Offseason rumors
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Me too. We need him and one of Snell or Montgomery, or a trade forCorbin Burnes. Not sold on Cease unless we get him and the impact bat. Drawing a blank on his name, maybe Robert's. A second baseman on short years and an impact bat, read Juan Soto or Bellinger.
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Luis Robert would be quite the impact bat, and is easily the most valuable piece on the White Sox: he's the guy they're building around, not the guy they're trading. People have been speculating about Eloy Jimenez, who has tremendous power but has been hurt and uneven and is only an outfielder if you squint.
That said, if Luis Robert, a 25 y/o two-way CF (under team control at very reasonable salaries, including some team options, through 2027) were in fact available, I'd offer Mayer, Duran, Rafaela and Crawford for Robert and Cease. Baseball Trade Values accepts that one. Instant farm system for the White Sox.
Then sign another Yamamoto or Montgomery and basically anyone to play second base and we're looking like a solid team.
RF Verdugo L
3B Devers L
CF Robert R
DH Yoshida L
SS Story R
1B Casas L
C Wong R
RF Abreu L
2B Reyes R
Rotation: Yamamoto Cease Bello Sale Pivetta
That's a ballclub.
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There is zero % chance they would accept that package. We would do that in a second.
I don’t think they do they package for Robert’s alone. Let alone both.
The problem with proposals such as this is always the same. Why would the team trading with the Red Sox package their two best players in a single deal, when -- if they were inclined to trade them both anyways -- they could trade them in separate deals and likely get a better haul?
Yeah, all these deals where the Sox give up little to no pitching seem pretty unrealistic. The ChiSox wanted Bello+ for just Cease, but now they would throw in Robert for that? I’m skeptical.
Okay, fine. I don't think there's a realistic chance Robert is available, and I guess if you're dealing Robert, you probably want younger players anyways, because you're signaling that the next contending White Sox team is post-2027.
Putting it in here because it's not Sox related (at all) but wow, that's a good deal for the Braves.
Getting 5 years of control of Kelenic for absolutely nothing beyond simply paying $12.5m to Marco Gonzales to be a 5/6 starter. Impressive move.
Getting 5 years of control of Kelenic for absolutely nothing beyond simply paying $12.5m to Marco Gonzales to be a 5/6 starter. Impressive move.
View: https://twitter.com/TomCaron/status/1731788167001288935
View: https://twitter.com/NESN/status/1731795374359105661
Brock Holt will be the Sox representative at the MLB lottery tomorrow
View: https://twitter.com/NESN/status/1731795374359105661
Brock Holt will be the Sox representative at the MLB lottery tomorrow
I love that Holt is still part of the Sox family. I'm really curious to see if he has any broadcasting aspirations.
Jon Heyman reported on a Bleacher Report live stream on Monday afternoon that the Red Sox “so far haven't been tied to anyone big but…that they are in on (Seth) Lugo": https://www.si.com/mlb/red-sox/news/red-sox-reportedly-showing-interest-in-free-agent-starter-after-strong-season-steve1
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Listening to MLB radio on drive to work. Bowden and Perez live from Winter Meetings in Nashville. In their segment about Yamamoto, they're now talking about the total outlay of his contract approaching $300 million. I'm guessing it'll come down to Mets and Giants as much as i want him to be the Sox top priority by far. Less than a week ago, I thought 9/$252m would get it done. Maybe it's time to turn our attention to Imanaga and Stroman or ERod?
I wasn't listening, but "total outlay" sounds like it would include the posting fee so the actual contract wouldn't be $300m if so. The posting fee doesn't count toward the AAV or tax threshold stuff.
Including the posting fee, the outlay on a $252m contract would be a bit over $285m.
My apologies, "total outlay" was the wrong term. They specifically said the contract numbers they were hearing approaching 300m were before the posting fee. They also said the Mets and Giants were basically saying they'd go dollar for dollar to get their guy so reading the tea leaves, he likely won't be coming to Boston, sadly. This also probably means Montgomery's deal will be in the 160-175m range, which i think is an overpay for a guy who isn't an ace. And he reportedly prefers the Rangers.
So what's the deal with Lugo? Looks like he was either injured or relegated to middle relief with a handful of spot starts and saves for basically his entire career. Then last year at the age of 33 dude pitches 26 starts/146 innings of sub-4 FIP with pretty decent looking peripherals. BABIP of 0.298. I'm not sure what to make of this.
The last time the Red Sox signed someone named Lugo they won the World Series, I'm just saying.
Bumping from the Winter Meetings thread.
Soto is a primary need because he's a generational talent who just turned 25. Cronenworth had the third-most fWAR among all second basemen the last two years he played the position ('21-22).
One thing I think (I hope!) the Sox have at their disposal this year rather than in the Bloom era is the ability to pay premium in free agency to replace assets already on the roster. In one manner of strategy, imo, Pivetta, Verdugo, one of Houck or Crawford, and maybe even Wong might all be traded because we can replace them by signing more expensive players on short-term deals for just money.
Easier said than done, but we could do something like this and still be pretty unconcerned about luxury tax implications in 2026.
