Chicago White Sox

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Apr 4, 2018 -> 11:44 AM) Man, there are a lot of OF's in AA and high A and only so many spots for them to play once everyone is healthy. I wonder if you might see RH start buying some pieces or trying to trade for some draft picks to clear up some of the logjam. Limited AB's will hurt all of their developments, so its better to pare down then to have the most loaded OF in A+. I don’t see much of a jam at AA. Hawkins & Robbins don’t warrant regular playing time, so the everyday OF should be Fisher, Polo, & Jimenez. High A is stacked, but Robert will miss the first month or so & Adolfo is DHing, so that leaves Rutherford, Basabe, & Call as your regulars & Booker as your 4th OF. Will be interesting to see what happens when Robert comes back and Gonzalez forces a promotion. My guess is we’ll see a chain reaction where Basabe & Call get pushed up to AA and Polo & eventually Jimenez get pushed up to AAA.

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Apr 4, 2018 -> 11:39 AM) They are coming along, the farm system is deeper than it has been in nearly 30 years which holds some of the guys back that would be making it into full season ball in years prior. Nunez and Reyes have upside at GF and there are a litany of guys on the AZL roster that have a fairly good ceiling. They did well identifying Tatis, who is now a top ten prospect and Adolfo is starting to click and he took the lions share of the Sox pool in the year he was signed. The problem with LatAm talent is that it is so volatile, players that sign for millions of dollars don't make it through AA, and players that sign for $30K can end up as all-stars. I think patience is warranted on that end as some of those guys will still have a chance to shoot up the charts and make an impact in the next few years. I don’t disagree with you from a conceptual standpoint, but our guys are burning out in rookie ball. Look at the every other organization and tell me how many only have three LatAm signings in their top 30? I get we identified Tatis, but we should still see a handful of guys each year hitting full season ball. If those guys burn out in A ball like Johan Cruz, Antonio Rodriguez, & Luis Martinez I’d actually consider that to be progress. But guys like Amado Nunez can’t get over the Great Falls hump and that’s a real issue. At some point we should just get lucky and see a few guys come out of nowhere & make the jump to Kannapolis as it’s simply a numbers game and for the most part we’ve fairly active in recent years. Maybe these past couple signing classes are a sign of things to come, but right now I view our LatAm program under Paddy being a pretty big failure.

Also, the lack of LatAm talent hitting full season ball is really discouraging. Carlos Perez is the only prospect of note on Kannapolis’ roster and he’s pretty fringey IMO. I know a lot people here give Paddy the benefit of the doubt given what he started with, but I find these results to be unacceptable. Whether it’s a scouting or development problem is up for debate, but all our LatAm signings shouldn’t be burning out in rookie ball. Something has to change here or we’re going to go back to a bottom 10 farm system as soon as our top guys graduate.

Looks like the rosters have finally been set: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2P...amp;single=true No real surprises for Kannapolis. Was hoping there would be at least one younger positional to crack full season ball.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 09:52 PM) I'm still looking for this reputed excess pitching depth. The rotation has 2 starters. 3 needed. Okay, I'll add Rodon - 2 needed. The bullpen has one keeper, Jones, who will likely be traded; and perhaps Bummer. The rest are stiffs. 7 needed. That's a total of 9 pitchers needed. Okay, I'll add Fulmer to the pen (kind of a compromise) and that's 8 needed Total of leaving absolutely no depth. Using a prospect wash-out rate of 50% (which is really way too low), that means 16 pitchers are needed just to get to 5 and 8 (in contrast, the Astros have 8 starters). In a best-case scenario, the Sox need 16 legitimate pitching prospects. Oh sure there is free agency (crapshoot) fo a spot or two. And they could trade (the Sox record on trading FOR veterans, is, to be kind, less than exemplary). Stockpile the pitching. Giolito Lopez Rodon Fulmer Bummer Kopech Burdi Hansen Dunning Cease Stephens Adams Guerrero Puckett Clarkin Flores Vieira Burr Hamilton Pinto Frye McClure Henzman Johnson That’s a pretty good amount of pitching depth. And given we have like $10M in payroll commitments next year we can definitely splurge to fill some holes.

