South Side Hit Men

I see the Dodgers as the primary targets to eat 2023 salary (Lynn, Grandal, Pollock, Graveman, Kelly), in exchange for assets they may want (Robert, Liam, Cease, dare I say Moncada). I think you can still move Eloy, Moncada and Lucas. Anderson could be traded to a contender looking for a stopgap at SS on a good contract. A motivated Sox ownership could slash payroll 50% + if that was their goal heading into 2023, even if they bring back Abreu. Give Hahn and Tony a five-six year extension to let rebuild 2.0 play out, perhaps promote Getz and give Hahn KW’s spot. Jerry may already have put this plan in motion. Guaranteed Future Money Moncada $42.6M Robert $39.0M Hendriks $29.3M Jimenez $27.2M Lynn $19.5M Grandal $18.3M Graveman $16.0M Pollock $11M-$13M (Bench Now) Leury $11.0M Bummer $9.3M Kelly $9.0M (WTF) Diekman $4.5M Harrison $1.5M

The 2017 OD Tanking Lineup was far superior to the lineups vs. Arizona, and better at LF, 3B, RF and C than the 2022 White Sox. 2B Tyler Saladino (Downgrade) SS Tim Anderson LF Melky Cabrera (Upgrade) 1B Jose Abreu 3B Todd Frazier (Upgrade) DH Cody Asche (Downgrade) RF Avisail Garcia (Upgrade) C Omar Narvaez (Upgrade) CF Jacob May (Downgrade)

Yesterday, the Sox started three 40 man roster worthy players. Today they are down to two, with Eloy resting, Abreu at DH and Vaughn at 1B. Game Notes: Tony La Russa (678-643 .513) continues to need one more win or to resign before season end to clinch a winning record with the White Sox heading into 2023. AJ Pollock will clinch $1M today during his third plate appearance. Tony is hell bent on getting him $1M-$2M more before year end with 53-103 additional plate appearances. Dylan Cease looks to capture his second win in August, and 13th on the season. Dylan leads the staff in many categories, including IP (139 1/3), bWAR (4.4), Ks (182) and ERA + (175), and will enter his first of Arbitration eligible seasons heading into 2023. Carlos Perez scored a hat trick yesterday with an error, passed ball and two stolen bases allowed. Josh Harrison returns to the lineup. He is third among White Sox hitters at bWAR (1.4), behind Abreu (3.4) and Robert (2.5).

Rick Hahn will still likely have only one 80+ win season through games of October 5, 2022. 63, 73, 76, 78, 67, 62, 72, 35, 93, ?? Go Blow!

People are alike all over. Weeeeeee! This season couldn’t have gone better for Jerry. He can point to the $68.2M payroll division champion Guardians as the correct prototype and new five year target during the likely 2023 sell off. 12,000 season tickets will still be sold to sponsors and fans of Sox laundry. And this is Tony’s landing spot starting in 2023 or 2024 for Tony, where he will remain until Jerry or Tony dies. Let the record show John Paxton (and Doug Collins) are still on the Chicago Bulls payroll, just as Rick Hahn and Kenny Williams have been on the payroll going on their third decade together.

Rodon missed the entire season.

AJ Pollock needs 4 more plate appearances to clinch another $1M, 54 for $2M, 104 for $3M. He needs to be DFA'd tonight to prevent Tony from making it happen. Speaking of Tony, he still needs one more win to assure an over .500 White Sox career through 2022. I can see his cowardly ass stepping down with one game to go to ensure it if they lose the next 34.

I would say this is more of a fare assessment, though he still both plays and gets far more production than most players across MLB. He averages in the Top 2 on a MLB team in both games played and production. Since his 2018 permanent callup: Hitter fWAR Rank - All Players: 52nd (12.1) Hitter Games Played - All Players: 60th (557 games played) Hitter Games Played - Pier age group (27) or younger: 20th Yoan and Tim have been injured this season, but have played the amount of games one could expect over their careers. Robert and Eloy are consistently injured year in and year out, and miss significant playing time on a consistent basis. That is my definition of injury prone, one who just can't stay on the field on a regular basis either due to injury severity or pain tolerance for less severe injuries. To tell you the truth, if I was playing I would do what I could to return to the field, but on this team in 2022, I would look at the pathetic situation, culture and management and would definitely consider saying fuck it. I don't think there are more than a handful of White Sox today who are happy they are playing for Reinsdorf, Hahn and La Russa. Why put yourself at health and contract risk for these inept assclowns who own and operate this pathetic franchise, and prioritize employing unqualified embarrassing senior FO and field management over trying to field the best team possible. You need to look out for your professional and financial interests first, because that is the lone personal consideration of Jerry, Rick and Tony, all of who would fuck you over as a player in a heartbeat, unless you are one of their pets like Leury, Lynn, Kelly, or puts up with this horseshit as a loyal soldier like Abreu.

