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I think the need for power at first is overblown in this offensive environment. There were exactly six 1B in the Majors last year that hit 30 or more homers, for example, and that includes DH Adam Dunn. The low offensive environment is perfect for the Loney school of first basemen to thrive, because you can't just fling a dook against the wall and expect it to splatter on a 25 homer 1B like you could in the steroid era. The entire league, us included, is starving enough for OBP that anyone who can avoid outs has a place on a team. They just aren't making replacement-level first basemen like they used to.

Good news for the Charlotte rotation crunch

QUOTE (iamshack @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 11:48 AM) Get in line behind Marty and I. Do we need an official club? I had no idea Marty and I agreed on something.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 08:50 AM) I'm not sure we can say they're "Considering" it, but there appears to have been fairly respectable, non-bruce-levine names that have liked the White Sox and Mariners and put the 2 names Viciedo and Saunders together. The Sox know Viciedo better than anyone at this point and given his lack of development, I consider it plausible that they might reach a point of personal frustration with him in a way other teams wouldn't. When I start seeing proposals involving him that otherwise make no sense, as you say...that starts making me think that a personal issue could very well be the problem. This is one I could easily be mistaken on, because the only way to really gauge how a team feels about a guy personally is to read between the lines; looking at performance, playing time, trade rumors, competition on the roster, etc. If nothing happens and he goes out and gets 600 PA's this year, then they're still showing confidence in him. If they make a move like this, or they give him 350 PA's and platoon him with a lefty OF who is older and getting close to FA...those kind of things argue to me that they have a real problem with the guy. This makes sense. I mean, the reality is that Viciedo is about 400PA away from being a "change of scenery" candidate. Everyone can see the potential, but he has gotten about 0% better at hitting over his last ~1000 or so PA -- it's very possible that the coaching staff is just saying "I don't know what else to do with this guy."

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 06:56 AM) The Boras-White Sox thing is overblown especially with Hahn in charge right? Could that have something to do with it? Might the Sox be afraid of the contract that Viciedo and Boras will ask for? How many years of control is Viciedo now, 2 more? In my non-informed opinion, it is indeed overblown. You don't get the GM job if you're unwilling to be in play for a large fraction of the most talented players around because of a personal relationship. Also, Viciedo is not currently a threat for a big contract, lol.

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Mar 10, 2014 -> 05:58 AM) I'm probably more in favor of trading Viciedo than anybody here, and even I don't see Saunders as being a good return. I like his defense and his ability to take walks is something the Sox are still sorely lacking, but his contact rate is pretty poor for somebody who is not a slugger, and the Sox don't really need anymore lefty outfielders unless DeAza is also going away in a separate deal. I challenge your title of "most in favor of trading Viciedo!" But yeah, no upside with Michael Saunders. If we didn't have Eaton, though, I'd probably do it. But we have Eaton.

Franklin's ceiling is likely not very high, but he's got a very good chance of being a solid contributor. I don't get the impression he's any better than Semien, though. That said, I think Viciedo is horrible, so I'd make the move. I'd trade him for Ackley if we didn't already have a logjam there. But for this team, a flier in the OF is mroe valuable than a flier in the IF.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Mar 9, 2014 -> 12:48 PM) The Mariners system is so top heavy I can't imagine being excited about receiving prospects from them because we wouldn't be getting Walker/Hultzen/Paxton/Peterson/Pike. Past that it gets ugly for the most part. When the Sox and M's talked Franklin-Viciedo does anyone remember who turned it down? If that trade was revisited and completed, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that the Sox could break camp with Franklin-Alexei-Beckham at 3B-SS-2B and eventually move Alexei or Beckham. Franklin and Semien take over in the middle and Davidson gets 3B. That being said I have a really hard time figuring whether I like Franklin or not. I believe the story was the Mariners offered Ackley for Viciedo, Hahn countered with Franklin for Viciedo, and then talks stopped.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Mar 8, 2014 -> 10:45 PM) I'm pretty sure Viciedo already knows his limits. Why wouldn't he practice pushing them when it doesn't hurt to try?

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 8, 2014 -> 07:41 PM) Hanging on every pitch during the first week of spring training games is ridiculous. If Ventura is green lighting everyone, which I doubt, wouldn't it make sense to see in spring training, WHEN THE GAMES DO NOT COUNT, who can and cannot be given that option? Plus young players make plenty of mistakes. The good thing is when these mistakes are made, there is plenty of time to work on them now. You can be assured if Alexei and Beckham failed to cover the base, they were coering bases for more than a little while the next morning. People want young players playing. A couple of places where the fundamentals were worse than at USCF last year were Birmingham and Charlotte. Young players screw up, especially the first couple of weeks of spring training when it has been months since they have played in a game. I'm with DA on this. This does not represent actual baseball. The pitchers are out there throwing all fastballs, the players are lifting and running to get in shape, and the baserunners and fielders are literally practicing things with no regard to the game situation at all. You can't judge them on this stuff. April 1st? Sure.

