Shortly after the Mike Clevinger news broke on Tuesday afternoon, Ken Rosenthal tried to cut the tension of the room with an hors d’oeuvre of a trade rumor in case White Sox fans wanted something and somebody else to think about.
Whether it was intended as a diversion or just inadvertently timed, my internal reaction was “Not now, Ken.” But since I’ve used up my allotment of time and space on the Clevinger situation until further news emerges, we may as well circle back to the second base solution Rosenthal floated.
I still say, “Not now, Ken,” and it only has a little to do with his Lopez’s Naperville roots, or his track record. Sure, too much of his career production resides in a year that wasn’t the most recent one …
| Years | PA | SB/CS | BB/K | BA/OBP/SLG | bWAR | fWAR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 565 | 22/1 | 49/74 | .300/.365/.378 | 4.3 | 5.9 |
| 2019-20, ’22 | 1074 | 14/9 | 65/155 | .228/.280/.292 | -0.1 | 0.9 |
… and if you put strength in the larger sample, then the Sox were better off tendering Danny Mendick for nearly a quarter of the price.
No, it’s more that the White Sox are already dealing with alarming amounts of Kansas City Royal in their diet. The coaching staff includes Pedro Grifol and two others he brought from the Royals coaching staff, and Andrew Benintendi is the centerpiece of the offseason. That may already be too much.
We’ve seen the White Sox overindulge on Royals cast-offs before, whether it’s Mark Teahen or several Kansas City relievers, which reminds me of this A.J. Pierzynski quote:
In 2007, veteran Sox hitters underperformed, new faces didn’t pan out and the bullpen was atrocious with a 5.49 ERA.
“It was never a good idea back then to bring in the Royals bullpen,” Pierzynski said. “Basically we traded for the whole Royals bullpen. That wasn’t good.”
The White Sox did fleece the Royals in the Joakim Soria deal in 2018, but that represents the only real good to come out of acquiring recent Royals, and they failed in their attempt to flip him into younger talent. Everybody else has more or less flopped.
And after watching the White Sox limit their pitching acquisitions to three pitchers who all overlapped with Ethan Katz in the minors — Clevinger distant, but among them — I would prefer to see more diversity in their ecosystem.
While Royals GM JJ Picollo didn’t thoroughly shoot down the rumor in his interview on MLB Network, he didn’t add fuel to the fire, either.
“We really need the depth in the middle of the infield. We have a young second baseman in Michael Massey, and Nicky Lopez has been with us for a number of years. It’s going to be a difficult thing for us to part ways with Nicky Lopez. Certainly understand why there’s interest in him, but for where we are right now and the value Nicky brings to our club, we expect him to be a Royal in 2023.”
Cody Stavenhagen has a good interview with Kevin Seitzer on how analytics has changed the role of the hitting coach in recent years. Since José Castro was Seitzer’s assistant before Grifol tapped him to be hitting coach, Seitzer’s comments might shed more light on how the Sox will prepare hitters this season.
A snippet:
Rick Hahn new strategy is to outsource the FO duties with his manager, pitching coach, etc. He cannot be worse even if he tries.
I am on board to upgrade 2B, but if we want to upgrade over Sosa/Romy, then let’s do that. Trading for a Sosa alike to replace Sosa is pretty much thinking that Sosa will be terrible. I see no point in bringing in a 2B that can produce somewhere between 0 to 1 WAR because I am sure Sosa can bring that to the table as well.
If they are kicking the tires on Nicky Lopez that leads me to believe they don’t have much faith in Sosa.
This is setting up to get pretty ugly:
No fifth starter
No closer
Mediocre prospects for second base
A respectable prospect learning in right
If they are kicking the tires on Nicky Lopez that leads me to believe they don’t have
much faith in Sosaa clue about how to run a professional baseball team.There….I fixed it for you 😋
Its not just that they have no 5th starter, they dont have good options at 6,7,8 so…. maybe Martin is ok, but you are still beyond thin in the rotation
Hahn cannot afford to keep waiting to see how the Clevinger situation evolves. The pitching staff was already quite thin with Clevinger. Without Clevinger and Martin’s health in doubts, it is just in the gross negligence territory.