Calligraphy

Nope, just this season. 2018 Age 23 season. 2018 149 Games (92%) 2019 132 Games (82%) 2020 52 Games (87% w COVID) 2021 144 Games (89%)

Cueto is a good low cost one year pick up, but will likely return to form if he is able to pitch in 2023. OK to sign as a 6th-7th starter at a similar deal to this year, but to rely as an every fifth day starter on a contending team is ludicrous. ERA / FIP / Starts 2019 5.06 / 5.71 / 4 2020 5.40 / 4.64 / 12 2021 4.08 / 4.05 / 21 2022 2.98 / 4.00 / 18

The Sox have six legitimate Major League hitters a team would want on their roster Circa August 2022: Abreu, Anderson, Jimenez, Moncada, Robert, Vaughn. You either keep these six and find actual starting C, 2B and RF and play for 2023-2024, or you hire a competent GM to sell off what you can and target 2025-2026 as the first legitimate “multi-championship window” season since 2005.

2017-2019 Tanking White Sox lineups were far stronger than this. 2-3-4, all three 1B/DH I might add, are the only three players any GM attempting to field a winning team would even want on their 40 man roster. Hahn has assembled all nine.

He is on the 7 Day IL (I checked as well, why Burger wasn't brought up), retroactive to August 21.

Yaz should return in a few days, but it’s absurd Robert isn’t on the IL. If Eloy is hurt, you are down to a backup catcher and Romy available off the bunch. Jerry told Stone to blame it on Hahn (see below), but Tony is to blame as well as he either has equal or total input on roster decisions. https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/steve-stone-is-puzzled-over-why-the-white-sox-so-often-keep-banged-up-players-active-we-dont-seem-to-have-the-fastest-healers-around/ar-AA10QoUn

Likely Starters: SP Martin C Perez 1B Abreu 2B Harrison SS Elvis 3B Leury RF Sheets CF Pollock LF Vaughn DH Eloy Bench: C Zavala INF Gonzalez OF Engel OF One Armed Bandit

Between October 2019 and January 2022: The Chicago Cubs fired Joe Maddon after five seasons, three LCS, one WS and a .581 winning percentage. The Chicago Bulls fired Gar Forman after seven playoff appearances in eleven seasons, one conference final, and a winning record (450-419 .518). The Chicago Rapists and Racists fired everyone except the owner who oversaw then whitewashed everything, after winning three Stanley Cups. The Chicago Bears fired Matt Nagy (34-31 .523) with one losing season in four years, and Ryan Pace (48-65 .425) after seven years of sucking ass.

Perhaps, but Jason Benetti can mention Mark being from Orland Park and that he went to Saint Rita. What else is there to talk about on broadcasts these days?

White Sox Milestones: Tony La Russa still needs one win across the final 36 games to enter 2023 with a winning record as White Sox Manager (currently 678-642 .514). AJ Pollock needs seven more plate appearances to vest another $1M in 2023, 57 for $2M, and 107 for $3M. Eloy Jimenez needs to appear in six more games to finish with 56 games played, his second highest total with the White Sox. Gavin Sheets is 17 games away from doubling the 54 games he played in 2021, but still remains 2 HRs behind his 11 hit in 2021. White Sox enter tomorrow with 36 games remaining. Minnesota is now a game ahead of the White Sox, and also another due to the tie-breaker. With a Cleveland win tonight, the White Sox will be 5 Games Back in the Division and Final Wild Card Spot.

https://soxmachine.com/white-sox-news/white-sox-injuries-will-continue-until-morale-improves/ The White Sox lack a governing body over the conditions of their bodies, which is emblematic of a greater erosion of standards. Following up on the conversation in the comments a few days ago about the fights between Tony La Russa and Jimmy Piersall, Jon Greenberg pulled out a relevant passage from a Piersall book published in 1984.

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I appreciate your response. What I tried to do was clarify the expectations or terminology we are using. I agree with a lot of what you write here, but in terms of player availability, I lean more toward production and a reasonable overall playing time expectation than counting trips to an IL, sometimes used just to give a player an extended break for an injury that could take 4-6 days to recover. I also consider a younger player ahead of his peer group (in the majors at ages 23-24) need additional time to adjust to playing in the league with limited/no experience, and less development time than players promoted 1-2 years later. It's why I commended the slow easing in of Vaughn, and Tony's management of him, in 2021 after no 2020 minor league season. When it comes to players like Robert, Eloy, Madrigal, or others who are absent for half or more games each season over 3-5 seasons, I don't think there is a debate that these players are in fact injury prone and have trouble staying on the field for more than half a season. When it comes to Bummer or Anderson, who have been both productive and available more than nearly all of their peer age group over several seasons, I side with they played as expected. Tim Anderson averaged 5 of 6 games played, nearly all starts, during his several year career. Being off one game per week and playing the other five is what I expect out of a starting batter. For catchers it would be four of six games, or 95-100 games at catcher per year (not counting DH/1B appearances) for a solid starting catcher. I also think a player who wants to play every single game like Abreu would benefit from being off at least once every other week. He has played very banged up at times, and also mired in slumps because he doesn't ever want to sit. While that work ethic is admirable, the team and his overall production would likely benefit from 2-3 games off per month of scheduled rest / work load management, to allow him to be fresh and more productive during his appearances.

Sounds like "elite" "120 game a year" catcher Yasmani Grandal, less $68M in payroll. Outperformed White Sox Cesar Hernandez without playing a game, Madrigal has a good chance at finishing with a better WAR than Harrison (and lightyears ahead of Leury) before season end, with over $10M in savings. He's not the savior by any means, but he wasn't my 3rd overall pick, he wasn't given away by me for absolute garbage which will linger for three years with the Kimbrel extension and trade for Polock, and he is better than any of Hahn's garbage acquisitions the past three seasons.