Eminor3rd

He's 2-4 years away.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jun 2, 2017 -> 10:05 AM) Tim Dierkes‏ @mlbtrwhitesox 12h12 hours ago Slow Start From Quintana May Not Hurt Trade Value Much http://dlvr.it/PJ5Q5Y #whitesox #mlb Perhaps this is why: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/jose-quinta...un-suppression/

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jun 1, 2017 -> 02:48 PM) Did you watch the game? They didn't exactly crush him. I don't know if they want him or not, but the dinks they hit off him wouldn't exactly scare them off. Yeah that was an extremely frustrating sequence of hits to watch.

QUOTE (bmags @ May 31, 2017 -> 01:28 PM) I don't know if this is true. How many low power guys become high power guys? How many slow guys become fast guys? Weak arm guys become strong arm? Seems reductive, but I'd bet hit tool actually develops better than those. Fielding I'd say is probably the most likely to improve, as we hear players are just not getting the reps in prep. What's more likely, is can you afford to be really bad in an any one area and still be anything more than a role player/spot starter? Of those that are still really good, I'd bet they are great at speed and fielding. Or, they have a great hit tool/power, but you have to put them at DH. I think a question is whether a guy with 50s across the board and 55 speed is more likely to blossom into a star than a guy with a 40 hit tool hitting enough to make his other skills worth it and be a star. Maybe if we draft Logan Warmouth we are definitely getting a Major League infielder. Or maybe we'd just be getting a Brett Lawrie slashline and are constantly hoping for a star in their place. I wouldn't describe those you listed as "fixable flaws." However, I agree that maybe the better way to frame it is "if you have one awful tool, which is the one that hurts the most?" And I'd say it's hit tool.

You keep playing him, IMO. At the deadline, you simply move him for the best offer you receive, even if it's disappointing. There is plenty of time after the deadline for Davidson to get everyday ABs.

Of all the "fixable" flaws for prospects to have entering their pro careers, it sure seems like "making contact" comes with the highest bust rate. I don't know if that's actually true overall, but it definitely seems to be in our organization.

It's impossible to have a legitimate opinion on whether or not to trade Quintana without knowing the offers on the table -- both during this past offseason and during the coming trade deadline season. That said, we DO need more prospects. We have a lot of good ones now, but not nearly enough to account for attrition. As much I love Quintana, we're not to the point where we can start looking at current stars and realistically expecting them to be stars for our next contender. We very much still need to be in asset collection mode if we're going to do this the right way.

Stay the course

I think Sale will most likely slay us, as he appears to be in the midst of a peak season -- but I'm hoping he gets himself worked up and overthrows and starts walking guys. Of the two, I trust Quintana to stay calm under pressure more, though whether or not the difference will be enough to overcome Sale's raw power remains to be seen. This will be fun one, in that it's a win to root for in a year when most wins don't matter. And our homestand ends on Monday, so I'm actually going to be able to watch the whole game live. I'm excited.

For me, it's the same as always. I want them to win every game I'm watching. It's just easier to shrug off the losses and harder to get excited for the win streaks. Pay more attention to the minor leagues. You can watch all the games now via milb.tv if you want. I'm biased because I work in the minors -- but the games at the full season level are just as exciting. The crowd is smaller but typically more engaged. The world doesn't care about their championships, but the players absolutely do.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ May 27, 2017 -> 12:09 PM) Wile e coyote, heroes, you are so clever. Keep on professing, professor Straight battle rap going on here.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 23, 2017 -> 04:47 PM) His Luis Robert scouting report has jack-all to do with the White Sox, same with Chris Sale, he's a hard-headed, highly opinionated ex-scout with a large platform.

QUOTE (bmags @ May 25, 2017 -> 12:57 PM) I really really really want to want Kendall, but in the future sox forum we found an article on strikeout rates in college and success correlationa nd he was in the tier beyond mark reynolds. I just don't know if he can do it. I'm with you.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 24, 2017 -> 09:40 AM) I'm glad you say it's an issue as you are a great writer. I just am amazed and shocked when people discuss pitchers for the Hall and bring up wins still. I think it's just that there's never a clean cut-off of power in these things. The current crop of voters is pretty divided on a lot of things, which leads to no one getting in.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 24, 2017 -> 10:22 AM) WINS MEAN NOTHING I've been told over and over. So how can you say this? Wins shouldn't be in the discussion. And yet wins have been THE major argument for or against a pitcher's going to the Hall. "He had (fill in the blank) 20-win seasons." "He won 25 games one year." My point is no pitchers will be getting in the Hall ever again except relievers because saves still mean something to the Sabes people. You continually seem to be confused about who is making the decisions you rail against. You are correct that this is an issue, but the source is very clear. "The sabes" that told you that wins are meaningless are not the ones keeping pitchers out of the HOF for having few wins. Every year, all of the most prominent "sabes" rally to get Mike Mussina, Curt Schilling, etc. into the HOF unsuccessfully.

