Chicago White Sox

100% agree that Rick or KW can’t be afforded to make those trades. And I fully agree that trading Robert would both suck and be a huge risk, but the question will be whether you can win with him in the near-term and if a godfather package can be attained.

I don’t think we have a choice on Cease because we‘re going to lose him before we can put a competitive roster again. I don’t disagree with your general view on Robert, but at a bare minimum we got to explore what someone would be willing to give up for him. Perhaps it won’t be enough to Balta’s point, but with his years of control he might be able to land a transformational package. If not, he’s a hold for now, but I truly believe 2024 & 2025 are going to be super ugly given the the complete lack of pitching in the upper levels.

I literally used the word “some”…?‍♂️

TBH, I think we have to trade Cease in the off-season and potentially Robert as well. Otherwise, I think we’re going to see a lot 3rd place AL Central finishes for the foreseeable future, which is both super embarrassing and fulfilling to me at all. Scorched-earth rebuild is likely needed and Cease / Robert are the only two who can really move the needle. It sucks obviously, but so does being mired in mediocrity while in the worst division in professional sports.

My point is 1B is an easy position to platoon, so restricting your comparison to everyday guys ignores some left-handed 1B who get the bulk of the at-bats and provide more value in tandem than Andrew does alone.

And look at the minor league reinforcements? It’s slim pickings at the top of the system. I don’t see any reasonable path of competing before 2026 and a ton needs to go right for that to happen. And every day that we pretend we are somehow a contender is another day competing is further delayed.

Is this based on qualified 1B? Adjust the PA requirement down and he quickly falls down these lists. And even further when adjusting for ballpark factor.

Probably unlikely, but to me it’s a no-brainer. Right now, we have three years left of control with Vaughn after this season. With how he’s hitting right now, he’s basically a one win 1B. Personally, I think a month in AAA might allow him to work on some adjustments without pressure to actually produce. And adding a 4th season of control buys us another season of development and greatly increases his chances of providing value to us in some way shape or form.

I think we need to rebuild. The offense has proven it is incredibly flawed and I don’t see enough improvement being possible to change our outlook.

To build off this, does anyone see a path to competing in 2024? How do you put together a competent pitching staff, add a starting catcher, and fix the general shittiness of the offense in one offseason? Even with a new GM, that’s too tall of a task to address. IMO, this is the last season of the competitive window and that’s using the term very loosely.

I wouldn’t just move Tim to move him, which probably makes the whole concept unlikely but I’d at least explore his value this deadline. Regarding Elvis, I just don’t see a reason to keep him. Give Sosa & Romy all that playing time and see what you have. Andrus has been terrible offensively as many of us were expecting. As for Santos, I 100% agree on selling high on relievers, but I also don’t think you trade a young controllable reliever like him at the deadline (don’t think you’ll recoup full value). If he can be the closer over the second, he could be a piece we’re able to sell for something very useful and hopefully it’s a new GM making that deal.

Might not look great optically, but the thought process is Vaughn needs to work on stuff in the minors without added pressure whereas Sheets gets one final shot in majors to show what he’s got (including his ability to play 1B) before we have harder conversations about his place on the roster.

Outside of Anderson, who do you have a problem with? Lynn? I think we’d all be excited to get out of the Graveman contract.

That’s true, but the control issue still remains. The pitching staff is literally a house of cards and is gong to collapse by next year. If Anderson was playing at a superstar level and Eloy was putting up a +130 wRC+ I could see a case to roll the dice, but nearly everyone is underperforming or hurt. Just feels like there is something substantially broken in the clubhouse and I don’t see if working itself out this year with Grifol at helm. Given that it sounds like it will be a seller’s market, especially for pitching, we should go hog wild and sell everything with limited control that we can.

In terms of actions, here’s what I’d like to see happen immediately: Trade all rental-ish type players: Gioltio, Lynn, Clevinger, Graveman, Kelly, Lopez, Middleton, & Grandal Seriously explore a Tim Anderson trade and see if you can get 75% on the dollar (probably unlikely, but worth looking into) Release Andrus and give Sosa or Romy the 2B job the rest of the way DL Moncada for an extended period of time and let Burger handle 3B Demote Vaughn to Charlotte temporarily (have him focus on elevating the ball while clawing back a year of control) and let Eloy / Sheets cover 1B/DH Call up Colas and let him play RF the rest of the way even if he struggles Make Santos the closer and see if we can turn into a valuable asset Call up any arms with a pulse and be prepared for routine blowouts After the trade deadline, fire Rick Hahn (I’d do now if possible) and make KW interim GM for a couple of months. Pursue a GM from a quality organization in the off-season and offer him a President of Baseball Ops title. Mike Chernoff would be my top target. Once a replacement is had, force KW to resign and then clean fucking house. Getz, Haber, KW Jr. etc should all go (Paddy can stay for now). Grifol and his entire coaching staff should also go. Start afresh with a new GM and manager selected by the new front office. Immediately start modernizing the scouting, player development, and conditioning functions. Don’t rush things by drafting high floor college players. Let this thing bottom out and hope you can string together several drafts of high ceiling talent. Build this organization the right way from the bottom up and hope the end product is a team can regularly dominate the worst division in major sports. This is really not that hard if we are willing to go external and do things the right way.

