moonslav59

At worst, we suck for a couple years, get some better picks, reset the tax, get more international bonus pool money and get the farm back into good shape in 2 years. Add to that any young players or prospects we get via winter or summer trades of FAs to be, and cliff may be just 1-3 years NOt 86 years. If we try to stay semi-competitive while rebuilding, it may be more problematic, but even that is doable. BTW, while I think DD went too far, specifically the Kimbrel & Pom trades (and the Thornburg & Kinsler deals in hinsight), I don't think he burned Rome to the ground. We kept Devers, Beni, DHern and a few others. He left a few structures standing.

Unless it helped us get a nice return we wouldn't have gotten otherwise, I can't see tendering JBJ a contract and then paying part of his salary (arb) to dump him for scraps.

You say you've gone back and re-read my post. How about going back and re-reading your post? I think that you moved the goal posts just a bit as you often seem to do. I should know better than to argue with someone who is right. Now don't indulge me by telling me about all of the mistakes you have made. Also do not waste your time by telling me that nothing personal is intended in what you say. you and the experts are right of course and any other argument doesn't matter. I'm fine with the goalpost moving comment, although I view it as just adding to or expanding my original post and not goal post moving, but everything else was a clear put-down. It is classic passive aggression and condescension. You say you appreciate posters who realize there is more to the game than stats, and I assume you meant me, but then you "paint a rather nasty picture of me" and the part about "any other argument doesn't matter" is way off base. I'm always open to any debate. On the DD issue, I have often defended him and taken issue with Kimmi and some posters' use of certain words like "destroyed" and "decimated." I feel like I'm in the middle ground on DD, and you paint me out to be a some kind of closed-minded radical anti-DD-ite. Okay, maybe I've been more critical than defending of DD, but it's the nature of sites like this. People tend to talk more about what they disagree with or take issue with than things they agree with.

Yes, anything can happen, and our 4 rings in 10 playoff appearances , including 4 for 4 in the WS, makes it seem like the odds are actually better than they actually are. People sometimes point to our 2004 championship as a wild card team, but that year, we had the 2nd best AL record and 3rd best in MLB. We were a top contender that year. We had the best record in MLB in 2007. That was no crap shoot. Many feel the 2013 season was a fluke, but we had the best record that year, too. The 2018 season was far from a crap shoot. We've had some really good teams that, to me, were a big step up from being called just a "playoff contender." While I agree with you that DD went too far, and we may disagree on the degree of that, I can totally see why GMs go that extra mile to greatly improve their chances and hedge against injuries and/or too many down years from our players. DD got us a ring. I can't really fault him too much for going the extra mile, and I was accepting of the projected consequences for the most part.

I don't think you would. We'd have to pay too much for Porcello, and you'd say it was too much. I do think teams will trade for JBJ, and he won't be non tendered, but I've been moving towards the non tendering position, of late.

Prospects acquired by Sox GMs by 4 Periods: Theo First 5 years (2003-2007) D Pedroia A Rizzo J Pablebon J Ellsbury C Buchholz Dice-K Okajima Jed Lowrie Doubront David Murphy J Masterson D Bard Cla Meredith Middlebrooks C Hansen Theo Last 4 years (2008-2011) Betts JBJ Vazquez Barnes Workman Tazawa Alex Wilson Margot S Fife Lin A Ranaudo Swihart C Kelly Brentz Westmoreland Ben's 4 years (2012-2015) Devers Benintendi Moncada T Buttrey M Kopech L Allen A Espinoza D Hernandez R Castillo Chavis B Johnson M Dubon Basabe Basabe S Travis Lakins D Marrero P Light C Asuaje Bautista DD's 4 years (2016-2019) H Velazquez D Flores (RIP) Casas B Mata Dalbec Houck Chatham J Duran G Jimenez T Ward A Flores M Lugo N Song Shawaryn S Anderson Feltman Groome I must have missed some names. Help me out....

We have opinions that differ from you and team management. Not everyone takes what we say as us "pretending to know more..." I guess when you disagree with a team decision, it's not pretending to know more, right? It's just an opinion. Look, I know I come across too strongly many times. I have opinions and I voice them. I don't always preface them with "IMO..." but I assume people just take it that way. I don't see things in black and white. I know you find it hard to believe I can be really thankful for DD but still have serious issues with what he did, but I do. I'm tired of hearing about how stat geeks always act like they know it all or what they say is the final statement to end all discussion. To me, you and those who bash stat geeks come across as more "know-it-alls" than we do. Plus, some of us stat geeks actually played the game, too. You aren't the only one.

