chisoxfan09 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 Hell I know I will get flamed but what the heck. We have about 30 million coming off the books and should be in the 95-97 million range for next year. What if: We go after Jose Reyes? I know we have an ultra-dependable SS in Alexei already but this guy´s performance is off the charts and he is the MVP so far in the NL!!! I am thinking it is going to take Carl Crawford money to start the conversation (7/142). I know there would be some negative fanbase reaction to trading Alexei (We could get some decent young players for the farm) but we get the perfect lead-off machine who has learned to draw walks, already makes contact, and is a crazy stolen base machine!!! I dunno if you can get a more proto-typical hitter than Jose Reyes. OK Flame away. :chair :huh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caulfield12 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 $150+ million and Alex Rodriguez's quote that he's the best player in baseball today say NO. Dunn's, Peavy's and Rio's already-existing $150 million in commitments say no as well. Reyes' injury history prior to this year isn't confidence-building. Reyes is having a great season, undoubtedly, but there's just no way with our current financial situation...even if we managed to make it to the playoffs, attendance and revenues in all likelihood will be down....unless thousands more fans start showing up between now and August 15th. Finally, Ramirez is actually one of our strengths. Probably our best and most important player when you take both offense and defense into consideration. While I would love to see a middle infield of Reyes and Ramirez (pushing Beckham to another team or back to 3B, which doesn't make sense because of how good he's become at 2B)...it just seems completely unfeasible. I would imagine if anything we'd be cutting salary this offseason...with the possible loss of Buehrle and the probable loss of Jackson. Down to the $95-110 million mark, unless something changes drastically in our fortunes the next 80+ games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChiliIrishHammock24 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 Pre-injury, I'd love to have Reyes, but I'm not going to want to go after another superstar w/ injury problems. We already have Jake Peavy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
max power Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 (edited) I'm hoping they persuade Mark to stay, and let Edwin walk. Its a damn shame we don't have Hudson here to provide the club with some financial breathing room. If we did, we could take on yet another major acquisition, though that hasn't been working out so far this year. If they let mark go, they need another lefty. Sale? Some free agent? Edited July 2, 2011 by MAX Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greg775 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 This team has made so many bad acquisitions (Peavy, Juan, Rios, Dunn, Edwin) and decisions I can't even imagine what players we'll be bringing in in the future. Our only good moves are with unknowns like Mr. Humber! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chisoxfan09 Posted July 2, 2011 Author Share Posted July 2, 2011 This team has made so many bad acquisitions (Peavy, Juan, Rios, Dunn, Edwin) and decisions I can't even imagine what players we'll be bringing in in the future. Our only good moves are with unknowns like Mr. Humber! In hindsight I have to agree with you Greg. Getting bowled over by half a year of MVP performance is just being too naive in this baseball market. If Reyes had been a yearly MVP candidate without the injury history then maybe I could see the argument. But the fact is we need a very explosive lead off hitter/base stealer with his kind of toolset. They just don´t grow on trees. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chisoxfan09 Posted July 2, 2011 Author Share Posted July 2, 2011 (edited) $150+ million and Alex Rodriguez's quote that he's the best player in baseball today say NO. Dunn's, Peavy's and Rio's already-existing $150 million in commitments say no as well. Reyes' injury history prior to this year isn't confidence-building. Reyes is having a great season, undoubtedly, but there's just no way with our current financial situation...even if we managed to make it to the playoffs, attendance and revenues in all likelihood will be down....unless thousands more fans start showing up between now and August 15th. Finally, Ramirez is actually one of our strengths. Probably our best and most important player when you take both offense and defense into consideration. While I would love to see a middle infield of Reyes and Ramirez (pushing Beckham to another team or back to 3B, which doesn't make sense because of how good he's become at 2B)...it just seems completely unfeasible. I would imagine if anything we'd be cutting salary this offseason...with the possible loss of Buehrle and the probable loss of Jackson. Down to the $95-110 million mark, unless something changes drastically in our fortunes the next 80+ games. Caul, both points are very good and have merit. I don´t see the fanbase just reversing their appetite to come to the ball park over the next 2 months. But I did preface the thread with "Only if we continue to be All In". Edited July 2, 2011 by SpainSOXfan09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Balta1701 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 The biggest problem for the sox next year is that te positions where we've gotten weak performance this year are positions where we actually have players. Dumping Dunn, Rios, Beckham for an upgrade is really tough, because of contracts and because they should be better than this. So that's where this suggestion comes from, trying to upgrade a position of strength because we can't easily replace the positions of weakness. Anyway, I think it would continue to be difficult to get fair trade value for alexei. He's well paid himself which limits his market and teams would have to pay a heavy price to make it worth mp if him as much of his value to us is on defense. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disco72 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 QUOTE (SpainSOXfan09 @ Jul 2, 2011 -> 03:14 AM) Hell I know I will get flamed but what the heck. We have about 30 million coming off the books and should be in the 95-97 million range for next year. It's certainly an interesting concept, but the problem is that one of your guiding assumptions is off. While the Sox do have $30.3 million coming off the books, more than half of that is made up for in raises to 10 current players (16.25 million). So, that leaves roughly a $14 million difference between this year and next year, and that doesn't account for arbitration raises to Danks and CQ (or Pena, but I'm sure he'll be gone). All numbers courtesy of Kalapse's Payroll Resource So the real question is, how do the Sox get better without spending much money? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Balta1701 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 QUOTE (Disco72 @ Jul 2, 2011 -> 09:26 AM) So the real question is, how do the Sox get better without spending much money? Rios, Beckham, and Dunn play like Rios, Beckham, and Dunn are supposed to, and Viciedo comes up to replace Pierre. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ILMOU Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 QUOTE (MAX @ Jul 2, 2011 -> 01:39 AM) I'm hoping they persuade Mark to stay, and let Edwin walk. Its a damn shame we don't have Hudson here to provide the club with some financial breathing room. If we did, we could take on yet another major acquisition, though that hasn't been working out so far this year. If they let mark go, they need another lefty. Sale? Some free agent? His name is Philip Humber. MB will be back, and Sale will be starting. Edwin, he gawn. Danks is a likely trade candidate, IMO. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Balta1701 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 QUOTE (Stan Bahnsen @ Jul 2, 2011 -> 01:08 PM) His name is Philip Humber. MB will be back, and Sale will be starting. Edwin, he gawn. Danks is a likely trade candidate, IMO. If this team is "All In", then I think it's unlikely that D1 will be gone Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wanne Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 (edited) The best possible "additions" we could add would be a few "subtractions" of some dead weight IMO...hard to do both at the same time. I kinda doubt we're "all in" next year. Of course it depends on the second half of this season...but we've been down this road before. Edited July 2, 2011 by Wanne Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greg775 Posted July 2, 2011 Share Posted July 2, 2011 QUOTE (Wanne @ Jul 2, 2011 -> 07:40 PM) The best possible "additions" we could add would be a few "subtractions" of some dead weight IMO...hard to do both at the same time. I kinda doubt we're "all in" next year. Of course it depends on the second half of this season...but we've been down this road before. This "All In" figures to be a one-year thing. Right now we're one under .500 and all-in. We are only in the race because of the division we play in. If Sox don't win division handily, this all in stuff will be a thing of the past. Our payroll figures to go down drastically with the team dumping most anybody who makes a buck not named Paulie or Mark. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eminor3rd Posted July 4, 2011 Share Posted July 4, 2011 It's boring, but it's true: The way this team gets better is by underperforming stars playing like they should be playing. If we had the 2010 versions of Dunn and Rios, we'd be 6 games up in the division. Add a good version of Beckham to the mix, and Pierre could go 0 for his next 300 and we'd still have this thing in the bag. Which leads to a related thought: We can still be "all-in" next year without adding anybody at all in free agency, save maybe a reliever or two. If we let both EJax and MB walk, this our starting rotation: Danks Peavy Floyd Humber Sale That assumes that Peavy stops finding new ways to get injured, Humber doesn't turn bad, and Sale can successfully make the transition to SP. It isn't unrealistic to bet on two of those three things occurring. If Pierre walks and CQ stays, our lineup looks like this: SS Ramirez 2B Beckham DH Dunn 1B Konerko LF Quentin RF Viciedo CF Rios C Pierzynski 3B Morel When you look at that, imagine the Dunn is actually Dunn, Rios performs like last season, and Beckham gets closer to his peak. That's rather solid for AL Central. Yeah, almost everything has to go right, but if you really think about it, only three guys in our lineup (PK, CQ, AR) are having decent seasons. The remaining 6 are severely underperforming. You can't assume that over half your guys are going to have down years - if that happens, you can;t do much about it. If even 6 of those 9 have average years, and that pitching staff stays healthy, this team could be much better next year even without replacing the $30m coming off the books in EJ, MB, and JP. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greg775 Posted July 4, 2011 Share Posted July 4, 2011 When you look at that, imagine the Dunn is actually Dunn, Rios performs like last season, and Beckham gets closer to his peak. That's rather solid for AL Central. This is what bothers me. The team always "looks good on paper." The reality is Rios is not going to hit and Dunn appears done. Beckham is an enigma. Right now he looks like good defense no hit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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