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Wolkow was always considered a project when the White Sox drafted him in the 7th in 2023 as a 17.5 year old. Hes still only 19.5 and I think all things considered he would be a top 40 pick in this years draft if he was eligible. I did a little write up earlier in the year expressing my optimism on him and the early returns are strong. When I was watching him, I saw a flawed player in the frame of a big league star. His legs are massive and he is incredibly athletic for a guy that is 6’7 240. He looks like Colston Loveland in a baseball uniform. What I didn’t like wasn’t just his swing and miss but also the pitches he was watching. He seemed to have issues with pitch recognition and at times looked overmatched. The goal for this year was to graduate A ball and to start 2026 in High A. To get a feel for how young he is, he has just 7Abs out of 250 against pitchers younger than him (6 ended in a hit). The season started off horribly. Wolkow was 9/68 (.132) in April with 1 homer and 23 strikeouts to 8 walks. It was certainly not a cause for panic as this guy is still young for the league and guys of his size tend to develop a bit slower. His .426 OPS left little room for optimism however. May was a slight improvement. He slashed .218/.297/.368 (.665 OPS) which was far more palatable, but his 30 strikeouts to 9 walks mirrored his poor performance in April’s. June has been another story. Wolkow is 19/56 (.339) with 4 homers and 14 strikeouts to 9 walks and has a 1.001 OPS. We’re seeing the K numbers get to where they need to be while the power and walks go up. He had a 123 wRC+ last year in A ball in 320 PAs so it’s hard to look at his 95 wRC+ in 250 PAs as a positive development. His .406 BABIP last year wasn’t going to be sustainable and quite frankly his 40.6% K-rate last year put a big damper on those numbers. The K rate is down to 26.8% this year and is 20.8% this month while having his best power month (.554 SLG) and walk rate (13.4%). Even in his excellent July last year, had a .553 SLG, 37.3% K Rate and 14.2% walk rate. Getting all 3 of those metrics in the right place was the goal this year, because success at the next level can’t rely on a .400+ BABIP. This month was his best as a pro outside of rookie ball and shows the bones of a great prospect on the cost of a lottery ticket. This is the exact player the Sox have been wanting to develop for years and I will be watching him as closely as any prospect in the system the rest of the year. You just don’t see 6’7 240 lefties come around often. I would have more concern about his pitch recognition if he was a 4 year SEC hitter that played high level high school ball in Florida or California. When Aaron Judge was his age he was a freshman in college with 2 homers in 187 ABs using a metal bat (.902 OPS) but still. This will take a lot of time and a lot of reps, but this month was a huge step in the right direction. The next challenge for him is lefties. Hes 9/44 (.205/.327.227) this year with 0 hrs and 19ks to 6 walks. In 2024 he was also 9/44 with 0 homers and in 2023 in rookie ball he was 1/10 with 0 homers. Thats starting to be a concerning sample. I think the Sox should do whatever they can during this season and off season to help him see more pitches against lefties. Simulated games, whatever you need to do. There are worse things than being a strong side platoon player, but he’s a guy that has time on his side to develop. Don’t platoon him until the bigs. Let the kid develop his approach and get reps.

I would hope this guy feels a lot of remorse, and not just because he's banned from all ballparks. But, if he's yelling stuff like that in public, chances are he's behind his keyboard saying worse stuff. Go read the comment sections of just about any post of Facebook or X, and you see how terrible people are...hidden behind their computer screens or phones. I don't know if we'll ever be better, but what happened the other night should open some eyes about how words can hurt, deeply.

Maybe we shouldn't do that. Maybe we shouldn't refer to human beings as "waste products" either. It's dehumanizing in a similar vein as this loser fan's actions; it doesn't make you better than him, it makes you akin to him. Don't understand the specificity about public education and parents either...how would you even know to make this baseless assumption? Yeah, it's totally, like, his math teacher's fault from a decade ago he got drunk and made a public fool of himself.

No shot this 22 year old kid knew that his mom died in a car accident 8 years ago (when he would have been 14). Hell, I didn't even know that until this happened. The big thing here is to be careful about what you say to people, I know this resulted in him being thrown out and banned but man mouthing off to the wrong person about something you don't even know how impactful it is to them, recipe for disaster. I always get on my wife when she rages in the car at another driver on the road for doing something stupid, you never know who is going to lose it and have a gun or follow you somewhere.

HR Colson.

Bad back, can’t hit fastballs. Doesn’t bode well.

I appreciate the sentiment. I don't like baseless negativity and personal attacks, so I want to be sure I don't contribute to it. I definitely could've phrased what I said more constructively.

there is something very toxic about this organization they we will probably never really know. Of course there was Omar V. incident. This place is not attractive to free agents unless it's ones many teams pass on. So I would think this organization has a tarnished reputation and who knows how long that will last.

This is my experience with Colson

Colson HR, again. He's 3-4.

Another HR for Colson.