It is very likely Kopech or Lynn will miss time. Hahn needs to bring in someone urgently. We should not count with Clevinger. Nobody wants him in the dugout. He is a toxic asset and a “team chemistry” destroyer.
Hahn should be signing Michael Wacha or Chad Kuhl by now. Somebody that can eat innings.
Right now, I am penning the White Sox to be 3rds place and probably under 500
Yes, I could easily see this season being worse than last year. If any 2 or 3 of Eloy, Moncada, Robert, TA, Vaughn miss significant time, and the probability of that happening is pretty reasonable, with the complete lack of depth in the organization, this could be a very bad team. Plus our closer is out and the starting pitching doesn’t even have 5 starters right now. Well done Rick. Another solid winter.
Starting pitching depth was my biggest concern heading in to the offseason. Next was LF. I figured there were internal options that might be able to cover RF and 2B, but the rotation is paper-thin unless one or more of the youngsters makes an unexpected and meteoric rise through the system.
Even if Clevinger morphed into Mother Teresa with a 98-MPH fastball, there are specific injury concerns with him, Kopech, sixth-man Martin, maybe Lynn. Of course, all pitchers are ticking time bombs. Now our sixth man looks like he’ll be our fifth man. Who steps in at the first injury? Burke? Stiever? Diekmann?
For the record, I think we’ll see full and effective seasons from Cease, Giolito, and Lynn.It all might work out, but there’s little margin for error.
LF was addressed. So there’s that.
Sosa is a 45 FV prospect. There is a chance he produces 0 to 1 WAR, or possible even more. There is also a strong chance he produces -1 WAR if given significant playing time. It happens all the time to prospects much better than Sosa in their debut season. Having depth is a good idea.
Would much rather sign one of the MIF free agents than Lopez, but the idea that they’re just set with Sosa when he could be completely unplayable is not great.
I believe it was Margulus who enlightened me on Sosa’s MO about arriving at new levels, in one of the podcasts. He said that Sosa struggles mightily upon arrival and then has decent numbers by the end of the season. Meaning, that after the struggle period, he achieves at high levels.
In the world of, you are who the scoreboard says you are, I’m all in on letting Sosa have his chance and willing to be patient through the struggle.
It happened in AA, I don’t know that you can call once a pattern but since he wet the bed in his brief callups its all you can hang your hat on. Romy had a great 2+ months in the minors in 2021 and has shown little like it before or after that. Worse he was exposed at the end of last season going .111/.130/.178 with 21 SO in his last 16 games. I don’t mind these two battling for a spot in ST but to have them as your only options is needlessly reckless.
I don’t care for Lopez being the solution at 2B. But I wouldn’t mind something like Leury Garcia, Gavin Sheets, and Yolbert Sanchez for Lopez. Get out from under the Garcia contract and open up the UT spot. You take an upside gamble on Lopez at 2B, but shift him to UT and start Sosa or Romy if Lopez doesn’t pan out.
Sheets is probably the White Sox opening day RF or DH (after either Eloy gets hurt or/and Colas implodes).
More seriously (although the above may in fact be true), Nicky makes $3M a year so they’d be moving Sheets and Yolbert to save $3M a year and get slightly less projected WAR than Sosa. That does seem very White Sox but I’m hoping they don’t do it, if only because the saved money won’t be used in any constructive way
They’d save about $3m this year and $5m next year. The hope—even if it’s a farfetched hope—is that you unlock whatever Lopez showed in 2021. If you do, you just solved 2B for the next few years. If not, then you save $8m for two players (Sheets and Yolbert) who probably aren’t major league regulars and are easily replaceable. I’d take that gamble.
I’d be in favor of getting Lopez. We’d be pretty sure that his defense is going to be fantastic, so that if he produces anywhere close to a league average offensively, he’d be a great pickup. Also he’s left handed. And for the people that say we need a clear “upgrade” over Sosa, I don’t get it. Sosa is a risk. We don’t know what he’ll do. He may hit like he did last year. Lopez is also a risk, though a risk with lots of upside looking at 2021. But we would then have two chances for decent production at 2B instead of just one — and Lopez is LH as well, so even if everything goes well for both, there are useful platoon opportunities.
