ChiSox59

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Feb 3, 2016 -> 11:40 AM) Sands is really good vs LHP though. If Shuck is on that roster, who takes the place of LaRoche vs LHP? That's the problem. Avi. RF is someone not currently on the roster (Ethier/Fowler/Jackson,etc.)

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 3, 2016 -> 10:36 AM) Shuck is the only guy they have who can play CF off of the bench. He can play all 3 OF positions. He will be on the opening day roster. Avi should be a LaRoche's platoon partner. If they acquire Ethier or another LH OF that can't hit LH pitching, they should get someone who mashes lefties. Sands comes to mind, but they aren't going to carry 6 outfielders, so something has to give (Cabrera, Eaton, Ethier (or other LH bat), Avi, Sands and Shuck). Either Avi is in AAA or Shuck/Sands is DFA in that scenario, but Shuck is the only guy that can really play CF, unless Leary finds his way on the roster. Austin Jackson AND Ethier should would be nice. vs. RHP: LF: Cabrera CF: Eaton RF: Ethier DH: LaRoche vs. LHP LF: Cabrera CF: Jackson RF: Eaton DH: Avi Shuck is 5th OF and Sands is in AAA where he belongs. Probably a pipe dream, though.

QUOTE (bmags @ Feb 2, 2016 -> 11:36 AM) Injuries and attitude. Never heard good things about him. Really? Seemed like a pretty good guy to me. Obviously intense, but didn't seem like a bad clubhouse guy at all.

QUOTE (coco1997 @ Feb 1, 2016 -> 10:42 AM) Yadiel Hernandez. Seems risky to wait on him. He's not holding his showcase until Feb 23, so if he is the plan and you miss out on him, you're left empty handed. Fowler and Jackson are surely gone by then (and most likely the 2nd tier guys).

Are our White Sox done adding for the season? Are we going into the season with Avi in RF and Saladino at SS? Here are the notable players that remain available: Outfielders: Dexter Fowler (QO) Austin Jackson Alex Rios Marlon Byrd David DeJesus Chris Denorfia Matt Joyce Ryan Raburn David Murphy Grady Sizemore Will Venable Drew Stubbs Shane Victorino Delmon Young Infielders: Ian Desmond (QO) Jimmy Rollins Clint Barmes Willie Bloomquist Rickie Weeks Alberto Callaspo David Freese (not a fit) DH/1B types: Pedro Alvarez Morneau Casey McGehee Starting Pitchers: Yovani Gallardo (QO) Chad Billingsly Mark Buehrle Jeremy Guthrie Josh Johnson Cliff Lee Matt Latos Tim Lincecum Justin Masterson Cory Luebke Mike Minor Alfredo Simon I don't think Desmond is a long-term fit, so unless he is willing to take a 1 or 2 year deal, I'd pass. I think the Sox aren't really all that interested and fully play to use Saladino as the bridge to Anderson, which I am fine with. As has been discussed at length around here, one of Austin Jackson or Dexter Fowler makes too much sense. While I hate giving up the pick for Fowler, I think he's the best fit. Venable, Joyce, DeJesus and Murphy all make varying degrees of sense as a platoon partner for Avi, but I prefer Avi be LaRoche's platoon partner and occasional OFer. I'd still like to see the Sox bring in some more competition for the 5th spot, but at this point I think its 2 of EJ/Danks/Turner, and that's ok. Things just get very thin very quickly if an injury were to occur. Thoughts? Any hidden gems? Its starting to get awfully thin out there.

QUOTE (TheFutureIsNear @ Jan 31, 2016 -> 11:17 AM) Trade Melky, Robertson, and Frazier for hopefully 2-3 legit hitting prospects that are near MLB ready. Zero chance of this happening if the Sox are around .500, which was the OPs question.

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Jan 30, 2016 -> 01:54 PM) Huh? Of course LaRoche will be on the team, and should be to see if he can regain some of his old form. The Sox are paying him the 13M regardless so theres nothing wrong with seeing if theres anything left in the tank during ST. If a player out-performs him in ST then LaRoche becomes a LH bench bat with power potential late in games as well as serving as a quality backup to 1B. If LaRoche continues to regress during the season and the Sox need his roster spot, then they can release him but there's no point in releasing him now. The voice of reason and logic! / thread.

