CaliSoxFanViaSWside

Wow thanks for that .I had no idea. I thought it was a guarantee Captain Obvious ?. I was asked who is saying to give him a shot and my response was people said minor league deal or NRI which was true, which is a shot . You telling me chances are he wouldn't make he is meaningless to that exchange.

Dodgers and Yankees both have problems beyond closer. Not sure what they are going to do about them. Trade market may open up more. But I think they're going to take care of position player needs and feign like they are fine with internal options with closer for the time being. It may change. There's still 2 boring months of the off season to go. Sox will probably sit tight let all the decent relievers left get paid by other teams. Save our prospect capital . As bad as the whole TLR hiring and performance was, it's difficult to understand how much blame him and Menechino get judging by the TLR vitriol shown in the TLR invited to ST thread. Usually it's like managers can't cost you too many games or win you too many. If TLR and Menechino made so many players suck and get injured I'd truly have to question how committed the players are to winning also. Cease, Cueto, Lopez and Hendriks didn't seem to be bothered by anything the coaching staff did. Abreu hit less HR's but over all had a fine year. Vaughn did much better as a hitter. I think it's probably very rare that veteran players, which the Sox youngish core are now, would fully change anything that's worked for them en masse. I'm not buying into what amounts to "the best shape of their lives " stuff about how much dedication to preparation and sabermetrics by the new staff is going to transform everyone to their peak performances. Hahn is getting sympathy by trying to undo the whole mess of TLR with fluff about the organization is now in the best shape of it's life .

Are we reading the same thread ? NRI/Minor league deal, that's a shot to make the opening day 26 isn't it ?

I've seen the word "earn" in regards to Colas here and some people, maybe more than your "correct" call ,think it's the incorrect call. But it certainly would be the "save face" call since they didn't call him up last year.

Well Grandal is project by FGDC for 2.4 WAR in 354 PA ,115wRC+ next season while Romy is .9 w/294 PA and 91 wRC+ and Sosa 1.2 w/ 287 PA and 100wRC+. Colas is 1.6 w/ 400 PA , 116 wRC+. TIFWIW.

It's amazing to me people say give La Stella a shot but want Colas to earn his way onto the team by playing in Charlotte 1st. Old,bad, injured LH non HR hitter come on down. Young LH HR hitter who is way ahead of Sheets in RF defensively nah earn your way here and you can't play too many rookies because we're in the window !

https://www.southsidesox.com/2020/3/2/21159697/value-generated-by-white-sox-international-signings?_ga=2.11346740.1068181808.1672255323-1099104242.1672255323 Yes. If we are moving the goals posts from the OP statement about recent success because of minor leaguers to how the Sox have done from 1990 -2019 the Sox were credited with the most of their WAR in that period from Ordonez and C. Lee since their careers are done. They get a boost from Abreu who they paid $68M for. They had a period from 2005 to 2007 with Iguchi (2005), Escobar (2006) and A. Ramirez (2007) Basically you can create any parameter. We can remove the crazy money signings from all teams and then see how it shakes out. You can do it by age groups too I suppose if anyone had the time or info. You can probably divide it with current rules which wouldn't show much for most teams since those rules haven't been in place that long. Or you could even count WAR per money spent and have all kind of different positions teams would be. Since the OP asked if the Sox are currently building a better system with IFA's the answer is basically indeterminable or no since it's still too early to tell. Even Robert signing for big bucks hasn't moved the needle much since he's been injured so much but his 6.6 fWAR total would be more than some . Touting minor leaguers is one thing but who rises to MLB and actually produces any WAR is another. Carson Fulmer and Zack Collins were ranked top 75 prospects at one point so the proof will be in the future pudding.

I'll believe it when I actually see a few Dominican's playing for the Sox . MLB has been mining the DR for years. Have the Sox ever had one play for them who did anything ? Until that happens any hype is blowing smoke up our...

I don't know for sure but Ruiz and perhaps Santos have an option or 2 left. I'm not too worried about too much depth because there other are arms that could eventually be DFA'd, Carlos Pérez, Bennett Sousa, Nicholas Padilla, and Rule 5 pick Nick Avila . Any of the bottom guys could be traded also Ruiz, Diekman, Kelly etc. Still could trade any at the deadline too if things fall apart again. I know you like that idea more.

I just posted in another thread about going after some of the better arms left on the relief market to perhaps trade from excess in order to resolve, 2nd base and 4th OF. The names I came up with were Michael, Fulmer Matt Moore or Andrew Chafin. The I discovered that MLBTR has an article covering the remaining relief pitchers on the market. I originally took my info from a November article I read on the 10 best remaining relief pitcher and those 3 were the only ones left on the list. So there are others listed in the MLBTR headine story. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/

I'd like to see the Sox go after 1 of these 3 guys who are left. Michael Fulmer, Andrew Chafin and Matt Moore. Maybe even 2 of them. Then you have the depth needed to trade Hendriks taking 1 or 2 of the 3 decent remaining relief pitchers off the market. Or you can hold onto Hendriks and trade Kelly/Diekman/Ruiz. I would hope that the money to sign them is less than the Hendriks money but even if it's a little more you have more pieces to trade and alter your payroll any way you want . Snatch up more relievers and let see the offers come pouring in for our excess. Might be able to resolve 4th OF and 2nd base that way while holding onto our prospects.