Separately, I still don’t understand why we should somehow discount “outlier” seasons — if 2021 does in fact meet the statistical definition of an outlier. If you get an outlier in a science experiment, you might think there was a measurement error or something like that. What’s the thing we think happened in 2021 that won’t happen again? As far as I know, none of the projection models make any attempt to discount outlier seasons — which they could of course do if they thought there was reason to do so — and I don’t know why we should think differently.
He was great when he BABIPed himself to slightly above average offense in ‘21. In the three other seasons he’s played in the bigs, his wRC+ has been in the fuckin’ 50s. His batting line looks like Madrigal’s without Madrigal’s 80-grade bat control and his avg EV is literally in the 1st percentile, for 2022 anyways. It was better and closer to avg in ‘21.
I’ve been advocating for the addition of a plus defense/lefty contact hitter, my preferred option being Guillorme, but Lopez’s stick is maybe too light even for my tastes. It’s good to have a lefty option there, and I do like that he’s a very competent SS as well, but I’d prefer Guillorme or your crush Kemp.
Yeah, I’d prefer either of those as well. I would also probably put Guillorme above Kemp, but I don’t think the Mets will trade him, while I do think Kemp could be had.
I would prefer Lopez over nothing though. He’s only been in the league four years. Three of them were bad and one was all-star level. Yes, the all-star level one he had a high BABIP compared to the other years, but it was only .347, which is in the reasonable realm for BABIPs for someone with a little speed like Lopez (unlike, for instance, Seby’s .404 last year, which will probably never happen again).
But I don’t expect that the only two possibilities for him in 2023 are either “bad” or “all star” (or a BABIP either below .275 or above .340 — he’s had no middling BABIPs yet). It’s plenty likely that he has a BABIP in 2023 somewhere in the range of the projection models’ forecasts, which go from .289 (THE BAT) to .293 (Steamer) to .304 (ZIPS).
And with that would come a wRC+ in the range of 72 (THE BAT) up to 84 (Steamer). Still not great, but given his defense and the fact that he’s left handed, wouldn’t be a bad addition at all IMO.
BABIP isn’t some mystery these days. If we compare Lopez’s batted balls to our resident BABIP wizard TA, we can see why he doesn’t regularly put up high BABIPs. Their GB/FB/LD rates are roughly equivalent.
But TA’s avg exit velo and hardhit% are around average, and Lopez’s is in the fuckin 1st percentile for both, worst in the league. TA of course barrels up the ball vastly more often than Lopez. TA also almost *never* hits pop-ups, obvious BABIP killers; Lopez is merely mildly above average there. Honestly, I think Lopez loses a lot of blooper singles bc he’s got so little pop that the OFs can play in, with no fear at all of him hitting it over their heads.
Finally, TA gets a lot more infield hits, which is bc he’s a righty– as in general most grounders are pulled, and there’s a lot more ways to beat out throws from balls to the the left side than right side. A grounder deep in the 3B-SS hole is the obvious one, but a swinging bunt down the 3B line is much harder to handle for a righty-throwing catcher and/or a RHP (falling off towards 1B typically) to handle than a swinging bunt down 1B line. Same thing re tappers past the mound vaguely at SS, it’s much harder for RHPs to handle to the left side than right. And then there’s just exit velo and distance to throw re grounders too.
There’s a lot working against Lopez’s BABIP here, relative to TA or Madrigal. A guy hits a lot of fairly hard grounders could be said to be subject to BABIP luck, bc it’s just spray angle. But hitting the ball as soft as Lopez does, yet not often in ways that are difficult to field, isn’t a recipe for BABIP success.
I’m not saying we should expect a .350 BABIP, but we shouldn’t expect him to be as bad as in his 3 bad years either. We should expect something like the average of all 4 years, as the models project.
