Chicago White Sox

QUOTE (Hatchetman @ Jun 1, 2017 -> 07:34 AM) I'd settle for something between no hits and 8 hits in 4 innings. That may have simply been some bad luck. He didn't give up any HRs (he has given up a lot prior to his no-hitter), which may be a sign most of them weren't hard hit balls. From what I've seen, fastball command has been his issue, so seeing no walks and 2/3 of his pitches being thrown for strikes is a plus for me. He's got to learn to trust/repeat his mechanics first before I worry about anything else. And in that sense, controlling the strike zone and not giving up gopher balls when he falls behind is a promising start.

Also, it seems like he's been the victim of a short spring training due to the hand injury and some bad luck. Obviously he's going to sport a low BABIP no matter what but he should have a good 40 to 50 points of positive regression coming his way. And I think there is reason to be optimistic his HR numbers improve as well. On a positive note, his walk rate is up nearly 50% vs. PY and his defensive metrics have rebounded nicely. There's a potentially very useful player here for a contender, just need him to start demonstrating that ASAP.

I think you just got to hope Frazier goes on an extended hot streak between now and July 31st. With Quintana, Abreu, & Jones unlikely to be moved this season, we're running out of quality trade chips. Frazier isn't going to land a haul no matter what, but maybe he could land one nice piece if he gets hot over the next two months. There will be teams looking for 3B help and Frazier's value does extend beyond the field and into the clubhouse.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 31, 2017 -> 09:11 PM) ALL OF THIS WAS A DIRECT RESULT OF THAT STUPID BUNT THE INNING BEFORE...WHITE SOX GO AHEAD 2-0, the entire game changes in complexion. Blow the opportunity, you ALMOST always give up runs the next inning. This is not the NL. The AL teams just have way too much firepower to play small ball like it's 2005 the first two months. Starting to think the Cubs were right on Renteria....he's like Torborg/Manuel, good managers at working with youngsters but NOT the right man to lead them to the promised land. (But at least he played a major role in getting Luis Robert and will be around until the beginning of the 2019 season or halfway through that year.) Seems like quite the leap of faith there. The bunting sucks but otherwise I have no real complaints. The guys appear to be playing with much more swag/confidence under Renteria and we're not seeing the team wide slumps we've witnessed multiple times a year in the past.

Let's score some f***ing runs.

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ May 31, 2017 -> 08:47 PM) Rey through 6. 1 earned, 6 k's, 1 walk. He's done for the night, but great start for him. I honestly think he's ready for the show and he's now past his service date deadline. Hopefully we see him up in the coming weeks.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 31, 2017 -> 08:43 PM) Kopech continues to live up to his advanced billing. Trade is working for both teams. I guess Basabe's a bit disappointing, but we were never going to get two headliners and a third in Devers/Benintendi if Hahn waited on DD for 100 years. Basabe is super young for his league and made huge progress in the 2nd half of last year. I'm not overly concerned at this point. And honestly, when you get arguably the highest ceiling positional & pitching prospects in all of the minors as headliners, I'm ok with a toolsy OF and an interesting relief prospect as the secondary pieces.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 31, 2017 -> 08:41 PM) He'll be up at some point...at the very least, for whichever team (won't be BIRM) makes the playoffs...unless they think his overall innings are too high and want to shut him down at the end of August. Doubt they'd bring him up to Chicago, unless the White Sox were in first place despite trying not to be, but the likelihood of that happening is about 1%. At any rate, there will eventually be some openings in that Knights' rotation, but I have a sense they'll push guys like Guerrero/Cooper/Adams (just to see how they fare)...no hurry to move Kopech to Charlotte. OTOH, if the White Sox internally believe they have an opportunity to compete in 2019, we'll see him at some point in 2018 in order to help him get his feet wet and start learning at the big league level. With someone who throws that hard, you almost worry about "wasting" those innings in the minors, but it's a chance they're PROBABLY going to be willing to take for the good of contract/economic control. Kopech had something like 35 minor league starts coming into this season. He should stay at AA for most of the season. His number one developmental goal should be to build up innings. That's going to be a two year process and I don't see a huge reason to rush him to AAA at this point.

