NorthSideSox72

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jun 8, 2014 -> 05:04 PM) Randomly added Capital Reef, grand staircase escalante and cedar breaks the trip as well. The entire state of Utah is beautiful. The great salt lake smells, though. Zion and Grand Staircase are on my short list, would love to see those soon.

QUOTE (Bigsoxhurt35 @ Jun 19, 2014 -> 12:42 PM) Going to see Kanny tonight. Nice. Feel free to share any reports from the game!

Sorry for leaving this dormant for a bit, but I've updated the list of available tickets. Not many left, let me know if you are interested!

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 19, 2014 -> 09:11 AM) The primary concern with Gallo is a 32.3% K% thus far in the minors with no real signs of slowing down. Just looking at the numbers, I think his game compares favorably to Adam Dunn, which is not a bad thing at all, just that I'm not sure he's a top 10 prospect. Unless he has moved positions, he's still a 2B, right? An Adam Dunn bat that can play even semi-competent 2B is a BIG value player.

QUOTE (ChiSoxJon @ Jun 18, 2014 -> 10:31 PM) Can't believe we traded Juan Silverio for organizational depth...look at him now, great move KW/Hahn, kid will make it to the show and be successful before we know, while our return is outta baseball QUOTE (Chilihead90 @ Jun 18, 2014 -> 10:46 PM) You are willing to bet he makes the show just because he had a .774 OPS in AA? Not saying that's bad or anything, but I'm not willing to bet he becomes a guy we really wished we had back just based on that either. I think he has to be joking. I'm not sure he'd even register on the T25 with the Sox at this point if he was still here. He's suddenly developed power, but he was a couple years ago a below average defender at 3B, doesn't draw any walks and his K:BB numbers tell me he'll struggle in AAA and MLB. This is his 6th year in the minors, and I'd say his listed age of 23 is questionable at best. Would it be nice to have him in B-Ham instead of Curley right now? Sure, he's younger and has more power, so maybe. Maybe his defense is better, I don't have any reports on that, though his FPct the last two seasons have been .917 and .939 which aren't good numbers. But this idea this is some sort of face-slap thing is ridiculous. It made perfect sense to move him at the time they did.

Sorry for the delay on this, they released their roster right before the first game. Enjoy reading. Lots of 2014 draft picks on there.

Recap Up - first one written by our newest recap writer, Daniel aka Quinarvy

QUOTE (maggsmaggs @ Jun 17, 2014 -> 01:24 PM) You can find it sort of Baseball Reference. You will have to do the individual math, but you can get the league-wide strikeouts and at-bats/plate appearances. http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/l...cgi?id=c1884526 This might be even better: http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/l...e.cgi?year=2014 Close enough, I can calc it from there. Thanks! I tried B-R and couldn't find that page.

OK SoxTalkers, I'm writing a piece for FutureSox, and there is a data set I need that I cannot seem to find. I am sure this must exist somewhere, but all my Googling gets me nothing. So I am hoping someone here knows... I am looking for league-wide strikeout rates (or even just raw K and PA numbers) for any given level of the minors, i.e. AAA. In other words, I'd like to know how often hitters across all of AAA strike out, on average. I have found this for MLB, but not the minors. Does anyone know where I can find this?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 17, 2014 -> 09:31 AM) Surkamp is pretty much the left handed version of Dylan Axelrod. This isn't really the case, other than to say they both have low-marginal fastball velocity (upper 80's, T90). Surkamp was a T20 prospect in the Giants' system for years, was putting up numbers at lower ages per level than Axelrod, and has (or at least had) above average breaking stuff. Axelrod has never had breaking stuff that was even average really. Not saying Surkamp is anything great, but the only similarity I see between them is fastball velocity.

We are also doing a series of Draft Roundtable Discussions, hosted by Dan, and including Jeff and I. We're sounding off on various draft-related topics, like favorite picks, sleeper, first to majors, least favorite pick, etc. First post is up - favorite pick whose name is not Rodon. Other topics coming soon.

Sox are now at 30 picks signed, 1 definitely won't, 9 open questions. Draft Tracker on FutureSox is up to date, including affiliate assignments for a bunch of the signees.

Dan is putting together a series of posts on FutureSox as a roundtable, including Dan, Jeff and I, each sounding off on a particular draft topic. The first topic is: who is your favorite draft pick other than Rodon? Article is up here. Coming soon: sleeper, best tools, other topics (which hopefully will generate some disagreement).

Great Falls roster is up now, with a lot of 2014 picks on it. No AZL Sox roster yet. We'll have a GF preview soonish. Ethan Wilson, Dane Opel and Matt Lane start on DL. Nick Parent and Nick Blount are both on the restricted list due to their PED suspensions.

There is something disturbing to me, looking at the quotes in that article, when comparing Anderson to Ravelo items. Not because they are in the same sphere as prospects, but because of the reaction to certain things. When Capra talks about Ravelo, he talks doubles and power projection. Makes NO MENTION of the fact that he's consistently had the best plate discipline numbers of any prospect in the system this year and last. Anderson is talked up (rightly), and they go out of their way to talk about not wanting to "force" plate discipline with him. Anyone else see a pattern, or bias, here? Which happens to fall in line wth the tendency of the org across the board having so many hitters struggling with strikeouts? The juxtaposition of those quotes really highlights it.

meh

I'm more concerned with Barnum's 12 errors than Anderson's 28. 12 is a TON for a 1B in less than half a season.