Dude hasn't made a serious post this decade.

You know what, that was probably too aggressive. My bad - don't mean to be a dick.

It's not that deep man. This stuff is all just fluff until it culminates in more winning. That's the point he's making. You also just said you don't engage with petty insults then went deeply personal and beyond "petty insults" to Ray. I mean what are we doing here? Calm down it's the fucking White Sox.

Ah yes, renowned climate change scientist Joe Rogan. Let’s hang onto his every word for all things climate change related. 😅😂🤣

I don’t have any evidence for this, but it feels like retractable roof stadiums require a larger footprint than open air parks. If they are already sharing the 78 with the new Fire stadium, space limitations might be an issue as well. April weather sucks for baseball, but I struggle to see how a few cold/wet series in April and maybe a few overly hot series in late June or July justify the cost of a roof. Same with the handful of games impacted by rain every season. Chicago has weather extremes, sure, but we aren’t Houston, Phoenix, or Seattle. Domed baseball in Chicago will never make sense to me.

I'll say this; this thread has reminded me how exhausting and pointless it is to participate in in-depth conversations about advanced analytics, modeling and ML... especially in baseball and athletic circles.

For me, it’s all about giving the most young guys at-bats and seeing who can play where. I am not an Elko believer by any means, but this is the season to give him a shot and see if he does something with the opportunity. Will help come to a 40 man roster decision faster. Vargas is probably better at 1B, but his bat is also less valuable there so why not give him an extended run at 3B to see if he might get better? With Colson no longer a major threat, the spot is open for the taking. Sosa doesn’t really have a potential long-term spot outside of 2B so I’d just let him run with that for now. For him, the focus should be learning some semblance of plate discipline, but even with say a 110 wRC+ he needs to play an actual position instead of just DHing to be of any real value. Baldwin may not be an everyday OF, but he’s capable of handling the corners to some extent and that’s the quickest path to at-bats. I also think it’s an area that he needs to work on because I think his ideal role on a legit championship club is 10th man who fills in everywhere and can replace a guy who goes down with injury without the spot imploding. I am confident he can handle 2B and wouldn’t be upset if that’s his long term outcome. I candidly haven’t been following Ramos as much as I should, but I’ve always felt like he was a dude who’d need to learn the OF because of the Colson factor. With Montgomery’s struggles, Bryan may end up being the answer at 3B long-term and push Vargas elsewhere on the field, but my current order of operations would be to prioritize Miguel from a defensive position this season. Vargas has shown me enough to believe he is a major league hitter. We need to find his ideal long-term home defensively so we can start filling out the rest of the roster around him.

Lenyn is just a solid big leaguer. Sox fans are too used to everybody being horrible so they have a hard time seeing a player with flaws without assuming that he's 100% flaws.

Montgomery appears to be cooked unfortunately. Obviously there is zero reason to give him on him right away, but he’s firmly out of the long-term plans until he shows some semblance of the prospect he once was.

I am happy to see the progress Vargas is making and hoping the same for Sosa. The Sox need to be patient with Sosa to see what they can get out of him. Eduardo Escobar always comes to mind on a late bloomer that had decent success after hitting 25 years old.

With Colson looking like a potential bust, I’d rather see Meidroth continue to play SS with Sosa at 2B.

Sosa is fine for where they're at as a team. I don't need to see any more Rojas or Capra.

No, I wasn’t there. Just read about his age in an article. Truthfully I feel for the kid. His behaviour was disgusting, but most of us were lucky enough that our worst behaviours weren’t national news.

Not excited and not counting on him anymore. Prove me wrong, Colson.

Was there that night. AJ stepping on Aaron Boone rounding 3rd, Uribe throwing out Coco Crisp on a bang bang play. Crede hitting 2 homers including the bomb off Riske. Fun times.

I've learned not to be that way since eventually I'm that same stupid driver I've rant about. You reap what you sow.

They had a dominating run through the regular season and post season. They had a great/reliable rotation and a lineup that had all the pieces you need to be successful back then (good lead off man, 2 hitter that could move guys over at will, RBI guys, and clutch hitters like Crede in the bottom half. They had a manager that everyone loved playing for. It wasn’t luck. It was a once in a lifetime “team” that you rarely see.

It was a great team that also got a little lucky. Almost every WS winner needs luck so no shame there. I just wish you know, we had something else to celebrate about lately.

It will last as long as Reinsdorf owns the franchise.

We're all adults. We all work(ed) jobs where we had to assess departments, amass data to find inefficiencies, etc. And we all know what corporate mumbo jumbo sounds like. It's usually a red flag when somebody leads with "I do this for a living", then sprays a fog of corporate-speak to prove they're the only ones with authority to critique anything. You're fine.

Good point about the footprint needed. Just doing a quick online search of a few random open air and retractable roof stadiums showed that the retractable ones took up something like twice the amount of acreage. Something like 12-15 acres vs. about 25 or so. And yes, it's a legitimate question as to whether (no pun intended) such a thing is necessary in our part of the country. The only cold weather cities with retractable roof ballparks are Toronto and Milwaukee. The other northeast/midwest cities seem to have managed without a roof.

