VAUGHN vs ABREU APRIL RESULTS

[soxrwhite]

Abreu old and expensive.

Vaughn young and cheap.

[chitownsportsfan]

I really don't understand this thread. I mean I do, I guess, because Jose is Jose -- but Vaughn has not panned out how anybody would have hoped. When you draft a 1B/DH only type in the top 5 you sure as hell are hoping they can at least hit 30 HR a year and get on base enough to produce 2 WAR. So far, Vaughn has not done that. He's negative fWAR for his career.

He's still young enough to where you hope with some adjustments he can hit more fly balls and the power will come, but comparing him with Abreu doesn't make much sense. It's not like the Sox hit a grand slam here. They were outbid by an actual good franchise on Jose, and his replacement still is yet to have a positive fWAR season. The joke is still on the Sox. The Astros can eat Jose's contract no problem if they need, and they have hung a couple banners in the last 5 years regardless.

[gogosox1959]

34 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

Even if everyone else hit their full potential, Vaughn as is would still be a disappointment.  Granted, the team wouldn’t be so dependent on his production but it would still be suboptimal for his position. 

Currently Vaughn is #11 out of 26 qualified 1st basemen in  OPS.  I predict that his OPS will be going up as his power stroke seems to be coming alive recently and will finish in top 10.  He's in 4th for most extra base hits.  May not be optimal, but he seems to be doing okay now and still has significant upside potential  

    https://www.mlb.com/stats/?playerPool=QUALIFIED&position=1B

[chitownsportsfan]

Vaughn is 44 runs below average defensively since he came into the league. That's -4.4 fWAR right there. That's amazing. And the Sox thought he was maybe an OF!

[Tnetennba]

36 minutes ago, gogosox1959 said:

Currently Vaughn is #11 out of 26 qualified 1st basemen in  OPS.  I predict that his OPS will be going up as his power stroke seems to be coming alive recently and will finish in top 10.  He's in 4th for most extra base hits.  May not be optimal, but he seems to be doing okay now and still has significant upside potential  

    https://www.mlb.com/stats/?playerPool=QUALIFIED&position=1B

All I am saying he hasn’t been good to this point, especially on defense.  He’s not finished product yet so there is still hope that he can that middle of the order power bat he was projected to be coming into the draft.  

[Rocky]

19 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

All I am saying he hasn’t been good to this point, especially on defense.  He’s not finished product yet so there is still hope that he can that middle of the order power bat he was projected to be coming into the draft.  

He's been playing out of position his entire career! 

[JUSTgottaBELIEVE]

6 hours ago, bmags said:

Congrats to vaughn but he was a terrible pick at this point. While obviously CJ Abrams hasn't produced much yet, he held much higher prospect value (as seen by netting one of the best players in baseball). I hope that's a lesson to those who railed against him as a "KW pick" and "Just an athlete"

I think this is premature. I still believe Vaughn has the ability to put together a Konerko-like type of career. Some of those doubles this year will start turning into homers as the weather improves.

[bmags]

4 hours ago, BigHurt3515 said:

It is only terrible because everyone else sucks and haven't lived up to their potential. They drafted him because he was nearly MLB ready and would be a good compliment when we were supposed to be competing. He is still a good player, it just doesn't look as good when the team is awful

We had a 3rd overall pick. That is a terrible idea just to grab the guy that can be MLB ready. He also wasn't a very good complement! We struggled to find a good place for him and ended up with 12 1B who have no power.

[Greg Hibbard]

Eh, the jury really is out on Vaughn, but I’m sick of settling for the 8th or the 12th or 14th best player at a given position as some sort of benchmark of success. Good organizations, when they have a top 5 pick, draft players who end up in the top 5 of their position. Hopefully Vaughn can become the .900 OPS commodity we all hope for, because that’s what he needs to be. 

[MEANS]

I think AV will be fine. You need to at least give him this season to start seeing what we really have with him and what a full season at 1B shows what he can do. I think there are a few other guys on this team that I am much more worried about: Eloy/Robert/Moncada/TA...

[chitownsportsfan]

1 hour ago, bmags said:

We had a 3rd overall pick. That is a terrible idea just to grab the guy that can be MLB ready. He also wasn't a very good complement! We struggled to find a good place for him and ended up with 12 1B who have no power.

There's a lot of HS kids in those drafts we had high picks that are blowing up as well. Opportunity cost.

[Flash]

Notwithstanding comparisons to Vaughn (no doubt they are redundant) but part of Jose's value was as an example and mentor figure to the other Latino players. I don't think its entirely coincidental that Robert and Eloy have looked lost at the plate and are on a downward trajectory. Not saying Jose would have prevented that but my sense is he help them navigate through the rough patch.

 

[Squirmin' for Yermin]

3 minutes ago, Flash said:

Notwithstanding comparisons to Vaughn (no doubt they are redundant) but part of Jose's value was as an example and mentor figure to the other Latino players. I don't think its entirely coincidental that Robert and Eloy have looked lost at the plate and are on a downward trajectory. Not saying Jose would have prevented that but my sense is he help them navigate through the rough patch.

 

I am starting to hate the abreu was a "leader", "mentor", "great example" words thrown around for Abreu.  Our players had always appeared to be lazy, we had a bad and divided clubhouse, no accountability, and more lazy...  Is this indicative of a good leader, mentor, and great example?

[soulfly]

6 hours ago, Greg Hibbard said:

Jose has had very poor 30 game stretches before, particularly early in the season. It’s concerning, but I don’t think there’s any way Houston doesn’t let him try to play through it for the whole year with maybe a couple days off to clear his head if it gets really bad. 

Yea and while that may be true about playing roughly half of your home games in Chicago in April and then others in northern colder climates, it ain't really holding any weight now that he's in Houston.  From the schedule it looks like there was a week of cold baseball in there for him so far this season.  Sure, he might be able to turn it around and history says he should.  But the early it's cold excuse isn't going to fly for him now.  He might just be cooked.  I like Abreu and I wish him well, but I certainly won't be upset if that s%*# ass organization has to eat his contract.

[Snopek]

Good guy Jose showing solidarity with his former team by having a terrible year.

[soulfly]

3 minutes ago, Snopek said:

Good guy Jose showing solidarity with his former team by having a terrible year.

TEAM PLAYER

[Rusty_Kuntz]

If he was an very good fielding 3rd baseman, his hitting would be fine. But he's pretty much a DH, where it's meh. 

With his inability to field or run, he's gotta be .900 ops guy with 25+ HR to be valuable. 

I will give him credit that he seems to have knack for driving in runs. 

[Tnetennba]

18 hours ago, Rocky said:

He's been playing out of position his entire career! 

I’m speaking only of this year playing his natural position. 

[Timmy U]

To be fair to the Sox, Vaughn was the 3rd player in a 2-player draft. Sadly, for as much as they sucked during the rebuild, they never got the first pick once. In that draft Adley Rutschman was head and shoulders above everybody. Witt was a distant 2nd.

If they didn't take Vaughn, it would have been CJ Abrams. So far, he's meh. JJ Bleday is a bust. Riley Greene has been... okay. With 20/20 hindsight, you'd take Corbin Carroll, but he was from a non-baseball hotbed, there were questions about his power at the time. BUt it would have been a great pick. Same with my guy Kelenic. I guess it's fair to say that a philosophy of going for-near-to-the-majors, skills-over-tools players like Vaughn and Madrigal doomed the rebuild. Hopefully, whoever replaces Hahn & company is more like Poles. Traits over performance.