Abreu Signs 3/$50M Extension

[greg775]

1 hour ago, chitownsportsfan said:

He's under performed his projections two years running.

Tough crowd if you go by his traditional baseball stats. Didn't he lead the AL in RBIs? 33 homers is a lot in my world.

This is an early Christmas for fans like me. I always posted I thought he'd get 2 years and a third year option and total deal worth about 40 million. Frankly I posted that to not get kicked off the board. Of course I hoped he'd get up to a 15 mill a year average. Let's face it. Most people against this deal are advanced stat people or baseball age-ists who think 32 is old (for somebody that's on the current team, not a sexy unknown on some other team). To be fair, these people also see him as a doofus, a butcher at first base defensively. We just signed a 31 year old catcher to a nice deal, although to be fair this is his age 31 season coming up as Grandal turned 31 in November.

The way a fan like me looks at this: We just signed Jose Abreu, my current favorite player. I personally feel if u wanna win a WS it helps to have a guy who has been with the team a long time and WANTS IT BADLY. He mixes in well with the younger guys, a leader. What's more, I am not of the opinion he will suddenly turn into a .199 hitter with 17 homers, 42 RBIs in 550 at bats. I guess that COULD happen. I'm not worried about it.

To me, this gives us a guy who bleeds White Sox colors, wants to win titles and just might do it. Throw everything together: this team is better off with him (yes at this salary) than without him. If you held a gun to my head would I say he's overpaid a bit? Yeah I guess. But in my world, who cares? Not my monopoly money and with Jerry spending for Jose and Grandal and more to come, there's pressure on the front office from Jerry finally I'm sure to complete the rebuild fast and win now/soon.

Obviously I love everything about the signing of Jose: it's the right thing to do. Time to start winning, folks.

Edited November 22, 2019 by greg775

[NotHahn]

12 minutes ago, 3GamesToLove said:

This is silly. One plays a premium defensive position incredibly well coming off some of his best seasons, the other is a terrible defensive player at the least valuable position and is clearly in decline.

Does it matter about his defense since Abreu will most likely be a DH by next year?

[he gone.]

3 minutes ago, mqr said:

Well they haven’t so

Okay, well then what if Grandal's knees age like every other catchers have and he's just a DH?

Grandal being the second coming of Jesus reminds me of the time SoxTalk was obsessed with Cespedes. Grandal is a fine player -- we need to temper the expectations - he's likely to be less than a .250 hitter and have a OBP of like .345 and hit 20 homers. Honestly he'll probably just put up a year like McCann did last year. 

[Soxfest]

Sox outbid only themselves to sign Abreu. JR loyalty 101 strikes yet again.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Soxfest

[Lillian]

2 minutes ago, BrianAnderson said:

Okay, well then what if Grandal's knees age like every other catchers have and he's just a DH?

Grandal being the second coming of Jesus reminds me of the time SoxTalk was obsessed with Cespedes. Grandal is a fine player -- we need to temper the expectations - he's likely to be less than a .250 hitter and have a OBP of like .345 and hit 20 homers. Honestly he'll probably just put up a year like McCann did last year. 

I agree with this assessment and my expectations are probably not as high as some here. The one thing that he does bring, which McCann does not, and which is sorely needed, is that middle of the order, LH bat. If he can hit around .250, with an OBP of .350 and with power, he will fill a very important hole, in the lineup, vs. RH pitching.

[NotHahn]

2 minutes ago, Tony said:

Ok.....so then you posted their offensive stats, which are similar, and are now totally taking defense out of the equation?

You can’t figure out the difference between arguably the best catcher in baseball (an already thin position) and a 32 year old DH only?

This is an incredibly stupid position to take

I didn't even give a "take." I just posted some stats and stated what most were saying about the 2 contracts. Just thought it was funny the stats were similar.

[Lillian]

Lots of hyperbole in this thread, mostly from the "haters". Perhaps we should wait to see what else the front office does. If they were to sign a top tier pitcher, or even just below that, like Wheeler, I wonder if those, who are so concerned about payroll limitations will feel better about this contract.

[Bob Sacamano]

Anyone hear from Ron yet? Or did he have a stroke?

