ChiSoxTrojan

Burger only has one option left, I highly doubt he sticks on this roster all the way to 2025. There will also be plenty of other options for the starting 3B spot - Ramos, Sosa, and Montgomery should all be MLB players by then.

You do realize that most major league "starters" don't play 162 games, right? Even if technically healthy (as in not on the IL)? That's especially true for rookies (Colas), and guys with a history of nagging injuries (which includes everyone you listed as part of your "core"). I would expect Colas will be playing no more than 4 days/week to start out, and everyone else you mentioned will probably get a day off/week. That's pretty standard roster maintenance over a 162-game season.

Exactly, he had a 97 wRC+ as recently as 2021. That's why you give him a couple months to start the season no matter what. Maybe he really did fall off a cliff in 2022 and will never be the same (mediocre) player he was before that. Or maybe he just had a bad season, where he was overused and hurt the majority of the time. I really don't see any point in eating $10M without at least trying to find out if he still has something left in the tank that's useful. It's not like there's some uber-prospect banging on the door that Leury is blocking - we're talking about Romy Gonzalez or a bunch of past-their-prime vets that haven't been good enough to earn an MLB deal.

Sheets and Burger are the only bench options that are at all likely to produce at even an average level offensively. Without one of them on the roster, you're looking at a lot of lineups with .600-type OPS hitters stacked at the bottom.

Yeah, I saw that you posted earlier that you thought Sheets was "cooked", which I found odd considering (a) he had a .765 OPS in the second half last year, which was 5th on the team (and two of the guys ahead of him are gone), and (b) he has the second-highest career wRC+ against RHP of anyone on the team (again, second to Eloy). Why would you call a player "cooked" who is 26 years old, and was one of the most productive hitters on the team last year? Doesn't make much sense to me.

Leury may be replacement-level, but I'm not convinced the Sox have anyone in the organization who can replace him right now. Romy is the obvious candidate, but what happens if he comes out and puts up a .508 OPS against RHP, like he did just last year? If Romy can't cut it, then you can try to replicate Leury-level production with a combination of like Alberto and Marisnick, but then you're using two players to try to replace what one guy should be able to do. There's just no point in getting rid of Leury until (a) you know he can be replaced, or (b) he's so bad that he's unplayable. I don't think we're at (b) yet.

The more I see, read, and hear about Colas, the less I think this is a worry. He has done very well in the minors against LHP, in fact he had slightly better numbers against LHP than RHP last year. Sure, he'll probably get more days off than a more established OF, because he'll likely have typical rookie adjustments to make, but I don't think any struggles he has will be limited to LHP and I don't think all (or even most) of his off days will come against LHP. In fact, since one of the main guys who will take ABs away from him (Sheets) has proven to be terrible against LHP, Colas could get more days off against RHP because that's when it makes the most sense to play Sheets.

I don't see the point of Alberto over Leury. They offer similar production at the plate, the only real differences are that Alberto can't play OF and he doesn't have $10M left on his deal.

I don't expect the Sox to make many of the "irreversible" decisions people are talking about - those include DFAing Leury, or giving a bench spot to any of Alberto, Marisnick, Hamilton, or Reyes. At most they do one of those things. I think Zavala, Sheets, and Leury are going to be on the roster no matter what, with the 4th spot going to one of Romy/Hamilton/Marisnick. If Colas doesn't make the team, that opens up a spot for Burger.

If Leury hit well from the left hand side, this wouldn't even be a discussion. He has a career .633 OPS against RHP, which unfortunately is .150 better than Romy. If by June Leury is scuffling while Romy looks like he can do better, then by all means make the move.

Romy is a career .241/.261/.350 hitter, including an abysmal .196/.221/.261 line against RHP. Leury isn't a great player, but even his awful 2022 is better than that. Could Romy be better than Leury this year? Absolutely. But are you confident that it will happen? I'm not. What happens if they get rid of Leury, and Romy is still striking out 36% of the time with a miniscule walk rate, and can't hit RHP? There's really not much downside to keeping Leury around until you're more confident that Romy can adequately replace him. It's a low bar, but it's a bar Romy has yet to reach.

