Autumn Dreamin

Colson will play in normal Cactus League games too obviously, but I also assume he'll be starting in the "Spring Breakout" Sox vs. Cubs all prospect matchup which is March 15th. They're doing a special reveal of the rosters on March 7th. More details here: https://www.mlb.com/whitesox/news/white-sox-prospects-who-could-play-in-spring-breakout

I'm looking forward to Speas, who comes from the Gregory Santos school of "Just woke up, time to throw gas":

BA with a "next 10" in the system after the top 30: 31. LHP Christian Oppor 32. RHP Juan Carela 33. RHP Alex Speas 34. LHP Tyler Schweitzer 35. RHP Eric Adler 36. C Korey Lee 37. RHP Maximo Martinez 38. RHP Aldrin Batista 39. C Ronny Hernandez 40. LHP Fraser Ellard https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/10-chicago-white-sox-prospects-to-know-beyond-the-top-30-in-2024/

Numbers for the new guys:

Last I saw, there are like 10 teams with $1 million+ "officially" unaccounted for. This includes teams that are known for being very active internationally, like the Astros and Dodgers. Orioles and Marlins are up around $2 million, Royals still have over $4 million... Maybe there's some bureaucratic holdup impacting multiple teams/players. Maybe everyone's saving up for the Sasaki bidding war (or to just trade the Dodgers money to pay Sasaki with...) Maybe it's the MiLB roster shrink this year...are some teams waiting to make room for their stateside promotions (via ST cuts and/or the MiLB 60 day opening) so that they then have room for their remaining DSL guys? Or I guess maybe the other teams have legitimate explanations, but in our case, Jerry just ran off into the woods with the international bonus pool money in a burlap sack like a cartoon villain. Wouldn't want to miss an opportunity to catastrophize!

Maybe I'm being too sensitive, but it's very funny to me how they just ignore the whole of his White Sox tenure for this framing... Somehow, absolutely nothing happened between his Giant's DFA and late season injury ? When a playoff team trades two of their top 25 prospects and a draft pick for you, you're no longer "under the radar"...and when you have a 132 ERA+/2.65 FIP over a full season, it would be very hard to follow that up with anything that could be considered a "breakout." But sure. I look forward to him producing much the same results as he did here and being heralded as some hidden gem that only the Mariner's staff was savvy enough to unlock after he unfortunately disappeared into an alternate dimension during the 2023 season.

Ozzie's boys don't quit? Congrats to him. Wonder if he'll manage the Venezuela WBC team next go around?

The most relevant bit:

Some more detail/imagery in this thread.

So this was an interesting read: https://www.prospectslive.com/prospects-live/2022/9/14/prefecting-berroa Basically, a prospect/pitching nerd breaking down how he thinks the key to making Berroa the best version of himself (including potentially keeping him as a SP instead of a RP) might lie in changing his slider grip. The change he recommends and the comps for it? Well... Now it could just be some guy looking at pitch data and dreaming on a prospect he likes....but this particular guy, Tieran Alexander, has since left the prospect-blogging business to join the staff of "an unnamed MLB team" as a consultant, so at least one front office out there is convinced he knows his stuff. Not trying to imply that he's in Chicago of course, but just that he has some decent credibility on the subject and it wouldn't surprise me if the Sox line of thinking on Berroa might be similar given the Cease/Rodon comps (and that he seems to share Katz' belief in the importance of pitch tunneling, since he worked on a SABR Award nominated analysis on the subject).

Also, Santos has been traded away from three Bannister orgs now. Red Sox > Giants > White Sox > Mariners. So I guess if Bannister gets poached by the Mariners in a few years, look out for Santos to be moved again.

Seems worth noting that both Berroa and Santos were with Bannister's Giants... Make a similar set of tweaks to help his stuff play consistently at the MLB level, and you get an extra year of control, an OF, and a draft pick for the trouble? I guess. Lane Ramsey DFA'd to make room, and I wouldn't be surprised at all to see him claimed.

Montgomery cracks the top 10 ?

Let him play, man...

?

Let Banny cook.

Carlos Perez slashing .311/.395/.463 in winter ball, walking twice as much as he strikes out, leading the league in RBIs, taking out his frustration with the Maldy signing on baseballs...

Quero playing in an upcoming international series.

Can you imagine? ? You start warming both a RHP and LHP to potentially relieve your starter depending on how the inning goes, and now they both have to come in. The first guy in HAS to face three batters because he's NOT allowed to get the third out. Do inning ending outs just get waved off because the inning can't end until the second RP comes in? Intentional walks to meet the minimum, and then you just hope the second guy in can wiggle out of it?

Yerado Ciofani, LHP: https://www.milb.com/player/yerardo-ciofani-820864 No real details yet, but it is official.