Vance Law

QUOTE (Soxfest @ Jun 24, 2015 -> 08:59 PM) It is obvious Alexei does what he wants when he wants. His defense is terrible and he has no fear of being benched. I agree that some sort of mental thing is going on and I'd be happy to see Beckham at short for a couple/few games for Alexei to collect himself.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 24, 2015 -> 04:41 PM) How the front office could have built a team around pitching when the defensive metrics were that bad (and completely ignore defense) is just awful. They haven't "built" this team. They 'are building' this team. And the previous two seasons whose defense you reference was during the process of them tearing down and selling off the old team. Catching defense doesn't seem like it's been a major problem. Fangraphs says Soto's better. And he now seems to be starting half the games. Abreu is going to play first base. Just like Miguel Cabrera plays first base and you put up with his deficiencies. Sanchez has been pretty excellent in the field. Micah was terrible which is why he's not playing there now and won't unless/until he becomes at least passable. Alexei was excellent last year. He seems to have some unforeseen mental issues going on this year. Even still, Fangraphs has him as the #16 defensive shortstop. Gillaspie is bad at third. Beckham is above average. Gillespie has gone from being the starter last year to being a platoon player with a late-inning defensive caddie, to now not even getting every start against righties. All while you and I and Rick Hahn and everyone else knows he is not the long-term plan at third. But if he simply hit up to his career average against righties could make for a fine platoon guy. But he hasn't hit that well this year. Several White Sox players haven't hit that well this year. Many people where clamoring for a free agent upgrade at third last year. Those people should look at what Pablo Sandoval (5 years $95 million) is doing. Fangraphs has him as the worst defensive third baseman in baseball by a good margin. Chase Headley (4 years $52 million) is #27. There would be reason to be upset with Rick Hahn if he had shelled out all that money. Cabrera isn't great, but he's at least in the neighborhood of average and an enormous improvement over Viciedo. Eaton has not played well which is disappointing because he has the ability to be excellent as we've all seen. And the f.o./coaching staff are aware, based his benching for not playing where they've told him to. He seems to be a s***ty meathead who would do a lot better if he didn't try to overwork that tiny brain. He should be fine if he just blindly busts his ass and does what the brain people tell him to do. Garcia has been bad. He's the one player with some possibility of being here longer term from whom you expect to see some improvement. This will also be his first full season (if he makes it through). He also seems to be dealing with a knee problem. Maybe he'll hit enough that you worry less about the defense. Maybe he needs a defensive caddie and more time at DH. Maybe he doesn't hit enough to warrant him having the job. Those questions will answer themselves over time. Again, first half of his first full season. And you'll note he hasn't bee offered a long term extension. The Cabrera signing is the closest thing to longish term commitment (at only 3 years) to a player who's subpar defensively. And he's not that bad. And he can move to DH after a couple years if he's still here.

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Jun 22, 2015 -> 09:48 PM) I can't imagine Davidson ever making the majors at this point. I imagine Reed should still contribute at some point. Assuming we start selling off players at the deadline I could see him being called up at some point. He could be Mark Reynoldsy in a platoon.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Jun 21, 2015 -> 09:29 PM) I don't agree that Flowers is better than Soto and either do the advanced metrics. Nor non-advanced metrics. Like slugging percentage.

What are the chances Jake Peter overtakes DeMichele at Birmingham in the near future?

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Jun 20, 2015 -> 12:40 AM) Where the heck has Trey M been? He came out of a game with an undisclosed injury a few days ago I believe.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 20, 2015 -> 10:02 AM) Why? The White Sox actually need someone to play SS next year and won't have a lot of money to spend to fill the role. What's the harm? I'm not sure sure I understand, unless you meant to write "why not?" I was suggesting if Saladino continues to be worthwhile on offense, I would love to see him take over for Sanchez within the next month or 2. Assuming Micah's defense is still not passable and Saladino's (by all reports) is quite good, Saladino just might be that fused together Micah/Sanchez hybrid who is acceptable on both sides of the ball.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 20, 2015 -> 12:55 AM) The problem is Beckham had been hitting righties much better than lefties. 380 ops vs. lefties, 726 against righties. That kind of blows up the whole concept...then you add Gillaspie's defense and you're in the bottom quartile at that position...not unlike 2012, when it killed us. And last year he hit lefties much better than righties. They've been bad overall. Gillaspie's foot problem I'm sure doesn't help. But they're not even in the conversation with LF, 2B and C for biggest problem on the team.

QUOTE (BigHurt3515 @ Jun 19, 2015 -> 11:35 PM) Did the front office really think Conor and Beckham would be a good platoon? For all intents and purposes it should have been/ could possibly still be pretty medium. Gillaspie as of now has about a .755 career OPS against righties, Beckham.670 against lefties for something like a .727 combined. The American league average is .733.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Jun 19, 2015 -> 11:14 PM) I loved the Bonifacio signing. Ideally, he would have 125+ games under his belt by the end of the year because he'd be the primary backup 2B/SS/3B/LF/CF/RF. Instead, we screwed things up by signing Beckham and basically eliminating Bonifacio's role. Is this for real? If he was a better option than Beckham, or Shuck, or Sanchez, or Gillaspie he would be playing more.