Leury has struggled in RF, but he's fine in LF and even CF. Not a gold glover, but more than capable of being a backup OF. Romy I admit I haven't seen play OF as much, but those who have seen him say he's a natural in the OF. If the option is between starting Marisnick or Hamilton in RF with Eloy at DH, or starting Eloy in RF with Burger or Sheets at DH, I'd take the latter option any day. The difference in difference in offense more than makes up for the worse defense.

If the Sox have Leury and Romy on the bench, there's no need for Marisnick. Romy and Leury can both play all 3 OF spots. Burger would make more sense.

I was going by memory, but then I looked up the numbers and it refreshed my memory that his bad defense was much more concentrated. TA had 12 errors last year. 6 of those 12 were in a 3-day period (4/20-4/22 - against Cleveland and Minnesota). Other than that one 3-day stretch he played solid defense.

Tim is going to be in the lineup almost every day, Andrus is more likely to be going in and out. It doesn't make sense for Tim to be going back and forth between positions based on whether Andrus is in the lineup. RE: TA's defense, he had a month or two stretch at the start of the season where he was making a lot of errors. But he cut that down by mid-May (I don't remember exactly when and I'm not sure how to pull up monthly fielding splits) and was solid the rest of the way. Hopefully that continues, really I'm not all that worried about it.

Buehrle was a 2-time ERA leader? Of what, the White Sox?

The bench would be really weak against RHP if Sheets is not on the team. And 2/3 of at bats come against RHP.

That's true - I've never liked Leury as a de facto LHH. But he's probably better hitting RHP than any of the other options for his roster spot (Romy, Marisnick, Hamilton).

Makes sense, someone's going to have to play 1B in Charlotte.

This is nothing more than Grifol trying to light a fire under Leury's ass. It makes zero sense to DFA Leury out of Spring Training when the jury is very much still out on whether Romy or any other option is capable of filling his role.

For a guy that has been averaging 5 starts/week over the past 3 full seasons, 2 starts/week is a significant reduction and is about what I'd expect for Leury. In fact the last couple years all I kept hearing was that Leury was over-used, he should be starting twice per week not every day. 2 starts/week really isn't a lot. It seems like you think every one of the 9 starters is going to play every single day, and that's really not how this works, especially when most of the starters have a history of nagging injuries. And if you call Vaughn a part-time player when he's making 5 of 7 starts per week, then yes I suppose I'm advocating he be a part-time player until he's worthy of getting more work. So far he hasn't.

I'd expect Sheets to start 3 games per week at least to start the year. 2 at 1B, 1 at DH. I could easily see it being more if he continues to be one of the best hitters on the team against RHP and Grifol doesn't want him to leave the lineup.

Leury has always been a league average CF. His problems have been in RF, which has more difficult reads with balls slicing into the corner. Everyone is down on Leury, and for good reason after last year. But he's going to be on the roster to start the year, and he's going to get 2 starts per week. One of those starts can be in CF. It's one of his better defensive positions (better than RF or 2B at least).

It's not just about who is "capable" of playing 1B, it's about who can play 1B and make an impact with the bat. Sheets has a career 118 wRC+ against RHP. That is the second-best number for anyone on the team (behind only Eloy's 129). It's better than Vaughn (93), and even better than any of the other LH hitters like Grandal (115), Benintendi (116), and Moncada (112). Sheets is a guy you should want to be in your lineup against RHP. You really think it's worth not having that bat around, just so Billy Hamilton can swipe a few bases with a .400 OPS?

Grandal is the other option that makes sense, but Grifol did say last week that he hasn't thought about Grandal as a DH. He said he's the catcher. (1B wasn't mentioned.) Obviously that could change once the season starts, but IMO the best way to keep Grandal healthy and productive is to limit his opportunities, which means that when he's not catching he would be on the bench getting an actual day of rest. Again, that could change if he's hitting like he did in the second half of 2021 when you couldn't take him out of the lineup.