Balta1701

It’s $15 million guaranteed with a player option for the next $5.

Bennett Sousa seems likely to be the first option? Having a good spring.

Would you rather pay $15 million for 1 year of AJ Pollock or $6 million for Joc Pederson?

And he's definitely going to get additional opportunities, but he also was 1-6 with a 7.62 ERA at Charlotte before he was called up. I have no idea what changed when he came up, but I also don't know for certain which guy he is, because that's like 2 different guys.

There is very likely $1 million in savings. Pollock receives $5 million as a buy-out if he declines his player option. The White Sox have either taken on 1/$15 or 2/$20 if I'm reading this right.

Give the laughs all you want @ChiSox59. You left a paper trail.

Content with him being gone, impressed how many people who thought he was worth Bellinger are suddenly totally ok with that return. It's pretty much taking on an OF who fits but who is somewhat overpaid.

Then deal with the injury before you start his service time clock.

Yay! In ballpark announcements of rule and play interpretations!

I think it is a safe guess right now that the injury we saw yesterday is a TJS. I’m pretty sure you’d be as surprised as me if it was only a partial tear or something like that. If he is down for a Tommy John surgery, then given his lack of innings I think it is an inescapable conclusion that he will never be a starter. The white Sox will have only 3 years of control with him and that will not be enough time to stretch him out before he leaves. They will put him in the bullpen and no one will bother trying anything else.

7. Error bars are high enough that it might be 8-9, but 7 is a good number for the first round. As I said last time. Have a paper. I assume with this data you’ll say that clearly 7 was being generous and you admit that even a 2 WAR reliever for 3 years would be average performance at best. https://content.iospress.com/articles/journal-of-sports-analytics/jsa200586

A quick check finds that the average first round pick is worth 7 WAR give or take. There were 10 relievers in all of baseball who put up 2 WAR last year. So, you need him to come back from TJS and immediately have him become a top 10 reliever in baseball and stay there with no issues for 3 years to get that kind of value from him. There is one reliever in all of baseball who has been a top 10 WAR reliever each of the last 3 years, one other who would probably have gotten there if 2020 had been normal (Hader). You are literally saying “he will come back and immediately be a top 3 reliever in all of baseball.”

As long as a team has a hard budget limit…yes?

Is he ever going to be a starting pitcher?

Are you satisfied with the value gotten out of this first round pick? 6th guy out of the bullpen/mop up duty for one year?

It absolutely does for service time. Service time does not accrue in the minors. There was plenty of work this kid could do there last year, and if he got hurt while building up his arm, the team still has 6 years of big league control and time to fully rehab him.

Posts yesterday: “we have a top two bullpen in baseball”. End result of yesterday: ouch. Posts today: “Shortstop and center field are awesome!” …

The cross up though is the way they acted like this pick had no risk to it. If you thought this was a risky pick, even if you thought he had the stuff to get big league hitters out right now, giving him time in the minors dramatically drops the risk because you avoid starting his arbitration clock. Risky pick in the middle of the first round? I get that. Risky pick followed by a gamble that massively increases the potential losses if things don’t go perfect? Seems like a sucker bet.

DeGrom injury day

So I think we can all agree that this probably happens even if they keep him in the minors last year as a starter. However, the big difference for the White Sox is service time. Assuming the obvious, he’ll be out all of 2022 and a good part of 2023, the first time he would be back at full strength is opening day 2024. Because they rushed him up to the big leagues, this is his second pre-arbitration year, and 2023 will be his final pre-arbitration year. He will be in his first arbitration year the next time we see him completely healthy, and at that point the White Sox will only have 3 years of control left with him. And at that point, he will not have even reached 80 innings in a season. Had they kept him in the minors last year and this happened, they would still have 6 years of control of him, and if he got hurt in spring training this year they could have still worked him as a starter in 2024 in the minors if they wanted. Damn that was an expensive call up.

I believe we are all thinking that.

Garret Crochet was removed from the March 31 game against the Reds with arm trouble. Put any updates in here.

Does he bend his arm up after the previous strikeout?

Oh come on this one isn’t even top 20.