39th round pick Davison says he will not sign. Not a surprise, just noting it. A few guys are tweeting out affiliate assignments now too. Some guys are already headed out, rookie teams start in LESS THAN A WEEK.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Jun 13, 2014 -> 09:53 AM) I would have thought that Wendelken would have been top 15-20ish. I actually forgot about him - that's what I get for doing it off the top of my head, haha. He'd probably be in the 20-30 range for me.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jun 13, 2014 -> 09:09 AM) Your lists are always the best and this is no exception -- but I'm still so shocked at how highly Adams is ranked at this point. I'd be curious to hear you elaborate on how he's higher than Davidson/Sanchez despite not having thrown a professional inning. QUOTE (southside hitman @ Jun 13, 2014 -> 09:21 AM) I have to agree, Rodon has been a dominate college pitcher in a power conference for three years, so it's an easy choice to slot him at #1. Adams has potential no doubt, but that's a bit high for my taste. I didn't take a ton of time when I did this one, but I do remember debating Adams anywhere from 5 to 9. One way to think of it is, Tyler Danish was seen early-on as a Top 10 guy out of high school... and I think Adams has better stuff and a higher ceiling, based on the reports I have read so far. I think he's got a #2 type starter as a "ceiling", and that's higher any pitcher in the org right now other than Rodon, IMO. That said, honestly, you could slide him to 8 or so and I wouldn't argue it. It's very tough ranking a guy like Adams against a guy like Sanchez, or even Davidson - just so different in so many ways, it is hard to pin down value. Maybe the easier way is to rank pitchers only, for example.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 13, 2014 -> 08:58 AM) Every day that Rodon doesn't sign, pisses away the small chance that he could pitch for Chicago this year. Now THAT part I don't really care about. Whether or not the guy pitches a couple September games this year is pretty irrelevant to me, unless the team is in contention that late in the season. I just want the guy signed and getting started in his pro career.

QUOTE (The Mighty Mite @ Jun 13, 2014 -> 08:35 AM) 20,000 to watch Sale go up against Scherzer. Piss poor. Something is seriously wrong up there, a big market team and we are averaging 19,000+ a game. 28th in MLB in attendance. We have a nice team with a great new star in Abreu and one of the best pitchers in MLB, the team does not give up and deserves some support. Right now if I owned the Sox and the stadium contract was up I would move this team to somewhere were it would be appreciated. Chicago does not deserve the White Sox. I want all of you to know that I'm a 68 year old die hard White Sox fan who has lived and died with this team since 1953, I still get up in the middle of the night and check the Sox score on my I Phone and for me the to say this is sacreligious. I know the Sox have addressed some of the pricing issues but Sox fans seem like they have just lost interest in the team. I have lived in Florida for over 20 years but I supported the team the 48 years I lived up there and would still do so, every year when the Sox come to Tampa you will see me at the Trop. I worked evenings when we lived up there but always tried to make one game every home stand. I also belong to another Sox Board and there were 3 threads about last nights game. That's sad coming from a membership of 8,000. A 19k average is still higher than the Sox were getting during many seasons in the 70s, 80s and even late 90s. This is not a new phenomenon. It probably FEELS new because 1) The Cubs used to be just as bad or worse but since the mid-80's have become a huge attraction, and 2) We saw such big numbers 2005-2007 and we've been in decline since 2009, so each year feels successively worse. Also remember, this team more than ones in some other regions of the country gets much bigger numbers in the warmer summer months, regardless of opponent. If the team is in contention in August (not likely but who knows), the numbers will start to go up. More importantly, if the team can be a contender for a multi-year stretch again, then the season ticket base will go up again. It's not that complicated, and the fan base hasn't suddenly died off. It's pretty close to what it was as a % of the city.

QUOTE (TRU @ Jun 12, 2014 -> 04:08 PM) See wites post, don't think you understood what I was saying. Personally, I don't give two s***s if we sign Rodon or not. He has just as good a chance to be terrible as he does at being great. Not only is that laughable, but if you feel that way, why are you even interested in the draft discussion?

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jun 12, 2014 -> 03:19 PM) I really, really hope they find a way to call him up this year. If the Sox are well out of contention in September, and they don't have a major 40-man roster issue at that point, and if Zaleski has pitched well in AAA... I wouldn't be surprised if they add him to the 40 just to give him a September appearance like that. Then after the season they can DFA him to free up the spot again, I don't think he's a claim risk anyway.

De los Santos to the "Temporary Inactive List", and RHP Matt Zaleski was activated from DL. Zaleski is just awesome. 11 seasons in 1 org, no other org, no majors - probably the only guy ever to do that (CKamka researched it, couldn't find another example). He's coming off his 2nd TJ surgery. Chicago area native, born in Arlington Heights, went to high school in Addison.