It is a tale of two city teams.
The White Sox were a divisional contender on paper during spring training.
The Cubs were still mired in a long rebuilding process. The top prospects were still years away from the talk in spring training.
But the exact opposite happened: the White Sox failed in their fans' expectations while the Cubs surprised their fans with a playoff run, which included beating the rival Cardinals.
Both teams have a lot of work to do this off-season to have a "contender" tag during spring training. The Cubs are desperate for starting pitching while the White Sox are desperate for hitting.
The teams are natural trade partners on a needs basis, but since they share the same territory, they rarely trade. Which is a shame since each team has valuable usable parts for the other. The White Sox declined an option on Alexi Ramirez so the team is in need of a shortstop, which the Cubs have a surplus. The White Sox have a stacked deck of starting pitchers, with two more youngsters working up the high minors. There could be a blockbuster deal if the teams would put their organizational hatred aside.
And it seems that the trade market may be more active this year because of the high cost of free agents like Price, Zimmerman, Heyward and Greinke.
Four days before the GM meetings began in South Florida, the Seattle
Mariners and Tampa Bay Rays had already engineered a six-player trade.
Seattle acquired right-hander Nathan Karns, lefty C.J. Riefenhauser and
minor-league outfielder Boog Powell, sending first baseman Logan
Morrison, infielder/outfielder Brad Miller and right-hander Danny
Farquhar to Tampa Bay – all before the free-agent marketplace even
opened. None of these players are big names, but they fill existing needs in the teams' depth charts.
