moonslav59

Agreed. I did not want a top 10 prospect traded for a rental, so he likely did about the best he could with what he had below #9. I do think Fedde looked like an inexpensive get and had another year of control at $7.5M, but it's hard to know what the CWS would have wanted from us for him.

The more I think about it, the moves Brez made were just a bandaid on a gaping wound. By themselves, they look okay, but in totality, we came up way short of what was needed.

Criswell should be starting. I may be wrong about "going with the hot bat," but pitching is a whole other ball of wax.

Gasper, the friendly 1Bman/Catcher is now at 1.105 with WOO. Rogers went 5 with GRE. 5IP 4H 1ER 2BB 6K Jh. Garcia homered and is at .953. (Will he make the top 15?)

Devers started the year having a tough time with RBIs. He's now on pace for about 100. His current .981 OPS is by far his highest career number and is 5th in MLB, as of now. O'Neill is 13th at .900 Others: .866 Refsnyder (.775 in July) .857 Casas (played for Woo, tonight) .853 Duran (.892 July) .828 Abreu (.884 July) .803 Wong (.654 July) .773 Romy (.849 July) .753 Yoshida (.914 July) .722 Smith (.930 July) .701 Rafaela (.775 July) .690 DHam (.543 in Jul) Note: Bogey has had a nice July and just passed DHam at .695. Devers is 1.107 in July and O'Neill is .961 Too bad the pitching looks like the flip side of this.

Tradition. Have you given up?

Was it real, or did it seem like 100 trades went down in the last 3-4 days?

Word out, the Yanks had a deal for Flaherty, but his medical records caused them to pull out of the deal.

Hey, the Dodgers will be DFA'ing a couple guys, so I'm sure Brez is waiting to pounce.

SEA passed HOU for first in the ALW. The WC race, assuming HOU loses: 64-45 NYY (0.5 from BAL) 58-48 MIN 59-49 KCR 56-50 BOS -2.0 55-52 HOU -3.5 55-52 TBR -3.5 52-56 TEX -7.0 (-4.5 from ALW) The next few games gives us a great chance to gain on those around us, but the opposite could happen, too: 1 v SEA Off 3@ TEX 3@ KCR Off 3 v HOU 3 v TEX 4@ BAL 3@ HOU Off August 22

The post All Star Break Sox have not looked good, at all. The deadline came and went with nothing major happening, but some decent attempts at fixing the pitching staff with 3 rentals (Luis Garica, Lucas Sims and James Paxton) and a longer term try (Quinn Priester.) We also upgraded the catching depth with RHB Danny Jansen. We DFA'd McGuire, Chase Anderson and Brandon Walter. Yohan Ramirez was promoted and struggled in his first game. I have to say the "realistic" view is not all that rosy, but other teams have some major issues, too. That might be our best hope. This team has fought back, several times, this year. The pitching has been in decline, while the offense has been improving. There is not much evidence the staff will turn it back around and do well, going forward. I'm not saying it can't happen, but there just hasn't been any signs of life. Assuming Priester plays in AAA, to gain the 6th year of control, this will likely be the 26 (40): SP: Houck, Pivetta, Paxton, Bello, Crawford (Priester, Keller AAA) RP: Jansen, L Garcia, L Sims, Criswell, Kelly, Bernardino, Wink & Booser (Horn, Y Ramirez, Weissert in AAA) C: Wong & Jansen (Heineman) 1B: S Smith (Casas at end of AUG?) (Dalbec) 2B: DHam & Romy (Grissom, Westbrook) SS: Rafaela 3B: Devers LF: O'Neill/Refsnyder CF: Duran RF: Abreu/O'Neill DH: Yoshida (Valdez) AA: Wikelman 15 Day IL: Martin & Slaten 60 Day IL: Giolito, Story, Whitlock, Murphy, Mata, Perales Hendriks (end of AUG?) The farm got a bit shallower, but we lost no top 10 prospects, except maybe Yorke. We have our work cut out for us. Link: Part II: https://www.talksox.com/forum/threads/20859-A-Realistic-View-of-2024-Part-II

Agreed. 12. Yorke (might have moved to 10-11) 13. Lugo (was up and down and likely topped out) 15. Paulino (was likely to drop to near 20) 28. Coffey (started making some noise) 29. Portes (just 19 y/o) 37. Zeferjahn (not sure he had much hope) 54. Y Vargas DFA #50 Walter

Anyone know why Mayer was pulled after 1 PA?

We lost some farm depth, but much of it seemed duplicated or destined for AAAA status. Portes and C Coffey still had some promise, but pretty far away. Lugo and Yorke were coming on, this year, but both seem destined to be DH/LF'ers, something we have way too many of. I had hoped for better returns, but we didn't really give up much. We should see some serious promotions to fill some of these gaps. Priester might be our #1 ML ready SP'ers on the farm, now.

To me, it seems the Kikuchi & T Scott trades were the only clear big overpays, but I'm not expert on these types of deals for prospects. I had hoped we'd get Flaherty. The tigers didn't seem to get much for him. The Fedde trade looked like a steal, to me, but I'm glad Brez mad e a real effort to improve our weakest areas: the rotation & the pen.

Sounds about right. I had Yorke and Lugo on the top of my to trade lists, so I was not surprised. C Coffey might come back to haunt us, but Portes surprised me. He could hurt, too. A 6 seems right. I wonder how close we came to Flaherty. Was Anderson traded?

Six get Luis Garcia! That’s a nice get. I had hoped for more, but this was a better try than Bloom. Dodgers got Flaherty.

Yup. I posted this earlier... On June 10th, he had an ERA of 4.43 and an FIP of 6.16. It's been 2.40/3.16 since then (15 IP 13Hits 7BB 17Ks 1 HR) .645 OPSA.

Arms are a huge risk, but we can't ignore adding some with crossed fingers. To me, trading for a younger pitcher is less risky than signing 29-30+ FA pitchers. Trading for a young pitcher is less risky than drafting one or signing IFA pistcher. Once a pitcher has been in the minors (or majors) our scouts can get a better read on their skill level and projections. Nobody can project injuries, but we need to add quality arms and hope enough work out. We are overloaded and bottle-necked with some positional players/prospects. We need to use our strength to improve our weakness: it's that simple. Making it happen is not easy.

So... Yorke, Portes, C Coffey, Paulino, G Batista & M Bolivar for Lucas Sims (RP), James Paxton (SP), Danny Jansen (RHB C) and Quinn Priester (SP likely to be in AAA for 2024.) DFA: McGuire, Chase Anderson and Walter Overall, I like the deals, especially the 6 years of Priester, but nothing really jumps out as a big addition for 2024.

We need 2-3 more, even if Sims does great. We had zero reliable RP'ers before today.

Josh Bell to AZ. No biggie.

Agreed. He should help. We need 2-3 more like him or better.

I have repeatedly suggested we trade Abreu for an Abreu clone who bats RH'd. However, I'd prefer we package him for a solid pitcher with 2.3+ years of control. Priester will be in AAA, so he should not count as a pitcher acquired for 2024's run. Sims had not been acquired, when I made my points. Paxton is barely better than Criswell/Pivetta, but he should eat innings. He was not the level of pitcher I hoped for: neither was Sims. The "lane" chosen was mediocrity. Full throttle. There is still time to change that, but like I said, I'm not expecting anything major.

Brandon Walter DFA'd to make room for Sims. No surprise.