Knackattack

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Dec 21, 2015 -> 11:35 AM) Maybe I'm misreading the stats and I'd also argue the stats aren't that great because sample sizes as a platoon player are tough, but given limited playing time and playing a variety positions, he had positive Dwar last year. That has fluctuated. Maybe I should have restated my comment by saying above average defense vs. Avi / Melky (which is what I was more implying). His defense though is statistically solid (based upon the limited Defensive Stats I'm looking at) but also statistically flawed given the sample size. Shuck definitely looked solid in RF to me last year. 1000 times better than Avi and his arm plays pretty decently there as well.

Whoever we sign needs to play RF to get Avi off the roster. Getting him out of RF and the line-up adds 1.1 WAR right off the bat...

If you can't sign one of the big guys, sign Parra and Fowler.

QUOTE (ChiSox59 @ Dec 18, 2015 -> 11:28 AM) Perhaps. I'd be fine giving Avi another chance, just in a limited role unless he earns more or in case of an injury. Think about...under current roster construction, after Avi and Shuck...next man up is Jerry Hairston or Jason Coats. Avi needs to be retained, but I'd be fine with him starting in AAA. I agree here, but Shuck was a pretty great 4th OF for us last year and the tools that made Garcia a top prospect are better off being honed at AAA playing every day rather than once or twice a week in the majors.

No Avi in RF! He shouldn't be on the team at all. Pretty sure he graded out as the 3rd or 4th worst player in baseball and he definitely passed the eye test for that. He looks like he needs at least 1-2 more years in AAA learning the strike zone and how to play defense.

Melky in LF can be stomached but Avi in RF absolutely cannot be. He has to go. It's 1 more year of Melk chugging around like a fool in LF, then he is DH for a season.

QUOTE (dpd9189 @ Dec 18, 2015 -> 10:44 AM) If they back load a deal for one of the UFA's, then odds are that contract won't have an opt out in it. If you look at Heyward's deal for the Cubs he's getting a major chunk of his $$$ in the first 3-4 years of the deal so if the Sox signed Upton let's say at 6/$120 mil with an opt out after 3 years, there's are real good chance he'd be getting over 50% of the contract in the first few years before the opt out which makes back loading a deal like that difficult. Well, that's where you gotta sign the guy and say we are going to be good and in playoff contention for the next 2-3 years. You offer him 10M in 2016, then 25M in both 2017/2018.

QUOTE (Hatchetman @ Dec 17, 2015 -> 12:52 PM) Sign Upton. Sign Austin Jackson. Move Eaton to left. Cabrera to DH. Eaton Melk Abreu Upton Frazier Lawrie Avila/Navarro Saladino Jackson Actually doesn't look that bad

White Sox: Got the player they wanted at a more than reasonable price. Win Dodgers: Traded 2 fringe prospects and a highly regarded IF prospect for 2 less fringey prospects and a well regarded, high upside & risk arm.. Even Reds: Got a Highly regarded IF prospect and 2 fringe prospects for best IF trade chip on the market.... Fleeced

QUOTE (knightni @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 01:04 PM) Gordon is limited to LF, though, correct? I'd rather have Upton with his RF arm and sheer power. Plus, he's younger than Cespedes. I mean he grades out really well in LF and he has a good arm.. I'm sure he could play RF well

QUOTE (shysocks @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 01:07 PM) I'm not missing the point at all. I extended the analogy to overpaying for two guys, and you said "Fine, do it." I want to spend on an outfielder too, but the point is that teams have a finite amount of money to spend despite the salary cap of $Infinity. Do you disagree, or is that not the point? The Dodgers had a 300M payroll. If a team wants to spend wildly they are free to do so. All he said was that if the owners wanted to go for a high cost, winning team, they could do it. You're looking way too far into this lol.. If you're going to field a winning team, you gotta spend the money on good players.

QUOTE (beautox @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 01:06 PM) I'm sad to see Trayce go. Having said that this is a good move. Sox need to sign a 3WAR OFer, If they do that they're sitting at about 36WAR as projected from steamer. That puts us in the thick of it for the wild card and the central, with a fair amount of upside in projections regarding Sale, Quintana and Eaton, with some additional upside in Lawrie & Saladino. Also some added excitement and being on a winning team might bring a little improvement from Mr. Abreu who quietly had a bit of a sophomore slump

QUOTE (shysocks @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 01:03 PM) LOL sure thing man. Let's sign EVERY free agent, what could possibly go wrong? Can't tell if you're trolling or you don't understand how money works. I think he is just getting at the fact that handing out a big money deal this offseason doesn't handcuff the team for years to come or force us to move some one first... Danks/LaRoche coming off the books next year is a huge boost

Gordon is a 20 homer/30-40 doubles guy.. don't know why we aren't regarding him as a power bat

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 12:04 PM) I feel like all the people bemoaning Trayce being traded didn't know who Trayce was or barely knew who he was before August. When Future Sox writers aren't trashing this deal, you can try to feel good about it. I was high on Trayce but the likelihood of him being played in the right positions by Ventura and the league taking time to adjust to him is much higher than all of his tools clicking at the same time just because he got to the bigs.

Adrian Beltre is one of the best defensive 3rd basemen in recent history and by far the best in the Majors. Longoria was a revelation and an incredibly elite player, offensively and defensively at 3rd. Either of these guys in their prime would have cost Rodon, Fulmer, Anderson and the rest of the farm. We acquired an above average offensive player at a position where that is a scarcity and the fact is that he is an above average defender there and we got him for a bunch of potential but zero certainty in the 3 players we lost. 4 months of Bryant UZR isn't enough to justify comparing Frazier to him since we all know the defensive metrics (that you used as well, Balta) take a few years of accumulated data to be held as reliable, and when that fact is brought up your counterarguement was that it has to be guys that are consitent for 4 years... I respect your views and your posts, but wouldn't you want a guy that has consistently posted UZR stats of the 5-9 range for the past 4 years? Sanchez put up a 4.4 and this whole board was claiming he was an elite defensive 2b...