QUOTE (ptatc @ May 24, 2017 -> 10:09 AM) Which all leads to wins. Looking at total wins will give you a good idea of all of those in combination without looking at the individual parts. Wins show more of the combination of all of those work to together to show effective the pitcher has been. This is in contrast to how good he was individually. Take a guy like Nolan Ryan. He had a great number of K but also a great number of BB. He couldn't win game for the life of him. His average year was 14-12. Now as a GM a guy who is trying to win games to win a world series. How do you judge a pitcher who can never seem to win? Will all of his K and some dominant games be worth it to help the team win? This is where wins can help judge his overall effectiveness. Again ti's not the only thing to look at and the value has decreased over time due to starters usage but it does have it's place. The problem isn't the idea that a win is the ultimate goal, it's that the starting pitcher has LESS THAN HALF of the actual control over whether or not the win happens. It's simply not precise enough to be an effective measure of a pitcher's value. Thought exercise: A win is 50% run scoring (offense), 50% run prevention (defense). Given that, a pitcher has a maximum of 50% influence. But of that 50% influence that defense holds, the defenders in the field hold a significant portion. The pitcher undoubtedly holds MORE, so let's estimate that 40% of that 50% goes to the pitcher, and 10% goes to defenders. Given that, a pitcher has a maximum 40% influence. But of that 40% influence that pitching has on the win, a single pitcher only pitches part of the game. So far this year, the average innings thrown per start for SPs is 5.66, or about 63% of the total innings pitched. When we apply that to the pitchers 40% influence, a pitcher has a maximum of 25.2% influence on the win. So, on average, the starting pitcher of 2017 has an affect on ONE QUARTER of the outcome of the game. That's giving the pitcher 80% of the credit of all outs, and 20% to the defense, which I think is conservative. You can set your own values, but even if you give the pitcher credit for 100% of run prevention, that brings the ultimate number to 31.5%, or still less than a third. The pitcher is still the single most important influencer of a win, on average, but his influence is not even remotely close to the point where you could say that he controls the outcome. It's insane to judge a person by a measure of which he does not have control. And so we get more precise, by instead measuring the components of the win over which he DOES have control.

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/active-star...o-shot-at-hall/ It's an issue. The problem isn't which stats you decide are important, it's a complete denial of the fact that the game evolves and is really old and therefore norms for counting stats don't hold up over time. We can argue over whether or not wins are important all day -- but the reality is that pitcher usage has changed drastically to the point that wins can simply no longer be accumulated at nearly the same rate as they used to be. The way the game is played today, no pitcher will ever accumulate 300 wins, no matter how good they are, so 300 wins is a stupid way to judge a pitcher. Even if you like the win as a stat, the number 300 is simply not applicable in today's game. This is why so many arguments based on "traditionalism" are nonsense. It's not to say that your preferred aesthetic can't be to preserve tradition, but the world changes and many old ideas and memes just don't hold up, regardless of how you feel about them.

The way I see it, JR just spent $50m to buy you a prospect. I'm not going to complain if he dumps a couple no-names to recoup some of the cost.

I think Jose Abreu is a guy who has more value to us than he has to the rest of the league. First base production is actually way up this year league-wide (so far), and even a team with a big hole there will only pay so much for what is essentially average-ish production from the position. For us though, he's a really mature and likeable guy for the fans, he's a calming and popular leadership presence in the clubhouse, he's a role model and familiar face to our top Cuban prospects, and he's paid fairly. Certainly, if someone wants to overpay, we'd have to consider, but I'd plan on keeping him around for the duration, honestly. Avi, on the other hand -- if he keeps this up into trade season and someone is willing to pay for THIS YEAR'S production, we should ABSOLUTELY try to cash in. But I think that any acquiring team is going to look at the same numbers we are and will price the risk of regression into their offers. Ultimately, it'll probably make more sense to keep him around given what I'd expect the offers to be.