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ May 31, 2017 -> 08:32 PM) I really, really wish if Delmonico is staying in aaa that he'd get more reps in the outfield. Yeah, he's definitely not a 3B. LF is where they should be working him.

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ May 31, 2017 -> 08:24 PM) Kopech and Rey came to play. Two most important pitchers in the system, so great to see.

QUOTE (daa84 @ May 31, 2017 -> 07:34 PM) kopechs numbers are silly Is there is a starting pitching prospect in the minors with a higher ceiling?

QUOTE (Hatchetman @ May 31, 2017 -> 06:53 PM) I don't know how to respond to this. I guess I have higher aspirations. I get the dissapointment, but given how big of a mess Giolito has been this season you got to look for little victories. Again, I can't tell if those 7 hits were hit hard, but if they weren't this start at least represents some progress.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 31, 2017 -> 06:55 PM) I'll start by saying you and I often agree on much, and you are one of the more knowledgable posters here. That being said, I think you and others who are pushing this "true market value" narrative are putting WAY too much stock into this notion that trading human beings bilaterally in the offseason or during the non-waiver trade deadline are conditions for a well-functioning, efficient market from which to transact commodities. Cmon. This could hardly be a less-efficient market. There are all kind of constraints, a lack of information, GM's under enormous pressure, Owners vetoing deals that have actually been agreed to, payroll constraints, job tenures that don't align with rebuilding timelines, etc. While that doesn't mean fair deals cannot be made in this environment, this is not some incredibly well-functioning marketplace where one can look at transactions which did take place or did not take place and make rock-solid conclusions about value from them. It just isn't. I'll admit I'm only speculating based on publicly available information (which isn't much). And you're 100% correct there could have been other factors that constrained the market. But the one fact we do have is there was a limited supply of quality starting pitching available in free agency and a limited amount of teams that had a surplus to trade. The market should have been theoretically great. Again, maybe there were other factors that we're unaware of did hurt Quintana's market. We'll never really know. Regardless, if I were Hahn I guess I'd ask myself why I'd expect those constraints to suddenly go away and if a sudden change in supply of quality pitchers would more than offset them. Outside of perhaps banking on some trade deadline desperation, I don't see how Hahn could have realistically expected future markets to be better with any level of certainty.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 31, 2017 -> 07:04 PM) Man this thread got shook. Lol...I wish we could pin J4L's post for all of eternity.

While a stupid move, who gives a flying f*** about this?

QUOTE (Hatchetman @ May 31, 2017 -> 06:00 PM) This guy is a mess. ? I mean I get he only went 4 innings, but he gave up no walks and threw roughly 2/3 of his pitches for strikes. He also didn't give up any homeruns. Unless they were hard hits, I'd actually consider this a promising start all things considered.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 31, 2017 -> 12:36 PM) First of all, I was one of the largest proponents of acknowledging that risk, which is why I kept posting about the price increasing come the deadline as compared to this offseason. Secondly, some of the posters literally began their posts with "I hate that I was right about this." Umm, gloating. Irregardless of just how likely this kind of a dropoff was, I don't think it was anywhere near justifying taking a package that was significantly substandard just because you didn't want to carry the risk. Let me clarify, I personally wasn't trying to gloat and quite frankly it's too early for anyone to gloat. We have wait and see what kind of return he ultimately delivers before we officially say being patient was the right call or not. Right now it's not looking good, but that can easily change over time. I'll end my arguing after this one last point, but ultimately valuation is subjective. Every GM can look at an individual player and come up with a different value. However, in baseball terms, fair value is essentially what your peers would pay for your asset in an unconstrained market. So in this case, if Hahn's asking price was so far off from what all other GMs felt was fair, especially given the favorable market conditions, it screams to me that Rick did not value Quintana appropriately. Sure, it's possible all the other GMs are undervaluing Jose but is that likely? Not in this day & age where GMs are constantly looking for undervalued assets. Again, I know this is all speculation, but it's rooted in common sense. I have no reason to believe that Rick Hahn is the only guy who truly knows Jose Quintana's worth, so I can't automatically give him the benefit of the doubt that offers weren't sufficient. As I've said numerous times, if you can't get fair value in perfect market conditions, maybe you need to reassess what fair value actually is.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 31, 2017 -> 09:42 AM) Some of you guys are really frustrating. You aren't really suggesting a realistic course of action moving forward. Just gloating that impatience should have been rewarded now that Quintana has underperformed. I think Hahn deserves the benefit of the doubt, considering he actually had all the information, while the rest of us were the beneficiaries of leaks and other forms of inaccurate information, and that while by no means optimal, our current position is the position we find ourselves in. Rather than continue to gloat, what is the best path forward? Again, you're assuming that being patient was the right approach, but failing to acknowledge all the risk that came with holding Quintana into the season. This isn't about gloating, it's about questioning Hahn's decision & valuation approach. As for what to do, now we have to hold Quintana until the offseason and possibility into next season. There really isn't much of a choice. Hopefully he rebounds before the end of the season and makes his overall 2017 numbers look reasonable.

