White Sox sign Martin Maldonado 1 year/4 million, vesting option for 2025

[Quin]

Also, to add to this, this is a problem that only exists because of Reinsdorf.

I'm going off of Spotrac's estimates here. fWAR in parentheses, but I'm using 2022 for Stassi and omitting Fedde since he reinvented himself in the KBO.

Maldonado (-1.2), DeJong (0.3), Lopez (1.1), Soroka (-0.4), Stassi (0.0), and Fedde will cost roughly a combined $25.75M.

Their combined fWAR: -0.2.

Now, fWAR isn't an end all, be all and maybe Bannister turns around a healthy Soroka (a big if) and Fedde's KBO reinvention makes him a #2-#3 MLB pitcher (which would be amazing).

But if the Sox are gonna be awful as we expect, do we need $26M committed to them, which Jerry will stomp and moan about with a cratering attendance, when the AAA guys can battle for the backup spot behind Stassi and Lenyn/Popeye could make a play for second?

Obviously best case scenario is good performances from the vets (where their defense aids pitchers) and minor leaguers and they keep or trade Soroka (being 26), Stassi or Maldonado gets traded and the other is the vet mentor, Montgomery sends DeJong to a contender, the aforementioned Lenyn/Popeye, etc. 

[T R U]

12 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

Do you realize who our manager is? The only way they're off the roster is through the IL. 

Grifol took a team with "championship aspirations" and lost 100+ games. This team is primed to lose 100+ games again. If hes back in 2025 then this is just a clown show organization.

If they carry two veteran catchers who offer no offensive upside and MAYBE some defensive upside all season long instead of trying to develop or see what they have in their young guys then this is just a clown show organization.

Maybe we are just a clown show organization though, so you may be right.

[Chicago White Sox]

3 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

Except...those were mostly the same pitchers he was dealing with the previous year, at least one of the new ones had a better than league average CS rate, and their other catcher, Yainer Diaz, threw out 15/50 baserunners. 

Read this again because I like it. Yainer Diaz threw out 15/50 base stealers. Martin Maldonado threw out 14/100 base stealers. In 1/2 as many chances, Diaz threw out more baserunners than Maldonado. 

Tough to argue against that then.

[T R U]

3 minutes ago, Quin said:

Also, to add to this, this is a problem that only exists because of Reinsdorf.

I'm going off of Spotrac's estimates here. fWAR in parentheses, but I'm using 2022 for Stassi and omitting Fedde since he reinvented himself in the KBO.

Maldonado (-1.2), DeJong (0.3), Lopez (1.1), Soroka (-0.4), Stassi (0.0), and Fedde will cost roughly a combined $25.75M.

Their combined fWAR: -0.2.

Now, fWAR isn't an end all, be all and maybe Bannister turns around a healthy Soroka (a big if) and Fedde's KBO reinvention makes him a #2-#3 MLB pitcher (which would be amazing).

But if the Sox are gonna be awful as we expect, do we need $26M, which Jerry will stomp and moan about with a cratering attendance, when the AAA guys can battle for the backup spot behind Stassi and Lenyn/Popeye could make a play for second?

Obviously best case scenario is good performances from the vets (where their defense aids pitchers) and minor leaguers and they keep or trade Soroka (being 26), Stassi or Maldonado gets traded and the other is the vet mentor, Montgomery sends DeJong to a contender, the aforementioned Lenyn/Popeye, etc. 

Man I cant believe I forgot about Fedde, that's a perfect example of what the Sox should be doing more of this offseason. If he is legit, then you have a valuable asset to deal this season.

[Quin]

Just now, T R U said:

Man I cant believe I forgot about Fedde, that's a perfect example of what the Sox should be doing more of this offseason. If he is legit, then you have a valuable asset to deal this season.

Yeah Fedde is actually a really good signing, but I felt the need to include him because if he doesn't work out it's gonna be used as another "ah we can't sign pitchers from Asia for another 10 years" justification from JR.

[South Side Hit Men]

3 minutes ago, Quin said:

Also, to add to this, this is a problem that only exists because of Reinsdorf.

I'm going off of Spotrac's estimates here. fWAR in parentheses, but I'm using 2022 for Stassi and omitting Fedde since he reinvented himself in the KBO.

Maldonado (-1.2), DeJong (0.3), Lopez (1.1), Soroka (-0.4), Stassi (0.0), and Fedde will cost roughly a combined $25.75M.

Their combined fWAR: -0.2.

Now, fWAR isn't an end all, be all and maybe Bannister turns around a healthy Soroka (a big if) and Fedde's KBO reinvention makes him a #2-#3 MLB pitcher (which would be amazing).

But if the Sox are gonna be awful as we expect, do we need $26M, which Jerry will stomp and moan about with a cratering attendance, when the AAA guys can battle for the backup spot behind Stassi and Lenyn/Popeye could make a play for second?

Obviously best case scenario is good performances from the vets (where their defense aids pitchers) and minor leaguers and they keep or trade Soroka (being 26), Stassi or Maldonado gets traded and the other is the vet mentor, Montgomery sends DeJong to a contender, the aforementioned Lenyn/Popeye, etc. 

