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QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 12, 2014 -> 12:53 PM) One of my worries coming into this season is that since Garcia actually hit "well" in Chicago he won't feel like he needs to change his approach at all. You and me both. This was on my mind a lot at the end of last season, but it seemed cruel to rain on everyone's parade by whining about it on here, since we all had so little to be excited about. Unfortunately, it might be that he has to crash for a couple months first before he's willing to really listen much. I'm jsut as worried that HE thinks he needs to change nothing than the management.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Mar 12, 2014 -> 12:24 PM) I think Steverson is the real wild card here with Viciedo. He preaches selectiveness and his experience is working with young players. Whether or not he can get through to him remains to be seen, but I truly believe he is the right man for the job and would like to see him given the opportunity to work with Dayan in 2014. I've said it before, but even small improvements in selectiveness could do wonders for Viciedo's offensive game. This is, IMO, the best reason for hope for both Viciedo and Garcia. Sort of like a change of scenery came to them instead of the other way around. Maybe this dude gets through to them -- it's refreshing, at least, to see Hahn making a good assessment of the type of message his hitters need. It at least shows that he has a good grasp of his team. Seems like there are several front offices that don't have a clue.

lol, POTY

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 12, 2014 -> 07:09 AM) But he also hasn't shown the projected power yet either. Viciedo put up 25+ homers at age 23. ...and at age 24, gave us a clinic on how 20% HR/FB is not sustainable. Here is the list of players since 2000 that maintained a HR/FB rate of 20% or greater, min 600 PA: Barry Bonds Manny Ramirez I'm going to go out on a limb and bet you one hundred gazillion dollars that he never reaches that HR/FB rate again over a full season (500+ PA) -- which means that if he's going to get to 25 HR again, he will have to learn how to hit first. Which, consequently, also explains how he was able to hit 25 HR in this offensive environment and still manage a below-league average offensive year overall at 98 wRC+. By the way, I sincerely hope Viciedo has an offensive Renaissance and you guys feed me s*** all season.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 11:45 AM) Can you give me a link or description of where in in their website to go? I got to seasonal totals but couldn't figure out how to do it by position. If you prefer sortable rather than seeing them all at once: http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=...=1990&ind=0

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 05:43 PM) Garcia is in his age 23 season, do we really need to worry about him slowing down anytime soon? Besides, Garcia has proven he can carry a high average in the big leagues, something Viciedo has yet to even sniff. It's one thing to be a 290 hitter with little patience and mediocre power (as Garcia has been so far in his young career), it's another thing entirely to be a 255 hitter with little patience and mediocre power (as Tank has been so far in his young career). Garcia is not Viciedo and Viciedo is not Garcia, don't conflate the value of the two because they appear to have similar lack of patience. Oliver really likes Garcia, projecting him for over 12 WAR over the next 4 years. That's a pretty damn good player, if he has a good season this year trading him should be the farthest thing on Hahn's mind, he should thinking about locking him up long term. Garcia has proven he can carry a decent average (.283) over 250 PAs on the strength of a .319 BABIP. And still end up with a 97 wRC+ because of an ugly .309 OBP. Garcia has a ton of improvement to make, both offensively and defensively, to become a good player -- he hasn't "proven" anything. The difference is that he's got 1000 fewer PAs of bad than Viciedo. Basically, he hasn't shown an inability to adjust yet, so we can have more hope with him.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 03:35 PM) Yes. Garcia put up a .370 BABIP with the White Sox. He swung at a ton of bad pitches and blooped a lot of them over the 2b in August. In September, he put up numbers that were more "normal" for how he was doing; hit .256 with a .673 OPS. Now to be clear...you don't necessarily have to "take the walk" to be effective at hitting. You can be a free swinger, but you have to do so in areas close to the strike zone or areas where you can actually do damage. Yes! Keep preaching this!

