Rick Hahn 2021 End of Season Press Conference

[Balta1701]

3 minutes ago, chw42 said:

Just because they didn't pick it up doesn't mean they won't sign someone for cheap at 2B. I still think Escobar is the most likely guy they sign to play 2B. 

I still think there's a nonzero chance that they go with Cesar as a bounceback guy, but not at $6 million.

[Dick Allen]

16 minutes ago, SonofaRoache said:

"The Atros were better than us for three of four days (ALDS)" 

No Hahn, just no. 

 

Just now, ShoeLessRob said:

Didn’t know, makes sense.

I think Hahn has a degree from Michigan, a law degree from Harvard and an MBA from NU. Turns out JR was ahead of his time hiring this type in the front office.

[Dick Allen]

2 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

I still think there's a nonzero chance that they go with Cesar as a bounceback guy, but not at $6 million.

It could be one reason they didn't announce the option decisions today even though we know the decisions have been made. Might be doing the same with Kimbrel. 

[Balta1701]

2 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

It could be one reason they didn't announce the option decisions today even though we know the decisions have been made. Might be doing the same with Kimbrel. 

IMO if they did bring back Cesar it wouldn't be for a while. Zero reason to sign a guy like him early, wait and see how your offseason evolves, maybe that's a position you wind up forced to spend more money at after you whiff on a RF option or something like that. If someone gobbles him up there will be plenty of other 2b options available in January (or later pending lockout).

[southsider2k5]

22 minutes ago, ShoeLessRob said:

Guy talks like a lawyer 

Mostly because he is literally a lawyer.

[TaylorStSox]

I still like Hahn and I'm excited for the team. If they can stay healthy and clean up 2nd base, I fully expect them to win the AL. I'm not that worried about RF if Eloy and Robert can play full time. It 2/3rds or your OF is elite, you can live with a platoon or a project in the other spot 

[southsider2k5]

 

[Jerksticks]

16 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

IMO if they did bring back Cesar it wouldn't be for a while. Zero reason to sign a guy like him early, wait and see how your offseason evolves, maybe that's a position you wind up forced to spend more money at after you whiff on a RF option or something like that. If someone gobbles him up there will be plenty of other 2b options available in January (or later pending lockout).

Agree.  I wonder if they sign one of the expensive middle infield guys to lock up 2B for the next 3-5 years and just roll with Sheets/Vaughn/Engel/Eloy as the corners and DH.  

[pcq]

48 minutes ago, ChiSox59 said:

Oh no. I also am very bullish AV. But not as an everyday RF with Eloy in LF. Cmon now. 

Yes starts with bull----

[southsider2k5]

 

[southsider2k5]

 

[southsider2k5]

 

[The Kids Can Play]

1 minute ago, Dick Allen said:

 

I think Hahn has a degree from Michigan, a law degree from Harvard and an MBA from NU. Turns out JR was ahead of his time hiring this type in the front office.

Those degrees and colleges are correct! However JR was never ahead of his time and is still lagging behind other successful owners. As a matter of fact, it turns out in 2000, Kenny Williams hired Rick Hahn as Director of Major League Administration and not JR. Two years later Kenny promoted RH to assistant General Manager.  In 2010 Hahn interviews for the Mets GM position which he obviously didn't get. RH also interviewed for the Angels GM job in 2011. At this point JR was getting many other owners calling him requesting interviews with RH. He was considered MLB league wide, as one as of the top GM candidates listed on Baseball America's list of Top GM Prospects. The only reason Rick Hahn was promoted to General Manager in 2012, is the the fact Reinsdorf knew he was going to lose Rick Hahn. It didn't take a genius to figure out losing Rick Hahn and continuing solo with Kenny Williams would continue to keep the White Sox in total mediocrity. 