ZiPS has him pegged for 1.7 fWAR in 497 plate appearances. I’d take that in a heartbeat for someone who hits left-handed, to pair up with whatever RH player the Sox think is their best internal option.
Adjusting to the same 497 PA’s, Steamer pegs him for 1.4 fWAR.
Neither of these are world-breaking projections, obviously, but I’d be happier with either for 2B, particularly against RHP, than just letting it ride with internal options.
Wasn’t it an outlier because he had a crazy high BABIP that season?
I don’t think a .347 BABIP is “crazy high” for a guy with some speed who’s only been in the league only 4 years. Also, who cares if it’s an outlier in the statistical sense? The projection models expect something much less than .347 but still higher than his other three years, which strikes me as reasonable.
I agree with you about Sosa. This is the nice part about acquiring someone like Lopez: you still have Sosa. If he’s good, then perfect: play him instead.
On “discounting” outliers, it entirely depends on the situation and what you mean by discount. You can’t ignore them entirely. But, in most cases, it’s a bad idea to plan around them. Acquiring Lopez and expecting him to return to his 2021 form (or even close) is a bad idea, in other words.
But not all outliers are created equal. Lopez’s 2021 probably is a kind of outlier because it’s so extreme, but it’s also difficult to know how to weigh his rookie year or the COVID-shortened ’20. He’s young enough and the offensive bar is low enough to make a gamble like this worth it, in my mind. But, yeah, @a-t brings up some good points that don’t make me hope for it. My Lopez deal is a kind of win-win for the Sox, in my mind, unless Sheets or Yolbert turn into something good. Worst case, they shed some payroll.
I wouldn’t “plan around” the outlier in the sense of “let’s hope he reproduces that, or that we can get him back to that.” But I would plan around the outlier in the exact same way that the models do — just averaging it in like any other year.
If there were a particular reason to suspect that something unique was up with a player that particular year — like his bat exploded to reveal cork towards the end of the season — then I agree that it should be discounted, but unless there’s something apparent like that, I don’t think there’s any reason to discount them at all.
BTW … the answer to your final question in our other thread regarding outliers is “yes” and “no” depending on whether you go by bWAR or fWAR. And that the two systems would tell you different things about whether the year should be discounted as an outlier or not is a pretty good argument to me for just not discounting outliers at all. That is, unless there’s some particular evidence that something different was going on in that year than in other years that would account for the unusual performance.
In most cases, averaging an outlier like any other year is a mistake. Lopez is not a good example because he’s relatively inexperienced and young. But suppose he has two more years of a 55 wRC+. Then you have ~5 full seasons of 55 wRC+ and one year of 105 wRC+. Expecting a wRC+ above 60 from him (even though his average would be around 65) is a bad idea.
Models can help you evaluate a player but they are only a part of player expectations. Models don’t tell you what you should expect; models tell you what you should expect if you played the season 1,000 times (or something like that). And that’s a meaningful difference.
But the models could easily just add a formula to disregard any outlier in projections regarding any player who has played 6 years or more, for instance. Yet they don’t. I think the reason is that it generally doesn’t make sense to do so.
Note that you could draw the line at 5 years or more, or 7+, or 8+, or whatever. The fact that there is no apparent reason to draw the line in any one place is another reason to doubt whether going from “average the year in” to “don’t average the year in” is not the right way forward.
I do agree that in your hypothetical I would start to strongly suspect the 105 wRC+ year as fundamentally different from the others, because it seems so extreme: the player gives rock steady year-to-year production every year but one, in which he suddenly gains 50 points in wRC+. Even if I didn’t know exactly what it was, that would intuitively seem to me more like the corked bat example (or that of measurement errors in a scientific experiment). Maybe steroids or something. I don’t think there’s anything like that in either of the two cases we’ve been discussing to this point.
But Sosa has shown the ability to figure it out at every level, LHB with power. I understand it’s like a brokerage disclaimer where past performance does not guarantee future returns, but to me, that’s the best risk mitigator I can think of for giving a young buck a chance.
Sosa isn’t left-handed.
Dang, I was on a roll, like when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor.
Niedermeyer? DEAD!
