Chicago White Sox

We should not be panicking on a young player for “shitting the bed for a month”…that’s called development

You have clearly never seen Baldwin play once in your life

We are not talking about the same players. The minor leaguers have gained a full year of experience and some of them have even take some initial lumps in the majors. There are simply more quality, major league ready options now at 3B & 2B than there were last year. Additionally, Meidroth was acquired after putting up a 131 wRC+ in a full season at AAA and Vargas was acquired as our key deadline piece who has already dominated the minors. These guys and a couple others need to actually play so we can start assessing if they will be viable pieces for the future or if we need to find other solutions at those spots.

MLBTR was projecting $4.3M for Rojas, so assuming it will be for more than you’re thinking. Regardless, relievers are volatile. Plenty of guys with past success have a bad season or were injured and have to take a prove it deal. Go look at last offseason and there are plenty examples right in that price range.

Fully disagree on Baldwin. Dude has a plus hit tool, plus speed, some power, and is a very smart, fundamentally sound, and versatile defender. To say he’s not much of a prospect is laughable. The only reason you’re not seeing him on prospect lists is he flew through the upper minors last year, made the majors, and quickly lost his eligibility. Does he have a superstar ceiling? No, but he’s a dude with enough ability to be an above average regular if all goes right. Also, how long do you expect this rebuild to take? When can we can start trying to develop some positional players? Do we have to wait until Schultz, Smith, & Taylor are fully developed since those are our three high ceiling arms? Right now, we literally have zero established building blocks on this offense if you assume Robert will eventually be traded. At some point, we have to actually commit to playing the young bats. Last year we gave a ton of mediocre vets to buy some time until the younger players were ready, but we are now past that point IMO.

Having plenty of at-bats “post trade deadline” doesn’t make sense when there are multiple young players ready now. And 200 plate appearances is simply not enough playing time to make a meaningful evaluation on a young player.

Lol…you are guessing too. The only difference is I’m actually considering where he’s played at in recent years to make an educated guess and you are just going with what’s easiest to justify the move and play devil’s advocate. I don’t think he’s a bad player, but I wouldn’t be signing a guy who takes away playing time from the only few positional areas we actually have some internal options. And Brooks Baldwin is a very legitimate prospect who shot through the system last year. No idea where you came up with that notion, but he’s a dude worthy of a ton of playing time next year.

I don’t think they’re planing to use him at SS though. Seems like he’s getting one of 3B or 2B.

Maybe…I’m just concerned they won’t use him in that capacity. I’d also rather use our limited budget on a free agent reliever who might be able to close. I think there is more flip upside with that type of player vs. utility guy.

We have two of the top catching prospects in all of baseball likely starting next season at AAA. Lee’s hold on the starting catcher job will be short lived, but you might as well use that playing time in interim on him.

Meidroth too. He just put up a 132 wRC+ over a full season in AAA.

Rojas is not really a SS though. If you play him at 2B, you are blocking one of Sosa, Baldwin, or Meidroth. At 3B, he’s blocking Vargas, Ramos, & Sosa. Those are the only spots we have multiple young options that actually need playing time. Those five dudes are going to lose a lot of at-bats due to this signing. And I’m not trying to be a hater either. I didn’t dislike the Tauchman / Slater additions as none of Fletcher, DeLoach, or Colas have done enough in AAA to be handed an opportunity. That’s not the case with several of the guys mentioned above.

It’s absolutely wild. The only spot we have multiple prospects at is 2B & 3B and we just blocked them all. No fucking clue what we are doing here.

Lot of rumors out there regarding Ben Johnson, but not sure how legitimate they are. It sounds like he wants the Bears job, but may push for a different GM to be paired with him (WAS Assistant GM). At the same time, Poles would like to stay clear of him for the same reasons. Again, not sure if there is any merit, but if so, I’d quickly kick Poles to the curb and let Johnson do his thing. Just got a bad feeling that Poles will be allowed to make the call and he’ll bring in a defensive minded “leader of men” type like Flores and f*** this all up.

Earn it how though? By having a good spring training? Those numbers are mostly meaningless from a predictive sense. If it’s based on AAA numbers, he deserves the first shot because no else has the track record there that he does. Ultimately, we are coming off a 121 loss season and can’t really pass on giving an extended look to a former top 50 prospect. 157 plate appearances after a mid season trade from the eventual World Series winner to the worst team in baseball history is simply not a large enough sample size.

I think that Feels like “and” would make more sense than “not” given the rest of the tweet, but obviously I wouldn’t put money on us still being in the mix

This kind of reminds me when Hahn kept trading international bonus slot to other teams for minor league relief prospects. Hopefully this “acquire all the unproven LH relievers in the 30’s that are a tweak away from real trade value” strategy works out better because this one in particular doesn’t make sense to me.

