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Offseason Part 2 - Lets the Rumors & Action Begin


Chisoxfn

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1 hour ago, Chisoxfn said:

The player I was referring to who the club was interested but couldn’t agree on was Kimbrel. Sox and the other team had pretty big difference in value (the Kimbrel bit was when I talked to him in person this morning…but I won’t / can’t mention other team…

But the recent post I made with the on fire quote was from a text chain I have going on with him (so is fresh).

Lulz @ FO trying to save face by insisting on a real return for Kimbrel. It's a sunk cost. It's over. You lost. It was a disastrous transaction and he's an anvil tied around our necks. The return is getting out from under the salary. There will be no other "return", Rick. Put your ego aside and get some damn savings to spend on a savage before It's too late.

I'm sick and tired of their damn pride getting in the way. 

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8 hours ago, Chisoxfn said:

So I just got a text from a buddy of mine who is very connected (to MLB not necessarily Sox). Said Sox are on fire right now and close on a couple sizeable moves. 

I’m eight hours late to the party, but this exactly the type of posted I needed after reading through nine pages of Harrison talk.

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8 hours ago, CentralChamps21 said:

Hopefully two or all three of these: trading away Kimbrel, trading for Manaea, signing Schwarber/Conforto/Castellanos

At this point trading Kimbrel only makes sense if we’re spending the savings on a RF.  A good starter via trade can fit in the budget either way.

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7 hours ago, Baron said:

 

Take this for what it's worth 

This dude has proven to be a total fraud and probably is Orlando striving for attention again.  I would not be giving this dude the time of day.  At least NSC & Portillo’s have gotten something right in their time, even if their wells have long since dried up.

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How about trade Kimbrel for scraps, then sign Conforto for RF, sign Schwarbs for DH/OF fill-in. Then trade Vaughn for a young ML ready pitcher with a nice ceiling.

And as someone else said in one of these threads, do not under basically any circumstances trade Vera.

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3 minutes ago, Sarava said:

How about trade Kimbrel for scraps, then sign Conforto for RF, sign Schwarbs for DH/OF fill-in. Then trade Vaughn for a young ML ready pitcher with a nice ceiling.

And as someone else said in one of these threads, do not under basically any circumstances trade Vera.

I'm good with that!

I hate the idea of trading Vaughn but he is no doubt our best trade piece. We may not have the time to let him develop into his full potential and we certaintly don't have a perfect position for him. Trade him for a stud SP in a fair 1 for 1 swap and then sign our RF and another lefty bopper for DH. Boom

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1 minute ago, iWiN4PreP said:

I'm good with that!

I hate the idea of trading Vaughn but he is no doubt our best trade piece. We may not have the time to let him develop into his full potential and we certaintly don't have a perfect position for him. Trade him for a stud SP in a fair 1 for 1 swap and then sign our RF and another lefty bopper for DH. Boom

I know it's pretty unrealistic to think Jerry would spend that kind of money. But if they want to go for it. Come on Jerry, you're 86 and father time doesn't wait for anyone.

Imagine the Sox lineup if you add those 2 left handed studs in? Harrison would be the only chance for an opponent to breath easy.

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Or, if you sign a DH, that makes Sheets expendable. That brings me back to the rumor last fall that the Orioles were quietly shopping John Means. Of course, Sheets is from Baltimore, and that might make him desirable for them to bring in.

The problem here is - Sheets isn't enough to headline such a deal, and I don't see them wanting both Sheets and Vaughn, because that's redundant. But that might be worth kicking the tires on. If you're spending a lot on DH and RF and are pushing the luxury cap, the SP addition needs to be someone a bit younger and cheaper.

And they do need a SP. They need SP depth, and they need to be ready to react if Keuchel pushes 160 IP at any point. They can't let that next season vest, even if he's having a comeback season.

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I don’t think there is any chance they sign two expensive bats or trade both Sheets / Vaughn as that will put too much pressure on the long-term payroll.

At this point, I think the best we can hope for is trade Kimbrel for whatever, use the salary relief to sign a left-handed power bat (Conforto / Schwarber), and a trade for a SP (Mannea, Montas, Gray, etc.).

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3 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

I don’t think there is any chance they sign two expensive bats or trade both Sheets / Vaughn as that will put too much pressure on the long-term payroll.