You still need to field some type of roster, and $4M per guy over six isn’t a big outley. They hopefully will add a few more players.

Still an improvement depth wise vs. Hahn spending $55M on Welington Castillo ($16M), Kelvin Herrera ($18M), Yonder Alonso ($17M) and John Jay ($4M) during tanking in 2017-2019.

[zisk]

At least we won't be getting Sal Perez. So there is an upside.

[CaliSoxFanViaSWside]

1 hour ago, bmags said:

Korey Lee still has plenty to show in AAA. He was such a classic Hahn trade, getting googley eyed because he used to have a high ranking on a prospect handbook. That the Astros gave him away should be all you needed to know.

 

I thought there would be more of a celebration to shut the book on the Salvador Perez talk. 

That was shut long ago by all but the most paranoid of Sox fans. He was always too expensive.

[JoeC]

1 minute ago, zisk said:

At least we won't be getting Sal Perez. So there is an upside.

Under Hahn, I would cynically state that this is just another move to try to negotiate a lower price to KC.

With Getz, I think you're right. 

[Balta1701]

12 minutes ago, Quin said:

Also, to add to this, this is a problem that only exists because of Reinsdorf.

I'm going off of Spotrac's estimates here. fWAR in parentheses, but I'm using 2022 for Stassi and omitting Fedde since he reinvented himself in the KBO.

Maldonado (-1.2), DeJong (0.3), Lopez (1.1), Soroka (-0.4), Stassi (0.0), and Fedde will cost roughly a combined $25.75M.

Their combined fWAR: -0.2.

Now, fWAR isn't an end all, be all and maybe Bannister turns around a healthy Soroka (a big if) and Fedde's KBO reinvention makes him a #2-#3 MLB pitcher (which would be amazing).

But if the Sox are gonna be awful as we expect, do we need $26M committed to them, which Jerry will stomp and moan about with a cratering attendance, when the AAA guys can battle for the backup spot behind Stassi and Lenyn/Popeye could make a play for second?

Obviously best case scenario is good performances from the vets (where their defense aids pitchers) and minor leaguers and they keep or trade Soroka (being 26), Stassi or Maldonado gets traded and the other is the vet mentor, Montgomery sends DeJong to a contender, the aforementioned Lenyn/Popeye, etc. 

Ironically, the last time we played this exact game of totaling up all the potentially bad money they spent, it was 2019, and it included a couple of veteran catchers because they decided they had no confidence in the catchers they had. One of them worked out great, for the money, but they got nothing out of him because they didn't have much control and didn't trade him before he was a FA. Eventually, the fact that they didn't develop any youth at that position and dumped the young catcher they had led directly to Grandal's deal, so even though they wound up with one of those catchers being an all star, in the end it all backfired on them and cost them $80 million+.

[Highland]

39 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Nothing wrong with signing placeholders and not over-spending on C tier free agents to multi year deals.  I think people here who are frustrated are just worried we’re making the move based on name value and not acknowledging the decline last year in his defensive performance (primarily framing).  The Sox under Hahn weren’t very effective playing in this space and more or less just lit cash on fire to “fill” holes.  Hopefully Getz does better in this tier of free agency.

No, nothing wrong with it, for now. But the organization is putting its reputation on the line again. Another rebuild. They can only do that for so long. What if this rebuild doesn't work?

[Quin]

3 minutes ago, South Side Hit Men said:

You still need to field some type of roster, and $4M per guy over six isn’t a big outley. They hopefully will add a few more players.

Still an improvement depth wise vs. Hahn spending $55M on Welington Castillo ($16M), Kelvin Herrera ($18M), Yonder Alonso ($17M) and John Jay ($4M) during tanking in 2017-2019.

Yonder Alonso was $9M after his stupid friends and family contract was bought out.

And I prefaced this with this is a stupid JR problem. Every bit of that $25.75M is going to be scrutinized if it doesn't work out.

[WhiteSox2023]

2 minutes ago, Highland said:

No, nothing wrong with it, for now. But the organization is putting its reputation on the line again. Another rebuild. They can only do that for so long. What if this rebuild doesn't work?

Unfortunately, not much.  Sox will lose some fans but Jerry will continue making his money.

[Tnetennba]

1 hour ago, Chicago White Sox said:

And for the record, Maldonado’s blocking and throwing was still above average last year (at least per Statcast).  It was his framing that fell off a cliff and killed his defensive value.  Be curious what happened there since he basically went from bad to worst in baseball at it.

How soon does the blocking et cetera start to fall off at 37? There's a lot of mileage on those knees/legs.

I'm not opposed to signing a vet C and agree with the purported intention behind the pick up, I just find it hard to squint and see Maldonado as anything but a net negative at this point.

Edited December 27, 2023 by Tnetennba

[Tnetennba]

1 hour ago, Balta1701 said:

No, they're blocking young players now. Note how no one complained about Stassi being picked up, it was reasonable to have 1 veteran who plays maybe 1/3 or 1/2 the time to go along with a young catcher acquired last year in a trade. Even if the young catcher isn't good right now, maybe that catcher picks up some things with a year+ of experience, and the guy you're paying to go along with him is making under $1 million.