There are a lot of guys who figure it out at every level, and then don’t once they get to MLB. They’re called Quad-A players.
Sosa has a poor approach. While this isn’t necessarily a death sentence, it’s one of the traits I’d be most concerned about translating to the MLB level. It not only affects his BB%/OBP, but his ability to get to his raw power, which is average or below.
By most prospect evaluators, he is in the 150-250 range of prospects around the league. Players in this range can certainly turn into valuable role players, but players in this range, and even in ranges above this, fail very often.
I’d recommend you look through prospects lists of other teams. You’ll see that players with profiles like Sosa (and Colas for that matter) are very common in other organizations, who often have a far larger number of prospects like this and often have top prospects considered significantly better.
I don’t think this is at all plausible, but I would do it for exactly the reasons you cite. They would be taking a modest chance that Sheets develops in to a decent roster addition, but getting out from under Leury’s contract for the next two years would be a clear plus. Yolbert is irrelevant.
Trades and signings for bottom feeding or mid tier players has been a disaster in the Hahn era… why they keep going to that well I have no idea. Let sosa or romy have at it… what the hell
Not to distract from the thread on Lopez and 2nd base, but did we ever get a real update on the Davis Martin forearm/precursor to TJS injury???? Would seem kind of important right now given there is almost no chance Clevinger pitches for this team… I cant wait for the 2nd week of spring training to get the news that Martin needs surgery and we get the Hahn “we never saw it coming” excuse.
I’m afraid the success of the Cueto signing last year has only emboldened their belief that they’ll be fine if they just throw in a pitcher from the bargain bin.
I’m obviously not rooting for the Twins, but you have to respect the balls it takes to make a move like trading away Arraez. They gave Correa a big contract and then swing a trade to move Arraez. While the Sox are having a wank with fringe players, some teams are willing to go beyond hoping to win the division by default….
That would require a commitment to winning that this organization just doesn’t have.
Spot on. You’re not going to shell out top-tier contracts or make gutsy trades when your owner’s top two goals are:
I’d love to see the Powerpoint presentation that Rick must’ve used to convince Jerry to go through with the rebuild in the first place. “See how big spending teams and small budget teams alike have successfully rebuilt? We can totally do the same…even though we don’t want to spend big to complete the process and we can’t come close to the scouting and development prowess of the Rays.”
Then I imagine Jerry said, “Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Just show me how much money we expect to make over the next few years.”
The lengths this team goes to acquire mediocre at best players is nothing short of astounding. Play the kids. Sosa, Romy, I literally don’t care at this point. If Leury is the starting 2B the Sox won’t see a dime from me.
I think the trade for Nicky Lopez should be the last big move Hahn makes before Jerry announces a long contract extension for him.
So deserving, a long time coming…..
Shockingly, we are once again winging it at 2d base and RF. maybe the kids will surprise. But we are also disastrously thin at catcher – I know, you can always find a backup. And we are hoping for bounce backs in health and/or performance from every starter not named Dylan Cease. It’s rather remarkable.
But given this past week, they have to go sign Wacha – or some other real MLB backend starter – and show that they are willing to pay for their incompetence.
You must be new here. The White Sox Way™ is to give the kids a hundred at-bats, call them busts, and then start Leury the rest of the way.
clearly you missed the sarcasm, which I thought was drippingly clear
I figured you’d recognize sarcasm yourself Mr. Sarcastic.
My avatar and myself do not understand why the White Sox would trade something of value for Nicky Lopez when Yolmer Sanchez is available for a minimum salary and does all the things Nicky Lopez does. Yolmer is a switch hitter too.
Yolmer’s no longer available, he signed a minor league contract w ATL yesterday
Yolbert, not Yolmer. Yolbert is not a switch hitter. (Unless you were kidding, at which point, good work.)
As I continue to try to talk myself into Lopez, I can’t get past how the realistic case expectations for him are essentially to be 2019 Yolmer.
I don’t really have issues with Lopez the player, but the process that leads the White Sox to have to dip into limited prospect capital in an attempt to reconstruct the 2019 roster is an indictment of the FO that justifies all the vitriol we give them.
