South Side Hit Men

This was the first time the White Sox were swept in Yankee Stadium since Robin Ventura’s 2014 team. Rick Renteria’s tanking teams finished 5-4 in the Bronx. The Sox are now 6-9 against teams this year currently over .500. How many times will the Sox get burnt by La Russa brining in a reliever for a second inning? Hope the Sox get a manager focused on getting White Sox wins, as opposed to Hendriks saves, before the window closes.

Not sure if Lamb in RF and Eaton in LF is a specific response to the dimensions of Yankee Stadium, or if this signals a willingness to have Eaton adjust to LF to allow Engel to play RF and Vaughn/Eaton LF when Robert and Engel return. On ability, Engel should never play LF in any defensive combination the Sox have, but thought Tony may never ask Eaton to play LF, because veteran / “he’s earned RF”. The defensive flexibility employed this season, including Vaughn and Mendick in the OF corners, has been encouraging, regardless of who is driving these moves (Hahn, Tony, or both).

Luis Robert was named the 7th most irreplaceable player in MLB based on his proJected fWAR, and the Grand Canyon sized gap between Luis and his pathetic replacements. Not sure how you can argue Leury Garcia or Billy Hamilton are not 0 WAR players. The gap is not as large with Eloy, since he is the worst defensive LF in MLB, so outside of perhaps Jake Lamb, you get a LF defensive upgrade. Also, the drop off is not as wide in offense with Vaughn as the drop off in CF.

No big contracts are coming off the books after 2021. “The money has been spent.”

1. How did it work out for Harry? Well after he rejected Jerry Reinsdorf’s offer to announce for his pathetic pay per view scheme which collapsed as an utter failure, Harry made more money, increased his audience by turning a former 50/50 Sox/Cubs town into a 70/30 Cubs/Sox town, and became a national icon. Jerry Reinsdorf, a pariah and architect of a completely dysfunctional mess in two organizations. 2. There are no reports of Yermin carrying a criminal record. You know who is a recidivist criminal, someone no parent should want their child emulating? Your guy Tony. 3. Tony also did not make up steroids, but like the Olympic Games, both have benefited from a steady dose of steroids for decades.“Sportsmanship”

Hopefully Tony will be occupied walking the stands confiscating the “disrespectful bobble-heads” and allow the Sox to play to win without him fucking up another game. COVID Vector Ground Zero

As long as he swings the bat at decent pitches when the situation calls for it, both the walks and attempts at hits will provide much value. He has been scoring at a solid rate in multi walk games. His good command of the strike zone is a good reason for his walks, but there are a substantial number of times he is hitting in front of the “pitcher” at the bottom of the order, similar to an 8 hole hitter in the NL. I expect pitchers to attack him more (and him to correspondingly swing more, get more hits) once (if) Leury finally becomes a bench player behind Engel, and later Robert and Eloy. (Hitter Yasmani batted in front of) 2021 Multi walk games 4/7 4th (Collins) 3 BB 0 Hits 0 Runs 4/8 6th (Williams) 2 BB 0 Hits 1 Run 4/29 6th (Vaughn) 2 BB 0 Hits 2 Runs 5/1 7th (Lamb) 4 BB 0 Hits 2 Runs 5/4 7th (Garcia) 2 BB 0 Hits 1 Run * 5/5 6th (Garcia) 3 BB 0 Hits 0 Runs * 5/6 6th (Vaughn) 4 BB 0 Hits 0 Runs 5/12 6th (Vaughn) 2 BB 1 Hit 3 Runs 5/17 6th (Garcia) 4 BB 0 Hits 3 Runs 5/18 6th (Vaughn) 2 BB 1 Hit (HR) 1 Run * - Cincinnati (Pitcher hit 9th)

How long have teams shifted him to this extreme? I do expect improvement, but not necessarily a return to career norms.