Shouldn't you have said Bah Humbug ? Happy Holidays !

No I did say offensive highlights in my intro. There's only one defensive highlight I can find and that was when he played CF in the Futures game and came in quickly on a sinking liner from Dusty Bakers son. That was right around the time he got promoted from A+ to Birmingham. I'm just reminding people they shouldn't worry about Colas' bat so much. Quick bat, hits hangers well . Seems to like the ball down. I would expect a large amount of sinkers, sliders and fastballs up to him.

Here's some Colas offensive highlights from the minors starting at AAA then progressing through AA and A+. https://www.milb.com/video/colas-posts-1st-aaa-four-hit-game?t=playerid-693049

I don't think they are available but I wouldn't count number of balls fielded divided by number of innings times 9 as anything meaningful or even moderately useful. Even statcast info wasn't very useful Vaughn's 1st season in the OF since everyone here was saying he was adequate while I screamed until i was blue in the fingers that he was terrible .

You should also look at " jump" along with range. This will show how instinctual an OFer is. Vaughn's was very low. But I would offer that getting those baseball savant type stats won't mean much for a while since he has to play a good amount before those stats can be compiled. cola's arm will definitely be better than Eloy's Vaughn, Sheets and probably Benintendi's too eventually. I don't think defensive positioning has much to do with range. I think it's based a starting point and a finishing point when tracking down a catch. Jump may be the same thing although it seems like something based in micro seconds and how fast a player reacts from the crack of the bat or the ability to read a flyball's end point quickly. The more you know about how a ball spins from a RHH or LHH is all prep work and keeping that in your head in the OF.

Probably why they signed Hamilton if they knew that Payton to Seibu was a thing.

Ha I like the cut of your jib ! Happy Holidays Trev !

I probably would too but that might be even harder to figure out but not for the reasons you gave. I wouldn't consider a move for prospects to be a sign of cost cutting. The Sox need quality prospects preferable a couple that have already advanced to AA or AAA that can be used as trade fodder for 2023 now or at the trade deadline or held onto for use in the 2nd half of the season on the 26. I hope that if the Sox sign Duvall or a decent reliever or both before they trade Hendriks that it will be a sign to you that they are a bit more serious than you think they are. Right now I'm holding out hope that the Benintendi trade and then an immediate trade of Hendriks would send a terrible message to fans, like Ha we gave you hope and now we are going to smash it because we are a sadistic group of MF's !! So yeah I'm looking for a sign like Duvall to show me they aren't that sadistic.

Ha ok can we make it 22 HR's for Vaughn ? I'd feel better betting on a higher number just so we can both say we expect Vaughn to hit at least 5 more HR's than last year. You win if he hits 23. Gentleman's bet unless we can figure out any terms at a later date.

I didnt say Hendriks needed to be traded with Crochet. I said that's what was suggested by and ex GM and it may be more even now or that the Yankees could throw in an arm. I have no idea what would be involved actually so if anything I am saying Hendricks is worth a guy who had 4.1 bWAR last year which would've been barely behind ABreu's team leading 4.2 bWar. Fangraphs gave Abreu a 3.9 and Torres a 2.7 so big difference in the War numbers between Fangraphs and Baseball Reference on Torres WAR total but even at 2.7 he still would've been 2nd on the Sox.

I'm not predicting who hits how many HR's I'm just saying we need more power from the whole lineup. The more the merrier but I'm not going to count on Anderson, Benintendi , Moncada and Grandal to all hit 15 each. I'd like to count on Eloy for 30+ and 25 each from Robert and Vaughn but 2 of those 3 are injured often. Another 20 from Torres would be very helpful to offset any lack of power from any of those guys in my 15 Hr group. Also Tim hit 20 HR's once so I made a mistake to say Tim had never hit 20.

I said this much earlier however. The ex GM who suggested the trade seemed to think Liam and Crochet was fair. Since that time we've seen the price of relievers go higher which in turn makes Liam worth more . I don't know if the Yankees would throw in another arm along with Torres but Gleybar Torres is a fine player and more production is needed from the everyday lineup to remove high leverage innings from the pen and give them a cushion to work with. The addition of Benintendi and Torres put 2 more solid bats in the lineup and we've would've been better last year with more consistent and healthy bats. I'm good waiting to see how things shake out with the Yankees and Dodgers and our own "will he or won't he spend more mystery". A difference maker at 2nd base isn't cheap. It's funny people remember how good Liam was on a .500 team but never seem to bring up that the Sox scored 3 runs or less in around half their games and lost Abreu. This team needs more power and there are plenty of people here who think it's not likely to come from Grandal, Moncada or Benintendi and have their doubts about Colas too. It also leaves Anderson and Vaughn who aren't yet 20 HR guys. That leaves the 2 most often injured guys on our team to produce power Eloy and Robert.

I am aware of the possibilities. I can't take a stance one way or another. It's a guessing game. Just seems odd that an uplifting move like Benintendi would be immediately followed by a cost cutting move. Plus even if Hendriks is traded and the Sox save some money I'm not certain that it would signal they aren't going to spend any more. But it would help to sign someone 1st before a Hendriks trade . Teams like the Yankees and Dodgers have to solve their own position player issues before I'd commit to dealing with them about Hendriks.

Yes it may but at least it would give us an indication that they do intend to do a little more than last year to get things right.