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Can we extend Grandal, only two more years left

Larussa a very interesting strategist. He uses his best relievers when the game is out of hand and puts in his worst ones when the game is close.

Maybe when Little Nicky hits puberty one of his teammates will introduce him to pornhub so he can build up that arm strength enough to make a competent throw from halfway between 1st and 2nd over to 1st?

don't talk to me ever.

But he's our douche

To be fair Nick is still used to the 60 foot T Ball basepaths he only stopped playing last year.

So moncada should catch a 106 mph sinking liner while playing in but yermin shouldn't catch a 40 mph throw that lands in his glove lol This sums up your pessimism pretty well.

Let’s be honest here...Vaughn’s baldness is an issue. Was his hair this bad when drafted? Should have been a huge red flag. He needs to shave that shit instantly and hope he looks tough with a baldy.

He dropped a routine ball. How was it not his fault? Madrigal can make a better throw, but a 12 year old catches that.

Amazing how many more posts and people show up when they have bad inning.

Would you rather face 9 Madrigal sized Madrigals or one Abreu sized Madrigal?

Well yeah that tends to happen when you stop making hate-able mistakes every game.

yoan needs to have someone throw him about 100 curveballs to hit... he looks like cerrano out there. maybe he needs joboo.

Not a good throw...but a major league player needs to make that catch. If he can't...he shouldn't be playing 1st base.

Oh hey, and the A's are beating the shit out of the Twins, good stuff.

Bunch of people making height and strength jokes from their couch about a guy who made the big leagues at that height. I've been critical of madrigal at times, but some of these posters have lost their mind with bias and hate. The guy has talent and has Been impressive in some spots and weak in others.

Hey fellas, if I wanted to watch a Dodgers game I'd watch a Dodgers game.

Crazy to say, but I'm just as impressed with Carlos tonight as last week. Be the man Hard Carl.

Lol is Nick a DH?

And we’ve seen that type of horseshit throw from Madrigal seemingly once a series.

Hey Jason, how about we put you on the mound and you sit there and get a 100mph ball hit over your head. Way to throw him under the bus. That's disgusting. Might as well just laugh at him for being an athlete.

Come on, let's all fuck off with this framing shit. They sold us on it, shame on us for believing that crap. HE FUCKING SUCKS!

Grandal...SMH, between the shit tier sequencing, the constant catchers interference and just inability to keep it in front of him.

He needs a cut off man from 2nd base

I'm starting to loathe Grandal.

Someone tell Grandal he's allowed to hit the ball in the air.

critical game, critical early moment and jason clowning about whatever the fuck he's clowning about.

I was curious about the debate so I dusted off the baseball simulator I wrote and simulated the 2019 season (that's what I have data for) assuming every White Sox hitter would hit according to Madrigal's career stats. FWIW the Chicago Madrigals were last in the league with a runs per game average of 3.52. I don't think that actually means much in terms of Madrigals value to the actual White Sox. Personally I am of the opinion that his stat line can be very useful in the actual Sox lineup. But it does show that a lineup of 9 Madrigals would not be a successful baseball team.

This is our best lineup IMO. I wish TL would go with this for a while. I've seen enough of Leury to last for the entire season.

Counterpoint: It’s perfectly legit for White Sox fans who had to suffer through late career Juan Pierre to wonder whether a .300 hitter without much in the wheels, power, or defense department might be a liability. Pierre hit .308 with a .370 OBP in 2009 for the dodgers just before coming to the Sox and it was a whopping 1.2 WAR. When he became a .280/.340 hitter for the Sox, he dipped into 0/negative WAR territory. I think Madrigal has upside and I’m excited about him on this team but BA is not the greatest measure here. His ceiling without power, wheels, or defense is not much higher than his high floor.

what a great thread. .327 career batting average out of the 9th spot is controversial. I miss the days of Yolmer Sanchez, Brett Lawrie, Chris Getz, Brett Lillibridge, etc. I'm going to start a thread for Dallas Keuchel now. Is he really a suitable #3 pitcher in our rotation?

Got my first shot yesterday, only experiencing mildly sore shoulder so far. This guy ?

wait, an I watching the right game? Lynn is on the mound and Chicago looks like Seattle in January? no, this is a replay, FFS. game isn't even on for 2 more hours, man never try and work and pull up a MLB.tv game apparently it's too much for me.

Collins just called a NH for Rodon, not sure why go with the $18million stiff. Oh yeah, $18 million is why.

Got mine yesterday too and oooof. I haven't called off a day of work in at least 5 years and seriously contemplated it today......not bad enough to actually do it though.

IDK about your second point. He's in great pitching shape even though he's a fatty. I do have issues with trading Dunning for Lynn - I had issues at the time because I am a fan of Dunning and thought he was one of those arms that is incredibly underrated in the modern game - command first, pure stuff second. Bieber is obviously amazing and I'm not claiming Dunning will be Bieber, but Bieber was another overlooked command first arm that exploded onto the scene in the big leagues. I think Lynn is really good and was wrong about him being able to sustain it, but I just didn't like moving one of our more proven - if not the most proven - young arm with years of control for a rental. It's one of those moves that can really bite you in the ass when you're a, sadly, cost conscious organization. Given that you could have acquired an arm of Lynn's caliber with money and kept Dunning for depth, I was never going to agree with the decision because you can never have too much pitching. I agree 10000% with your last paragraph.