As the title suggests, it’s officially time to blow this team the f*** up. This group of players is an absolute joke and even if we somehow lucked our way into the playoffs (which won’t happen) this team would be as dangerous as a butter knife come October. In terms of production, our positional group is 28th in fWAR sitting at a cool 3.3. If you take out our superstar CF (3.3), our slap happy LF (0.8), and a 27 year old rookie DH (0.8), we’d have -1.6 fWAR. That’s fucking incredible. Tim Anderson has gone from being a legit superstar SS to one of the worst regulars in baseball. Dude is now 30 and 1 1/2 years from free agency with what appears to be serious personal issues to boot. Beyond that, the roster is filled with DHs who have stagnated or regressed offensively. Eloy has gone from a 144 wRC+ in 2022 to a 99 in 2023. The coaching staff can’t seem to figure how to get Vaughn above a 110ish level wRC+ despite him having the talent for more. Sheets has gotten 184 PAs and is putting up a 94 wRC+ while continuing to factor into the RF mix. After that you simply have a group old (Grandal), bad (Zavala), old/bad (Andrus), or chronically injured players (Moncada). 2B & RF continue to problem areas for us and this off-season we will enter no viable catching options. To say things are bleak is a massive fucking understatement. The pitching staff has been better, but is still below average (22nd in fWAR at 5.8) and is filled with veterans with minimal control. Giolito (1.7) & Clevinger (0.7) are both free agents after the year and Lynn (0.8) only has a $19M team option remaining. What is even more problematic though is that Cease & Kopech are only controllable through 2025. The former is now represented by Boras, which means he is as good as gone the day he hits free agency. The ladder has been a massive disappointment and not even worthy of a potential extension at this point. Behind them we have absolutely nothing at AAA because Hahn has done such a bang up job creating a pipeline of talent. As for the bullpen, it’s pretty much Santos and a bunch of aging veterans. As should be painfully obvious to all of us, this pitching staff is going to be a disaster as soon as next year whether we sell at the deadline or not. Unfortunately, the reality is we’re going to need to rebuild and it’s going to be a long one given how bad Rick has done at building a minor league system. Again, it’s time to blow this team the f*** up and start from scratch. Specific actions I’d like to see taken will be in a follow-up post.

Gotta disagree here. Contracts were backloaded because otherwise they couldn’t fit those pieces in the 2023 payroll structure. Hahn fully expected to win this year.

Especially when they stated they wanted an experienced manager from a winning organization before hiring Grifol.

Rick Hahn has proven time & time again he doesn’t know how to build a quality baseball organization. For the bulk of his tenure, minor leaguers either had to learn on their own and/or had different voices at different levels teaching them different things. There was no common philosophy from top to bottom. So it should not be surprising that guys come up underdeveloped and do not reflect the characteristics of some sort of central vision of how win at baseball. Jerry is a complete joke when it comes to signing premium free agents and maintaining a culture of accountability, but Hahn is an incompetent baseball executive who has shown that the rest of modern baseball is well ahead of him strategically.

Sell anything and everything with less than two years of control. It truly sucks that Hahn is the guy who will have to do the trading, but it’s better than praying we somehow make the playoffs and magically get hot come October. This team is simply too flawed offensively and lacks any real pitching depth for that to happen IMO. And that really sucks because this s%*# division is trying to gift us a playoff spot.

Zero chance the Sox move out of Chicago. The only question that matters at this time is when will the Reign of Rick Hahn end. Dude may have the worst resume of any major league sports GM with 10+ years of experience. I 100% get that Jerry is the root of the problem, but if they hired a qualified candidate from outside the organization (think Mike Chernoff), there would at least be some reason for hope.

Were any other MLB beat writers laid off or are we so much of a joke that we can’t be afforded one despite being in the third largest market?

I cancelled. This season has been tough to stomach, but I barely follow anything but Fegan’s coverage. Dude is the best in the business and if the Athletic doesn’t want to keep him then I don’t see a reason to keep paying them despite quality Bears coverage.

What was your favorite part of the Alberto era? Mine had to be that monster May we just had. Too bad he won’t be a part of our upcoming jumbo June though ?

Sell him if you can get 90 cents on the dollar. Otherwise hold and pray he rebuilds some value. Truly sad that most of the few interesting pieces we have are playing below expectations.