Guest: MLB.com’s Jim Callis
The Rundown:
- New Top 100 prospect lists are being released and our very good friend Jim Callis of MLB.com joins the show to share his thoughts about the White Sox farm system. Why Eloy Jimenez could be underappreciated, reasons to be excited about Luis Robert, and cautious about Nick Madrigal.
- We have audio highlights from SoxFest 2019 which the central theme was about Manny Machado as Rick Hahn shares his insights on the pursuit this offseason.
- You also had a lot of questions for us so we open the P.O. Sox mailbag for the first time in 2019.
The Sox are preaching more position flexibility with players on the MLB team. They basically didn’t move guys around at all last year in a complete tank/development year. Do you believe them when they say players will move around more this year and moving forward?
— Pete Chapman (@PeteCha56613119) January 28, 2019
#posox Do you know if the Sox have explored a Grienke trade w AZ? His leadership & prep would greatly aid the young pitchers and Sox are in position to provide salary relief. Are the sox on his no trade clause? May be one instance where our lack of natl. attn. is a benefit.
— Brett Ruby (@brett_ruby) January 28, 2019
Is there anything the Sox could do this off season that would make you think they had a shot at winning the division in 2019?
— Gnome (@Gnome89) January 28, 2019
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Keith Law’s list is coming out the next two days. Can tell you already that Dane Dunning nor Nick Madrigal will be in his Top 100.
Yeah he didn’t seem all that high on the Sox system on ESPN 1000 the other day. He said there will only be 4 Sox prospects in the Top 100.
It’s pretty likely that the Sox system isn’t very good…all of their pitching prospects have health issues and they have 2 solid position prospects in Jimenez and Robert…who also has health issues.
What the Sox should do is use their low payroll to take on bad contracts in return for prospects. They should have done it last year as well, but they apparently thought they would be a competitive destination for free agents? Assuming they fail to sign a decent player, I think a clear-eyed assessment of the situation is that they need to restart the rebuild…acquire prospects and hope that Rodon pitches well enough to be flipped at the deadline.
No.
Absolutely not. Why would you restart the rebuild? That is foolish on so many levels.
OK, instead of “restart the rebuild” think of it as restocking the farm system by taking on bad contracts that run through 2020. The Sox need talent and I’m not sure where it is going to come from given that they have not shown an ability/willingness to sign quality free agents and the farm system is not obviously full of talent.
I think it’s going to be a few more weeks before we can accurately assess their ability to sign quality free agents.
Can’t recall a time when Keith Law liked the White Sox for just about anything.
Can’t recall a time there was much to like about the White Sox.
Keith Law last year preseason was pretty much on an island with Kopech as the best pitching prospect in baseball. Are we upset he’s not singing the praises of Carson Fulmer and Zack Collins?
Yeah, I understand the KLaw hates my team thing is a normal thing for all fan basis. But he is the rare 1 scout list you will find so there will be more outliers. He does a good job and answers people on his choices.
… though I will say ranking a guy he thinks is a ceiling 3 starter over Madrigal because he could just be a everyday regular (similar value) seems inconsistent.
That’s really not inconsistent. A #3 starting pitcher is still a pretty decent pitcher by definition, and ideally you want more than one of them on your roster. Meanwhile, guys like Yolmer Sanchez aren’t exactly in short supply at 2B throughout the league.
But they both present the same future value. 2 wins is 2 wins. If you are saying one is more accessible than the other then you have a broken metric in of itself.
At that point in the pack, the difference between the #75 prospect and the #125 prospect is pretty miniscule, and even Law would probably chalk it up to personal preference more than anything analytically noteworthy. He’s obviously not high on Madrigal like the rest of the industry seems to be, but think of this as less of ranking him behind Dunning so much as in the same tier.
Yeah and that’s a fair way to look at it if you assume his chances of reaching a higher bar are slim
Thanks for throwing the fun after-party last Friday! It’s possible I was over-served 😉 Nonetheless, it was great meeting some Sox Machine and 108ers in person!
Not that anybody cares, but if Madrigal is to be pronounced as the Spanish word it is, then it is pronouced ma-dri-GAL….I notice in the podcast Josh and Jim pronounced it as MA-dri-gal
They were probably using the English pronunciation, since they were speaking English.
You are correct. Madrigal is actually an Italian word, so it’s not even Spanish as I incorrectly thought.
Random observations:
On the Pipleline Top 100 Show, Harold Reynolds raved about Eloy’s bat but he also said “He can play some defense as well. He’s got great range” which confirms that Harold Reynolds just likes to say things.
Yoan Moncada told Renteria he wants to bat leadoff which is swell but I find it demoralizing to start the game with a whiff. Bat him lower and let’s all be pleasantly surprised by the results.
Heard a Baseball America podcast talking about Andrew Vaughan (rumored to be a very early Sox target in the draft) and they were saying he could be okay at 1B but might need to move to DH. If they are saying this before the guy is even out of college… that’s a hard pass for me. We got 1B covered by other former might have to move to 1b draftees.
But my biggest takeaway from the last few days and watching every clip and word written on the Sox is that I LOVE Eloy Cease. The players and the personalities. Very different people but it’s easy to picture them both adjusting to MLB easily and being fan favorites.
I chuckled when Reynolds said that about Eloy’s defense. I do have video of Jimenez making a diving catch, but his defensive ability reminds me of Carlos Lee at times.
I’ll be starting our MLB Draft 2019 coverage in mid-February when College Baseball Opening Day begins. There will be 1.5-2.5K words written about Vaughan on Sox Machine from then to the MLB Draft. Yes, he’s first base and only first base. Yes, he is the best college bat in this draft with 60+ grades for both hitting (contact) and power. Hence why he’s considered to be a Top 5 pick at the moment. Again, more to come on that topic.
Vaughan is all bat. I think he’s only 5’11”. For sure, one of Rutschman, Witt, or Abrams will be teed up at #3
I really like some of the preps in this draft. Looking forward to the coverage from Josh and always have enjoyed your takes lil jimmy