PREAMBLE
Longtime reader. First time poster. Figured I toss my delusional 2 cents into the mix.
The White Sox are a good team with bad flaws, a front office with no clue and an owner with “no money”. What more could you ask for?
ARBITRATION-ELIGIBLE PLAYERS
- Lucas Giolito: $7.9M Tender
- Reynaldo López; $2.8M Tender
- Evan Marshall: $2.3M Nah
- Adam Engel: $2.2M Tender
- Brian Goodwin: $1.7M Nope
- Jimmy Cordero: $1.2M Nope (resign to minor league deal)
- Jace Fry: $1M Bye
CLUB OPTIONS
- Craig Kimbrel: $16M ($1M buyout) Stuck with this bum…for now.
- César Hernández: $6M Bye
OTHER IMPENDING FREE AGENTS
- Leury García (Made $3.5M in 2021) Resign 2yrs/$10M
- Carlos Rodón ($3M) Too rich for JRs blood
- Billy Hamilton ($1M) Let go
- Ryan Tepera ($950K) Resign 1yr/$1M. He’s blah at best.
FREE AGENTS
Jorge Soler 4yrs/$100M.. Chances are he stays with ATL but he’s the only hitter I’d want here. He will become the everyday RF, hopefully.
Jon Gray 4yrs/$68M.. A good #2/3 guy to strengthen the rotation and take Rodon’s vacancy.
TRADES
Craig Kimbrel to PHI for Mick Abel… Philly needs help with their bullpen. Kimbrel is probably not the answer, but he’s their problem now. And with Abel the Sox get a good young pitcher that hasn’t crashed and burned yet.
Dallas Keuchel to NYM for James McCann… This is the swap of vets on bad contracts. Mets get a guy to throw the ball and the Sox get the McCanon back.
Yermin Mercedes, Zack Collins, Micker Adolfo and Romy Gonzalez to MIA for Edward Cabrera… Miami gets some hitters to fill out their 1B/C/RF mix and potentially DH if the NL gets it. For the Sox they get another flame thrower. And even though he wasn’t great in his debut, he has as much potential as any young pitcher out there.
SUMMARY
The 26 man would be as follows
DH Big Baby
1B Pito
2B Legend (at least to start the year)
3B YoYo
SS TA7
C Yaz
LF AV
CF Pantera
RF Soler
bench
McCanon
Man of Steal
Burgatron
Yolbert (that’s Mr. Sanchez to you)
Pitchers
Gio
Lynn
Gray
Cease
Cabrera
pen
ReyLo
Burr
Ruiz
Bummer
Tapera
Kopech
Crochet
Hendriks
No idea how much the opening day payroll will be. But it’s probably not enough. This is largely the same group from last year, which is to be expected. The additions of Gray, Cabrera, McCann and Soler should cover up the weak spots. As far as second base goes…. I’m a big fan of both Yolbert Sanchez and Jose Rodriguez, both of which should see substantial time in the show next year. I see Yolbert breaking camp with the team and eventually becoming the everyday second baseman. Rodriguez probably doesn’t come up until June-ish, but I think he is the second baseman of the future and he should assume that role by mid summer.
The bullpen still leaves much to be desire, but if the whole Kimbrel situation taught us anything it’s that money doesn’t solve everything. The Sox have some decent in house options that should be as good as a high priced vet looking to play out the string.
With all of these moves the Sox can now look forward to potentially forcing a game 5 in the ALDS in 2022. yay.
Jorge Soler is NOT gonna cost 25 mil AAV. If you’re not comfortable with Eloy in left, Soler is just as bad in Right. He’s a DH with questionable record, the Royals salary dumped him on the Braves.
There’s worse players out there getting paid more. $100M is probably what it’ll take to get him here. The defense is bad, but the Sox don’t give a **** about defense. They’ve made that clear over the years. I’m buying the bat and anything else he brings is just gravy. Btw royals are a bum welfare team, so their decision making is going to be influenced more by money than talent.
They have track records.
Soler only has ONE good season, worth only 3.5 WAR. He was worth negative WAR this season. He’s a replacement level player.
He’s not getting 25 million a season, That’s Mookie Betts money, that’s Giancarlo Stanton money, that’s Bryce Harper money, More than Jason Heyward, more than AJ Pollock, More than Marcell Ozuna.
If he HAD any trade value, the Royals would have gotten even a lottery ticket prospect back.
They got Wade Davis.
They have track records.
Soler only has ONE good season, worth only 3.5. He was worth negative WAR this season. He’s a replacement level player.
He’s not getting 25 million a season, That’s Mookie Betts money, that’s Giancarlo Stanton money, that’s Bryce Harper money, More than Jason Heyward, more than AJ Pollock, More than Marcell Ozuna.
If he HAD any trade value, the Royals would have gotten even a lottery ticket prospect back.
They got Wade Davis.
Wtf are you even going on about? The scrubs got wade Davis for Soler like 6 YEARS AGO. Kc got some minor leaguer bc they’re a garbage team and were in fire sale mode. And yeah negative war blah blah blah …he showed up to play after the trade. Dudes been stuck on garbage teams his whole career. Being on a good team must’ve done something for him.
You don’t think the price is right and that’s fine. He might not get that much but it won’t be far off
I’d be amazed if Solar got more than 25 million total let alone 25 million AAV for 4 years! I suppose we’ll see but that looks like a massive MASSIVE overpay! He had a -0.4 WAR for the season last year and a 97 OPS+ according to baseball reference so he was a below average bat and his defense is not his saving grace. I predict he’ll sign a one year deal for 6-12 million depending on whether or not the universal DH is implemented. Kudos for creativity on the plan though! Hadn’t looked at Edward Cabrera before
I believe that 88shrug infiltrated this site. In reality, he’s the agent for Soler. I’m in full agreement that nobody, not even the dimwits running the Sox, will give him 100 mil for four years.
Honestly Im not a even a fan of Soler. But the way he played down the stretch for Atlanta shows he has an “it” factor; much like TA, that this team could use more of.
I see him as comparable of a player to someone like Ozuna and Ozuna got 4/$65M two years ago. Add inflation and a world series MVP and you never know how high the bidding will go. I just don’t want garbage like Joc Peterson or Adam duvall brought in, paid $10M give or take just to be dfa’d by mid June.