Tony gets off on ripping certain types of athletes who raise his ire. Likes making a big production out of it, telling anyone who will listen that his way is the right way. Doesn’t matter if they play for him, or even play the sport of baseball. Kapernik, Tatis, Yermin. Ozzie Smith, Ron Gant. There will be new names to this list before all is said and done. Just find it interesting he doesn’t pay attention to a game when it’s close, leaving pitchers like Foster and Lucas in to wilt and die, but when a game is a blowout, he’s suddenly interested.

To the FBI, or Steve Stone’s Twitter feed?

Carl Everett now admits dinosaurs do in fact exist, and he does not like them one bit.

Better yet, the rookie he loves as if he were David Eckstein, Nick Madrigal.

Based on Tony’s statements today, it sounds like he would be more at home in the Twins broadcast booth than in the White Sox clubhouse.

Indeed, been very happy with what Adam has brought, with effort and attitude. A very pleasant surprise, even if he can no longer perform at the rate he did before the trade. Perhaps someone should show Tony video of Josh Donaldson kicking dirt on home plate, you know, out of sportsmanship and respect.

“Feed me!” ?

Mendick really needs to be playing more games for the Chicago White Sox.

And people say I hold a grudge. So glad I have Len and DJ.

Runs and RBIs are largely a function of what others adjacent in the lineup to you do (beyond HRs, which is moot in this discussion). If Madrigal can do what he did in 2020 (OBP .376) or April (OBP .369), his WAR will be high/valuable, and his runs will be at a solid clip batting 9th in this lineup. His May production (OBP .200) is abysmal, he isn't even MLB roster worthy at that level of production. Pitchers have adjusted, how he adjusts in return will go a long way as to whether he will be a valuable contributor or not. It's likely somewhere in between these two points, but needs to be over .330/.340 to be a regular player, unless he is able to develop some power without sacrificing his ability for contact, a trade off nearly every ML hitter considers.

I was under the impression Grandal moved to this stance due to his injury. Any word on whether this will be soon? https://www.dailyherald.com/sports/20210424/soxs-grandal-adjusts-after-changing-catchers-stance-due-to-knee-injury Really want to go to automated strikes next season. I believe Grandal will improve defensively by being able to focus on the other defensive aspects of the position when pitch framing is no longer a priority.

No @soxfan49 today? Hope Jose gets some rest and the Sox can take two of three with him out. Hoping Eaton can play tomorrow to keep Garcia and Hamilton from both being in the lineup. Go Sox!

Andrew Vaughn is getting a little sumpin' in the upper left hand corner of Ryan's tweet. Good for him, he deserves it, and the number 99! "Wild Thing" indeed!!!

Thank you, appreciate your confirmation of what I suspected (positional adjustments). bWAR appeals more to the math side of my thought process. I wish Baseball Reference would incorporate similar/same defensive metrics, including pitch framing for catchers, though hopefully that becomes moot with automated strike zones. Or do we say mute on SoxTalk.

Would someone explain how Fangraphs calculates a positive 2021 0.2 fWAR for Madrigal (as of now), when both his Offensive (-2.0, only Leury is lower) and Defensive (-0.6) ratings are both negative? When I looked at the glossary, positional adjustment is the primary factor I see which may be the reason. Also, how does Abreu have a negative defensive rating (-1.0)? Is he being dinged for his positional adjustment (Mercedes is -3.9 as DH), whereas Grandal’s fWAR are goosed upwards (high number of games caught X positional adjustment)? I’m more familiar with bWAR, and their oWAR + dWAR = bWAR are much more in sync. Use fWAR here because that seems to be the common source here. Thanks in advance.

Both plays weren’t smart (bunting or running home), though the first was intentional with time to think and the later an in the moment decision which possibly was sparked by the former. I don’t see Moncada pressing and trying to score with no outs in that situation. With one out, a strikeout or popout for Grandal leaves him at 3rd with two out. Speculation on my part, but logically it makes more sense why a runner would try to score with one out, but be more cautious with no outs. Too bad COVID restrictions continue to limit reporter access to the clubhouse, as Moncada could have explained his thought process.