09:50 AM) Build from WHAT? We have s*** in our system. The FA market is going to be littered with "damaged goods." Teams are locking up their good young players early (just as we did with Sale) so they aren't hitting the open market. The guys that do hit the market are doing so because they want a monster contract (how many of those turn out well?) or because they are mediocre and expendable. If you want to keep Sale, you're looking at having to basically build through the draft. Given where we are right now as an organization, that is going to take time. Time that will be wasted with Sale winning 6-7 more games for us a year to put us in 3rd or 4th place instead of 1st or 2nd. Very rare is the case where a team cannot turn its fortunes around in SIX years. And part of the way you have to go about turning it around is by keeping the cost-controlled players that can contribute in a big way over the next six years. Sale is the best and among the only examples of that on our team. He's the one guy you don't want to move. If you keep doing that, you're just kicking the can down the road constantly (Royals)

QUOTE (CaliSoxFanViaSWside @ Aug 6, 2013 -> 08:44 AM) But once he learns to lay off the junk, he'll be a beast. Most of the stuff we're talking about now isn't really related to my original post about how Viciedo has been worse at the plate this year, so I don't really know what to say about that. But the line quoted above -- I absolutely agree with. The problem is that it isn't a given that he actually will learn to lay off the bad stuff. The thing about Garcia being older and more advanced than someone like Hawkins is, in fact, one of the biggest reasons I worry about his plate discipline -- because he has come much farther, and has been instructed much longer, and he still is swinging at 41% of the pitches out of the zone. When you combine that with the fact that the White Sox coaching staff (from what I glean from the media and the way most Sox hitters have acted) appears to encourage an aggressive approach, I am afraid there's a good chance, maybe even a higher than average chance, that Garcia won't actually learn to lay off said junk. Watching Viciedo make zero progress is just further reason to believe the coaching staff isn't able or willing to teach an approach that will work for Garcia. Of course, it's certainly possible that Viciedo simply isn't capable of recognizing pitches and it has nothing to do with the coaching staff. Maybe Viciedo is just obstinate and all of my impressions of the coaching staff are wrong; they are trying their best. It's also possible that Garcia will never listen to the coaching staff anyway and have a revelation and change his approach for the better on his own. Or maybe he'll just be Vladimir Guerrero. I hope one these things is the case, but there is no evidence that points to them, so it must be considered less likely that they will happen than what all of the data points to. And so I'm worried about him because it doesn't look like he's in the right environment to succeed, and that's why I didn't like the acquisition. I acknowledge he has tremendous talent and potential, but I was hoping that the Sox would address their horrid immaturity at the plate by acquiring a hitting prospect that had already shown a propensity for a more mature approach, and I thought it was a real possibility because there were some logical candidates on teams that wanted Peavy.

If you trade Sale, that really awesome staff is way less awesome. It's already taken a hit with the loss of Peavy. I don't think you can afford to trade Sale unless you're committing to a scorched-Earth rebuild.

Sale doesn't go unless you don't expect to competitive for years. I bet Santiago/Quintana would fetch more than you'd think in the offseason. Pitching market will be just as thin as it was at this year's deadline, and we're talking about pre-arbitration guys now.

I think you can safely move one of Quintana or Santiago for a young hitter. You just deal with Danks as your 3 man and let Rienzo/Johnson/Molina/Castro/Axelrod fight for the other spots. If I had my choice, I'd move Santiago and try to sign Quintana. Whoever said 2014 is a transitional year hit it on the head. You know you're not likely going to win but you're using it to shuffle stuff around to contend again soon. It's just a punt, not a rebuild.

lol wat

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Aug 6, 2013 -> 03:49 PM) Why would anyone trade Q or Santiago? No no no. You better be getting an all star, young position player in return. Also, you're not, so there goes that. I think he means that it would be a need-based swap, a la Pineda/Montero deal, but with more established players obviously. I actually think Quintana is an extension candidate.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Aug 6, 2013 -> 09:32 AM) For what, Andy Wilkins? If he is willing to take a huge paycut, there is nothing in the system that really stops Konerko from coming back. If Dunn remains, you use the DH spot to get all of our OFs at bats.

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 03:03 PM) And the results have been underwhelming. He's certainly not a reason not to acquire an OF'er. Guys in the minors are working on improving. Player Development needs to push them to give them a reason to change their ways. If they just let a guy sit an rake at low levels, he's just grinding in his worst habits that won't hurt him until he gets to higher levels. You can make a case that minor leaguers should ALWAYS be struggling up until the point that they dominate at the highest level, otherwise they aren't really improving.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 02:08 PM) Depending on the position adjustments of course. And the Sox likely got by far his worst in April out of the gate. Yeah, no doubt he'll likely be better, if only a little, going forward. But why would they bet ~$9m on him being substantially better than one of their AAA scrubs, or any other trade target this side of Izturis, for that matter?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 09:51 AM) The Yankees have gotten -1 WAR out of 3rd base and -1.5 WAR out of their shortstop spot. Which means they've been better off without Keppinger.

