As bad as Flowers is, he is around league average for a catcher

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

What is it exactly that you think Jose Quintana is better at than Jon Lester? Because it certainly isn't limiting baserunners or scoring.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

No one outside of a few in the subdivision value Quintana as a #2 starter.

_________________
"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Obviously the guy doesn't make $150MM or whatever Lester got.

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

I understand that, but let's not kid ourselves about who the better pitcher is. If Lester wins two more games than a guy like Quintana and those games are the thing that gets Team 107 and counting into the playoffs and they ultimately win a World Series, who is to say what those wins are worth? Personally, I would say they are priceless.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Lester is a weak #1. Quintana is a weak #2. He's not a #4. That's absurd.

_________________
Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

Quintana is a #2 if you want to finish in last place.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

see, now that's just plain stupid. He was 10th in WAR last year among starters. Probably will be top 20 this year.

_________________
Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

Yet he loses every game.

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Quintana has never gotten any support. Ever. Its bizarre.

True....you can have one automatic out in your lineup if he compensates for it defensively. The Sox don't have a single every day player betting over .300....NONE. Alexei, Beckham, Sanchez are all awful. La Roche, Eaton, Melky are meh and paid to be good. If any of these higher paid clowns have value, i'd sell 'em off in second.

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Flowers isn't really good enough though to excuse the average.

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Elections have consequences.

He let's a flurry of balls past him too

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

This is why a lot of people scoff at WAR. The game isn't just about personal statistics. It's primarily about competing in game context. I wonder what the collective WAR of the starting pitchers faced by Quintana in the games in which he faced them is.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Neither of us has any verifiable knowledge of how he is valued by MLB.

Statistical value indicates that not only is he a #2 starter, he is a pretty good one.

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Quintana has been facing the equivalent of Bob Gibson in his career for the White Sox. They never score for him, they often play horrible defense for him (and he very often overcomes it and escapes those innings) and he still puts the Sox in a position to win time and time again. How many brilliant Quintana games were blown by the pen last year? The Sox have scored a total of lik 15 runs for him all season.

His BABIP against is at .329, which is higher than John Danks. Danks is like the definition of "imma throw this crap and hopefully they hit into outs." Quintana doesn't give up many HR either, so its not like batters are just lazering balls off him. He doesn't allow walks. I dont know what more you can expect a guy like him to do. He's playing on some god-awful teams.

Chris Sale went on one of the greatest pitching runs in league history and the Sox still lost those games. You want to tell me the best pitcher in the game right now isn't a true ace because of his W/L?

He was just ranked the 41st most valuable player in the league by Dave Cameron. That's probably pretty close to how he's viewed league wide.

Not sure if you checked or care but since Rizzo dipped to .298 before the break neither does the Cubs.

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Elections have consequences.

Rizzo takes walks ..more than anyone on the Sox .


What did ya expect? Laroche is 35 n going to a tougher league.

Gordon Mendoza has always sucked fat dick.

The Melkman is a convicted juicer , he got his dough n saved his liver.

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mike can't help himself, he knows the cubs, he loves the cubs

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

I had no hate there. Just was interesting to me that when I looked it up that the Cubs have no starter over .300.

_________________
Elections have consequences.

Rizzo has more walks than the Sox. Period.

_________________
Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

Fine with me. I am not trying to tell anyone the Sox are better than the Cubs. Only that the Cubs do not have a regular player hitting .300. It is ok.

_________________
Elections have consequences.

He is... the unluckiest pitcher in the world.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

I haven't studied the Cubs offensive stats...interesting on their BA.

Back to the Sox, it's not just their BA....OBP is also garbage. It's a very bad offensive team. I'm willing to live with Flowers, as Catcher is one of the toughest positions to solidify. The other automatic outs in the lineup need to be addressed.

Going into the season I was optimistic based on the pitching staff. The Sox have starting pitching, which will always make you competitive. Adding Melky and La Roche didn't excite me, but figured there was maybe enough to carry the offense. Nope. Eaton is down. La Roche and Melky are underwhelming. Beckham still can't hit. Alexei blows and there's a few other positions with no production. The cupboard is bare and they need to get better through the farm.

The good news is with the starting pitching, they're not that bad off. It can be turned around quickly. I just hate seeing signings like La Roche and Melky where you know it's not going to live up to they hype. Waste of money.

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This thought interested me. There were many here that said the Cubs could rebuild while spending money on free agents at the same time. Namely, they didn't need to lose at the major league level while retooling the system. Why do we (as fans) care if a team wastes money? It's not our money. So here you have the White Sox who have avoided the complete rebuild and went out and have signed several free agents in each of the past two off seasons in an effort to avoid being bad.

I supported the Plan all along because I don't like a team built largely on free agents. I prefer that free agents be signed to fill needs. When your needs are an entire 25 man roster, I don't think free agency works for that scenario. By the way, I have supported Hahn's moves as well. I thought he did a nice job, but it has not worked out to date. Lesson, there's more than one way to do it.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

"Waste of money" is tied to the fact that if you get lucky and have a team of younger players who are contenders, you'll have money available to make a serious push for the WS.

I don't remember the numbers, but Melky's contract hurts. It's not crippling, but he's getting paid a decent amount and that could bite you down the road.

Then there's the cynic in me that thinks they know they won't compete and they're just giving the illusion of trying to win by having veteran free agents.

I'd just rather see younger players than a bunch of overpaid veterans.

The Sox approach can work. Invest in your starting rotation and build from there. The problem is, when your farm system doesn't produce and you can't find other farm busts on the cheap that rebound, you're bad.

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The problem with Melky's contract is that they gave him three years. If they had given him two, he is probably movable this year.

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

The(o) Plan, while based in waves and waves of draft picks, has seen it's success through trades. If the Cubs were exclusively relying on players they drafted and developed, they would be a last place team again this year.

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. All free agents aren't the same. Many teams build for years with prospects and never do a damn thing. As brutal as the Sox offense is, the Cubs aren't much better in spite of all the vaunted young guys. And there's this odd assumption that time will just make them better. Maybe it will. Maybe Addison Russell is just another overmatched big league hitter.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don