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Personally my expectations are fairly low. When the season starts, Sandoval will not have faced MLB pitching on a consistent basis for 18 months. As he was not exactly a stellar hitter to begin with, I don't expect a rapid adjustment. My hope is he turns out like Lackey. Gives two awful seasons with a missed year and miraculously turns it around. But that's probably too much to expect. ..

I wouldn't put much faith in Eric Wilbur's assessment of anything. Wilbur, like many people, doesn't understand the normal attrition rate of prospects, even top ones. No team sees all of their top ten make the majors for any prolonged length of time, let alone become stars. Especially recently, the Sox have excelled in this area. They have four starters from their farm with less than 3 years in the majors, and only Benintendi has yet to be an all star (for hopefully obvious reasons). The Cubs are the team everyone loves as young talent, but in their lineup and rotation how many prospects have become starters for them? Just Bryant and Contreras. And unless Baez starts, they will have as many Sox farm products as their own, thanks to Rizzo and Lester. Most top ten lists really only yield a handful of major leaguers, and even fewer bona fide stars. Even the BA Top 100 list.contains maybe 10 all star caliber players annually. And three times that many from any list any year will never make the majors beyond maybe a September call up. And that is the list of the best of the best. So yes, we will have prospects bust. So will everyone else. And that's ok. The Sox have 6 levels of minor league baseball feeding a singular 25 man roster, like every team. But in the past few seasons the Sox minor league teams have been doing a great job feeding their MLB team. And deciding they aren't just because Lars Anderson and Casey Kelly didn't pan out doesn't change this. If you think this is the case, why keep Benintendi? Surely he will flop, because Steve Lomasney did. Now where is a700, who tried to call me out a week ago when I pretty much Sox fans would react exactly like this?

I expect Buchholz to be dealt. And also Elias. And maybe Hembree or Abad as well...

I've mentioned Holliday a couple times, but his better days are past. Over the last three years, he's gone down to being barely above average

I never said you were against trading prospects. I questioned if you were the guy asking about Dombrowski's reputation for dealing prospects. Someone did and made me look up his trading history. ..

Now we just need for Dombrowski to stop taking to Mitch Moreland. After his first two moves today, that would be anticlimactic. It's like starting off a meal with a delicious shrimp cocktail, and following it up with tje perfect streak., and then for dessert serving a healing helping of Mitch Moreland.

I like both these deals, but anyone who ever doubted Dombrowski's reputation for dealing prospects (moon?) should certainly see it is justified. ..

So it looks like the rotation, in whatever order, will have Price, Sale, Porcello, and ? Most of us like Rodriguez, but thoughts on him starting in Pawtucket and serving as inevitable depth? With two others from Wright, Buchholz and Pomeranz rounding out the rotation? That leaves the bullpen with one displaced starter, let's say Pomeranz, along with Kimbrel, Thornburg, Kelly, Ross, Abad and Hembree, with Barnes heading to Pawtucket for depth (he's the only one with an option) and Elias looking for work. Or can Dombrowski forget about Mitch Moreland and maybe deal Buchholz (or ?) for an actual DH?

For the second season in a row, Dombrowski's first big move was to acquire a good reliever. It's nice to see he learned from his mistakes in Detroit

He's a horrible defensive player capable of committing errors as a DH. But the interest isn't surprising given he was a college teammate of David Price. .

It would involve emptying the farm, including dealing Giolito, Lopez, and Robles, and a few others. They do have a very good farm. But it can be true that sometimes a GM just focuses solely on one young player and failure to include him is a deal breaker....

Well as much as aces can help a team, is this really the Sox biggest need? We currently have two Cy Young winners in the rotation. I like Sale, but I don't know if the Sox will be considering any big rotation upgrades with the priority many fans want. They do have a couple more pressing needs at DH and in the bullpen. ..

The White Sox reportedly wanted Trea Turner and Lucas Giolito from Washington if you need a basis for their demands..

As talented as I think Sale is, I wouldn't go all in on him either. This past season raised questions with me about whether or not he is a whiny prima donna. If the asking price was Swihart and another lesser, sure. But we all know its isn't. ...

I didn't like the decision to not go for it, but there is something to be said for setting up your rotation. Really that call by Farrell appeared to be playing it safe. If you go all in for home field, you still may not get it as it's out of your control. Then you go into the worst case of playing on the road with your game one starter as whoever's turn it is. If you set up your rotation, it's done. And maybe if things break right, you luck into home field anyway...

Success in the post-season doesn't counter the advantage of having another hitter in the lineup for 162 games. Defense is important, but defense at the expense of offense , especially done too often, may have a price...

On a one year deal, there is no real need to worry about his career trajectory. He had a terrific season last year and is unlikely to duplicate it. But how much does he have to drop off before people start thinking "we should have signed Logan Morrison!!"? For one year, he would have been acceptable. For multiple years, his inevitable decline becomes a bigger factor. ..

But even a declining Beltran is better than a lot of other options. I'd take a declining Beltran over a peaking Mitch Moreland or Adam Lind. Especially if the commitment involved was only one year...

If Carlos Beltran is breaking down, Matt Holliday is legally dead...

Yes one could ask about de la Rosa. He actually probably is a better pitcher than Erik Johnson, at least he certainly has had more success at the MLB level. My only concern- clearly Arizona's as well - is his health, which has been an issue with him since before coming to Boston last time...

Of course he'll start. And so will Price, Porcello, Pomeranz, Wright, Rodriguez, and maybe 10 other guys...

The Sox aren't going to get a better pitcher than Buchholz for $13.5mill and certainly not in this market. And going after Chapman? The Sox have Kimbrel in the role he wants. They do need to add a reliever or two, but Chapman (and Jansen) might get closer to $20million. The Sox shouldn't ignore the pen, but they don't need to chase the big name pitchers in order to get those 180 outs

4 of the top 6 made the playoffs. I wonder how many other positions have that. Although Texas had Lucroy for less than half a season...

No Barnes?

I really don't see why they are so adamant about a left-hander. Is Adam Lind really going to help this offense more than Napoli?