Balta1701

As a team that is 21st in home runs replacing some of those guys with power hitters might help too.

There is some unavoidable math. 1. The white Sox payroll in 2022 was $195 million. Their luxury tax number is $210 million - with the tax at $230. 2. They have $170 million already committed for next year, give or take change. That leaves them about $25 million to spend to match this years’ payroll and $47 million or so to the luxury tax. 3. Your setup of both Nimmo and a mid rotation arm blows past the current payroll and nearly gets to the tax line. We may not know the budget but I think it’s fair to be skeptical that they will massively increase payroll up to the tax line. That leaves some options: -Trade for guys that are cheaper -Sign a Velasquez type back of the rotation guy instead of a mid rotation guy -Sign a cheaper OF than Nimmo.

Even with the best coaching in the sport, they’d be completely outclassed by the Astros, despite having a higher payroll and a much more recent rebuild and set of high draft picks. That’s the part that’s on Hahn.

There’s no better interview for managing the white Sox than declaring everyone around you was a blameless victim of circumstance.

700.

The Astros would definitely sign him for a year.

His contract is also big enough that he can’t be moved without either paying a lot of it, giving up something of value with him, or taking someone quite bad back. Montgomery and Moncada going out doesn’t make this team better, and Moncada for Hosmer or Corbin doesn’t make them better.

They suck specifically in ways that are coachable. Fundamentals. Approach. Motivation. Focus. Energy.

Yeah I’m still in with they’re ahead of Cleveland without the bullshit. I just watched a key series where the white Sox gave away the first game with bullpen insanity, were completely outhustled, looked like Sean Spicer on DWTS on defense, and took 1 walk in 3 games (COME ON). That is a completely different series with coaching.

Top of the AL? No the Astros are loaded and Judge might hit 61 tonight. Top of the Central and 90 some wins against weak competition? Absolutely.

I once posted that he was an average at best reliever and it was the most heinous thing I ever said.

They have the #3 system in MLB and played 16 rookies this year, a franchise record over 120+ years. They assembled depth worth s%*#.

Dylan Cease?

Money says Quintana is paid more than Giolito next season (or gets a multi year deal).

I wonder if there was anyone at Soxtalk.com who spent the 2021 offseason screaming "We need depth there are bound to be a ton of injuries again and we can't rely on luck to plug those holes we need to plan in advance". Naw, can't think of anyone who might have said that. No one could have predicted it. Hell, between Cueto and Andrus they got incredibly lucky covering for injuries this year again. Darn good chance that the next time they sign someone off the scrap heap to fill in for injuries they get a .600 OPS instead of .850 like they got out of Andrus.

Pollock's is a player option, not a team option. The team can't just choose to buy him out without paying the entire deal. If he declines the player option, he gets $5m or whatever the number is with all the plate appearance shenanigans. AJ Pollock would almost certainly not get money comparable to the extra $7 million or so on the free agent market, he'd get offered a couple million by someone based on this season. Now, it's possible he could be miserable enough here that he would do that, saving the White Sox a few million in the process. He could also decide to take the $5 million buyout and retire. But most likely, he's stuck here unless you want to send money or talent along with him to move him.

Gavin Sheets does have a decently high pop fly rate. But no, I haven't noticed extra ones lately, because the ball is always weakly hit on the ground. It's like injuries. Pop flies are always bad, so when people see them they assume the White Sox must be extra bad at having them, regardless of what they're actually doing.

LOL the White Sox in 2022 have the 3rd highest ground ball rate in baseball. They tried to address their ground ball problem by hitting the ball on the ground more as they believed flyouts were bad. Their infield fly ball rate is actually the lowest in baseball because of this. Menechino offense worked exactly as this post says it should.

Disney+ has it also.

1. There are professional search firms whose job it is to contact and bring in candidates for such positions. If Kenny Williams wanted one of his last acts for the organization to be a part of hiring a new GM, I'm not sure if I'm ok with that or not - not without knowing who was actually doing what this season. We saw the Bears do something like this last year, the business people were a part of a committee along with a set of outside football people they paid to consult on this topic. Bring them in and let them do their job. See who actually has a plan and who stands out. Maybe they turn out to be failures, but how is that any different from the current mess? 2. At least he gets to fire LaRussa again. Seriously, if HH were to be brought in to be GM, he can't physically do the job, we all know that. He'd last months at most and then they'd be hiring someone else. He's not going to be taking calls at all hours of the night, organizing meetings with scouts, overseeing the draft, traveling to winter meetings, negotiating contracts, that's a huge amount of work. Even if he's still mentally perfectly sharp, he's not physically up to that task and I can't imagine he wants to be away from his family for 70 hours a week. He can come in, fire LaRussa, and retire.

No one I have ever heard of. Do a series of actual interviews for the GM position. Actually evaluate who is qualified and what someone's plan is for the future and how to fix this. I know very few executives around baseball outside of people in the White Sox's organization, defaulting to the next random white guy in the White Sox's organization would be a terrible idea. Then, get this - actually let the GM do a coaching search! The GM should bring in a dozen people and interview them. This should be a diverse group, the interviews with non-white candidates should be honest, they should not be sham interviews because someone has already decided on hiring a white retread manager. People with experience, people without experience. People from the US and elsewhere. I would be ok interviewing Beltran even. Then, the GM narrows the field based on the interviews and - get this - brings people in for a second interview before making a decision on a position with a 7-figure salary. Then, even more remarkably - the GM and head coach work together to pick out their remaining staff! The absolute utter worst thing they could do is pick a coach or Gm from inside the organization without bothering to do a search...again. That's how the last 3 have been decided and every one of them has been a terrible result. Please no begging former White Sox players to take the job either, plenty of people will be interested if you offer the job fairly.

