Haze's Offseason Plan - The Window is Open
Dear Jerry,
Thank you for the opportunity to act as Temporary Special Assistant General Manager. Below you'll find the best club we could put together for 2020, while remaining flexible in order our options open for 2021 and beyond.
We were able to come close to our $120M budget and only exceeded it by $4M. That said, your 2020 club has been significantly upgraded as we head into season 1 of our 3 season window. Of course we expect to sustain success, yet the focus is on winning a World Series within the next 3 seasons (2020-2022).
Plan Highlights
1 ) Two long-term holes filled (C and RF) to balance our top-heavy lineup: Yasmani Grandal and Mitch Haniger
2 ) One long-term piece added to our pitching rotation: Jake Odorizzi
3 ) Two pieces added to bolster the bullpen: traded for RH reliever Austin Adams (Seattle) and signed RH free agent reliever Brandon Kintzler.
4 ) Kopech starts in AAA, Rodon is tendered as an insurance policy. We remain thin on depth, but also have Dunning and Jimmy Lambert who should be healthy and in AAA to start 2020.
5 ) We decided to upgrade the bullpen, lineup and starting pitching which forced us into a budget bind. We could not upgrade at DH but feel Palka can provide left-handed power, while Collins and Mercedes get daily AB's in AAA. Forcing McCann into a reserve role, and retaining the versatile Goins to spell Abreu at 1B has us feeling confident in our bench - especially when Robert is called up.
Arbitration Eligible Players
Alex Colome – Tender – $10.3M
Leury Garcia – Tender – $4.0M
Ryan Goins – Tender – $.9M
Evan Marshall – Tender – $1.3M
James McCann – Tender – $4.9M
Yolmer Sanchez – Non-Tender – $6.2M
Carlos Rodon – Tender – $4.5M
Josh Osich – Tender – $1.0M
Club Options
Welington Castillo: Buy Out
Other Impending Free Agents
Jose Abreu: Retain
Ivan Nova: No
Jon Jay: No
Hector Santiago: No
Free Agents
Jose Abreu - 2 years $28M ($14M/yr) – Jose has agreed to move down in the lineup and possibly DH more. We did leverage the fact he really wants to be here into a team-friendly 2 year deal as we keep an eye on Andrew Vaughn's progress.
Yasmani Grandal - 5 years $110M ($22M/yr)
Scooter Gennett - 1 year $8M - Coming off a poor and injury plagued 2019, we feel it's likely 29 year old left-handed hitting Gennett will return to pre-2019 form. The career slash of .286/.327/.449 in encouraging, plus he averages 18 homeruns over 162 games.
Jake Odorizzi - 6 years $96M ($16M/yr) – Long-term addition to bolster our starting pitching staff.
Cole Hamels - 1 year $7M – We signed Cole hoping he can give us quality innings, yet are fully aware of recent health issues. Budget constraints put us in a position to go old and affordable.
Brandon Kintzler - 2 years $12M ($6M/yr) – Righty reliever Logged 57 IP last season with a 1.035 WHIP. He's 35, but wanted a 2 year deal - giving the 2 years allowed us to sign him at what we feel was a discounted rate.
Trades
White Sox receive Mitch Haniger (Age: 28 - $3M estimated arbitration salary - under control for 4 seasons) and RH relief pitcher Austin Adams (Age: 28 - pre-arbitraton - under control for 5 seasons)
Seattle receives Nick Madrigal, Steele Walker, and Jace Fry
(Trade accepted at https://www.baseballtradevalues.com/trade-simulator/ - Sox TV: 53.5 & Mariners TV: 54)
Lineup
Anderson SS
Haniger RF
Moncada 3B
Grandal C
Abreu 1B
Eloy LF
Palka DH
Engel CF (until Robert)
Gennett 2B
Bench
McCann C, DH
Garcia OF, 2B
Goins 1B, 3B, SS, 2B
Mendick 2B, SS
Pitchers
SP - Giolito
SP - Odorizzi
SP - Cease
SP - Lopez
SP - Hamels
LR - Herrera
MR - Corderro
MR - Osich (Lefty)
MR - Adams
MR - Kintzler
SU - Bummer (Lefty)
SU - Marshall
CL - Colome
Total Payroll ~$124M
Sincerely,
Haze - ChiSoxHaze