Very nice game for Saladino. 3 hits, a home run, and he has 7 stolen bases in his last 6 games. I wonder if they'll try him at second if he keeps this up for a bit. He couldn't hit worse than Sanchez if he tried.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 15, 2015 -> 05:40 PM) We aren't realistically going to spend Upton money next offseason anyway...not on just one player. Probably not. I was just listing the legitimate positive additions on the FA market. And I believe Alex Gordon has another option next year. I don't really expect they will end up trading LaRoche. If the team nosedives, Shark is the only thing that will go and bring a return. Bonifacio on a salary dump. Alexei won't traded and he'll be brought back next year.

I just hope the team goes one way or the other over the next month. If Melky, Alexei, Eaton, and even Sanchez (hitting worse than several pitchers) regress to the mean that should be enough offense to get back above .500 with the starting rotation doing what it should be doing. If instead you think Melky, Alexei, Sanchez, can be historically bad for an entire season, well, then we'll likely have dug a deep enough hole to be sellers in July. Shark will go and flipping LaRoche would become a potentially decent idea. We'd add player(s), free up money and just need to land one of: Chris Davis Jason Heyward Justin Upton Y. Cespedes Ben Zobrist Plug Davis in at DH or improve the outfield with one of those guys and push Melky to DH/OF. We're then back in basically the same situation as 2015 but now with hopeful improvement from Melky, Micah, additional players from Shark/LaRoche trades hopefully a new C and/or 3B, Beck/ E Johnson or a FA (Shark!) in the rotation with Fulmer knocking on the door.

Trade Gillaspie to the Braves for Juan Uribe. 2015 World Series champs.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 12, 2015 -> 08:13 PM) regret that I wasn't more pissed. This is a nice tag line for you.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 12, 2015 -> 06:01 PM) If Viciedo and Semien go on to have careers out there, it will make that Samardzija deal look even worse, lol. Phegley also batting over .300

How does this pointless thread have 9 replies? Let alone 9 pages?

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Jun 10, 2015 -> 11:38 AM) This year looked great on paper, but the crime is poor coaching right now. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! wRC+ Adam Eaton 78 C Gillaspie 76 T Flowers 54 Alexei 53 Melky 48 Sanchez 5 (yes, that's 5)

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 24, 2015 -> 09:26 PM) So are we saying LaRoche is a good hitter? Are we happy with what he's put up? Just wondering. **refuses to engage with greg**

QUOTE (raBBit @ May 24, 2015 -> 08:28 PM) Do not let facts cloud your reasoning. LaRoche (LaDunn?) has parallels with Dunn so he's the problem. It's not that our 1-2 hitters who had OBPs over .350 last year can't crack .300 this year. It's not that our best hitter is having a sophomore slump. It's not that our reigning Silver Slugger shortstop is hitting at the worst rates on his career. And it's definitely not because our C, 2B and 3B are offensive black holes. The offense is in a bad place and that's obvious. Trying to pin this on one player is entirely silly. We had holes and they are still holes. We have productive players and they are not performing to their ability. At some point this will flip to an extent and regress to the mean. That's not to say this team is capable of being an elite offense but they most definitely can hit better than they are hitting right now. Good point here. I was getting a little facty. Another thing to think about when ignoring the 1 and 2 hitters and the overall terrible starting pitching is that the manager keeps totally losing all of the games for us.

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ May 22, 2015 -> 12:43 AM) I will say that I liked every signing at first blush except the LaRoche signing. Then I talked myself into it. Well, so far, he's looking like a bust and a lot of it is the Sox refusal to bench him against most LHP and play him moreso than Jose at 1B. He should be playing 1B 100 games and Jose 62, instead it's going to be like Jose 120 and LaRoche 42. OPS at .790 this month with a .432 OBP

QUOTE (Condor13 @ May 14, 2015 -> 04:52 PM) You do the smart thing and don't say anything, it accomplishes everything you want and does not make your organization look classless. The when you want to make a move you make it. Did Hahn call a press conference to talk about great Micah Johnson is playing? Or was he asked a question by a reporter and chose not to say to the press "Micah is bad at defense and we're going to send him down in a couple days."

QUOTE (Jake @ May 14, 2015 -> 01:53 PM) I've seen Gordon put up 115 wRC+ numbers for a scattered month or so for years and I know it just isn't real. Use him like you've been using him. He would be better than Micah, but I doubt he'd be better than Sanchez. Sanchez obviously will be given the starting job first. Do you think he will hit better than Beckham over the course of the year?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 14, 2015 -> 01:38 PM) Ok to call this a complete failure of the white sox policy of aggressively pushing prospects up to the big leagues as fast as possible and an admission of that failure/attempt to correct it? Why would you choose not to just see it as "we'll try out this guy first and see how he works out. ALL THE WHILE being aware of the fact that the guy who didn't get the job merely was sent to AAA to play baseball. We did not vaporize him. He continued to be alive. So switching between the two players is an extraordinarily easy non-event."

Well there's the answer. I wonder if they intend to have him skip a bunch of starts throughout the season, put him in the bullpen at the end of the year, or just shut him down. I suppose it will depend on if the team manages to get back in the race.