T Cod’s Offseason Plan

Couple of very simple principles I am abiding by in my plan. First, I try to avoid selling low. I don’t love paying Dallas Keuchel ace money at this point, but I’m not going to pay someone to take him off my hands. Not asking him more than being a serviceable 5th starter. Second, for a team with budget constraints like the White Sox, it simply does not make sense to allocate so much salary to a closer, even if he’s one of the league’s best. Therefore my plan centers on paying market value for a superstar everyday player and trading a high salary but high value player (Hendriks) in order to fill needs at a lower cost.

ARBITRATION-ELIGIBLE PLAYERS

• Lucas Giolito: $7.9M Tender
• Reynaldo López; $2.8M Tender
• Evan Marshall: $2.3M Non-Tender
• Adam Engel: $2.2M Tender
• Brian Goodwin: $1.7M Non-Tender
• Jimmy Cordero: $1.2M Tender
• Jace Fry: $1M Non-Tender

 CLUB OPTIONS

• Craig Kimbrel: $16M ($1M buyout) Decline (unless we know we can actually get value in a trade, but can’t risk paying that salary)
• César Hernández: $6M Decline

 OTHER IMPENDING FREE AGENTS

• Leury García (Made $3.5M in 2021) Thanks for the memories
• Carlos Rodón ($3M) Too rich
• Billy Hamilton ($1M) Minor league deal
• Ryan Tepera ($950K) Too rich

FREE AGENTS

No. 1: Carlos Correa ($30 million per year, up to 10 years I guess). Get one of the best players in baseball. Should this fail, would be willing to throw big money at Seager, Semien, or Arenando (Moncada back to 2B).

TRADES

No. 1: Trade Liam Hendriks to NYY for Joey Gallo, Nestor Cortes and Clay Holmes. As mentioned before, we simply can’t afford this much of our payroll invested in a closer, no matter how good he is. Gallo fills need in RF, and we add two good arms to bullpen for cheap.

SUMMARY

Here’s the 26-man Opening Day roster:

LINEUP
2B Tim Anderson

SS Carlos Correa
CF Luis Robert
1B Jose Abreu
C Yasmani Grandal
LF Eloy Jimenez
RF Joey Gallo
3B Yoan Moncada
DH Gavin Sheets / Andrew Vaughn

BENCH
C Zach Collins or Seby Zavala

IF Romy Gonzalez or Danny Mendick
OF Adam Engel

UTL Andrew Vaughn / Gavin Sheets

ROTATION
SP Lance Lynn
SP Lucas Giolito
SP Dylan Cease
SP Michael Kopech
SP Dallas Keuchel

BULLPEN
LH Garrett Crochet
LH Aaron Bummer
LH Nestor Cortes
RH  Clay Holmes
RH Jose Ruiz
RH Ryan Burr
RH Jimmy Cordero
RH Reynaldo Lopez

PAYROLL: $171 million

I think the lineup can be scary good. I’m confident in starters 1-4 & if Keuchel can’t get it done, we have several options in the bullpen (Lopez, Cortes, Crochet). Don’t have a specific guy labeled as closer but we have a bunch of good arms and I think committee approaches are more than fine. Would love to have a better backup catcher and utility IF, but no $ to spare. If there are better options out there on the cheap, all for it.

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