This. Exactly this. Equally bad [IMO] is/was that Lynn is old and fat, which makes it unlikely for him to fight off age-related regression and injury long enough to make sense to re-sign him. So, if 2021 was the year that they decided to go "All-In," and push in all their chips, it was dumb to back the Lynn acquisition with Cease as the #5, and no bench depth to get through injuries. Especially, given that LAD and SDP look to be flat-out more talented than the SOX. In other words, they punted on the longer-term by giving up 6 years of Dunning, while NOT doing enough this offseason to increase their margin for error in THIS season. That is, if 2021 is, in their view, "their year."

You sure wouldn't have many complete games thrown against you.

This is such an odd post coming from the guy who was hyper critical about Kopech sitting out last year, questioning his drive, and analyzing his divorce... I honestly think we look at athletes from this personal angle far too often. This is their job and it is often unrelated to who they are as a person. Kopech seemed to be suffering, and likely still does, from some mental health problems that at times can hamper development personally and in the workplace. The year off appeared to give him some time to re-calibrate, become more comfortable with himself, and refocus on things he felt were important to him. I'm sure having a kid can do that to you. At the end of the day though, pedastaling athletes tends to just lead to disappointment and is always unwarranted. Enjoy what they accomplish on the field, the entertainment they provide, but analyzing them further typically leads to misinformed thoughts on people who are coached on how to speak to the media and say the right things. As I've gotten older I've evolved to stop doing this. "Seems like a decent guy" is something I'm much more likely to say now than "he's such a good dude." We honestly just have no idea, and there's been enough heinous actions by athletes that there's no reason for us to propel them to some level of grandiose based on how good they are at a game. Enjoy the greatness on the field, and accept that off the field we're all human and prone to errors in judgement and mistakes - both big and small. Saying that athletes have more drive and determination than regular people is honestly comical. People that wake up everyday and go grind a job that they don't like to put food on their table requires much greater drive and determination than someone who is naturally gifted and plays a game for a living. Just my two cents.

Not really. He became a pleasant surprise that people were cautiously optimistic about, but nobody was praising the heavens we had Dane f'ing Dunning on our team. Go back and read threads from around the playoffs -- the narrative was "I can't believe we don't have a third starter." Dane Dunning didn't count. Then he got pulled in the first inning of the game he started. That was the final image of Dunning people would have carried into the offseason and beaten him over the head with had he never been traded. Guaranteed.

True, I just think people who have preferred the Sox keep Dunning, and spend $ on a FA SP or two. Instead, we traded 6 years of Dunning for 1 year of an underpaid SP. And then we didn't even use those savings to upgrade the team in the meaningful way. I think its fair to cast criticism at the move. I hated it. Still don't love it. Happy to have Lynn as he is what the Sox need in a #2, but it sucks to have given up 6+ years of Dunning for just 1 season of him.

It's a buncha herd mentality. It's not by chance that almost every single major league team has the exact same requirements while most states have very different data sets, population density, etc. etc. In a very American way I bet you see increases right around Memorial Day. I'd guess 40-50% right around then. Either way, you still can't explain to me with a straight face the reasoning or methodology to all of the seating arrangements. I watch the Boston game and there are sections that are completely open, not a person in them. Centerfield had nobody. But right/center had fans scattered throughout. Tell me how that makes any sense. if you're that concerned wouldnt you want to spread those 20% out at max distance? Texas is averaging 27,000 a game ... the 7 day rolling average in DFW area is lower than it was 21 days ago. It's outside. Not controversial post here, but we can easily fit 20-25,000 fans in at these games utilizing the whole ball park and still be very safe, even to those who are conservative.

Are we really arguing over an unprovable 9-Madrigal hypothetical and acting like we really know the outcome. Really.

Not true at all, because your 27 outs are all balls in play. Runner(s) would be advancing on most at bats. There would be plenty of 1-hit innings that would result in a run.

Per Statcast: K % = 100th percentile Hard Hit = 3rd percentile BB Rate = 24th percentile Sprint Speed = 75th percentile (was 71st just a few days ago and 78th last year) Outs Above Average = 9th percentile (was 86th percentile last year) The talk of him having poor speed was greatly exaggerated here, even if he’s the not speed demon scouting reports had him hyped up to be at the time of the draft. Defensively he’s been abysmal this year, but it’s a small sample size and last year OAA actually liked him. Either way, I see him developing into a slightly above average defensive 2B when all it said & done at a minimum with some upside beyond that. Offensively, we all know the contact ability is legit, but hitting a bunch of soft singles isn’t going to be enough. He’s got to find a way to hit with a bit more authority like he did the other day and rack up some doubles and/or start drawing more walks. I think that happens and he becomes a pretty damn valuable player, even if we’ll all still be wishing we took Kelenic instead.

Nick Madrigal is a very good young player. He makes contact and puts the ball in play and makes things happen. What do you judge a player by anyway? Home runs exclusively? Madrigal reminds me of Nellie Fox

Yeah same. If only they had some sort of system where they could take clips of the high points of the game and clip them so we could just watch those. Maybe they could even use some sort of social media platform to distribute said clips. hmmmm, maybe a start-up idea?

What you guys are failing to factor in is a little thing I like to call TWTW, and this guy has plenty.

Where Nick was drafted is somewhat irrelevant at this point, but it comes up all the time. Its akin to what you paid for something is somewhat irrelevant once you own it -- all that matters is what it is worth now. We can debate until the cows come home if Madrigal was a good pick with #4. But its pointless. He is here, and he is the 2B. You can not like him because he doesn't have a huge ceiling due to his skillset, but not liking him because of where he was drafted is silly. I still feel like Madrigal is great fit for this roster. We have a ton of free swingers and guys who K a ton. He adds nice balance. I was expecting better defense and I've been hard on Nick at times for his lack of defense so far in MLB, but he's looked much better recently and still feel he's the perfect complementary piece on this roster.