[Kyyle23]

11 minutes ago, The Kids Can Play said:

Those degrees and colleges are correct! However JR was never ahead of his time and is still lagging behind other successful owners. As a matter of fact, it turns out in 2000, Kenny Williams hired Rick Hahn as Director of Major League Administration and not JR. Two years later Kenny promoted RH to assistant General Manager.  In 2010 Hahn interviews for the Mets GM position which he obviously didn't get. RH also interviewed for the Angels GM job in 2011. At this point JR was getting many other owners calling him requesting interviews with RH. He was considered MLB league wide, as one as of the top GM candidates listed on Baseball America's list of Top GM Prospects. The only reason Rick Hahn was promoted to General Manager in 2012, is the the fact Reinsdorf knew he was going to lose Rick Hahn. It didn't take a genius to figure out losing Rick Hahn and continuing solo with Kenny Williams would continue to keep the White Sox in total mediocrity. 

Lmao total mediocrity.   Love the off-season 

[Harry Chappas]

7 minutes ago, Kyyle23 said:

Lmao total mediocrity.   Love the off-season 

Going to be a looooooooooong off season.  Unless the Sox spend $500M signing free agents it will be a failure.

They need a 2B, organizational depth, a couple bullpen arms and maybe a starter.  

People cannot grasp that young players get better and as such the White Sox offense should inherently be better simply by being more seasoned. 

I just watched post season baseball and the White Sox as currently constructed are not behind of those teams....maybe the Dodgers but the Dodgers rotation is a mess. 

 

Edited November 5, 2021 by Harry Chappas

[ShoeLessRob]

40 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

Mostly because he is literally a lawyer.

Yes as I posted above to another poster, didn’t know. Makes sense. 

[The Kids Can Play]

On 10/13/2021 at 12:29 PM, Y2Jimmy0 said:

I doubt the Mets would be interested in Ken Williams. Rick Hahn could have the gig tomorrow if he wanted to move the family though. 

Agreed. No MLB team with any brains would want Kenny Williams, but Rick Hahn could be a president of baseball ops for a ton of teams if he wanted to move. Let's not forgive people, Reinsdorf is too dumb and loyal to get rid of incompetent executives as witnessed by Jerry keeping Paxson in charge with his Bulls for so ridiculously long. Oh yeah...it took his son Michael to finally correct that mistake and move on from Paxson. Too bad Michael Reinsdorf can't run the White Sox too. 

[SleepyWhiteSox]

1 hour ago, KipWellsFan said:

Well he did go to Harvard Law School.

Psh.  Yea but how many posts and reps does he have on soxtalk?!

[South Side Hit Men]

 

[EloyJenkins]

34 minutes ago, Harry Chappas said:

Going to be a looooooooooong off season.  Unless the Sox spend $500M signing free agents it will be a failure.

They need a 2B, organizational depth, a couple bullpen arms and maybe a starter.  

People cannot grasp that young players get better and as such the White Sox offense should inherently be better simply by being more seasoned. 

I just watched post season baseball and the White Sox as currently constructed are not behind of those teams....maybe the Dodgers but the Dodgers rotation is a mess. 

 

to this point...what rookie or younger player exceeded expectations this year? Obviously Robert put up ridiculous numbers...but the expectation for him should be star or potentially superstar. Here is where I see progression v regression:
1B -  Abreu / BU Vaughn = to 2021 - Abreu may hit higher average, but track record is here
2B - FA  ++ production in 2022 - Can't see how it could be worse than what we got
SS - Anderson = to 2021 - Anderson will be fully healthy and capable of improving on defense and minor power uptick
3B - Moncada +  to 2021  - Moncada should have all long covid effects gone and get a full off-season to condition
RF - FA / Sheets + production based on Free agent pickup
CF - Robert = to 2021 -  the overall numbers will be bigger than last year because of time missed, but expect ridiculous production here
LF - Eloy + to 2021 - a fully healthy Eloy HAS to produce huge power numbers or this team doesn't take next step
C - Yaz/FA = to 2021 - Yaz put up numbers in-line with his career and expect more high OBP/power results. what they do with backup will matter defensively, not offensively
DH - Vaughn / Sheets / Yaz + to 2021 - Vaughn getting more seasoning and Sheets being used properly for matchups should provide great production over 2021 results

Realistically...every position player should produce equal to or higher production than 2021 IF they stay mostly healthy.  1B, C, SS and maybe 3B stay flat, but everywhere else has room for growth. This team is going to be GOOD to GREAT in 2022 offensively. 