Is Jake Marisnick 2019 Adam Engel? Pretty close. I’m sure they hope Oscar Colas is 2019 Eloy and not 2019 Ryan Cordell. Beware though, 2019 Leury had 618 PA.
2019 Adam Engel was a superlative defender in CF. I think the ship has sailed on that profile for Marisnick (as it has for Engel).
I didn’t see Yolmer signed with Atlanta. My general point is that there are a lot of players with Lopez’s profile available for no trade cost. The best case for Lopez is a BABIP fueled 2021, but Yolmer’s BABIP fueled 2017 was just as valuable. It is probably just as likely to happen again too.
No trade and much cheaper than $3.5 mil. Didn’t we already give an NRI to same-ish player in Hanser Alberto? It’s a silly proposal and it says all that needs to be said about this FO that its given serious discussion.
I really was hoping Hahn and Co would start taking things more serious this offseason, but hope and reality are not the same or whatever Jerry said. Like some of the hirings as a sign of expanding the operation but the lack of everyone being on the same time line along with constant issues between draft strategy and development has hurt this franchise and continues to haunt them. Between that and an offseason strategy of hope and a prayer(not new to this team) seems to be back firing already. Now my hope is simply “live long enough to see brighter days”
I can’t even bring myself to root for this team knowing that the owner and GM are such despicable people. I’ve had enough, no reason to remain a loyal fan of a team run by scoundrels, basically.
It’s like smoking. You know you are killing yourself and then you go buy another pack because you’re an addict.
I don’t smoke but fortunately I haven’t felt ashamed of myself when I look in the mirror and see the same Sox fan.
This team is a total embarrassment. Any feeble attempts they make to improve the team now would be like giving a blood transfusion to a corpse. This team is done. Beyond done.
Time for fans to walk away from this cesspool. Maybe the worst owner/GM combo in pro sports.
OT, but I am a little surprised that Robert and Moncada are playing for Cuba in the WBC, but Abreu isn’t.
it’s probably that per ESPN “Cuba did not consider including players who defected while representing the island during international events”. So it’s a political choice. V unfortunate, bc a full-strength Cuba team would be formidable.
Moncada left Cuba with the government’s permission to do so; Robert is vaguely described as having ‘defected’, but it was in that time period where players were increasingly allowed to leave with the government’s blessing. His presence on the WBC roster suggests his ‘defection’ was actually permitted one way or another.
Abreu, as we know, did not leave quite so easily, or with the government’s permission.
A year ago no one was expecting a .500ish Cleveland team to finish above third place, both because of the obvious strength of the division champs and the moves made by the Twins.
This article echoes a lot of what is being said about the Sox this year.
Here’s another. Look at the 2021 lines of the roster. Uninspiring. ZIPS pegged them at 77 wins. PECOTA had them at 78.
I point this out to show that no one knows anything. The season will end and everything will look obvious in hindsight, like last year’s Sox bad defense being costly or Tony being a drag on wins. So when Cease, Giolito, and Lynn all finish in the top 10 in Cy Young voting and Timmy wins his second batting title and Eloy is a potent middle-of-the-order slugger who has 640 PA and Colas is the Rookie of the Year and the Sox win 96 games, it will be something everyone should have seen coming.
This Clevinger nightmare is just the latest reason to be disappointed and angry and embarrassed by this team. There are so many ways the Sox could have created a deeper and better balanced roster. We could end up longing for the good old days of 2022 when we won as much as we lost. But remember this: At this point we don’t know anything. In a few months, it will all be obvious. And maybe it will be good. Maybe not.
I like your optimism, and your scenario is certainly possible. But I think a scenario where 2 of Timmy/Eloy/Robert/Moncada miss significant time or are ineffective (Moncada), Lynn spends time on the DL, Giolito is more like 2022 than 2019-20, Grandal remains a shell of his former self, and Leury gets 400 ABs is probably more likely. I sure hope not, and much of that could have been avoidable if Jerry had a legitimate GM who would have built some quality depth. A season where Burger, Hamilton, Zavala, Leury and Sheets get significant playing time and they don’t get 120 starts from Cease/Giolito/Lynn/Kopech does not look like a successful season.
