BamaDoc

If people are thinking about this years playoffs, you need to remember the 28 man roster. The last few years have seen teams succeed well with one time thru the lineup strategies. With the 28 man roster that will be easier to do than in years past. We don't have a lot of guys you are going to pinch hit for. Our switches will be for defense or maybe pinch running. Giolitto and Kuechel give you two solid pitchers. Cease has the stuff by seasons end maybe he is your third. Often you only need three. If baseball goes to the bubble for playoffs, maybe you don't have all the off days and need more. But if you go one time through the lineup, Gio Gonzales, Lopez, Rodon creates mismatches or forces teams to pinch hit early etc. and could be quite successful. Longer term, the cost of an ace is huge. Your best bet is to constantly develop them. Thats why I hold Kopech as he has ace potential. Giolitto can be a free agent after the 2023 season. If the rebuild has taught us anything is it is you need a ton of pitching depth in prospects as not all will develop or they may be derailed by injury. The biggest market inefficiency that I see now is that starting pitching is paid at a higher rate than ever while each year pitching less innings than ever. I think you can make the case that if a pitcher doesn't sign the team friendly extension early in his career you treat him like a running back in the NFL. That is callous and cruel but it may fit the economic reality. It may be wiser to build better bullpens and churn thru starters. Our team operates on a budget whether we like it or not. We have a core group of position players signed that looks great. I expect McCann to leave for playing time so Collins serves a purpose longer term. The future is bright and the window is open. Don't start closing the window by getting over excited now and depleting the pitching depth we will need.

The expanded playoffs has created a situation where there are a lot less teams selling/dumping players. That has created higher demand for the few teams willing to trade. When supply is low and demand high, prices go up. I think this is going on and either something gets done last minute if the price drops or we sit anything major out.

Tie = safe

Here is a thought I just had. Are the announcers paid by the Sox and provided to the network or employees of the network with the Sox having approval. Jason has gone through his growing pains. He has called games for terrible teams. He has to be enjoying this and can see the future. The Sox should sign him to a ten year deal with perhaps options or a rolling ten year deal. He could be the voice for a generation of new Sox fans who will be showing up now that the team is good. Sox have done long term extensions for players who wanted the security. Perhaps Jason would like that as well.

Correction. A ton of homers by your team lol. I remember Harry with Sox and the disappointment in his voice. Hawk also

And winning fixes a lot of things. A ton of homers has to be fun for announcers.

Sure hope EE gets going. I was worried because a lot of his production last year came in about a ten game stretch. I was in favor of a Collins/Mercedes platoon and using the money savings towards RF or pitching.

What we aren’t used to is a decent lineup. EE is a streak hitter and slow starter. Don’t know how streaky Mazara is but he was never great vs lefties. Engel has earned the right to play vs lefties and give days off. The positive is we won seven in a row while these two have contributed little. Hopefully as hot guys cool off, these two will be better.

Get him out

Wainwright may be kind of guy who gives us fits. I expect him to live on outside corner and let it break further away. Gotta be patient or look for it and go the other way.

With Bummer out, I don't think that is how you pitch Detwiler. He pitches three innings and you probably lose him for two days. I still can't believe he is currently our best lefty over Fry.

By the end of this season we should have a better idea on some of our younger pitchers. Cease maintained his velocity yesterday till the end. If he and Kopech progress it will allow Keuchel to move one slot down each year of his contract. Due to this short season, next year we may need to monitor innings on a lot of these players so depth will again be important. Next year you could see Rodon/Lopez/ Dunning and the youngsters as your 5 plus positions. It probably makes more sense to see where we are near the trade deadline next year and maybe add then if needed. After 2021 is when it may make more sense to add a starter and hopefully we are attractive as a competitor and should be generating money. Colome is a free agent after 2020 I believe. Solidifying the bullpen is a bigger need to me. We will need another lefty you can depend on and possibly a closer. We have a plethora of right handed options. A lefty besides Bummer who can get both sides out and be relied upon would be nice.

Good job. Are you allowed to link?

Can’t believe I’m writing this but with Bummer to dl, Detwiler is now more important for later innings. Fry to wild to trust in high leverage

I would love to see all our players beat the shifts to the point they have to defend us much more straight up. We swing at pitches away that we should either drive the other way or take and generate favorable counts. We strike out to much. Most our guys have easy power and don’t need to sell out. I know “it’s modern baseball “well this guy thinks a lot of modern baseball sucks! Ricky does have issues but no one was going to win with the last few years roster. I do think it is important for our roster to have a bilingual manager if a change is made. I don’t see a change this season.

Great article that goes into a lot of depth at The Athletic. Can really feel for the stranded guys.

Sadly, baseball could be serving as an example to the country of how to do things. Instead we are seeing some teams do it better but even within teams we see the range from good to poor examples. These guys stand to make millions and don’t take it seriously enough. Disappointing as I was looking forward to baseball being my escape and instead COVID will continue as a major story line.

Think it shows that when our starters are constantly behind, batters can sit on a pitch and do damage. Also from games I have watched, a lot of our misses were bad misses. Thirdly, when you are not pounding the zone, the umpire is less inclined to give you a borderline pitch.

Kalapse thanks for finding that. #1 in swinging at balls out of zone. There is your culprit. No reason to throw strikes if you don't have to. Also #4 in getting a strike on first pitch. It seemed we were always batting 0-1. Maybe to passive on first pitches? We need to hit some first pitches the other way or to beat shifts. At worst we miss and are down 0-1 just like we are taking it but by trying you break defensive tendencies and could really get rallies going. We have a ton of natural power bats, I don't think we have to sell out for it. On the other side, I bet our starting pitchers are among the worst at throwing strike one.

Three of top 15 are White Sox. Eloy may not have enough appearances. Wonder if we lead league in fewest strikes thrown to our hitters?

Cuthbert has passed through waivers and been sent to Shaumburg. Madrigal or Marza?

I wished he had worked out. His comments are interesting as he says we were to analytics based. Cooper is always blamed for not being “modern “ enough. They don’t exactly line up.

Not crazy about lineup or the order but trying to be fair. During the game, they announced Hill was out. If that was the case, give credit to Twins for F'ing with our lineup as maybe Ricky was expecting the lefty to go today.

I wonder if teams that get off to a bad start really pack it in. From a management perspective a bad team won't effect your gate if there are no fans. Will the 2021 draft order be based off 2020 records?

To add to above, that would have Gio pitching about once through the rotation while everyone else stretches out and he builds up his shoulder. If his shoulder responds, he could swap with a ineffective starter or if his shoulder remains an issue he stays in the pen. By the time the rosters are cut to 28 then 26, if he remains in pen, you could probably use him twice a week. I doubt you want to use him more than that due to risking the shoulder. Players like him or Lambert(TJ) you probably only warm up to use by the time rosters shrink.