Chicago White Sox

It’s wild you linked to an article that provides very little info and then pull almost nothing from it and instead just throw out your own random thoughts. The only key takeaway from that article is that per Ken Rosenthal no teams had interest in Fairbanks at 1/$11M at the time of the non-tender. The Rays were not worried he “might get hurt or not perform” next year because they had no interest in retaining him and wanted to use the money on other needs. They could have theoretically picked up the option in hopes of his market improving later, but that was a risk they did not feel like taking given the lack of interest in him at the time. I’m still not sure what Matz has to do with anything here…seems pretty clear they chose to use their limited dollars on a LH swingman instead of Fairbanks based on need priority.

I believe we’re at $61M with a full 26 man roster of pre arb guys. However, let’s say we plan to add four more players (1B, OF, RP, SP), we’d also shave off $3M of salary out of that $61M. As such, I think you could say we have $32M to work with if you assume an exact $90M payroll. Theoretically this would be possible with that space: 1B: O’Hearn = $13.5M (2/$27M) OF: Bleday = $2.5M (1/$2.5M) RP: Fairbanks = $10M (2/$20M) SP: TBD FA = $6M

Interesting that Paez cracked Longhagen’s Top 100 list prior to the 2025 season but he fell off after a change in release point and injury.

I’d say ~$90M is what I’d expect.

Depends on the additions. A legit closer would provide far more value than their projected WAR given who they’re replacing. Regardless, the bulk of improvement needs to come from the young guys. I’m happy with smaller scale additions in FA this offseason to improve the floor and take some pressure off the kids.

Last year led to losses?

Getz listed off a pretty big laundry list of items including high leverage relief help, more SP depth, a LH bat at a corner IF spot, and possibly another corner OF. Throw in Kay and two Rule 5 picks and that would be quite a bit of activity. Likely small stakes financially, but could / should make the team better and more fun to watch.

They didn’t have a TV deal for a large chunk of last year, hard tot believe the payroll wouldn’t go up.

The org acquired and developed Crochet into a starter but decided to trade him for three positional prospects. The org acquired and developed Cease and then decided to trade him for a top 100 prospect in Thorpe who would have been part of our rotation if not for TJS. The org acquired and developed Lucas Giolito and then decided to trade him for top 3 org prospect in Ky Bush (and Quero) who would have likely been in the rotation mix if not for TJS. The org selected Mason Adams in the 13th round and turned him into a legitimate SP option for last year if not for TJS surgery. If you look at the data, the amount of TJS’s that impacted our org last year is a major outlier. If self-inflicted, then our front office has done something truly unprecedented and we should see another wave of injuries this year. Candidly, I think it was just bad luck just as the years & years of good fortune under Herm Schneider was partially good luck driven. I also don’t blame Getz for not having the budget to go out and sign veteran FAs better than Martin Perez (who also got injured, but admittedly also is old). At the end of the day, there is plenty to rip Getz for, but just don’t believe Shane Smith being our best SP last year is one of them. He is the dude whose front office went out and actually identified Smith as the best talent available in the Rule 5 draft and successfully turned him into a quality SP. If anything, the Brewers should be ridiculed for not protecting one of their best 26 players.

Unfortunately many here refuse to accept that Getz has made some structural improvements to the organization and that the fruits of those labors will not be seen overnight. As such, it’s easy to blame Getz for a lot of the shortcomings he inherited with the major league roster and focus on the bad. And don’t get me wrong, he’s certainly partly to blame for our PD failures but he also didn’t get to set the budgets and make the investments in data & technology needed to modernize his function. The reality is Smith & Vasil should be viewed as huge wins and early signs that the foundational work is starting to pay off.

I mean, they had a SP in Crochet that is leagues better than Smith, but we are rebuilding and traded him in the offseason to add multiple positional pieces. We also had three major league ready SP’s go down with TJS in spring training, which is super fluky and certainly hurt our SP depth to start the season.