The pen certainly didn’t keep us in this game.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 09:03 PM) Not to mention Moncada is already one of the best defensive 2B in the game. A .750 OPS to go with that is a very valuable player- and that number will most likely go up throughout his career Moncada’s floor is probably a 2.5 WAR player. That would be with basically no improvement. His ceiling is a 6 to 7 WAR player. If I had to guess, I’d wager he ends up much closer to his ceiling than floor. It will take time though.

QUOTE (StrykerSox @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:51 PM) And where did you get 100 extra OPS? Is he gonna hit 20 more home runs than I gave him? Remember, I was generous on his BABIP, so .740 is lucky. Not likely. The only path to serious success lies in cutting down strikeouts. It seems like he strikes out looking a lot, so maybe that’s a positive sign, but if it doesn’t get better somehow, he’s not going to be worth what we gave up. Better somehow? He’s 22 years old and has one of the loudest set of tools in Major League Baseball. He’ll most definitely get better, the only question is how much. It almost seems like you’ve never this guy actually play.

YOLMER BOMB!!

Davidson with a hell of a game. 0-4, 2 K, 1 DP, & 5 LOB. And this isn’t just normal game thread b****ing, I simply don’t believe he magically became a good hitter overnight. One 3 HR isn’t going to change my opinion.

A walk and then a Timmy slam would be nice.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:32 PM) This 1-2-3 has a chance to be very special Imagine if Jimenez were up right now

Wow, thank god that popped out!

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:25 PM) Moncada raising that OBP. Now let's raise that SB total. If Axford can?€™t hit the strike zone, maybe now is not the time.

Dreaded leadoff walk for the Jays.

Gotta get one this inning.

QUOTE (StrykerSox @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:14 PM) The typical unsubstantiated tripe from you. I don’t take you too seriously at all, but if you’re capable of it, I’d love to hear your reasoning as to why we shouldn’t be concerned that we traded one of the best players/contracts in baseball for a guy who could K 200 times in a season. Because I don’t judge a player simply on their strikeout rate and I also assume that young players will get better with experience. Dude put up a 104 wRC+ in his rookie season despite a 32% K rate. As that K rate cuts down and the power plays up, the kid is going to be a beast offensively and has all the tools to be a stud defensively. He’s 22 year old for Christ sake and I’d argue he’s already an above average 2B. We must be watching two completely different players, because if you can’t see the star potential in this kid I don’t know what to tell you.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:10 PM) Could be, but they gave him almost $5 million. It seems they are hoping for a little more than that. Honestly, I think it comes back to his presence in the clubhouse. I think they knew he was good with the kids and isn’t going to make a stink if he’s ultimately pushed out of the rotation. We can afford to eat a $4M salary when the time comes. If they were hoping for more, they would have signed one of the starters that got a $10M deal as they could have easily afforded it.

This is still a winnable game if the pen can hold them.

QUOTE (Tony @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:06 PM) Man if Tim can put it together this year, things look a lot brighter. I think people oftentimes forget he’s only 24 and is tooled the f*** up. The complete lack of walks will always limit his ceiling, but he can be an above average SS and given we control him through 2024 at reasonable rates that is incredibly valuable. He’s most definitely a key cog for the rebuild.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:03 PM) Anderson is a really fantastic base stealer And they should let him run wild. Speed is too important to his game.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:01 PM) Yes, even if some sort of miracle occurs and he is pretty average, it isn’t like he is going to bring back a very interesting prospect on a flip. I think they simply wanted a veteran influence in the clubhouse who could eat some innings until Kopech or another prospect was ready. I don’t think they have any expectations he’ll develop trade value or at least I hope not.

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Apr 3, 2018 -> 08:01 PM) Hey! A stolen base! Make that two!

If Anderson keeps this crazy HR pace up he’ll have a shot at a 30/30 season.

If Gavin Sheets is on Kannapolis’ roster, someone should let the Dash know as him starting the season in Winston Salem is currently the headline on their website.