[mqr]

2 minutes ago, soxfan2014 said:

Anyone hear from Ron yet? Or did he have a stroke?

He was praising it two pages back

[pcq]

2 hours ago, Lillian said:

With Robert, Moncada, Grandal and Jose, the Sox have the inside track on the Cuban pipeline. Maybe there will be more fellow countryman coming to the South Side, in the next few years. Perhaps that's one of the intangibles in this move. It's all part of the tradition started in the 50's, with Minnie Miñoso.

I had little doubt that Jose would be generously compensated. He would not be the first overpaid FA.

[JUSTgottaBELIEVE]

27 minutes ago, BrianAnderson said:

To play contrarian what if the MLB moves to robot umpires. Take framing out of it and what is Grandal?

They were talking about this on the Score earlier today. They cited studies that indicate catcher pitch framing drops off dramatically starting at age 32. I’m not sure Grandal is even an average defender if you take out the pitching framing component. Hopefully he bucks the historical trend.

[BFirebird]

17 minutes ago, BrianAnderson said:

Okay, well then what if Grandal's knees age like every other catchers have and he's just a DH?

Grandal being the second coming of Jesus reminds me of the time SoxTalk was obsessed with Cespedes. Grandal is a fine player -- we need to temper the expectations - he's likely to be less than a .250 hitter and have a OBP of like .345 and hit 20 homers. Honestly he'll probably just put up a year like McCann did last year. 

He does have less catching innings than most C at this point in their career.  So that could save his knees a bit.  And he should get routine days off behind the plate to DH when they want to play McCann.

Also, Grandal's early Zip projections (which are a conservative projection I believe), has Grandal being better than McCann's career year.  Which I would not expect McCann to duplicate based on his extremely high BABIP.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/instagraphs/yasmani-grandal-gets-his-multi-year-deal/

Grandal Early Zips Projection:

Year	BA	OBP	SLG	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	SB	OPS+	DR	WAR
2020	.236	.364	.445	445	62	105	19	1	24	66	88	142	3	118	12	4.9
2021	.234	.357	.439	428	58	100	20	1	22	61	81	133	3	115	11	4.4
2022	.232	.351	.420	410	52	95	18	1	19	55	74	123	3	108	10	3.8
2023	.229	.344	.398	389	47	89	16	1	16	48	67	111	2	101	9	3.1

[Jack Parkman]

1 hour ago, PolishPrince34 said:

JD Martinez has 3 years and $62.5 left on his contract at Age 32. Abreu should be nowhere near that type of contract and he's 1 year older than Martinez.

This is the correct take. There was no reason to sign him to this extension. 

Edited November 22, 2019 by Jack Parkman

[JUSTgottaBELIEVE]

Regarding Jose, I thought they’d go 2 years $28M with a third year option/buyout. This deal is guaranteeing about $15M more than I expected. Can’t say I’m surprised though. It is certainly an overpay but not enough for me to get worked up about when you consider the context/intangibles he brings to the club.

[Look at Ray Ray Run]

1 minute ago, Chicago White Sox said:

I wish you were my analyst and would go to bat for me as much as you do for every employee of the White Sox.

Go to bat? You think a guy is a cuck because his boss can make decisions he may not agree with?

Hell, I don't have a ton of people above me for what I do and I run into resistance plenty. I present well thought out analysis, with endless amounts of support, for financial decisions and changes and maybe 40% does my plan become an executable reality. I have people above me who make decisions that I would disagree with, but that's the nature of the real world.

Unless Rick owned the team, he would never have final say on every decision. Criticizing him for that is laughable. When an owner sets a budget that the GM didn't agree with, should he in turn leave because he didn't get to set the budget?

[Look at Ray Ray Run]

4 minutes ago, Jack Parkman said:

This is the correct take. There was no reason to sign him to this extension. 

To act like their pay is similar is odd though.

Abreu signed for 3 years, 46 million. Martinez is making 3 years, 62 million. Those two aren't all that close. There is a tier of pay between the two.

[chitownsportsfan]

Just now, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

Go to bat? You think a guy is a cuck because his boss can make decisions he may not agree with?