It was nicer than what you wrote, and true, too, unlike your post.

I know I can be condescending, at times, and come off as a know-it-all more than I mean to be. I guess that's the difference between you and me. If you don't think what you said is condescending and passive aggressive, then you don't know the meanings of those words. Look in Webster's. They give an example of passive aggressive. Here it is: You and the experts are right of course and any other argument doesn't matter.

If we had 4-5 top prospects about to come up, at a low cost, maybe we'd think more about paying Betts top dollar. Yes, it's hard to know, but certainly having very few impact and low cost players makes it hard on managing a budget, especially if the reset is a high priority.

In DD's defense, he did keep Devers (& Beni) and extended Bogey to a team-friendly deal, but the gap between the call-up of Devers and the next high impact prospect call-up (still waiting) has been way too long and mat still last years more. Chavis, DHern and Lin are the only prospects that graduated since Devers. These names are not all that flattering, either: Travis (not DD's pick) Walden (not DD's pick) Taylor (not DD's pick) Shawaryn (not DD's pick) Lakins (not DD's pick) Who might be called up in 2020? (Age-Player- last level)) 24 Dalbec AAA 23 Houck AAA 23 Duran AA 24 Chatham AAA 24 Ockimey AAA 23 M Wilson AA 23 Crawford AA 24 Bazardo AA 23 J Diaz A+ Likely 2021: 22 Ward A+ 22 Feltman AA 20 Mata AA 21 Groome 2022 or later? 19 Casas 19 Jimenez 22 N Song 18 M Lugo 20 Decker 19 A Florez The farther away guys look better. I'm not expecting another Devers anytime, soon. Maybe D Hern can get his walks down and be a huge asset. Maybe Ward or Mata might surprise. I just see a long gap between Devers and the next high impact prospect.

Just goes to show you, multiple "mid range" contracts can work out way worse than big ones like price's or Sale's.

Very true, but one could consider his restrictions on signing 30+ pitchers to $30M+ a year, too. Even without Moncada, Ben's farm building was way better than DD's. Rather than admit they were wrong, some prefer to bash blind squirrels.

I saw this after my post.

Except for Dice-K.

Your passive aggressiveness on full display. Stop acting like you are never condescending or all-knowing.

It was obvious the bubble was going to burst at some point. Theo owned up to the mistakes he made before moving on to the Cubs. You can't trade that much of your farm away and not expect some sort of blow back. We can argue all day about the extent and length of the blow back, but the blow back was all but certain. It's not pounding chests any more than using the blind squirrel statement against those who saw the writing on the wall while some of you had your heads in the sand. (One cliche vs another) Maybe it won't be a "cliff," and you guys can claim a hollow victory. Hopefully, we can remain somewhat competitive through the reset and rebuild. Hopefully, we can be highly competitive in 1-2 years (3 tops), and I think that is possible, especially if we start spending again after the reset year. We still have a pretty decent core to build around. Devers and Bogey alone will help. I'm thankful we kept those two and ERod. Maybe Beni can step it up. We have a few promising prospects, mostly far away, but I'm hopeful the next GM will be an expert at building up the farm and developing young players into stars.

Makes you wonder, if Harper stayed, would the Nats have gotten this far.

Sounds a lot like your breakdown of the Yankee farm.

Wait, aren't we supposed to follow the Yankee rebuild model? Isn't Cashman the genius?

I differ to the expert on losers.

It's what they do in their parks, their yards and their homes. It's second nature.

One ring and a farm foundation that led to another is far from "Total."

Go Astros!

It was only about 7 top prospects traded, but many many more were traded, too. It may not be as noticeable, but sometimes those non top prospects can surprise and add to the overall value of a farm. Sure, many prospects never make it to the bigs, let alone shine there, but the more you have, the better chance you have some will become helpful. Many on this list never did or never will contribute anything to a major league team, but the sheer volume alone is astounding. When you factor in the quality of many of them, of the value they had when traded, it's pretty shocking. Top Ranking according to Soxprospects.com while in our system: 1 Moncada 1 Swihart 3 Margot 3 Espinoza 5 Kopech 5 Beeks 5 Marrero 6 Guerra 7 Basabe 9 Dubon 12 T Shaw (not a prospect when traded) 12 Rijo 13 Allen 15 Martin 17 Buttrey 18 Basabe 18 Callahan 20 Bautista 20 Asuaje That's over 18 prospects once ranked rather highly.