chitownsportsfan

PECOTA seems heavily regressed to the mean, and while that might make statistical sense, what we are interested in as fans isn't the mean case, but the outlier case(s). What is interesting is the breakouts, both at the team level and player level. I haven't seen where PECOTA predicts outliers any better than ZIPS, or even the Diamond Mind sim predictions. Plus, the Sox have a lot of guys without a lot of data on them, or bad data due to injury. Garcia and Eaton (his bad 2013) fall into the injury related cases, and Jose Abreu is a 28 year old that had the 3rd highest wRC+ in baseball last year. Projections are going to put him down for a regression, but many scouts (and us fans) might be putting him down to actually IMPROVE, based on the fact that now he knows the grind of the season, many of the pitchers, how they plan to get him out, etc. I wouldn't guarantee it, but with Jose, there just isn't a lot of data for the projections to look at, in this instance scouting might be better informed. And of course playing time projections are often inaccurate. I'm not completely arguing to "throw out the projections, including PECOTA" but it's been proven time and time again that their predictive value is mixed, at best. Yea I'd rather the Sox were projected for 100 wins, but it's not the end of the world to see 78 either. I don't think Hahn or us fans think this is a 78 win team. I think it's closer to 85 but that's just my opinion.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jan 28, 2015 -> 11:27 PM) They will not do a strict platoon with any players. Just my feeling from comments but Ventura will play this new bench more but it will not be a strict platoon. It's def Robin's make or break year IMO. If he doesn't do SABER style things like play the platoon advantage (backed up by splits, not just some gut feeling) then he's going to be second guess both in the media and the FO imo. Hahn doesn't seem like he's expecting anything other than 85-90 wins this year. If Robin doesn't deliver the axe will fall, as it should, again, imo.

It's too bad they had to include Bassitt in the Athletics deal but I agree with witesoxfan I think they are fairly high on Beck and hell, by July, even Montas might be pushing for a MLB promotion. They have decent SP depth. They are a top heavy team though. If one of Eaton, Sale or Abreu goes down, they are losing 4-6 wins right there -- but it's better to have stars than not have them.

I think the Sox are gonna try and find "lighting in a bottle" at 2B whoever it may be. It's not a great plan, but it's not a bad one either when you have 2-3 guys that are all hard to destinguish. In a perfect world someone would grab the spot by the horns but I doubt that one of Sanchez, Bonaficio, or Micah will do that so they will play matchups as much as possible unless someone catches fire, doubtful, but maybe Sanchez will hit 280/320/350 in April and May and with that good defense he starts the rest of the year. Same with Micah or even Bonifiacio.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Jan 28, 2015 -> 06:06 PM) I want to know how many people that were in favor of Konerko coming back are angry that Beckham is back. Too lazy to go back and look. Other than both being longish tenured Sox, the situations are not analgous at all. Beckham, for whatever value he has, is OBJECTIVELY still in the absolute prime of his career. Konerko was in the dying embers of his career and the White Sox tried to kick the firepit in hopes it flared up a bit. Never happened.

Hahn is def being kind to Tank. If they felt he had a good chance of success (or anyone else did for that matter) then there would be a market for his services. That market doesn't seem to exist.

QUOTE (Hawkfan @ Jan 28, 2015 -> 05:30 PM) You suck Beckham. How the hell did he get 2 million? Is that really the going rate? It is. WAR on the FA market is almost at 8 million per WAR. For a .5 WAR player like Beckham, 2 million is fair value. edit: when you are talking about the 25th man, there is little "opportunity cost". If the 25th man gets more than 150 PA, something went horribly wrong anyways. No team plans on having the 25th man as anything more than plan D.

Bonifacio will be needed to fill in in the OF to give guys days off. Gordon will be the de facto backup utility IF, 25th man.