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 02:13 PM) Not even a tangible difference in the number of walks a guy gets? It believe -- don't hold me to it -- that in Baseball Between the Numbers they showed a significant difference in walks that a guy gets when they bat in front of a pitcher, but that was it. Look that up, wite! I'll forget when I get home.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 03:19 PM) http://espn.go.com/mlb/stats/batting/_/yea...e/type/expanded http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/stats/_/id/30103/dayan-viciedo 3.64 P/PA in the second half (post ASB) in 2012. It was 3.69 for all of 2012. It was up to 3.82 P/PA in 2013. This is why we keep statistics Nice! So he took more pitches AND swung at more garbage last year. Curious.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 02:42 PM) They're not going to challenge him until he can continously prove he's going to let pitches that are unhittable go past him. This ^

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 02:28 PM) This is the absolute most important part and about the only area where you and I disagree. I saw Viciedo as a patient hitter last year. It was only for about a 7-10 day stretch, but I saw it and it was amazing. And the only reason he was so patient was because it hurt to swing the bat, so he had to do it selectively. I'm sure they have, but why not try and work this method from that angle? "Pretend it hurts to swing the bat." He was taking pitches, popping outside fastballs to the right center gap, yanking inside fastballs down the line and into the outfield, and drawing walks when he wasn't getting those pitches. And then he suddenly feels better and OH YEA BRO I CAN JACK THIS BALL OFF THE GROUND INTO THE GULF swinging strike 3. I'm really, really, really hoping Abreu's mindset wears off on him a little bit. (oh, and obviously we disagree because you essentially do not believe he will while I do believe he will, but it's merely opinion and all we have to go on is the facts and the facts say he has gotten worse. I'm also a Bills fan, so eternally the optimist, always the loser) This is actually what makes me most afraid for him -- I believe I've seen him legitimately try to be selective too. 'twas most of the second half of 2012, when it looked, to me, like he was really REALLY trying to get deeper into counts. The problem was that it looked hapless. He was taking great pitches, then guess swinging at bad ones still. And it is THIS period of time that made me believe that it isn't a matter of patience with him, but rather a lack of ability to recognize pitches. If my hunch is correct, then he probably isn't even coachable. Anyway, I don't bring that up very often because I can't prove that he was actually trying to be patient, it just seemed like it to me. Do you know where to find avg. pitches per AB sortable by season splits?

QUOTE (Jake @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 12:12 PM) A player who has put up two full seasons of high 90s wRC+ is not exactly far from being productive. Dayan only has to get marginally better to be worth keeping around indefinitely. An infielder or elite defender that puts that up isn't far, sure. But a corner OF that is a defensive and baserunning liability needs to hit better than that. That's why that 96 wRC+ from last year, for example, led to a -0.1 fWAR. Also, barring stark improvement in his OF defense this year, the guy is destined to be a DH as soon as 2015. The AL league average DH last year was 111 wRC+. Also, this again ignores his startlingly declining plate discipline. His ticket to good playerdom must be paved with a change in philosophy, not simply a few more reps of his current plan.

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 10:35 AM) So...lineup protection...some stat heads say that is a myth, but how can you know that? You can not correlate two unrelated situations as evidence, and since baseball is so situational, there are very few situations that are replicated for various players. I would agree that is has very little effect for elite players, but for marginal players I feel it is a very real thing. As a pitcher, there are certain players you want to beat you by putting the ball in play and others that you want to pitch around. If you have Beckham and Abreu coming up back to back, you are going to be more aggressive with Beckham as the result of contact is not as dangerous as if Abreu (theoretically) were to make contact. The research that has been done on this that debunks it has been centered on observing Pitch F/X data for players who have had large discrepancies in their "lineup protection" over short periods of time, typically in situations where a player is traded or lost to free agency. No one has been able to find any difference in the types of pitches that these players see. Here's a Dave Cameron article examining pitch types to McCutchen over four years: http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/...lb/refresh/true The general conclusion is that scary hitters are scary regardless -- that even with a good hitter behind him, you don't want to serve it up to a guy that can hurt you. Guys like Abreu don't see intentional gopher balls no matter who is behind them, because one swing can affect the scoreboard in every situation. HR hitters don't get fewer strikes with no protection because they are already getting the fewest strikes possible. Lineup protection is just another one of those things that makes sense intuitively, but for which no actual evidence exists. If you can show an effect for it, you'd be discovering something new. But for now, there's no evidence of anyone actually being pitched to differently based on who hits behind him (pitchers excluded). Seems like it should be there, but it just isn't.