At this point, I think the best we can hope for is trade Kimbrel for whatever, use the salary relief to sign a left-handed power bat (Conforto / Schwarber), and a trade for a SP (Mannea, Montas, Gray, etc.).

I know....I was mostly dreaming hahaha. And if anyone is to believe NSC saying they're still talking to Tepera, they might not even have enough money for Conforto or Schwarbs. We would have the most filthy bullpen in baseball, but still wouldn't be able to hit good RH pitchers.

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Just now, Sarava said:

I know....I was mostly dreaming hahaha. And if anyone is to believe NSC saying they're still talking to Tepera, they might not even have enough money for Conforto or Schwarbs.

All good man!  On your latter point, the Sox should add another reliever and in a perfect world a semi-young catcher who pushes Collins for the backup role (ideally via a Kimbrel trade).  That being said, those additions need to be dirt cheap.  Adding Tepera at this point would be a poor use of our limited payroll space.

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2 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

All good man!  On your latter point, the Sox should add another reliever and in a perfect world a semi-young catcher who pushes Collins for the backup role (ideally via a Kimbrel trade).  That being said, those additions need to be dirt cheap.  Adding Tepera at this point would be a poor use of our limited payroll space.

I don’t buy the Tepera rumor at all.  He probably wants a shot at being an 8th inning guy.

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40 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

All good man!  On your latter point, the Sox should add another reliever and in a perfect world a semi-young catcher who pushes Collins for the backup role (ideally via a Kimbrel trade).  That being said, those additions need to be dirt cheap.  Adding Tepera at this point would be a poor use of our limited payroll space.

You’ll be happy to note Stone mentioned a back up catcher several times during his Score appearance yesterday.

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Alright, thinking through where the roster currently stands, here are the goals I had in mind for us coming into the off-season:

  1. Improve left-handed balance of the lineup  
  2. Acquire a #3 caliber or better starting pitcher  
  3. Strengthen the right side of our bullpen  
  4. Add power to the lineup where possible 
  5. Add some sort of infielder to address 2B  
  6. Enhance our team defense where possible  
  7. Acquire backup catcher / add catching depth  

So far we have made four moves this offseason that will add ~$26.5M towards our 2022 payroll.  Of the seven needs outlined above, we have only addressed two and a half of them.  Assuming Kimbrel is eventually moved, our RH setup men coming into the offseason would have been Ruiz & Burr which is obviously a bit terrifying.  As such, Graveman & Kelly were both essential additions and put us in a much better spot.  Unfortunate we had to spend a combined ~$16.5M on them, but that’s what happens your system can’t pump out cheap relievers fast enough.  Regardless, I’m very glad we made these moves.

The problem I have is spending $11M combined on Leury & Harrison.  Our biggest two needs heading into the offseason IMO was adding left-handed balance and acquiring a #3 caliber or better starter.  Yes, we needed to address 2B and it didn’t have to be anything crazy, but it was one of two spots where we could have easily added a left-handed bat and instead we added another low power RH hitter, one who is somewhat redundant with a guy we already had in Leury.  Given our broader needs, I’d much rather have Eduardo Escobar at 2B and use Romy Gonzalez as our utility guy for basically the same price or gone with Brad Miller as a cheaper 2B platoon option if wanted to keep Leury’s versatility.

At this point, the success of the offseason will come down to two things.  First we must offload Kimbrel’s salary and get something of value (reliever, catcher, etc.).  Second, we must use those savings to sign Conforto.  He adds left-handed balance, he adds power, and is a large improvement defensively over the Sheets/Vaughn combo in RF.  If we have to pivot to Schwarber to address our left-handed balance and power needs, then our defensive upgrades are limited to 2B.  Can we overcome that?  Sure, but having a black hole in RF is far from ideal.

The one piece of good news at the moment is the Sox seem determined to add another starting pitcher.  Whether they have the ammo to acquire a legit #3 and one with more than a year of control remains to be seen, but it won’t be from a lack of trying and they will no doubt add some SP depth.  I just pray they don’t go the scrapheap route here and add someone who can be impactful, even if only a rental.

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5 minutes ago, SoxBlanco said:

Is John Means a possible trade target? Or would he cost too much given the three years of control he still has?

I think he’d be tough to acquire.  Sonny Gray is still a name I could see happening.  The Sox have liked him for a while now and the Reds appear to be open to moving him.  Whether we can match up remains to be seen.

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