Not a huge fan of the move but whatever, Gordon will probably be the 25th man. He's better than Tank for that position. Seems they weren't willing to pay Tank's freight via trade, so whatever.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jan 28, 2015 -> 11:50 AM) Car is needed. Everything is close but not walking close and there isn't good public transportation. That said, if you wanted to just stay in Glendale, you could see plenty of action without needing a car. I think there is pretty much always a game (whether it is a Sox home game or a Dodgers home game) and the minor league fields are always hustling and bustling with activity, including minor league exhibition games as well. Fantastic experience. I might be biased cause I've been to Arizona a ton for spring training but it is 1000% times better than the grape fruit league. Here, the farthest drive is 1.5 hours (Tuscon) and outside of the minimal teams in Tuscon, everyone else is within 30-45 minutes of each other and a lot of stadiums within 10 - 15 minutes of each other. On top of that, the weather is usually fantastic and Phoenix has awesome awesome food. Yep, Spring Training is better in Arizona, things are just closer together and the weather is better imo. South and even mid Florida in March can get pretty steamy. I went on a couple trips down to Florida for college ball spring training (where our DIII team would get whooped by all the JUCO guys aiming to get drafted) and the weather at mid day was often sweltering. Arizona is that nice dry heat and Phoenix area in late February through March is about perfect, a lot of mid 70s. We didn't make it to the new Cubs park (another rain out, literally the only time it rained during ST 2014 was the one day on the one week I was there, but hey what can you do) but I've heard it's very nice. If you're into hiking and recreating Phoenix area is a paradise that time of year as well. On my "must do" for any recreation person is Camelback Mnt in Phoenix. It's a demanding (but short) 1800 foot ascension over about 1.5 miles and at the top you have a commanding view of the entire "Valley of the Sun".

QUOTE (LDF @ Jan 27, 2015 -> 09:47 PM) it is getting the car that will be a problem. not old enough to rent or can't drive?

not sure if this will work: play around with hotwire man, plenty of s*** out there, I guessed pretty well: http://www.hotwire.com/hotel/results?searc...=1&sn=sn3_5

QUOTE (LDF @ Jan 27, 2015 -> 09:38 PM) that was some of the things i wanted to ask. how are the hotels and it appears as a car is needed. You def want a car. as for hotels it's not that expensive. Check hotwire you can probably find a place for around $100 a night that's pretty decent, like a Marriott or thereabouts. You could go even cheaper and be fine. I stayed at a place the first two nights I was there (rest of trip was with a friend so that was nice) for like $50 a night that was OK. Even the s***ty hotels usually have a pool down there, land is cheap. I did it on like a $500 dollar budget not including airfare

Spring Training is a lot of fun. Especially if you are coming from a colder climate. I was there for the opener last year, 2nd game got rained out I think the only one all spring. The opener was a beautiful 75 degree partly sunny day and I got Jose's autograph pre-game. Eaton interacts with the fans a lot as well. The park itself is kinda out there, glendale is NW of Phoenix in the middle of desert really. That said, it's a gorgeous stadium and you just buy a cheap seat and move up the ushers encourage it. We had lawn tickets they were like 13 bucks or so, we moved front row in the later innings. The lawn area is cool though as well. Nice place. Dodgers fans are a wacky, wierd, wild bunch, at least the ones that make it to spring training.

lol I just read the first 5 pages of this thread and was like IMMA JUMP IN WITH THE NEW MEDIA DEAL STUFF HOW HAS NOBODY MENTIONED IT. old thread is old. Yea, as said, with the new TV money everyone is MLB is making bank. This isn't even factoring in the MLBAM profits, which every team gets a cut. I'd guesstimate the Sox are gonna clear 50 million this year, as will most teams. The real shame is teams like Oakland refusing to up their payroll for a year or so, now that is stingy ownership.

well it's not like some team wouldn't trade for him if chicago picked up 2 million on his deal. The clubhouse chemistry issue with Alexei and Jose is a non-starter. You think those two All-Star level players don't know you perform or you leave, no matter how good the chemistry? I think they would be offended if that wasn't the case -- both want to win. If Viciedo wants to file a grievance after a negative WAR season let him. The CBA has wiggle room there and I doubt the Union would pick Dayan's case to try and set precedent. I have written more about Dayan Viciedo than probably the rest of the acquisitions combined this offseason, wtf man.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 14, 2015 -> 05:57 PM) Speaking of which, great job of not reading the thread to the end. what, your point about the grievance? OK. It's a fair point but only tangential, thus I didn't bother to address it. He's (imo) unlikely to win, and even if he does, it probably won't be publicized. The real point of this entire discussion is that the Sox are almost certainly not on the hook for the full 4.4 million if they cut him in the spring. That point keeps getting missed over and over and over again everywhere on the White Sox Internets.