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 08:51 AM) Thats a little overly dramatic, he was tremendous vs LHP and had a lot of issues with RHP in his first full season. Last season he was greatly improved against RHP. The pieces are all there to show that he can be successful, he showed power two years ago, showed the ability to adapt his approach last season, now hopefully he can put it altogether. He is still fairly young and the indicators are that he is learning to play baseball at this level, and with that there will be growing pains. He is never gonna be a guy that has a good K/BB rate and he never has been. But as a rebuilding team, he is the type of player you need to keep until he completely flames out in case he is able to figure it out. And greatly, greatly horribad against lefties. As I stated a few posts ago, his improvement against righties went from "replacement level shortstop (72 wRC+)" to "slightly below league average (98 wRC+)." Meanwhile, his decline against lefties went from "MONSTER (173 wRC+)" to "Gordon Beckham (89 wRC+)." When he improved his splits, he didn't raise his performance against righties to meet his performance against lefites, he dropped his performance against lefties to match righties. Which was bad. Also, where are these sign that he adapted his approach? His O-swing, which was already bad, got WORSE last year. The average player swings at less than one third of the pitches he sees outside of the strikezone. Viciedo jumped three percentage points to 42.5% last year! If he's adapting, it's to swing at more bad pitches. Once again, I'm not saying he can't, but all the signs point to him NOT figuring it out. That's all I'm saying. You can have a good feeling about him, or you can think that he's worth a shot in the dark anyway, and I can see where you're coming from. I can even get behind the latter reason a little bit. But based on literally everything we can observe from the seats, it will be a reversal of ALL of his trends -- from pitch selection, to batted ball profile, to actual results on the field -- if he turns into an above average player.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 07:03 AM) And being a converted 3B, it is possible Ravelo could become that. There just isn't enough data available to really evaluate his defense at first base yet, and he's still relatively new to the position. Also, he wouldn't need to be as good as those guys to be a very solid player.

QUOTE (Joshua Strong @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 05:22 AM) I am not worried about Kolek's frame, his body is just more mature. He has a similar build to Noah Syndergaard who is listed at 6'6 240, and if you're worried about his athleticism remember that he is being recruited by SEC teams to play DE. Once he starts training with ML physical trainers his body will be in better shape. I think that guys like Hoffman and Beede have reached their ceilings and are who they are going to be, I don't find their numbers to be too spectacular or worth of being a top 5 pick in the draft. Tyler Kolek on the other hand is a 18 year old power-pitcher, who has a fastball that can hit 100mph and hits the high 90s with regularity. He also has a developing slider and curveball that scream plus, along with a change up that sits in the low 80s. He is compared to guys like Syndergaard, Strausburg and Jonathan Gray. The sky is truly the limit for Kolek and his potential. He has to be the pick. What makes you think Hoffman/Beede have hit their ceilings? Is it just age? Seems to me that Hoffman, at least, could use some help harnessing control. Probably mechanical changes.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 11:14 PM) I'm DEFINITELY not trying to troll here, just asking ... Where is the mouth that roared? Where the hell is Ozzie? I didn't think he could shut up this long. Is he consulting, broadcasting, doing anything?? You'd think by now he'd be working for Jerry in some capacity. I know a lot of you don't care what he's doing, but I'm really curious as to what the mouth is doing?? Still being paid to not work, is my guess.