QUOTE (lasttriptotulsa @ Jan 29, 2016 -> 02:29 PM) He had a 6 run inning in which the sequence went as follows. Flyout Single Reached on E4 K Single (1 run scores) Single (1 run scores) Walk Grand Slam Walk Groundout So Sale allowed 6 base runners that inning not counting the reached on error. Sure you can say those guys shouldn't have been batting because the inning would have been over after that K but that is part of pitching. You have to pitch over those things. How can you say a guy pitched a quality start when one error caused him to implode and allow 5 base runners and 6 runs the rest of the inning? Was that in Minnesota? Pretty sure I was at that game. Ugh.

QUOTE (SoCalSox @ Jan 29, 2016 -> 01:55 PM) My whole thing is why couldn't they have got Dickerson for Petricka & a lower level guy or two? Would be frustrating if this is the move they made. I like Petricka, but to think he's comparable value-wise to McGee is silly. Plus, while I wouldn't have been upset had the Sox acquired Dickerson, the dude is pretty s***ty in the OF.

QUOTE (SoCalSox @ Jan 28, 2016 -> 03:49 PM) I've already made my mind up, if they don't make any more moves to improve this team before opening day, I won't pay for the MLB package. Not going to sit through another frustrating season that could have been prevented, or at least had a lot of a chance to be prevented. THAT'LL SHOW EM'!!

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 01:10 PM) The hitters actually look pretty realistic to me except maybe being a best case scenario for LaRoche (honestly). LaRoche is going to have a nice bounce back season. If he doesn't, they'll cut his ass by June.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 26, 2016 -> 03:27 PM) I don't have any desire for a contract with Desmond or Fowler that doesn't allow us to opt-out after a year. lol. That ain't gonna happen.

QUOTE (QuickJones81 @ Jan 26, 2016 -> 12:12 PM) We don't have a wealth of high end prospects, so we probably don't have the ammo to snare a star, however, we still have guys that could be pieced together similar to the trades that have been made the past couple years. I would say we have two categories of trade value, high floor depth pieces and raw lottery tickets that other teams would be attracted to Depth: May, Beck, & Peter Lotto Ticket: Adams, Michalzcewski, Danish, Guerrero, Adolfo, Zangari, Stephens, & Hickman I dont think it is fair to consider Adams or Trey "lottery tickets". Or really Danish or Guerrero for that matter, although they're closer to that than Adams and Trey.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 23, 2016 -> 04:33 PM) The problem remains; with as little high level talent in the system as the White Sox have, in no small part because of the trades the last 2 offseasons, the White Sox will struggle to tread water when those guys leave in 2 years. They will have to either take a substantial step back in 2018 at those spots by playing rookies there that were pushed aggressively to the big leagues, or they will have to trade the little bits they are able to develop for veterans to continue treading water. And that sets them up with the same problem as last year and this year - a weak roster, not well stocked enough to compete unless "Everything" goes right, and not enough resources to hang with the well-built teams. That's the road to Sale and Abreu then leaving. I don't think it's too much of a stretch to expect Trey to be the 3B, Anderson the SS and one of Sanchez or Saladino to be the 2B come 2018. No one we've traded the past two season besides Semien would have been of any use in the infield. Micah perhaps, but his D will never be good enough to be an MLB regular.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 23, 2016 -> 03:07 PM) To point out again - the CBA is up again this offseason, and each of the last several times the CBA has been up they've made draft pick compensation harder to get. I think there's every reason to expect that again this year. For a $100 million player, someone like Upton, teams still don't care about the draft pick. But for a guy like Desmond - if he's getting in the $15 million/year for a couple years range - the value of a late first round draft pick is something like $15-$20 million on average, so the value of the draft pick is comparable to what they're getting. Those are the guys that really shouldn't be causing a team to lose a draft pick and that's where they will probably weaken it this year. How did you value a late 1st round pick at $15-$20M?

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 23, 2016 -> 12:13 PM) What happens first, Desmond signs or Caulfield returns? Caulfield will be back before the weekend is over. He can't resist.

