The official Hot Stove League Thread 2025-26 Offseason

[GL_Storm]

Kelenic got an NRI from the White Sox. lol

Screenshot 2025-12-31 075433.png

I guess he hasn't kicked the bucket just yet!

Oh wait....

All I know is that if Kelenic is on the White Sox team on Opening Day MLB needs to have him pee in a cup...

Why? Strength and power have never been his issues. It's always been swing and miss and chase, which is likely an underlying issue with pitch recognition. PEDs don't help with that.

[D-train]

I guess he hasn't kicked the bucket just yet!

Oh wait....

All I know is that if Kelenic is on the White Sox team on Opening Day MLB needs to have him pee in a cup...

Why? Strength and power have never been his issues. It's always been swing and miss and chase, which is likely an underlying issue with pitch recognition. PEDs don't help with that.

You would think that would be the case but look at Bonds and Boone. Bonds had a .288 BA before the turn of the century but then from 2000-2004 he hit .339. Boone hit .255 before he returned to the M's in 2001, then hit .301 from 2001-03, then once the PED crackdown happened he went right back down to .240 for the rest of his career.

[DavidGee24]

Astros sign Imai...

Some. Teams. Just. Want. It. More.

They and the Vegas Golden Knights are notoriously like that. Stepping back is just simply not in their creed.

[GL_Storm]

All I know is that if Kelenic is on the White Sox team on Opening Day MLB needs to have him pee in a cup...

Why? Strength and power have never been his issues. It's always been swing and miss and chase, which is likely an underlying issue with pitch recognition. PEDs don't help with that.

You would think that would be the case but look at Bonds and Boone. Bonds had a .288 BA before the turn of the century but then from 2000-2004 he hit .339. Boone hit .255 before he returned to the M's in 2001, then hit .301 from 2001-03, then once the PED crackdown happened he went right back down to .240 for the rest of his career.

That isn't an argument.

[D-train]

Why? Strength and power have never been his issues. It's always been swing and miss and chase, which is likely an underlying issue with pitch recognition. PEDs don't help with that.

You would think that would be the case but look at Bonds and Boone. Bonds had a .288 BA before the turn of the century but then from 2000-2004 he hit .339. Boone hit .255 before he returned to the M's in 2001, then hit .301 from 2001-03, then once the PED crackdown happened he went right back down to .240 for the rest of his career.

That isn't an argument.

Why? And like I said JK only hit 4 HRs in 399 AAA PAs. Major power outage.

[bpj]

You would think that would be the case but look at Bonds and Boone. Bonds had a .288 BA before the turn of the century but then from 2000-2004 he hit .339. Boone hit .255 before he returned to the M's in 2001, then hit .301 from 2001-03, then once the PED crackdown happened he went right back down to .240 for the rest of his career.

That isn't an argument.

Why? And like I said JK only hit 4 HRs in 399 AAA PAs. Major power outage.

I was wondering the same.

Seemed pretty obvious watching the steroid era that the roiders had a fast-twitch-muscle advantage.

Maybe he's saying it doesnt help with pitch recognition.

Ok, fine. Roids won't help you determine the spin. But it seemed to obviously help their reaction times in some way.

One way or another, they were better with roids than without.

[D-train]

That isn't an argument.

Why? And like I said JK only hit 4 HRs in 399 AAA PAs. Major power outage.

I was wondering the same.

Seemed pretty obvious watching the steroid era that the roiders had a fast-twitch-muscle advantage.

Maybe he's saying it doesnt help with pitch recognition.

Ok, fine. Roids won't help you determine the spin. But it seemed to obviously help their reaction times in some way.

One way or another, they were better with roids than without.

Maybe they help with the eye muscles..

[bpj]

Why? And like I said JK only hit 4 HRs in 399 AAA PAs. Major power outage.

I was wondering the same.

Seemed pretty obvious watching the steroid era that the roiders had a fast-twitch-muscle advantage.

Maybe he's saying it doesnt help with pitch recognition.

Ok, fine. Roids won't help you determine the spin. But it seemed to obviously help their reaction times in some way.

One way or another, they were better with roids than without.

Maybe they help with the eye muscles..

Seems perfectly reasonable to me.

[GL_Storm]

You would think that would be the case but look at Bonds and Boone. Bonds had a .288 BA before the turn of the century but then from 2000-2004 he hit .339. Boone hit .255 before he returned to the M's in 2001, then hit .301 from 2001-03, then once the PED crackdown happened he went right back down to .240 for the rest of his career.

That isn't an argument.

Why? And like I said JK only hit 4 HRs in 399 AAA PAs. Major power outage.

Because it's correlation rather than causation, and it's a bad correlation because Bonds and Boone were both credible major league hitters and Kelenic just isn't. And in particular with Bonds, saying that he only had a .288 BA prior to the turn of the century completely ignores what a dominant player he was at that time. I mean, just look at the numbers. If he had retired after the 1999 season he would have been a first ballot HOF inductee.

And with JK, the lack of HR output is a function of hit tool just not working that well, not his power. Unless he's all of a sudden gotten weaker, his raw power is 70 grade. But that doesn't matter if ML and AAA pitchers know your weaknesses and systematically exploit them so that you can't square up the ball.

[D-train]

That isn't an argument.

Why? And like I said JK only hit 4 HRs in 399 AAA PAs. Major power outage.

Because it's correlation rather than causation, and it's a bad correlation because Bonds and Boone were both credible major league hitters and Kelenic just isn't. And in particular with Bonds, saying that he only had a .288 BA prior to the turn of the century completely ignores what a dominant player he was at that time. I mean, just look at the numbers. If he had retired after the 1999 season he would have been a first ballot HOF inductee.

And with JK, the lack of HR output is a function of hit tool just not working that well, not his power. Unless he's all of a sudden gotten weaker, his raw power is 70 grade. But that doesn't matter if ML and AAA pitchers know your weaknesses and systematically exploit them so that you can't square up the ball.

Too bad Bonds was a horrible person. And you can't deny that both Bonds and Boones Contact skills took a massive jump once they got on PEDS.

https://www.espn.com/espn/page2/story?p ... man/060823