Who are the undeniable options at 1B & DH?

Fully agree.

Which I find bizarre, but the point is Taylor isn’t going to go much beyond 100 innings this upcoming season and there is a way to do that in a primarily bullpen role.

Ryan O’Hearn at 2/$26M and Peter Fairbanks at 2/$20M aren’t “big money additions”…they are affordable short term stop gaps. Not one single poster here thinks they are going to sign a big free agent.

I don’t disagree with any of your main points, but I assume they plan to treat him like they did Vasil last year and he was able to throw 101 innings and only had 7 appearances beyond 3 innings. Again, the only hope I can cling to is the fact they don’t want to make him closer right now and want to build him up a a multi inning reliever instead.

I have seen that in a few spots over the past six months, but the most recent was in the BA Top Prospect rankings list where they project Grant Taylor to be our eventual #2 SP and Bill Mitchell (who does the rankings) said in the chat that he was told by White Sox sources that the plan is still to eventually move him back into the rotation. I don’t disagree with your notion it’s weird plan and one I’m skeptical of working, but for now I do believe this is some crazy Bannister idea that he believes is possible.

I do not think Colson is going to be wasted at 1B when at bare minimum he can play a capable SS and likely a plus 3B. Him and Roch will almost certainly be the left side of our infield come 2027. If Carlson’s bat develops then maybe he pushes one of those two elsewhere, but that probably doesn’t happen until 2029 at the earliest. Bonemer is the tougher one to figure out. He’s only played the left side of the infield so far in his minor league career, but I don’t see why he couldn’t handle 2B theoretically. The other option for Caleb would likely be LF, especially since we don’t have any significant OF prospects outside of Braden. Regardless, this group of positional prospects is very exciting now if you assume Roch is the dude at 1.1 next year.

They claim they aren’t keeping Taylor in the bullpen long-term and instead are just ramping him up as a multi-inning reliever this year. I personally don’t like the plan, especially since we are burning service time, but I also don’t think it automatically condemns him to a reliever role forever. If they felt he was a long-term reliever, they would almost certainly make his closer.

Per Courtney Finnegan, the Sox are very much open to signing Fairbanks to a two year deal. Whether they can agree to financial terms remaining to be seen, but it does sound like he has some interest in joining the Sox. Additionally, take all of this with a grain of salt, but she said she also heard that Dustin May is a fall-back option at closer. Clearly this is a spot the Sox are willing to invest some money into.

You are literally setting an arbitrary $15M signing threshold because Getz signed a player to that amount two years ago when we were cutting payroll. I think it’s very possible they will sign someone over $20M. I don’t see them going beyond two years to ensure they have as much flexibility heading into the 2028 offseason. But I do think they are making a run at O’Hearn as a short term stopgap at 1B and I’d wager that will cost something around 2/$26M. I think they have serious interest in Fairbanks and that will very likely cost more than $15M over two years. Whether they can actually convince two dudes in their 30’s to sign with a 60 win team is a different matter. I’m not going to guarantee that because most guys will prefer a contender, but I refuse to believe 15M is some insurmountable figure like you are doing in every thread. Let’s flip the script, what happens if they sign someone over $15M? Are you willing to sit out the rest off-season if Getz proves you wrong?

Where in the f*** do you come up with this nonsense?

I’m not optimistic about Montgomery in CF. Feels like he good be an above average RF with his athleticism and arm though.

All else equal, I’d be hard pressed to take a HS prospect over one of the best college SS prospects in years. The latter provides a high ceiling without a ton of projection & development, which is what makes the pick so valuable in the first place.

I view them as being similar (especially bat to ball skills) but different. Antonacci has more power potential, but is not nearly as selective (as Meidroth is a unicorn in that regard). Chase is definitely the superior defender. No guarantee either is the starting 2B come 2027, but I think it’s the most likely outcome at the moment.