Hell, I don't have a ton of people above me for what I do and I run into resistance plenty. I present well thought out analysis, with endless amounts of support, for financial decisions and changes and maybe 40% does my plan become an executable reality. I have people above me who make decisions that I would disagree with, but that's the nature of the real world.

Unless Rick owned the team, he would never have final say on every decision. Criticizing him for that is laughable. When an owner sets a budget that the GM didn't agree with, should he in turn leave because he didn't get to set the budget?

Every take you have that includes a personal anecdote from your widget industry is dumb and you should feel bad for it.  MLB teams don't operate in any comparable way to other large corporations.  For starters, name another industry where you're guaranteed a profit just for being in the protected club?  The Mob I guess.  It's a legal cabal.  The economics are not applicable to your industry or any other.

[mqr]

1 minute ago, chitownsportsfan said:

Every take you have that includes a personal anecdote from your widget industry is dumb and you should feel bad for it.  MLB teams don't operate in any comparable way to other large corporations.  For starters, name another industry where you're guaranteed a profit just for being in the protected club?  The Mob I guess.  It's a legal cabal.  The economics are not applicable to your industry or any other.

All that might be true, but it's still Jerry's money and Hahn, or any GM in the world for that matter, doesn't get final say in what get's done with it. 

[Look at Ray Ray Run]

3 minutes ago, chitownsportsfan said:

Every take you have that includes a personal anecdote from your widget industry is dumb and you should feel bad for it.  MLB teams don't operate in any comparable way to other large corporations.  For starters, name another industry where you're guaranteed a profit just for being in the protected club?  The Mob I guess.  It's a legal cabal.  The economics are not applicable to your industry or any other.

Widget industry? I work in as about cutthroat of an industry as exists.

What does anything you said matter? It doesn't. No GM in MLB gets to make every final decision for a ball club. Period, end of story. 

To call him a cuck because he didn't fight his owner about a signing is comical. No matter what the industry, the owner (CEO or whoever) has authoritative power over the executives underneath them. I can make as thorough of a case as possible for why I don't agree with a direction, but at the end of the day I'm not signing the checks so I don't make the final decision on everything.

You made an immature distasteful post, that wasn't very logical, and now you continue to defend that post.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Look at Ray Ray Run

[Jack Parkman]

3 minutes ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

To act like their pay is similar is odd though.

Abreu signed for 3 years, 46 million. Martinez is making 3 years, 62 million. Those two aren't all that close. There is a tier of pay between the two.

50M and 62M aren't that far apart. 

I absolutely hate the 18M in 2022. That has the potential to impact a World Series contender. 

[Look at Ray Ray Run]

1 minute ago, Jack Parkman said:

50M and 62M aren't that far apart. 

I absolutely hate the 18M in 2022. That has the potential to impact a World Series contender. 

It's not 18 million for the 10000000000000th time. No matter how many times people post it to be critical, the White Sox are paying Jose Abreu 14 million dollars in 2022. If 14 million dollars at DH is going to impact their ability to contend then they never stood a chance. 

If a 14 million dollar sunken cost is the WORST thing that happens to this team in FA over the next 5 years, then holy cow they did an incredible job.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Look at Ray Ray Run

[caulfield12]

If they don’t sign Wheeler, Bumgarner, Ryu, Keuchel or even Hamels...and this is (indirectly) given as part of the excuse, that’s where a lot of posters are going to have a problem.

And there’s the whole issue of (needlessly) blocking Vaughn at 1B OR him DHing and preventing Grandal from getting at-bats there to keep him as well rested as possible in the second half of seasons (especially during July/August Chicago weather.)

Edited November 22, 2019 by caulfield12

[Soxnfins]

2 minutes ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

It's not 18 million for the 10000000000000th time. No matter how many times people post it to be critical, the White Sox are paying Jose Abreu 14 million dollars in 2022. 

^^ Ray gets that it's pretty much a 2/28M extension due to the $4M in deferred & $5M signing bonus.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Soxnfins

[he gone.]

4 minutes ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

 

You made an immature distasteful post, that wasn't very logical, and now you continue to defend that post.

Pot meet kettle. 

[SoxBlanco]

Could a possible benefit of this move be that we look like a very loyal organization, and that might attract other players if they are on the fence about signing with a couple teams?

Perhaps a bit of a stretch.