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2014/03/ervi...th-al-club.html

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Mar 7, 2014 -> 03:49 PM) Pujols - Abreu - Braun I say this backwards

QUOTE (sammy esposito @ Mar 7, 2014 -> 03:29 PM) Abreu is completely untested, Braun is coming off a ped suspension so is likely to have power outage, take Pujols has yet reached expectations at the plate with the Angels. Give us more choices

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Mar 7, 2014 -> 02:01 PM) Because the same guys were here the year before and we didn't have those mistakes. There were a lot of uncharacteristic things that happened last year and if the Sox can regress to their norms, that will get cleaned up. Its likely Davidson is butchering the ball in Charlotte to start the season given the roster crunch. I think there's a lot of truth to this. We saw this core display elite defense in 2012 and league worst in 2013 -- the "true talent" is somewhere in the middle, and while anything can happen, that is probably the most likely performance we'll see.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Mar 7, 2014 -> 10:35 AM) I cite this article all the time, but if you start increasing catchers' WAR for that, why not start increasing fielders' WPA for (and against) great (poor) plays? http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/venables-winning-defense/ It creates a very, very slippery slope. They showed Brandon Crawford's 5 incredible plays the other day. I've never seen those percentages, but it would be nice if they showed them on the FanGraphs site, just the same as they show the pitch framing stuff. It would also end Ryan Doumit's career as a catcher. That dude is the worst. Well, defenders DO get extra credit for making difficult plays in DRS/UZR, but it doesn't include WPA because WPA is 100% context. A routine grounder can have higher WPA than a diving catch, for example, depending upon what is at stake in the game situation. Pitch framing does seem to straddle a line between context-neutral and context-dependent, though I can't really put my finger on where it falls apart. I wouldn't be surprised if that's why the valuation numbers aren't adding up.

QUOTE (ScottyDo @ Mar 6, 2014 -> 10:23 PM) Not sure if this question makes sense or not but: In terms of runs saved accounting, would those ~2 WAR come out of their pitchers' WAR? I mean, their teams didn't suddenly get roughly 2 wins better by virtue of the fact that someone studied framing, and pitch framing isn't built into the catcher's WAR statistic at all. Basically, I guess what I'm asking is do you think there will be an effort to kind of "pull out" these undeserved strikes from the pitcher's stats so they're not getting credit for their catchers' talents? You've hit on one of the biggest controversies with pitch framing research right now. Intuitively, the "runs" should represent a zero sum situation. The top public saber guys are very divided on framing right now because of this type of thing. Everyone agrees that it's important and that it's been overlooked in the community, but there doesn't seem to be any sort of consensus on valuation.

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ Mar 6, 2014 -> 12:57 PM) Watching this video - His frame reminds me of a young version of former White Sox closer Bobby Jenks. That release point is scary due to potential platoon issues. How is his stuff? Sales and Mastersons are rare.

MLBTR running with it now: http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2014/03/whit...za-viciedo.html

Pito!

QUOTE (Vance Law @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 06:57 PM) I see now that you are not the poster who claimed Moustakas was more valuable because "power hitting 3B is harder to find than a second baseman." That was my initial impetus to join this discussion- That the power hitting 3B had a similar SLG to our second baseman. Feel free to ignore my mention of Moustakas' OPS. But you are making a different argument now. I refuted your claim that Moustakas was better than Beckham in their best seasons as well as in 2013. The opposite was true. Beckham was demonstrably better. Moustakas was demonstrably playing in more games. Moustakas may well end up the better player, or he may never hit. I don't know. If I had to put my money on anything, it'd be that Moustakas won't routinely put up the defensive number he did in 2012, which is currently accounting for the big part of his career value. Skewing it perhaps. But if he ever actually hits, he'll make that point moot. Ahh, I see. Yeah I was barking up the wrong tree. But yeah, Moustakas aside, if the Dodgers need a 2B so badly they end up looking at Beckham, they might as well just use Dee Gordon, who is similarly bad, albeit in different ways.

QUOTE (Vance Law @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 03:52 PM) There are lots of ways to cherry pick the numbers, and you have done that. If you want to compare Beckham and Moustakas' respective best seasons using only fWAR, you are making an apples to oranges comparison. Moustakas needed 149 games and 614 PA to accumulate 3.1 WAR while Beckham only had 103 games and 430 PA to accrue 2.5 WAR On a per game or per PA basis, Beckham was the better and more valuable player. On top of it, he was playing out of position at 3rd base. The exact same argument (excluding the Beckham at 3B) applies to 2013 when Beckham played 103 games to Moustakas' 136 but still only bested Beckham 1.1 to 1.0 on raw fWAR. Beckham on average was the better player last year. Moustakas is a "power hitting" third baseman who hasn't yet topped a .708 OPS. All of his value thus far is tied up in his defense and I for one tend to think his +18 in 2012 is an anomaly or downright incorrect. I'll believe it when he repeats it. It is silly to judge a player by the role that the media assigns him. His ability or lack of ability to be a "power hitter" is just one factor of his value. A run saved is a run earned. How is citing OPS and "power hitting third baseman" less "apple & oranges" than citing fWAR -- a league-adjusted, era-adjusted, park-adjusted, context neutral statistic that is designed precisely for the purpose of being "apples to apples?" But the point about playing time is valid. WAR is a counting stat. So we should use career rates, which should address all concerns of arbitrary endpoints and outliers (Moustakas +18 2012): Beckham has been a better offensive contributor by 3 runs per season (-8.18 RAA/500PA against -11.45) Moustakas has been a better defender by a 7.7 runs per season (8.3 UZR/150 against 0.6) The difference? Moustakas has been a better player by 4.7 runs per season. And this is beside the fact that Moustakas is almost exactly two years younger with almost exactly 2 years less experience, which leads to the very reasonable implication that he has more upside. So, Moustakas has been better to date and has more upside. What am I missing? How is Moustakas not demonstrably > Beckham?

From FanGraphs chat today: Comment From Concerned White Sox Fan What do you expect from Jose Abreu? 12:21 Dave Cameron: Everything I’ve heard so far has been positive. I’d say maybe top 10-20 hitter in MLB. That's high praise coming from him. He's cynical about everything.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Mar 5, 2014 -> 01:18 PM) Or Chris Carter Or, if you combine them... Trayce Thompson!

I think this was BEFORE he went out and got Corey Hart AND Logan Morrison.

Haha nice.