Goodness, DICK ALLEN IS NAILING THIS THREAD. Read his damn posts, there are differences in the way you can cut players on one year deals and multi-year deals. It's in the CBA. Dayan was tendered a one year, partially guaranteed contract. If he's cut in the spring, the Sox will owe him for 45 service days; I believe that will work out to about 1 million. I really don't see why there is so much confusion on this point. Dick is being very patient with you all he explained it at least twice in the last two pages.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 13, 2015 -> 09:08 PM) The key a player tendered in arbitration Yep, of course this isn't the case with Dayan, who avoided arbitration. The guy that runs that blog is such a putz, his own f***ing source says this, and it's "so rare" he quickly found two cases of it last year, I don't know if that's rare. I'd say it's closer to "unusual but hardly unheard of" The Sox have nothing to lose by stringing this out as long as they can. Injuries happen all the time in spring. Who knows what a team will offer in March? If nobody offers s*** you just cut him or hey it's a "go for it" year and he's kept around as insurance. Whatever, the entire tone of SSS' coverage on the Viciedo contract has been off, and this just continues it. SSS also says "the whole thing has a feeling of inevitability". GMAFB. The only thing has an air of inevitability is that thanks to all the improvements this offseason Viciedo's status will play out in a rather inconsequential matter this season. Thank goodness.

QUOTE (SoxPride18 @ Jan 13, 2015 -> 12:22 AM) What's the Sox payroll at now that Viciedo's 4.4 million is set now? It's not set, if they cut him before the 25 man roster date in early April he's only due 750k.

QUOTE (Vance Law @ Jan 8, 2015 -> 10:12 PM) Good lord, Melky should not/ will not be going anywhere near CF. The outfield defense projects to be very subpar at the corners with Cabrera and Garcia. It is a clear deficiency on the team and 'excellent defensive outfielder' is a wise use of one of the bench spots in my opinion (and I suspect others'). If not Danks, I hope they get someone who is a plus defender, like Danks. The Sox don't play in Comerica or Safeco, they play in US Cell. Hitting is marginally more important than outfield defense. There just isn't a lot of room. It's going to be very hard to find a better replacement CF for Eaton than Melky. If you're talking about the handful of innings a "defensive specialist" will get, that role just isn't that important to worry about. One thing Jordan Danks isn't, is anything above replacement. We shouldn't get caught up his utility as a defender because much like Viciedo, any value he brings in one area is more than negated overall. The Sox could still bring in a Danks like player as a NRI in spring, but it's hardly a critical spot. Talking a .5 win swing at absolute most imo.

Pathetic, Raines deserves to be in the Hall. The Voters suck.

Soxtalk has an Ozzie like obsession with the replacement level Jordan Danks. They don't need a fourth OF that can play CF because of Melky. Melky starting 10 or 15 games in CF to spell Eaton isn't the end of the world. Of course, they could always bring in a veteran type in the spring to compete for the role if they feel it's important. This has nothing to do with Viciedo is about clearing space on the 40 man for more moves, if anything. You know, it's not quite the dead ball era 2.0 yet. A 28 year old non prospect that has never seen a breaking ball he wouldn't swing at and can't catch up to MLB fastballs -- will absolutely kill the Sox at 1B.

I see the board has a new troll account. Great.

QUOTE (flavum @ Dec 22, 2014 -> 02:59 PM) https://twitter.com/LtDanJennings/status/547100443529064448 15 weeks I went to the opener in Glendale last year on Feb 28th, was a glorious 75 degree partly cloudy afternoon. Had a lot of fun. Probably won't make it down this year but I encourage anyone that can to go down there, the weather is spectacular that time of year and Camelback Ranch is a nice place to watch a game.