Regardless of all that, I will still follow this team and root for them all season. I don’t root for the owner/GM. I root for the players with the S-O-X on the jersey. I have for almost 60 years and won’t stop now, even if 3 imbeciles are in charge. GO SOX!!
I’m not particularly optimistic, but I think the extreme doom and gloom of too many commenters is over the top. This could be a competitive team. They could be fun to watch. I’m willing to let it play out. What choice do I have?
I agree. I can’t quit following the team just because of the horrible FO. I’d like to believe they will be good this year, and I’m usually very optimistic, but I thought last year could be a dumpster fire, and it was. The saving grace this year is that they actually have a manager that the players will play hard for. That could make a huge difference. But it would sure be nice if they could even make minor additions like Tony Kemp and Michael Wacha. That would help me feel better about this year.
There certainly is an upside scenario, but I don’t think it’s all that great: They could certainly win the easiest division in baseball. The Tigers and Royals are terrible. They’re probably on par or maybe slightly below the Twins, despite spending about an Aaron Judge more than them and having a worse farm system and less depth. They’re behind Cleveland, though within striking distance, despite spending 2x the payroll, having a much worse farm system. The Sox have an older roster that is supposed to be in their competitive window right now, while Cleveland’s window was supposed to open in a year or two.
If they do win the division, they’d face a 6th-seed that would probably be better than them, and if they win that, they’d face a division-winner who’d be a lot better than them.
And if they don’t win a World Series this year, the future looks even worse after this year. Yes, they have money coming off the books, but also are losing key players, and having other key players getting more expensive and/or getting closer to free agency. They have a bottom-5 farm system and no proven track record of drafting, development, or making productive trades/free agent signings to supplement the core that will remain.
You bring up a very good point. Just because they have a lot of money coming off the books the next two years, that doesn’t mean Jerry will spend it, let alone spend it wisely. If they don’t win the division this year and attendance goes down, you can bet Jerry will cut payroll and not replace Giolito/Lynn/Kelly/Hendriks with anything worthwhile. He may even not pick up TA’s option if he is hurt for a significant stretch this year. This is a very crucial year for this team. They need to be successful for Jerry to spend anything this winter.
What’s sad is that while there’s a lot of possible money coming off the payroll next year there are no internals and nothing to spend it on to replace what you are losing.
Lynn, Giolito, Clevinger, Kelly, Diekman, Lopez, and Grandal. Gio could be the 2nd best SP available and out of our price range. Same with ReyLo. It would be unsurprising if we ended up picking up the $18 mil option on a 37 yr old Lynn simply because we couldn’t spend it on any other pitcher. There are no C values out there for 2024. 2025 is much the same, we may end up going into rebuild mode the next few years even if we wanted to spend on FAs. If our few internal options don’t pan out, it could get really ugly. 2026? 2027 anyone?
Seriously, if Colas and Sosa bomb do we start selling?
Well if Colas and Sosa bomb, the first thing that has to happen is Hahn must be fired and replaced with someone from outside of the organization, not Getz. If he failed on a rebuild that started with Eloy, Moncada, Cease, Giolito, Kopech, Lopez and Robert all being acquired during the teardown phase, how could he succeed in any other scenario? Of course, then Jerry would have to hire someone from outside and let them run things without interference, which won’t happen. There are two possible favorable scenarios. One is everything goes right this year, the Sox win 90+ games, attendance booms and Jerry spends next winter. And two is Jerry sells the team or dies. I don’t see any other way this team makes big moves in the next few years.
At the start of ’21 if you looked ahead to free agency, Rodon wouldn’t have excited. Maybe he’s a buy-low guy you can unlock. You certainly wouldn’t have been planning in February to use him to plug one of your rotation holes that autumn.
The 2024 or 2025 classes could look a lot better when we actually get to them. And conversely a number of good potential free agents could sign extensions.