🤔

My sister gets upset and honks at people. I have told her the same thing you tell your wife.

I've been a software developer, manager and senior leader working in ops, app dev, data and ML for over 20 years. While you make good points about how ML works and what pitfalls to avoid, you absolutely talk out of your ass a good chunk of the time and it's hilarious to watch you vent hot air all around here. Still waiting on those sources.

Yeah, my wife is big about flipping off someone who cuts her off or drives like a maniac. I remember one time she flipped this car off and then they rode on our ass for a few lights. Its like dude, don't do that s%*# when me and the kids are in the car.

i wonder what Chicago catholic high school this fan attended

I'm more sad than angry how many of these Sox players turned out. There has to be a deep morale issue when you've seen these guys like Robert, TA just phase out. Sure there are injuries but going elsewhere seems to be uplifting. Imagine what it was like for Vargas last year going from the Dodgers to the Sox. The reality is most player don't like to get traded. How many of you had a job transfer that you didn't put in for?

Dude we do this every year. Last year you told me Ball was coming back and lo and behold the last half of the season he was injured and gone just like i thought . I’m just not gonna put my faith in a guy who looked good for 3 months, sorry done playing this game with that front office. You can be sunshine and balloons, I’m just not gonna be excited about this team unless they give me reason to. I’m not hoping they are gonna turn a guy into a super star because they absolutely have no ability

I was at this game in our seats in Section 127. About mid-way thru the game the guy and three young ladies sat in the open row in front of us. They were early 20's. The guy kept shouting heckles and insults and they weren't funny or appropriate. He used the f Bombs a few times and the Sox security guard that stands in front of the visitors dugout reprimanded him (very appropriately) for using inappropriate language. The guy stopped swearing but continued with adolescent type heckles about one players sister and then made the comment about texting Martes mother. It seem liked high school stuff ("your mother", "your sister" etc.) Lovullo was really upset pointed at the guy; he was livid. A few minutes later The security guard and a few other Sox security guys came down and escorted him out. We were kind of surprised because I have heard much worse heckling than that . But we were not aware of the "back story" about Martes mother until the next day in the media. I was really surprised. It was definitely wrong what he said but I wonder if the heckler really knew the situation about Martes mother. The heckler would have been 14 when she died (he is 22 now per the media) and would have to follow baseball pretty closely to know about the car accident. Definitely doesn't make it right but I'm just telling you the perspective of someone who was right there. Its sad that the WHite Sox organization and fans take another hit for a fan who cant control himself, its not representative of the wider fanbase but adds more fuel to the fire.

They are both the same dead end franchises because no matter the talking points, there is a Reinsdorf up top destroying everything.

Rides that end in a brick wall every season are rarely remembered fondly

Honestly, Sosa would be fine at 2B if the team was in contention. He's a good example of giving a player continued exposure at the MLB level to see what they are. He's just gotten better, especially with the bat. He's okay at 2B but needs to stay way from 1B. And there's no reason to see Capra get another AB. Rojas isn't any good either, but getting one or two starts a week at 2B is fine.

We'll get the excuse, "what do you care? the player doesn't read this." It's not about the player. It's about us. Every time somebody calls a player "hot garbage" or "trash", it's like a punch in the face. It's debasing to the person typing it and to the person reading it. And it's not as easy as telling us to not read it. We read through the posts. You don't know somebody typed that dehumanizing nonsense until you read it. And as for the "fan", the guy made a horrible mistake. It's in our culture to one-up. To take it just a little further. "My mother's a whore? You're mother ..." It's like porn addiction. Porn is shocking. But the shock wears off, so the user needs to move onto more extreme porn to reproduce the initial shock. A player's trash, then a dumpster fire, then on and on.

Nope. He was a waste product of public education and derelict parenting. He probably said things just a bad as a kid, got sent to the office and got a bag of chips or a sucker as well. We don't often go as low as that but look how we ridicule or are hateful to a player because of his performance.

I’m not engaging in petty insults. Have a good night.

Millions is low. It is more like hundreds of millions.

I get it, but that makes me worry that there will now be threats to him and his family. Just perpetuating repulsive behavior.

The fan was a fairly young man. I hope for his sake he learned a valuable life lesson here.

Does anybody really need to be blamed for the 22nd pick in the draft struggling in AAA? It's not like Montgomery was can't miss. There were already some polarized opinions about him. The number 1 pick in that draft has accumulated -2.1 WAR so far. 2. -1.8 WAR 3. Still in AAA 4. 2.5 WAR. .226 lifetime BA and he's 2 years older than Montgomery. 5. -.02 WAR. Back in AAA. 6. A+. The Sox suck at development, but nobody needs to be blamed for Montgomery's struggles. Baseball is hard.