The non-tender deadline for an 121-loss White Sox team was always going to carry an elevated body count. But a group of expected calls saw themselves out before Friday's spotlight could swing over to them.
The Sox moved to outright Jimmy Lambert and Matt Foster off the 40-man roster multiple weeks prior to Friday's 8:00pm deadline, and both elected free agency in response. The same methodology saw Nicky Lopez hit the market a week later, ahead of a final year of arbitration that would have seen him due in the neighborhood of $5 million.
But any case where you could see it flipping it in either direction has waited until the final day, with the first newsworthy revelation being that the White Sox are non-tendering first baseman/outfielder Gavin Sheets after parts of four seasons in the majors, with a source confirming FanSided's Robert Murray's report.
Sheets has hit a platoon split-heavy .230/.295/.385 over his major league career, with a platoon split-heavy .233/.303/.357 last season in 501 plate appearances. MLB Trade Rumors estimated Sheets was in line for roughly $2.6 million in his first year of arbitration had he been offered it.
Sheets' White Sox tenure is the epitome of a mixed bag. As a college first baseman drafted for over-slot in the second round, he was supposed to mash his way to the majors, and quickly. Instead, his four-year slog to Chicago was a testament to his personal resilience, willing his way back into the picture even when the team excluded him from the Alternate Site in 2020. His willingness to transform his body to make himself an option in right field literally wedged him onto the major league roster lousy with first base types, but also saddled Sheets -- and the Sox -- with such negative defensive value that he was battling with replacement-level production in every year after his sterling rookie campaign. His at-bats were defined more by deft zone judgment and barrel control than his hulking frame would suggest, but that's also because the suggested raw power disappeared for long stretches.
Sheets been a standup figure in the locker room for both teammates and media alike. He was viewed as a leader in the clubhouse, and it also surprised no one that after the historic 121-loss where surely no player wanted to discuss it, Sheets was the member of the roster who held court for TV cameras and spoke eloquently about how much it hurt.
How much value such work carried when it was in service to teams that imploded by cultural and performance standards across his tenure despite his best efforts was always in question this winter. With how often Sheets was asked to bat cleanup or publicly speak for the team, it can feel like a steep fall to now be off the club entirely, but being a core player is little solace when the core needs to be replaced.
Sheets freeing up one half of their monopoly on 1B/DH at-bats along with Ryan Fuller talking expectantly about working with him, served as big hints that the White Sox intended to tender arbitration to Andrew Vaughn, which they announced around 6:00pm.
Miguel Vargas and Bryan Ramos ending the 2024 season alternating between third base at-bats down the stretch, a glut of left-handed right fielders, and even Lenyn Sosa's 2004 Barry Bonds run in Venezuelan winter league all suggested the White Sox needed to pick one of the two between Sheets and Vaughn. Ultimately, Sheets simply did not play well enough to hold off new ideas. The White Sox need to be entertaining plenty, and it's easier to apply some of them to Vaughn.
The White Sox also non-tendered Enyel De Los Santos, whose estimated $1.7 million arbitration figure is more than teams tend to guarantee to someone that saw opponents slug .622 off his fastball last year. Justin Anderson and Steven Wilson were both estimated by MLBTR to be in line for roughly $1 million in their first years of arbitration, and both were tendered contracts. Wilson and his old college teammate Penn Murfee have been texting each other excitedly about a potential reunion on the Sox, so here's a victory for friendship.
The Sox Machine staff called it hours ago--hours ago--that Garrett Crochet would be tendered for a second year of arbitration, and we nailed it.