It really doesn’t matter though. Jerry won’t spend at the top of the free agent market, no matter how good or bad it is.
So you are holding out hope for a one year rental on a possible unicorn? I maybe overstated the dearth of the SP market a bit but I didn’t go to that extreme.
All I was suggesting was that perceptions of upcoming free agent classes can change. It may hold answers for whatever problems the Sox have at that time.
Understood, it was just my suggestion that the next 2 FA classes are pretty barren so having money to spend doesn’t mean much, and if you aren’t buying and you have nothing coming up then….. Of course Jerry could surprise us and sign a 30 yr old Ohtani but I’m not holding my breath on that. Example, the best RF is a 32 yr old Max Kepler, the best 2B is a 34 yr old Kolten Wong, and the best C is a 32 yr old Omar Narvaez. What’s money going to do for you here?
I’m actually thinking that going for broke this year may be the best course to take.
You last sentence is spot on. Unfortunately, Jerry doesn’t agree with you. They should have signed Rodon.
What I was trying to say, perhaps not well enough, is that the some players in those free agent classes may emerge in the next year or two and be players you’d like the Sox to sign. Looking at it today, it looks pretty barren, as you say.
I agree that there is less realistic chance that they’ll compete in either 2024 or 2025 if they’re not competitive in 2023.
This is a main reason I’m just very unconcerned about whether we have to give up some mid-level prospects for guys like Lopez or Kemp or Laureano or whomever we could realistically get with non-top-5 minor leaguers at this point. It’s also the main reason I’m in favor of trading everyone with value (particularly Robert, Eloy and Cease) if they crater this year. Given the shape of the team and the poor status of the minors, I think it’s pretty much 2023 or bust — at least until 2026 or later.
Where you are wrong, is that Colas will finish second in RoY voting to Sosa.
It wasn’t a prediction, but yes, I can get behind that vision. Like Lynn and Rice leading the Red Sox to the World Series in 1975.
The men at the top of the org chart are terrible, but at least the White Sox have some great people working for them. Good news on two:
https://twitter.com/whitesox/status/1618719182224506881
Cole Irvin would’ve been a nice pickup considering…….
I love that the Sox are trying to be more like the Royals.
We wish. The Royals have made the post season 11 times in 54 seasons whereas the White Sox have made it 11 times in a whopping 122 season. The White Sox have won 1 more World Series 3 vs 2).
The two second basemen that would excite me if acquired are Colorado’s Brendan Rodgers, Gold-Glove with 4.2 WAR (’22) and the Mets’ Jeff McNeill, NL bat-champ with 5.7 WAR (’22). Don’t know if they’re available, don’t know their price, and don’t know if the White Sox have the chips in their system to acquire either of them. Before the diagnosis, Liam Hendriks name was thrown around a bit for McNeill, I believe.
If names like Nicky Lopez or Nicky Madrigal are the choices suggested by commentors, I’d rather go into spring training with the Sosa-Gonzalez-Rodriguez-Ramos competition, all the while wishing Mendick would have been considered.
But Sox pitchers deserve strong up-the-middle defense and TA deserves an everyday double play partner that’s experienced. Quit putzin’ around and acquire one of Rodgers or McNeill (or another solid major leaguer if there even is one). If Sox think of themselves as contenders, Nicky Lopez ain’t gonna do it, IMO.
The trade “rumors” involving the White Sox and Mets were mostly fan/troll generated bunk, and were often wildly unrealistic. The Mets weren’t about to trade a 5-WAR second baseman to get Hendriks, and the White Sox weren’t gonna trade Eloy for a bunch of New York’s spare parts. Given the Mets are trying to win a World Series, I don’t see them moving McNeil.
Rodgers might be available, but this is the Rockies we’re talking about here, so who the hell knows what they’re thinking. He’d probably cost more than the White Sox could muster without gutting themselves, though.
You’re right, TG. I was just hoping to be overjoyed with a White Sox acquisition instead of all these “discussions” about settling for bottom-feeding in the second-basemen market.
“Hooray! Another noodle bat named Nick!”
Said no one ever…
Except Hahn, apparently.