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ May 22, 2017 -> 05:39 PM) You should look at the update on my Avi thread from earlier. He's carrying the same APPROACH but his swing is much improved. His pulling more balls, lifting more balls into the air and overall he's making way better consistent contact on fastballs up in the zone -- something he struggled with mightily early in his career. Everybody knows you throw Jose Abreu junk down and away once you get ahead in the count: but you make a mistake a fastball or leave a breaking ball up and more often than not he'll cream it. He's not the most disciplined hitter but he sure can hit mistakes. Same thing applies to Avi this year. In previous years Avi didn't punish mistakes -- for whatever reason he couldn't catch up to fastballs in the zone and he was constantly either missing them entirely or hitting them into the dirt. Right, if he's gotten physically better and is able to consistently damage those pitches so much despite similar swing patterns, he's for real -- at least until the pitchers adjust. We just need to see way more of it to come to that conclusion.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 22, 2017 -> 04:07 PM) Would the Brewers trade Thames for Avi, and vice versa? Both essentially have three year deals, including 2017. $15 million/3 years is cheaper than we'll end up paying Avi if this continues. Thames is already 30 but LH. Which one is more likely to have "figured things out?" Already subject of PEDs rumors from the Cubs. The correct answer is absolutely Eric Thames. And the reason is because when you break down his results and approach, there is a pile of evidence that he has made substantial changes that have led to his success. Then you look at interviews, and everything he says corroborates those changes. Eric Thames attributes his Korean transformation to a highly intensive, highly studied, muscle-memory driven effort to improve his plate discipline. Tons of reading on theory about which pitches to hit. Tons of practice at pitch identification. Multiple years of practice in a league that, while inferior to the MLB in overall talent, is famous for the sheer amount of raw junk thrown by its pitchers. Then he comes over here, his O-Swing drops from ~36% to 20%, and he rakes. He's a completely different hitter, with much better results. By contrast, Avisail Garcia puts up 2,000 PA of sub-replacement level production that is caused almost entirely by his total inability to choose the correct pitches at which to swing. All his coaches know this and have presumably been telling him and working with him to change it. He comes out this year and swings at exactly the same amount of s*** pitches, but carries a .410 BABIP and and an Adam Dunn-ian 22% HR/FB rate, and he rakes. He's the exact same type of hitter that he's been his entire career, with much better results. Now again -- maybe he's changed something undetectable. Maybe, against all odds and biological precedent, his natural athleticism has increased into his mid-20's to the degree that his talent has overcome his approach. Maybe his physical conditioning has improved and put him over the edge. But if the question is who is more likely to have "figured it out," the answer is absolutely the guy who actually made noticeable and significant changes. And that's exactly why it's NOT the time to extend Avisail Garcia, because we need a way bigger pool of evidence to support a sudden increase in output that is entirely inexplicable. I swear I'm NOT rooting against him. I want him to turn out to be the exception to every rule. It's just not likely, and so I don't think it's a good bet for limited resources.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 21, 2017 -> 08:42 PM) The next question is going to be about cash flow, with the Robert deal. Obviously we're hoping to clear a lot of salary from July-September, but how much, for example, is JR willing to eat to get a Kieboom or Soto (assuming that Robles is completely unrealistic). If the suggestion is Soto and a secondary starting pitching prospect for Herrera (control through 2018) and Cain (FA), we're going to have to eat at least 1/3rd or 1/2 to make it feasible for the Nationals. Otherwise, they'll just go to cheaper options like Herrera, Hand, Tony Watson, etc. I wouldn't be shocked if we saw some salary-dumping, especially for guys who are underperforming by the deadline. I also imagine we'll see fewer rebound free agents next year. Robert was a big expense for an owner who has explicitly lobbied against paying amateurs tons of money for years. Good to know Hahn can talk JR into it, though.

Kieboom and Soto have both had a ton of helium since prospect list season. I'd be thrilled if we got either of them for any of our relievers -- no way we'd ever get both.

QUOTE (scs787 @ May 21, 2017 -> 07:42 PM) He's hitting fastballs for one. I honestly don't know how the stat is quantified or if its even worth looking at, but when looking at wFB Pitch Value there is a world of difference. Avi never had a positive rating in that category, this year he 7th in the league. One of the critiques has always been he can't catch up with the fastball, and thus far it appears that has changed. Good observation

QUOTE (iamshack @ May 21, 2017 -> 07:07 PM) Have you watched his PAs? Honestly only about a third of them. Much fewer than I'm used to, but I'm working full season ball now From what I've seen, he's been making noticeably better contact on the exact same pitches, and has had his share of lean-over and ducksnort into short right field hits as well. But I've missed a lot. QUOTE (Dick Allen @ May 21, 2017 -> 07:11 PM) It very well could be, but if a bad player can be this good for 40 games, he is worth keeping around. To me getting the ball in the air can make all the difference. his BABIP is due to come down, but his is usually pretty high. He isn't going to hit .350, and his walk rate never was Tim Anderson, but I am starting to think he isn't going to hit .255 with 15 homers like Fangraphs said he would even after his hot start. The more success he has, the more confident he gets, and he probably starts laying off more pitches, thinking he is good enough to take a strike or two. Maybe he falls apart. We have seen it before. I hope he makes it. He works hard, he plays hard. He didn't deserve the hatred thrown his way in the past. Most guys suck. It is a hard game. You look at JD Martinez. His walk rate his k rate didn't change much after he went to Detroit, but in Houston his numbers were a lot like Avi's, and they suddenly changed with more hits and power. maybe the same thing. I agree totally he's worth keeping around this year. I didn't when we were trying to compete the past couple, but in a rebuilding year with no one knocking down the door, sure. The upside remains tremendous, and now the waiting costs nothing. The thing with JD Martinez is that he was one of the first guys to actually declare that he was going to change his approach (from "hit it up the middle" to "f*** it I'm going to swing for the fences every time") and then actually have his changes corroborated by the Statcast stuff (increased launch angle, exit velocity, etc.). The ironic thing is that Avi actually seems like a REALLY GOOD candidate to do exactly that, in terms of his toolset. If he cools down and looks like the same old guy, I actually really hope they convince him to try it. He would have to finally lay off bad pitches, but imagine if he could unlock the raw power. Again, if he keeps doing what he's doing somehow, it's a moot point. If he really has somehow learned to focus on cleaner contact and can keep the EB% up, his numbers may actually be able to survive a 60-80 point BABIP drop and still leave him an average-to-slightly-above MLB regular.