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 11:16 AM) For the record, I like the trade. But just to keep something in mind, look at this list: Frankie Montas (TRADED) Micah Johnson (TRADED) Trayce Thompson (TRADED) Tyler Saladino (GRADUATED) Zack Erwin (TRADED) Myles Jaye (TRADED) Yency Almonte (TRADED) JB Wendelken (TRADED) Junior Guerra (CLAIM) Those are all prospects that were either in the summer Top 30, or were likely to become that in January (in Almonte's case), all of whom the team has lost in a few weeks. Just pointing out that, this Frazier deal was good, but in exchange the team has taken a pretty big bite out of the system. They kept the top two in Anderson and Fulmer, but beyond that, an already not-fantastic list is much thinner now. 3 top 50 picks should help. Even 2 in the top 50 to add a couple high upside players to Fulmer/Anderson should be helpful. Plus, how many of those guys were top 15 prospects? Not very often I would imagine a team cares about adding the 18th ranked prospect in a system... so these guys aren't a major loss, IMO.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 11:13 AM) The Cubs put up nearly 50 fWAR last year. The Royals put up 38.3. The Astros put up 44.6. The Indians put up 42.8. The White Sox put up 23.5. If the White Sox replaced Avi Garcia with a 4 win player, and they were already 6 WAR better than the end of the year using your numbers, they would still need a lot of people to step up their performance or to get really lucky to put a team on the field that is a division contender. And again, that's assuming somehow we're as healthy as we were last year, which was a miracle in its own right. And we received negative numbers at RF, 2B, 3B, and LF (if my memory serves correct). The addition of positive WAR players at 3b (Frazier puts up a 3.5 lets say, I think we were -2.8 at 3rd last year - translates to a 6.3 improvement and already puts the White Sox at 30), 2B (I see Lawrie as a 2 WAR 2B) and an improvement in the OF and we should be right at where the Royals were last year. Add in the improvement of no Shark, a seasoned Rodon, and a full season of Sale and where would that leave us?

QUOTE (SoxPride18 @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 11:11 AM) Bob Nightengale ‏@BNightengale 45s45 seconds ago The #WhiteSox still looking to upgrade the lineup,GM Rick Hahn says,and could be in market for splashy free agent such as Upton or Cespedes. Add Upton and our pitching staff and I'd say Chicago's best team is on the South Side

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 11:07 AM) Is Frazier's defense really elite? I know it's above average, but I didn't think it was that good. Past 3 years - UZR: 7.2, 6.5, 9.7 DRS: 6, 7, 5 At third, that scales out to very good to right under elite IMO

QUOTE (Alexeihyeess @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 11:00 AM) It's OK to have mediocre catchers if the rest of the lineup is good. It's even OK to have a SS with limited offensive ability if the rest of the lineup is good. It's not OK to have a corner OF who can't do anything well, and another who needs roids to be an above-average player. You can't have all of the above, plus a DH who is just cashing a check before he goes back down south to live out his Duck Dynasty fantasy. The Sox are roughly the same team they were yesterday. The Sox are about 3-4 WAR better than they were yesterday, which is about 5-6 WAR better than the end of the year. Add in that we managed to dump Shark and all we need is a meager improvement in the outfield to be in contention for the division.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 10:55 AM) Avi and LaRoche, I'll give you as "worthless". But, IMO, Melky's RBI's/average gives him worth, as does Saladino's defense, and the catchers, given that it's by far the weakest position in baseball. I agree. And I don't understand the hate on our catchers, Avila used to be one of the top LH hitting catchers around and Navarro has been consistently strong as an offensive C. Platooned correctly and we will probably have one of the highest catcher WAR's in the AL. We're probably going to see 20 HR out of those two to top it off. Some people just can't be pleased. They are probably the same people that would have told you last week we didn't have the bullets to get Frazier without Fulmer/Anderson and now that Hahn did it they have to find a way to be pissed off. They'll also be the same people cheering for him when he puts up an .800 OPS for 7.5 m next season

Even just signing Parra for RF is an immense offensive, and defensive improvement and would probably make this team an instant contender.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 16, 2015 -> 10:42 AM) I think it continues the "High spending, low impact, weak system" philosophy we've seen and failed with for the last decade. We'll get a fine player, but even when we dump a ton of money into a back loaded contract for an OF in a couple weeks, we'll still be FAR behind the teams at the top of the division that have developed their own guys, we'll still see the same failures, we have absolutely zero depth if anyone gets hurt, and even with the big spending OF we'll still have multiple major holes in the lineup. And no, I can't tell you which guy the White Sox acquire will underperform, or which guy will get hurt, but it's the same gamble as last year. Bet the house, no plans for what to do when things go wrong, ignore the fact that things do go wrong. Same story again and again. If you replace Avi Garcia with Justin Upton, I don't think any team in the division has a better line-up, and our starting pitching is top tier as well. Eaton Melky Abreu Upton Frazier LaRoche Lawrie Avila/Navarro Saladino That's a strong line-up with some decent speed and power. Not to mention you have one of the best defensive left sides of the infield in baseball

QUOTE (BlackSox13 @ Dec 14, 2015 -> 08:53 PM) The Sox had 1 every day position player to have an OBP above .350, Eaton and he's it. I'll take help from wherever and whomever. Kim hit for AVE, drew walks with a low K-rate. Surely his stats won't fully translate in the MLB but for the money, the risk is rather minimal. Justin Upton's career OBP is .352