On the pitching side, Giolito can be better, Lynn will regress, Cease will improve slightly and Kopech is a wild card. Expect about the same production out of this group.

Bullpen - I just can't imagine this group being worse, especially in the luck department. Improvement is very handicapped by TLR intuition. But surface level should be lower expectations on the talk track...but better overall results as a progression to the potential. 
 

Edited November 5, 2021 by EloyJenkins

[raBBit]

50 minutes ago, The Kids Can Play said:

Those degrees and colleges are correct! However JR was never ahead of his time and is still lagging behind other successful owners. As a matter of fact, it turns out in 2000, Kenny Williams hired Rick Hahn as Director of Major League Administration and not JR. Two years later Kenny promoted RH to assistant General Manager.  In 2010 Hahn interviews for the Mets GM position which he obviously didn't get. RH also interviewed for the Angels GM job in 2011. At this point JR was getting many other owners calling him requesting interviews with RH. He was considered MLB league wide, as one as of the top GM candidates listed on Baseball America's list of Top GM Prospects. The only reason Rick Hahn was promoted to General Manager in 2012, is the the fact Reinsdorf knew he was going to lose Rick Hahn. It didn't take a genius to figure out losing Rick Hahn and continuing solo with Kenny Williams would continue to keep the White Sox in total mediocrity. 

Hahn was hired by JR after multiple letters and interviews and possibly (not sure) a relationship with Hahn's father who is/was a Chicagoland lawyer like JR. Reinsdorf told him he wouldn't let him waste his education and rejected to interview him. He said if Hahn was still crazy enough to waste his time trying to get into baseball, he would put Hahn with a scout to be mentored and learn. Hahn took the offer. Then Reinsdorf's friend Dennis Gilbert who helped the front office with negotiations left the team and the team had a need for negotiator and Hahn was hired. 

Hahn was listed as the top GM prospect in Sports Illustrated. 

The reason Hahn was made GM in 2012 wasn't simply because JR didn't lose him but that was part of it. The Sox had already had Hahn working in GM capacity during 2011. What changed the game, was Ricketts buying the Cubs and creating an additional level of the baseball hierarchy in order to bring in Epstein to the North Side. Reinsdorf saw what Ricketts did and copied it. The two Chicago teams were the first to employ this method of retaining executive talent in baseball operations. Now at least a dozen teams in the league have the same structure (if not more).

Edited November 5, 2021 by raBBit

[almagest]

35 minutes ago, South Side Hit Men said:

 

This is a good answer - it's long, but there's a lot of value in here. The point is that just shifting doesn't help you if it doesn't turn into extra outs.

[Harold's Leg Lift]

Tough day for the SHIFT MORE! crowd.  

[South Side Hit Men]

3 minutes ago, almagest said:

This is a good answer - it's long, but there's a lot of value in here. The point is that just shifting doesn't help you if it doesn't turn into extra outs.

There would be more a lot more value to the Sox if they had a manager willing  to align how they were pitching to hitters and shifting more than 27th or 30th in MLB. The Sox shifted from just below league average to the bottom under TLR.

The stats proved they were effective the limited number of times Tony and Dave Duncan’s son employed it. They are near league average in attempts vs. LHB. The problem is their complete lack of shifting against RHB.

The second unasked analytics question is why beyond the fact Jerry has a soft spot in his heart for Scabs did the Sox keep GIDP Menechino. Successful clubs, i.e. clubs which have advanced in the playoffs over the past 16 seasons, teach their hitters to lift the baseball?

In an era when ground balls are converted to outs at a higher rate than ever before, in large part due to the fact the most teams are not like the Sox and actually increase shifting, the Sox once again go backwards or are left in the dust by teams with modern successful baseball philosophy.

[South Side Hit Men]

9 minutes ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

Tough day for the SHIFT MORE! crowd.  

Tough day for the WIN MORE crowd as well. Goes hand in hand.