Sign Paxton, Lugo, Manaea or Junis and trade Pivetta
Sign Teoscar Hernández, Adam Duvall, Robbie Grossman or Aaron Hicks (plus Wilyer Abreu and Ceddanne Rafaela) and trade Verdugo
Sign Flaherty, Montas, Mahle or Giolito and trade Houck or Crawford
Sign Gary Sanchez (that's right, it's time!) and trade Wong
Sign Woodruff to a 3 or 4 year deal
Didn't Heyman say a couple of days ago Sox were still in on Ohtani (countering a Passan report they were out)? I don't think they'll actually be in on Ohtani but Heyman is super unreliable, bordering on useless these days from a rumor mill perspective. I'd have a hard time believing they weren't "in on" Yamamoto, Montgomery, etc. in some form.
I've always felt that BROCKHOLT! would be a great name for the lead of a 70s detective show. Tune in this week as BROCKHOLT! busts up a smuggling ring down on the docks.
You post a lot of good stuff, but I have be honest when I say I'm not really buying into much of this. Agree to disagree, but one year of a generational talant with this roster as currently constructed is a waste of resources. If you want to try to work a different deal for Cronenworth fine, but taking on Soto while augmenting the rotation with the guys you've listed doesn't address the team's greatest need.
It’s simple. If you like Soto, just sign him when he hits FA. Why waste org capital in a trade when this team even with Soto isn’t really a WS contender?
I kind of agree, but I also think there are benefits to getting him here in his final year as well, depending on the prospect cost. I certainly wouldn't give up any on Mayer, Teel or Anthony for him, but some combination of basically anyone else could be on the table.
Getting him in the clubhouse for a year and finding out if he fits before you need to consider offering him $400M isn't the worst idea.
The biggest drawback is that he's left handed, and kind of a DH, so I am not really sure where he fits on this team.
Also, nobody besides me thought Arizona was going to be a World Series contender last year, so that argument holds no water with me. They need to do everything they can (within reason) to make this year's team the best that they can.
One point: he refused an extension offer from Washington that was supposedly worth $440M, so I am guessing $500M will probably be the conversation starter (or more, depending on what Ohtani gets, as I am sure Boras will use Ohtani as a comparison case to Soto).
I'm pretty sure (from this reporting in the Athletic) that Washington's 15/$440M extension offer included his arb2 and arb3 years, which Soto was slated to be paid around $60M. So their offer was effectively a 13/$380M deal from the point of his free agency.
It does seem like he'll get more than that next winter, but maybe not $500M. Who knows. Boras can say what he wants though.
Another consideration may have been the state of the franchise at that point in time.
Like death and taxes @chawson
I’m coming around to the Soto idea. Certainly not the idea of dumping prospects for one year of him, but at least the idea of spending many hundreds of millions on just his bat. I criticized the Red Sox organization vigorously for not thinking long enough term around the Mookie decision (a decade long one) by riding out a couple bad years if necessary. I criticized Bloom vigorously for not adding any long-term pitching, even if it wasn’t a critical need per se that year. I remember what Ortiz meant for example (no one is likely to be THAT of course). As such, I should probably accept there’s not a wrong time (edit - for a franchise like the Red Sox at least) to add an historic bat, especially across most of its forecasted peak.
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Yeah, lots of smoke that the NYY deal is happening now. Get ready for the fan angst, especially if Yamamoto goes elsewhere.
The Yanks could add Soto by trade and then sign Yamamoto pretty easily. That would be a problem.
Hence why I avoid talk radio.... Fans are like Veruca Salt, and they want everything NOW... We should be more like SD last offseason... I heard they went pretty far in the playoffs....
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wAlQf4WdiE
I will wait for the offseason to finish before I try and complain
Case in point
View: https://twitter.com/TonyMassarotti/status/1732428551943581982
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As of now the entire division is a problem. Not to mention Houston, Seattle and the Rangers when you're fighting for 1 of 5 playoff spots (because by definition, no matter how atrocious the team that wins it is, it is literally not possible for the Red Sox to win the AL Central).
Having Soto would be great (and hopefully he becomes a FA next year and the Red Sox sign him for $500m), but just like everyone in the organization not named Bryan Bello, he can't be counted on to start 30 games and pitch effectively next season.
The Sox need to spend assets on guys that can.
Hopefully, the Sox put in an aggressive bid for Yamamoto to the point where another team has to grossly overpay.
It's always best to convince yourself early on that the team isn't going to wind up with the available stars. That way you accept reality and leave the door open for the occasional surprise
I have to assume Mazz is kidding there since he was very much on the Stanton over JDM bandwagon and has often admitted how wrong he was on that.
The idea of giving $100m to someone for their ages 34-37 seasons when they couldn't stay on the field for ages 22, 23, 25, 26, 29, 30, 32 and 33 seasons is too insane for even sports talk radio hosts - the callers might be that nuts though.
My present plan is to expect Dick Fitts will be the largest piece inserted into this team this week.
Morosi just now reiterated on MLB Network that the #1 priority for the Sox is Yamamoto. Nothing really new, I know. However, he said it with emphasis and that they may do "whatever it takes".
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