We do this exercise every year. There is always at least one guy that people latch onto as someone we can't afford to lose, and they never get picked. The White Sox have no kind of a roster crunch. If they feel that they can't lose Adams and/or that he will be picked, he will be protected. If he isn't protected, the Sox aren't worried.
Also, Shane Smith was definitely a guy expected to get picked. Besides not being on the shelf from TJS, Smith had a much higher K rate, velocity rate, and H/9 was also significantly better than Adams was last year.