QUOTE (The Baconator @ Mar 11, 2014 -> 12:02 AM) Man, Christian Yelich smoked that ball. Haha I didn't notice that before. Guess the scoreboard guys need to get into midseason form, too, lol.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 10:02 PM) OT: Am I the only one who still wants us to do whatever it takes outside of Sale/Abreu/Garcia to land Giancarlo Stanton? http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/6479266/v3149...-in-the-seventh

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 05:37 PM) The guy just turned 25 today. Saying he cannot improve is foolish. There are plenty of examples of people improving at that age. That's the second paragraph in what you just quoted, where I said he has talent and it isn't impossible for him to improve. But IF HE DOES it will be a complete reversal of everything we know about him. All things are possible, complete HALLELUJAH epiphanies of Zen clarity are uncommon. It's just how it is. It isn't a good bet that a dude with 1200 PAs of ML hackitude just "gets it," because the coaches have been trying to tell him that for years. You can find a few guys, sure, and that's why it is possible. But for every success there are 500 failures. You can beat a straight flush, for example, but the odds aren't on your side, and so it behooves you to cut your losses. That's all I'm saying. If Seattle is going to give us something of value to take our risk off our hands, we should do it, IMO. Not for Michael Saunders though.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 02:53 PM) That only really makes a difference if you underslot that pick and use the money elsewhere. Precisely. Which is why if you argue that that pick isn't likely to work out anyway, you can pick a lesser guy there to pick a better guy earlier.

QUOTE (Stan Bahnsen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 02:46 PM) I think we're looking at JefCon9 (translated as Gillaspinger platoon, batting 9th) to start the season. Get hot Matty. Jeff Conine? I'll take it.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 02:16 PM) He murdered LHP in 2012 and couldn't hit RHP. He improved vs. RHP last year and slipped a bit vs. LHP. It's cherry-picking, but cherry picking is fine when you are looking for anything, but if you take his 2013 vs. RHP and his 2012 vs. LHP, you are talking about a guy hitting close to .300 with a .332 OBP and an .820 OPS. Plus he can hit the ball 500 feet, and is still very young. There is a lot more there than some of the crap you wanted the White Sox to acquire. I think today is his birthday. You should at least be nice to him on his birthday. But that's the thing with cherry-picking, it's a thing you do when you don't have enough information to get the full picture. With him, we have SO much information, and ALL of it is bad. It's nice that he showed a more neutral platoon split last year, but he was below average against both, so really it was more like he stopped murdering lefties and still hit below average against righties. I'm not saying it's impossible that he breaks out, of course the talent is enticing. I'm just saying we've got tons of objective data showing him fail to make adjustments, so right now everything points to him not being able to reach his potential. And as of today, he's a bad player. I hope he has a great birthday though! He's already a multi-millionaire though, so I can't feel too bad about ragging on him for swinging at bad pitches.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 02:02 PM) The evidence is there. He has had stretches where he has been very effective. It's a matter of making it happen more consistently. To say there is NOTHING that says he can be successful is total hyperbole. Show it to me then, DA. Guess who else was awesome in stretches? Brent Lillibridge. Anyone can have a good week. We've got all kinds of results to analyze for Viciedo because he's had tons of playing time. Show me the promise in those results.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 01:33 PM) So you choose to ignore his second half Second half splits are not good predictors of future breakouts: http://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/relevance...ond-half-stats/ http://sports.espn.go.com/fantasy/baseball...k2k10secondhalf QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 01:33 PM) and his tools Tools mean jack if the player refuses to gain skills to accompany them. It makes sense to give the player the benefit of the doubt until he shows you otherwise. Unfortunately for Viciedo... well over the past three seasons, more than 1000 plate appearances, Viciedo's strike recognition has somehow DIMINISHED. This is an extremely, extremely discouraging trend. His Achilles Heel is O-Swing: 2011 = 36.4%, 2012 = 39.9%, 2013 = 42.5%. League average hovers around 31%. QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 01:33 PM) some minor league numbers The fact that he managed an .853 OPS in AAA one year is nice, I guess, and would be encouraging if that's all we had to go on, but I can't think of any reason at all not to trust the 1200+ PAs he's had at the major league level instead. Can you? QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 01:33 PM) yet create threads about players who suck in the minor leagues who have been DFA'd that the Sox should consider acquiring. IMO, it's easier to come up with evidence Viciedo can be successful than a couple of the names you suggested they should pick up. I would argue that the performance standard for "picking up a flyer for free" is different than "logjamming your OF for four years." If it's easy to come up with evidence that Viciedo can be successful, please feel free to do so. I haven't seen anything so far.