Yeah, I struggle with the Abreu part too, but as you note, I need an OF to make this work, and I don't have any other resources to play with other than the money that would otherwise go to Abreu. Most likely what they'd actually do with this is continue playing Eloy or Sheets in the OF and sign Abreu to play 1b - or rather they do it backwards and sign Abreu first and then make this move later - but I'm fed up with those guys in the OF and had to do everything in power to avoid that.

Burnes and Woodruff each have only 2 years of control remaining. Right now is exactly when Milwaukee might move them. In fact, I would go so far as to say that Milwaukee probably moves both of them by the trade deadline next year. That's exactly how they handled Hader.

So here's an alternate concept. Opening caveats: last year I was vehemently opposed to Chisox59 and others' suggestion of picking up Craig Kimbrel's option and letting Rodon go. This year - I totally get where he's trying to go with this setup, addressing the LH issue in the OF which I have to admit is a major one. However, I believe he's left one major flaw in his roster design - that starting rotation. To put some numbers on this - Houston has gotten 24.7 fWAR out of their pitchers this year, best in the league. The White Sox have gotten 15.7 fWAR, 10th in the league. Cleveland is 9th at 16.5. 2.5 of that difference is out of the bullpen, which is just super frustrating given the boatloads of money spent there, but still leaves an enormous gap in the starters. If you look at the rotation, it looks even worse - Verlander Vs. Cease, McCullers vs. Lynn, Valdez vs. Kopech, Javier vs. Giolito, Urquidy or Garcia against 5th starter/Martin? Every one of those matchups favors the Astros right now. So the White Sox are already starting at a deficit, and they are losing Cueto in this setup who provided a desperately needed 2.1 fWAR. Keuchel only was a -0.3 fWAR player, so getting rid of Keuchel's starts is basically a rounding error. Between losing Cueto and already being 4 to 8 fWAR behind the really good teams with him, I submit that the starting rotation is a major problem for the 2023 White Sox as presented here. While Kopech has the largest upside, and Giolito does as well, the White Sox could add Nimmo to their roster and still wind up not good enough to keep up with the big teams. A guy like Heaney who put up <1 fWAR this season, signed for $9 million, leaves the White Sox with a starting rotation that will be wobbly the whole year at best, and which could straight up collapse given that Heaney has only thrown 61 innings this year and put up an ERA of 5.83 in 2021. It may still get them past Cleveland if a lot of things go right, but the Astros, Yankees, and other teams are better than that on paper. Thus, when I do this one, I'm fixing the starting rotation first and worrying about the LH bat as a backup plan. Given that, I'm going to do something I don't want to do, but that I don't see any way to seriously upgrade the rotation without doing. I need to target a pitcher who is in their arb years, who is affordable financially because I can't pay Rodon, who has more than 1 year of control because of what I have to trade, but who might actually be a guy their team might move. 1. Andrew Vaughn + Carlos Perez to Milwaukee for Brandon Woodruff or Corbin Burnes and Keston Hiura -I have no choice but to move Vaughn in a deal like this. I am unwilling to move Montgomery, and the White Sox have 0 other top 100 prospects who could catch someone's interest. 4 years of control on Vaughn + 6 years of control on Perez is going to get Milwaukee's interest. This gets me 2 years of control of a top of the rotation arm, and the next 2 years are all I care about for this team anyway. I have added about $10 million total with them. Hiura is a talented former prospect who has been up and down a lot, he makes my roster next year because he's going to Platoon with Sheets to start the year. Hiura may or may not be in arbitration next year, I think this depends on where he comes down relative to the Super-2 rules and that's a bit beyond me to figure out. Yes, I have just left myself with a 1b setup of Sheets and Hiura. I'm not thrilled about this either, but both of them hit RHP fairly well which the White Sox do need. Hiura can also play some 2b, so if Sosa is struggling, I could have Hiura at 2b and Sheets at 1b against right handed pitching. I am also open to other concepts here, I'm not sure they'd do it in the division, but could Vaughn interest the Guardians for Bieber? 2. I still definitely need OF help because yes, Eloy is going to DH. I've spent about $10 million and I think I have about $10 million to spend, so I'm priced out of Nimmo already even assuming no big payroll cuts. We finally have to go out and sign a mid-level, LH hitting OF. Thankfully there are likely to be several options here - Conforto if healthy, Pederson, Gallo, or here we go - spend $8 million on Cody Bellinger when the Dodgers choose not to offer him arbitration. He also adds another player who could fill in some time at 1b. So my lineup: Anderson SS Moncada 3b Robert CF (assuming his hand isn't being amputated) Jimenez (DH) Grandal (C) Hiura/Sheets (1b) Sosa/Gonzalez (2b) Pollock/Bellinger (LF) Colas/Bellinger (RF) Rotation: Cease Corbin Lynn Kopech Giolito Martin (6th starter) At the very least, this is a potentially dominant starting rotation, this is a starting rotation that has a shot at hanging with Houston. The lineup is not as good as the one in the first post, but I haven't pushed the payroll as much as the first post, and I am not starting from behind on pitching. Fix Moncada and get the lineup to take some walks and it still scores a bunch. Unfortunately, I don't see any easy way to fix both the starting rotation and grab Nimmo at the same time. that's the choice RH has made for us given the sheer number of bad moves he has made. Thus, I can't say that this is clearly better than going after Nimmo, and I can't be outraged if they went that route, because frankly there's a good chance that neither of them works. This is one version of how it looks if you try to fix the rotation and go with patches in the OF.