This move is the one that has us annoyed, because now the young catcher gets buried in the minors, now there are two crappy veteran catchers who will eat up all of the available big league innings, none of the young catchers get any big league experience where they might even be able to learn enough to be backups, and we drop $5 million on top of that. $4 million of that didn't need to be spent at all, and there's a vesting option thrown in that the guy probably has a good chance to hit if he's healthy. Oh, and not to mention how they could have just kept Zavala last season - thanks Chris.

This is classic White Sox behavior. Wastes a little money - "Oh it's fine they have money to spend, that never comes back to haunt us." Blocks players or gives up on them "oh it's fine that guy isn't going to turn into anything anyway, that never comes back to haunt us". Hahn did this at the catcher's spot repeatedly, and it wound up eventually turning into a money pit.

Spot on. Stassi or Maldonado, not both. They've basically burned $8M on a guy at the tail end of his career hoping to squeeze just a bit more juice out of him. Seems awfully familiar.

[CaliSoxFanViaSWside]

50 minutes ago, T R U said:

Yeah I don't get all this change the culture talk.

You change the culture by leadership at the top and your manager.

Signing guys to 1 year deals / stopgaps isn't going to maintain a culture.

The best way to change the culture is by winning.

Nothing brings players closer than celebrating a hard fought victory .

Culture does not exist for a bunch of stiffs battling for roster spots who barely spend any time together battling on the same battlefield.

The Sox roster is chum and the walking dead.

 

[Chicago White Sox]

34 minutes ago, T R U said:

Man I cant believe I forgot about Fedde, that's a perfect example of what the Sox should be doing more of this offseason. If he is legit, then you have a valuable asset to deal this season.

Agree…not a ton of guys like that is the problem though.  However, if we are going to dumpster dive, I would target guys with additional control.  Kyle Lewis is controllable through 2026 and makes complete as part of a RF solution (not sure how his defense is nowadays, but has to better than Sheets).  Code Heuer is controllable through 2025 and his pitch mix still makes a ton of sense in our park.  I’m sure there are others like that who will come dirt cheap and can offer theoretical value beyond 2024 if they somehow pan out.

[Tnetennba]

1 hour ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Nothing wrong with signing placeholders and not over-spending on C tier free agents to multi year deals.  I think people here who are frustrated are just worried we’re making the move based on name value and not acknowledging the decline last year in his defensive performance (primarily framing).  The Sox under Hahn weren’t very effective playing in this space and more or less just lit cash on fire to “fill” holes.  Hopefully Getz does better in this tier of free agency.

Bingo.

[Chicago White Sox]

27 minutes ago, Highland said:

No, nothing wrong with it, for now. But the organization is putting its reputation on the line again. Another rebuild. They can only do that for so long. What if this rebuild doesn't work?

I don’t envision this being a rebuild like we saw previously.  If/when they move Cease, it will be for near major league ready prospects.  I think they want to be competing for a s%*# AL Central by 2026.  Unfortunately, there is not much we can do next year since the bulk of top prospects aren’t quite ready and will need some time to develop once they are finally called up.

[Tnetennba]

35 minutes ago, zisk said:

At least we won't be getting Sal Perez. So there is an upside.

This seriously might be to only silver lining for me.

[fathom]

49 minutes ago, CaliSoxFanViaSWside said:

That was shut long ago by all but the most paranoid of Sox fans. He was always too expensive.

I think the Sox wanted him but KC intends to contend 

[poppysox]

2 hours ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

Right and they're both worlds better defensively than what they've been running out there the last 4 years.  They're both going to tremendously help the young pitchers.  

Getz is trying to improve the culture.  These former studs are like extra coaches.  Maldonado, Sizemore, DeJong, etc. is an attempt to have our young players surrounded by pros weather players or coaches.  I know it isn't sexy, but I like having guys like Moncada and Eloy being influenced by guys who have been there.

[ChiSox59]

19 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

Spot on. Stassi or Maldonado, not both. They've basically burned $8M on a guy at the tail end of his career hoping to squeeze just a bit more juice out of him. Seems awfully familiar.

I mean, the option is vesting.  Its probably only $4M thrown to the wind. Which is like $1-2M too much, but a couple million probably not terribly important with a team that's sitting at $116.5M in commitments and appears unlikely to surpass $130M at this point. 

[CaliSoxFanViaSWside]

1 minute ago, fathom said:

I think the Sox wanted him but KC intends to contend 

If by contend you mean rising to the top of the miserable Central I suppose anything is possible.

[Tnetennba]

3 minutes ago, ChiSox59 said:

I mean, the option is vesting.  Its probably only $4M thrown to the wind. Which is like $1-2M too much, but a couple million probably not terribly important with a team that's sitting at $116.5M in commitments and appears unlikely to surpass $130M at this point. 

It's just very Reinsdorfian and all too familiar. Yes, it has a minimal impact to the total payroll number in a lost season, but it still seems like a waste to me.