A Realistic View at 2017 Part I

[Kimmi]

if the Sale deal delivers a title to Boston, then it doesn't matter if Moncada becomes a perennial MVP candidate. There is a good chance The CWS package delivers more WAR than Sale will in a six uniform. But if a pennant gets raised on the back of Chris Sale, then nobody will care

I agree with this. I've said that if we win a World Series in the next 3 years than it will all be worth it, even if both Moncada and Kopech go on to be perennial All Stars.

[Kimmi]

People need to get over the fact that the prospect package could return more value to Chicago. Of course it does!!!! That's how trades work.
You would not invest $10 in the stock market to MAYBE get $10 back in the future. There is an element of risk, so potential future value must be higher to make a trade even.


Even if you knew with 100% certainty Sale would give you 20 WAR and Moncada would give 30 WAR (money aside) even then that WAR today is worth more, think of the same concept as TVM.

Still, despite all that, I hated the Pom Pom trade and always will. But the Kimbrel, Sale trades are justifiable and make sense. I think I like the Thornburg trade too.

I have no problem with any single move by itself.

I have a problem with the change in organizational philosophy that Dombrowski has brought.

[Bellhorn04]

I said the same thing last offseason after we got Price and Kimbrel. Dombrowski overpaid the next higher offer for Price by $30 million. Geez, I can do that.

But by the same token, Theo only got Lester because he bumped our offer by 20 million. Most people said Theo overpaid for Lester. Anybody (with the money behind them) could do that too.

It's not really the individual moves that determine a GM's success. It's the total package that he puts together.

[moonslav59]

I agree with this analysis. This was pretty much Dave Cameron's point too: the Red Sox gave up too much for Sale--Cameron wouldn't have made the trade.

Dombrowski is making the media rounds going over how the two deals came together as if he has some special talent for such things. What a joke. In both cases, the deals were completed because Dombrowski overpaid. He did the same thing for Kimbrel. Anyone can make deals like this if you want to completely unload and decimate your farm system, which is what Dombrowski has done. If he didn't inherit a top farm system, Sale would still be on the White Sox. We kept hearing that Dombrowski is very shrewd when it comes to making deals, but I haven't seen evidence of it. In each trade, he is either getting fair value back or he is overpaying. What is so shrewd about that?

Trading nothing for A.Chapman was a shrewd deal, the one Cashman made last offseason.

I agree that the overpays were too much, ad we probably could have have gotten all what we have gotten for far for less.

Even Price at $21M/7 less would have us comfortably under the luxury limit.

Keeping just Asuage and Allen in the Kimbrel deal would have kept our farm a little fuller.

Keeping Kopech and maybe adding Basabe and Shaw would have greatly improved our long term outlook.

Nix the Espi-Pom deal, and maybe we could have traded Espi, Swihart, Hernandez and Owens for Quintana or just kept these four.

I will say, I think we should win a ring in the next 2 years- maybe 3, and I'm glad we didn't play it half way, but there's a strong argument to be made that we played it all out the wrong way.

[Bellhorn04]

Us fans could always do things better than the real guys do them.

[Bellhorn04]

If you really want to blame someone for a shift in philosophy, there's only one man you should be blaming and that's JH himself. He's the one who replaced BC with DD, and you can bet DD is doing exactly what JH expected him to do.

[S5Dewey]

Us fans could always do things better than the real guys do them.

Exactly true. When I think about second guessing trades that were made I try to keep in mind that I have no knowledge of what went into the trade. Who was offered and who was turned down in the back-and-forths and what the club's longer term plan is.

IMO it's also important to keep in mind that GM's play a tough game, especially when they know that they have the BEST player to fill another team's needs. For example, my understanding is that the Nats were balls-deep in the negotiations for Sale. MAYBE we could have gotten Sale and kept Kopech... or MAYBE we'd have lost him to the Nats if we'd insisted on keeping Kopech. One in the hand being worth two in the bush, I'm glad we've got Sale today and not the promise of Kopech in 3-4 years.

[Emp9]

Things could've been worse. DD could've made better moves, earlier, and we'd have traded for Jose Fernandez. Or is that the wrong way to look at things? I'm not really sure anymore.

[Bellhorn04]

Things could've been worse. DD could've made better moves, earlier, and we'd have traded for Jose Fernandez. Or is that the wrong way to look at things? I'm not really sure anymore.

You do sound confused LOL.

Jose Fernandez would be a sad example, I guess, of the role that blind luck plays in everything.

[S5Dewey]

Exactly true. When I think about second guessing trades that were made I try to keep in mind that I have no knowledge of what went into the trade. Who was offered and who was turned down in the back-and-forths and what the club's longer term plan is.

IMO it's also important to keep in mind that GM's play a tough game, especially when they know that they have the BEST player to fill another team's needs. For example, my understanding is that the Nats were balls-deep in the negotiations for Sale. MAYBE we could have gotten Sale and kept Kopech... or MAYBE we'd have lost him to the Nats if we'd insisted on keeping Kopech. One in the hand being worth two in the bush, I'm glad we've got Sale today and not the promise of Kopech in 3-4 years.

..and in replying to my own post ! ...
This is the attitude we should take with Buch. We have something someone is going to want - and want badly - when one of their pitchers goes down. We should hold out and make them overpay, which the right GM will do when he's desperate enough.

[Emp9]

You do sound confused LOL.

Jose Fernandez would be a sad example, I guess, of the role that blind luck plays in everything.

Not sure if speeding and crashing your boat into some rocks while high on cocaine and drunk is "blind luck", but...

[Bellhorn04]

Not sure if speeding and crashing your boat into some rocks while high on cocaine and drunk is "blind luck", but...

I meant blind luck for the team he plays for.

[moonslav59]

Exactly true. When I think about second guessing trades that were made I try to keep in mind that I have no knowledge of what went into the trade. Who was offered and who was turned down in the back-and-forths and what the club's longer term plan is.

IMO it's also important to keep in mind that GM's play a tough game, especially when they know that they have the BEST player to fill another team's needs. For example, my understanding is that the Nats were balls-deep in the negotiations for Sale. MAYBE we could have gotten Sale and kept Kopech... or MAYBE we'd have lost him to the Nats if we'd insisted on keeping Kopech. One in the hand being worth two in the bush, I'm glad we've got Sale today and not the promise of Kopech in 3-4 years.

One other aspect of this deal is that had we missed out on Sale, we might have gotten Quintana for Moncada, Swihart and Owens. Look at what the CWS wanted from the Astros for Quintna, and I think we could have beaten that without Kopech, Devers or Groome.

[Emp9]

I meant blind luck for the team he plays for.

Ok I gotcha. Yeah, just saying, things can always be worse. I try to look at the absolute worst & best case scenarios (not just in sports) to keep me balanced. Lol

[harmony]

..and in replying to my own post ! ...
This is the attitude we should take with Buch. We have something someone is going to want - and want badly - when one of their pitchers goes down. We should hold out and make them overpay, which the right GM will do when he's desperate enough.

Unless Clay Buchholz is the pitcher who goes down. It's happened.