QUOTE (bmags @ May 31, 2017 -> 11:37 AM) Yeah, aside from injuries, he wasn't really showing any of his tools prior to this year. That his power is finally developing is a big step. He should spend year in Kanny though. Most definitely. I want to see his walk rate improve before I even consider a promotion to Winston Salem.

Adolfo still has a long way to go, but hitting his 15th double before June is promising.

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 31, 2017 -> 08:30 AM) So what are you arguing for? I'm arguing that many posters here didn't fully acknowledge the risk of holding onto Quintana. The idea of keeping him for "when we are good again" was lunacy from the get-go IMO. Coming into the season, if you believed we couldn't realistically compete over the course of the next three seasons, then Jose Quintana was effectively worth whatever you projected his 2020 WAR to be us. Let's say that's 4 WAR. For another team he could have effectively been worth 15 to 18 WAR over that same period. The opportunity cost of keeping him and not receiving value from another team for his 2017 to 2019 production would have always been tremendous. Whether Hahn received an acceptable offer during the offseason, we'll never know or be able to prove. The problem I have is fair value is typically defined as what the market bares (assuming no market constraints). And given how this was one of the worst markets for starting pitching in recent history, it's hard for me to believe that not a single team was willing to pony up and pay fair value. Therefore, I'm willing to speculate that Hahn may have over-valued Quintana or under-estimated the risk of holding. I said in the game thread last night, but if teams were skeptical of Quintana being a legit TOR starter before, this bad stretch where his elite command has gone to s*** isn't going to help matters.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ May 31, 2017 -> 07:38 AM) Keeping Quintana doesn't make any sense. They need the prospects that they will ultimately get in return for him. People keep talking about 2019 but the Sox don't have many long-term answers as far as position players go. Where are those guys coming from? They are banking on Moncada, Anderson, Robert, and Collins. What if a couple of them bust though? They need to keep adding. Quintana will need a new contract by the time the Sox are good again so I just don't think keeping him makes any sense and I also don't know how this team is playoff ready in 2019. Great post. The "worst case scenario we'll just keep him for when we're good" argument never made sense with Quintana. And what really sucks is out projected prospect haul at the deadline is greatly reduced. Robertson is the only guy who seems likely to land a top 100 prospect at this point. If Nate Jones can get healthy soon he could as well. The rest of our trade assets, Holland, Gonzalez, Swarzak, Frazier, & Melky, are going to land back-end org top 10 guys and lottery tickets. Obviously you take what you can for those guys, but it's not going to move the needle like a Quintana trade.

http://www.milb.com/scoreboard/index.jsp?c...mp;ymd=20170531

Frazier!

QUOTE (fathom @ May 30, 2017 -> 08:59 PM) Wtf This. So much this.