From Jim Callis on a recent edition of Ask BA: http://ht.ly/nEhSu

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 11:28 AM) OOH OOOOOOOOOH I WANNA PLAY TOO Lol, I'm sorry I missed that one

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 01:21 PM) Because of the winless road trip? Imagine the raucous booing of both teams. No one will have shown up for any positive reason.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 11:09 AM) Frankly, if the Dodgers picked up about half of the guaranteed amount - guaranteed $71 million from '14-'17 - I'd have no problem with Andre Ethier as a platoon player. Sign one more lefty killer for the bench and then Keppinger and said dude to can play every time there's a lefty and then the hot (or "least cold") bat out of Dunn, Ethier, and Gillaspie plays that day. I doubt they do that, and really, he's not worth it otherwise. Let him remain the Dodgers' problem. Yeah, if both (a) Konerko retires and (b) Rios is traded for something other than salary relief, this could be an option to fill space and maybe keep the meatballs happy. Problem is that if we want the Dodgers to pick up half the salary, they are going to expect a prospect of some value back, and that would make no sense -- we'd just be giving back some of the value we gained moving Rios.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 09:28 AM) I hope he does not get that opportunity, I hope he goes to AAA to start the year, as he should, and earns an opportunity to take over a position by midseason. Yes, unless Alexei is traded in the offseason, let's use the opportunity to take it slow with the added bonus of manipulating his service clock

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 10:53 AM) Move De Aza to LF. Garcia in right. Sign a defensive CF. Dump Rios. Wait for prospects, or sign a FA when we're close to being ready. Ethier? Good gracious he's owed nearly $90 million and he's worse than Rios. Fixed that for you, since that's trendy in this thread

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 10:04 AM) That quote refers to "Staying healthy through the entire season" which is very different from throwing 4 consecutive complete games. QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 10:15 AM) I think he was referring to the fact that 4 starters never missed a start. And two guys took all 32 starts from the 5th starter's spot. It's not often a team goes through a season with only 6 guys making a start. Ok, sorry. Same point though.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Aug 5, 2013 -> 09:41 AM) He is calling 2005 luck with that comment. He takes any chance to belittle the Sox. He was just pointing out that it was insane that all four starters threw all of those complete games. It's the only time it has ever happened in history -- so he acknowledged the exception to his rule.

QUOTE (CaliSoxFanViaSWside @ Aug 4, 2013 -> 11:06 AM) Nothing against you but have you done enough research on variances in players O- Contacts rates to establish anything about it ? Maybe studied a group of high profile players from rookie year to now and see if there is any correlation ? Sometimes you make it seem like its the end all be all of how good a player is or will become like you did with Garcia. Doesn't hitting for a high average mean anything at all ? I'd be pretty damn happy with every Sox prospect putting up a .380 batting average with lousy O-Contact rates wouldn't you ? If I was making any sweeping generalizations, I think you are right to ask for some more evidence from me. But I'm not -- I'm simply talking about how Viciedo has taken a step backward offensively this year. That's an easy argument to make since all of his production-related numbers are worse, but since he is young and NOT a finished product, I'm trying to demonstrate a willingness to look beyond his numbers to see how his approach has differed. You and I both know that he swings at too many bad pitches, and if you look at Pitch F/X data, you see that he is swinging at more bad pitches than last year. I'm not aware of any research that tries to determine if successful players get better by learning to swing at more bad pitches, but that's probably because no one has felt that such research needs to be done. As for Garcia, I'm quoting that number in comparison to all of the Major Leaguers currently. You can look at the leaderboards and see that his pitch selection numbers rank in the top 10 worst of all Major Leaguers, and that really only Carlos Gomez is having a decent year among all of those in the same neighborhood -- leading me to believe that his approach may murder AAA, but there's little to no precedent for it doing the same in MLB. Garcia belongs in the Majors, he's been there before and has nothing left to prove in AAA, so I'm evaluating him like a Major Leaguer. You don't hear me spending much time talking about Courtney Hawkins' rates, for example, because he's 19 and has so much more to figure out before I can evaluate him like a Major Leaguer. Does that make sense? I know I'm clear as mud sometimes.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 4, 2013 -> 05:50 PM) I genuinely can't believe the Yankees haven't grabbed him yet. As of today, he is tied with Maicer Izturis for the lowest WAR in the entire Major Leagues, with -1.8. I cannot imagine any reason that any team would want to acquire that, much less at more than league minimum. What do the Yankees need a -1.8 WAR utility infielder for?

FWIW -- Keith Law has been one of Rienzo's biggest supporters. He called RIenzo our #3 prospect at one point, I believe.