QUOTE (CyAcosta41 @ Jan 22, 2016 -> 02:50 PM) Always enjoy the rock solid analysis in your posts, but seems to me that we're circling around the same point and might not be in disagreement at all. I'm in no way suggesting that "our" preferred terms includes three years for anyone, no matter what. We can all quibble about the baseball pros and cons of the talent targeted by RH and the Sox (and I think we've been less than adequate overall in targeting the right people), but it strikes me as silly to think that RH and company lack the intelligence to do his full-time job in a professional manner. Hahn is a Harvard educated attorney; listen to him for a minute and you realize he's a very bright individual. Despite the goofiness of media blurbs, does anyone think for a moment that the Sox would actually have a "three or no deal" policy, no matter what? You're right, if that were "our" policy, we'd be entirely out of synch with the rest of baseball. Instead, and what I was suggesting, was "we" value specific targets in specific ways. Stated differently, there might be "nice to haves" and then "must haves." It's perfectly reasonable to assume that in the opinion of those whose opinions matter for the organization (management -- not the fans and certainly not the media), management determined Cespedes to be a "nice to have." Get him on our terms and we'll take the known risks (obviously with the considerable upside potential too); however, no taking unnecessary risks (outside of our terms), no chasing. On a personal level, I think that getting any one of the big-three (not relevant now, but I preferred Gordon's skill set overall for this team, although I think Gordon was never truly on the market at all) actually a "must have" and the calculus changes to something dramatically different than the calculus for the nice to haves. Everyone can have their opinion, of course, but no way do the Sox have some rigid "three years or bust" policy. In fact, I'm convinced knowing their past, knowing the creativity of the management team, and knowing the near inside info I was told, they presented a three year deal with a host of asterisks -- an opt out and option years. That's what THEY thought Cespedes was worth. It doesn't matter that WE might have disagreed or done differently if we were holding down their jobs. Finally, the Sox did what it took to reel in Adam Dunn with a four year deal -- Dunn's best deal on that market. They considered him and his left-handed boom or bust approach a must have at the time (somehow I wasn't around when they called to ask my opinion, so they missed me telling them that I've always hated that style of slugger). Just last year, they bested the market and gave David Robertson a four year deal because they considered getting that "lock-down closer" a must have. They'll do what it takes when a guy achieves that "must have" status, but they'll let the "nice to haves" go if the price exceeds their internal assessment of value. That's a sound way to run any business that isn't simply a play-toy of a wealthy billionaire owner. I think a lot of the angst going on in this thread is simply some Sox fans valuing Cespedes more than Sox management does. Now, continually making the wrong choices is a good way for management to lose their job, but sticking to sound process is not. Nice post. One minor quibble, it was widely reported that Robertson had at least one better offer from the Astros, and perhaps as many as two or three higher offers, but he chose the Sox.

QUOTE (Knackattack @ Jan 22, 2016 -> 02:26 PM) Let's just sign Desmond to a multi year deal and move Anderson to the outfield We need a SS that is good at playing SS. I'd be intrigued with Desmond on a 1 year deal and get out pick back next year, but certainly don't give up on Anderson playing SS for him.

QUOTE (Frank_Thomas35 @ Jan 22, 2016 -> 09:51 AM) "White Sox Likely Next to Undergo Full-Blown Fire Sale" via http://TeamStre.am by Bleacher Report http://teamstre.am/1VdCgTI This article made me laugh. I guess if the Sox tank it's possible, but you don't go out and trade for Frazier and hold your top assets if you're thinking about blowing the whole thing up.

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Jan 21, 2016 -> 07:41 PM) http://www.businessinsider.com/yoenis-cesp...-to-plan-2016-1 Awful lot of stuff written about the uncertainty in signing Cespedes long term. Seems more and more every day. Is there something to the " red flags " that have been written about? The smoking between innings doesn't bother me but the other stuff does to some extent. Wait, what? Yo rips party darts between innings!? That's hilarious if true.

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Jan 21, 2016 -> 03:19 PM) I prefer Jackson as well and would like to see what Saladino can do at SS. I'm not against the idea of Desmond at all but signing Desmond doesn't help the Sox OF situation so I'm kinda stuck in the middle. I know this won't be a popular idea but in an effort to keep the comp pick I'm not against rolling the dice by signing Jackson for CF, move Eaton to LF, Melky to RF, bench LaRoche and sign Alvarez to a one year contract to DH and hope he can build enough value to be worthy of a comp pick in the '17 draft. Jackson upgrades the defense and brings a bit of speed to the lineup while Alvarez provides some middle of the lineup LH power. Not the best solution but both players are affordable and do not cost a pick. Dude you gotta stop with the Alvarez thing. He is no better than LaRoche.

QUOTE (Alexeihyeess @ Jan 21, 2016 -> 03:47 PM) A trade? Maybe a demotion or a release or something, but other than Robertson none of these guys are worth anything. Putnam and Petricka are definitely worth something. And Jones, too, obviously. Don't think it's a trade, but probably more likely they don't start the year with a traditional long man.

Edit: Accidental double post.

I like it. Was hoping we'd get him back around $3M. This is even better.