mvp 78

Whatever helps you sleep at night. The Sox can afford whatever payroll they want. They can keep everyone if they want to. Back to back to back to back Maybe in 2020 another team in the East could make a run. Jays? Rays?

I wish.

Scott had been waived.

The paid him $2.3M last year. Seems worth it for the production. Until he becomes too expensive for what he brings, you keep him. Fangraphs had him worth $18M last year if that kinda thing floats your boat (doesn't for me). His 2.2 WAR was higher than Jon Lester's last year (and that guy is so good that we couldn't trade JBJ for him).

People on the committee: Hall of Famers: Roberto Alomar, Bert Blyleven, Pat Gillick, Tony La Russa, Greg Maddux, Joe Morgan, John Schuerholz, Ozzie Smith, Joe Torre Executives: Al Avila (Tigers), Paul Beeston (Blue Jays), Andy MacPhail (Phillies), Jerry Reinsdorf (White Sox) Media: Hirdt (the only repeater from the HOC), Tim Kurkjian (ESPN), Claire Smith (ESPN) As I noted in my election preview on Friday, several of the candidates had connections to the voters, an inescapable fact of longevity within an insular industry but also an inevitable reminder of the old Veterans Committees’ history of cronyism, most notably from the 1960s through the 1980s. Baines, who was drafted by the White Sox with the overall number one pick in 1977, spent three separate stretches on the South Side (1980-1989, 1996-1997, 2000-2001), all but the first year of which were within Reinsdorf’s still-ongoing tenure of ownership. Additionally, he was managed by La Russa both there and in Oakland (1992), and was in Baltimore while Gillick was GM (1997-1998).

Harold Baines and Lee Smith have been elected to the National Baseball Hall Of Fame, as announced on the MLB Network. The two longtime veterans were voted in by a 16-member panel reviewing candidates from the “Today’s Game” era (1988-present). https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/hall-election-of-lee-smith-makes-sense-but-harold-baines/ Baines, who took 59.7% of his career plate appearances as a DH and set records in that capacity that were later surpassed by Martinez and David Ortiz, collected 2,866 hits and 384 homers over the course of his 22-year career. Nonetheless, he was poorly supported by the writers; though he lasted through five election cycles before falling off the ballot, he topped out at just 6.1%. At least in the era of the “Five Percent Rule” (from 1980 onward), there’s no precedent for a candidate with so little BBWAA support gaining election by a small committee. While his election does offer some hope to players bumped off the ballot in their first go-round — such as Bobby Grich, Kenny Lofton, and Ted Simmons, who missed election by the Modern Baseball Era Committee by one vote last year — the custom of withholding first-year votes from all but the most qualified candidates helps to explain those mistakes; with Baines, 94 to 95 percent of voters consistently judged him to be unworthy. Every bit as unsettling is the fact that Baines accumulated just 38.7 WAR (using the Baseball-Reference version) and 30.1 JAWS. Considered as a right fielder — I consider every DH candidate at the position where he accrued the most value — he ranks just 74th in JAWS, below 24 of the 25 Hall of Famers (19th century outfielder Tommy McCarthy is the exception). From under-supported BBWAA candidate Larry Walker (10th in JAWS among right fielders), to players such as Dwight Evans (15th) and Reggie Smith (16th) who have never sniffed a small committee ballot, that’s a troubling inequity. And everyone and their brother has a pet candidate just among the right fielders for whom a stronger case could be mounted. Tony Oliva, Rusty Staub, Dave Parker? All rank in the 30s in JAWS among right fielders, and appear to have stronger traditional credentials as well.

I'm not sure how a contending team like the Sox give Swihart consistent playing time. They need to win games and if Swihart isn't producing in short spurts, there's no incentive to playing him 150 games just because you feel like it. And that .391 BABIP in the second half of 2015 (his best at any level over a long stretch) may have played a very large part in the numbers he put up that year.

Hard for the defending champs to fill a roster spot with a guy like that. He'll get a ML deal elsewhere and that's probably for the best. I think we all rooted for Clay to succeed but it always seemed "one step forward, two steps back" with him. Fans see him as a guy with top of the rotation talent (which he's shown flashes of) but either his body, preparation or something else is preventing him for consistently being successful.

Didn't help that in his prior 5 seasons to that he only had one season with WAR above 1. He came in with a lot of potential, but seemed to waste it and just have shaky season after shaky season.

They are going with the same staff that helped lead them to 108 wins and a WS. Seems ok to me.

I'm intrigued that some people think his bat has anything in it. He hasn't shown anything since 2014 in AA.

Brian Jordan always gets overlooked.

Dave isn't scared of cliffs and has a plan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Jh5xT4Or8M&t=57s

It's a doomsday cult.

@Ken_Rosenthal Free-agent RHP Nathan Eovaldi in agreement with #RedSox, pending physical, sources tell The Athletic.

You keep saying this like it's a thing. It's not.

Good news is that the Sox won't have to worry about re-signing Price until November 2022.

What Jacko is inferring is that the Sox window won't close for another 10+ years. I agree with him.

No, you're not ridiculous. The idea of trading Mookie is though. I think you could make a case for trading anyone else on the roster, but I don't see how you could replicate Mookie's value in a trade. If you have the best player alive, you keep him.

They won 108 games with 3 catchers on the roster, maybe they can win 120 games with 4 catchers on the roster.

That's not true either. They could have and should have traded Pedroia. I was correct in harping on it even though you think I was just buzzarding because apparently I just can't be right about something if you disagree with it.

Is this turning into a Decepticon forum now?

Please don't compare trading the best player alive to trading an aging 2b.

Put me out of my misery.

I was told this would be a non-silly thread about what we could get back for JBJ, but now we're talking about trading Mookie... This place is too ridiculous for me sometimes.