The key difference is he has no options left, so you pretty much need to give him an extended look before deciding whether to cut bait. And unlike some of the others in the mix for playing time, he has dominated AAA and wouldn’t really benefit from more minor league seasoning regardless. That doesn’t change the fact he legit looked terrible last year, but he’s got enough pedigree to give him another three months IMO.

Not a single person in the world has called his RF defense terrible…like no idea where you came up with that notion

Based on his time with the Dodgers or simply due to a lack of tools or skill? Regarding 3B, my thinking is Ramos should start the season in AAA. He did not have a great 2024 at any level and he’s still very young. Let him get a bit more seasoning and arrive sometime in May or June if all goes well. I know most of the big publications have knocked him down into the teens, but he’s still my 5th highest rated positional prospect in the system (above Wolkow, Bonemer, etc) and I truly believe he has a great shot to become our everyday 3B. As for Sosa, I want him to compete against Baldwin & Meidroth for the middle infield jobs. I have no problem with him rotating in at 3B too, but I think he should get the bulk of playing at 2B. I get he was bad there last year for us, but I don’t recall him being a bad defender in the minors when I’ve watched him play (even at SS) and scouting reports have always highlighted him as a solid defender. I do think he profiles best at 2B from a tools standpoint though.

Couple of things worth highlighting here. Fletcher will turn 28 before the end of next season. He’s a really short dude who is more or less physically maxed out. Despite not being fast, he does get good reads and he has a plus arm as well. He is a legit quality defensive RF, but the lack of speed hurts in CF and he simply isn’t as good making plays out there. Not sure if that would change with more reps in CF, but the lack of speed will certainly cap his abilities there. My big beef with Fletcher is a lack of bat speed and power. This dude actually had a really high LA sweet spot rate and squared up on balls fairly well, but did little damage because he’s so small and his bat was so slow. If he had more speed and high end contact skills, maybe there could be swing changes to make him more useful, but that’s not really who he is. I think with more experience the chase rate might improve, but an improved walk rate can’t overcome his other limitations. IMO, he has a 4th OF ceiling and that requires him to be able to play a decent CF and make significant strides with the bat. Vargas is far more interesting to me and more worthy of playing time. His best single trait is his elite plate discipline. As bad as he was last year, his chase rate was in the top 10% of major leaguers and had a double digit BB rate. He’s also been regarded a being plus plus hitter in the minors, although that didn’t really show up last year when I watched him or based on his Statcast metrics which reflect a slow bat and poor quality of contact. Honestly, I was a bit surprised at how bad Vargas looked given his minor league reputation as a hitter. I believe Getz mentioned that Miguel lost some strength during the 2H of last year, so hopefully there is some explanation here for why a 65 grade looked so bad beyond just swing & approach related things. And while he doesn’t have great power, he’s got a bigger frame and doesn’t seem completely maxed out yet. No doubt Vargas is a wild card, but I can squint and see the outline of a useful major league hitter. Where he plays I have no idea though. What’s fascinating is he’s actually really fast and has plus arm strength. Unfortunately, he seems to lack in all key skill areas and simply isn’t a good defensive player anywhere at the moment. Could he possibly get to average at a non 1B position? Maybe, but that’s harder to imagine than the bat turning around IMO. However, I’m willing to wait and see how the bat comes along and endure the defense for the time being. To me, the plan should be to stick him at 3B for three months and focus on that spot. If the bat comes alive but he’s struggling at 3B, then try him in LF. I would avoid moving him to 1B or DH unless all other options fail.

Which is why you add some NRI’s to spring training. Again, at some point the 40 man roster is filled up. Shewmake is the only guy who is a clear cut to me, but he’s just holding that spot for Meidroth or Montgomery. The handful of fringe relievers on the 40 man at least have options and are likely placeholders for other pitchers in the system who will eventually need to be added. As bad as this team will be next year, the 40 man should be mostly filled by the halfway point of the season. The obvious fat is finally starting to dwindle.

Who are people bouncing from the major league bullpen to sign another long-man to a major league deal? This is simply a math problem at this point. IMO, we have seven dudes who should have OD bullpen roles in Anderson, Ellard, Berroa, Wilson, Varland, Booser, & Smith. Shane is the defacto long-man to start because he’s the only one who has to be the major league roster. That leaves one spot open and if you want a second long-man go with Schuster. And beyond that, you still have veteran arms like Scholtens & Dunn at AAA. By all means some another AAAA type to a minor league deal, but I don’t think we should give a long reliever a guaranteed deel. I’d rather commit a 26 man roster spot to a guy who can slot into the closer role that might be able to extract some value at the deadline.