KW: Stay Out of White Sox Minor League Business

[Marty34]

"We've been steadily, over the last number of years, bringing guys into our situation and been competitive, and they've been young players," general manager Ken Williams said. "We don't promote ourselves well enough on the minor league front, and that's my responsibility.

 

"I'm just not as (inclined) to spout off about our minor league players and promote them in that fashion. Our focus is here. Let them develop without fanfare and very quietly. Other teams recognize. And they certainly know when they see Nate Jones or Hector Santiago or Chris Sale or the other names we brought in. But we can't be concerned about other people's perceptions."

 

Santiago (2006) and Jones (2007) are products of drafts overseen by former scouting director Duane Shaffer, who left after a conflict with Williams.

 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseb...0,6861046.story

 

If this bullpen is for real, comprised of Jones, Reed, and Santiago, these minor league rankings will have been rendered meaningless.

[caulfield12]

If this bullpen is for real, comprised of Jones, Reed, and Santiago, these minor league rankings will have been rendered meaningless.

 

 

They're not meaningless.

 

1) KW forgot to mention that he built the #1 farm system in baseball in the 1999-2001 time frame. He wants us to believe that with a decade of experience, he's somehow become "worse" at promoting the system?

 

2) Producing relievers (even closers) is great, but you can't have more than a .500 or so team without producing All-Star caliber position prospects and starting pitchers.

 

At best, the jury's still out on Beckham, Morel and Flowers. Viciedo and Ramirez were experienced international players from the time they were 15 or 16. Brent Lillibridge and Alejandro DeAza, at least at this time, our looking as good or better than anyone we've produced internally in the last 5-7 years in terms of position prospects/hitters.

 

Saladino, Mitchell, Walker and T. Thompson are all a long ways from contributing at the major league level.

 

Stewart and Molina (albeit 2 starts) have been disappointing.

 

Still, if the White Sox win the AL Central or make it as a Wildcard, nobody will care if our system is ranked 20th or 30th.

 

As far as promoting the system, that falls just as much on Buddy Bell as it does Williams. If the team is worth $750-900 million, they can afford to hire five people in the front office who do nothing but promote Sox prospects. Heck, they could find five here at SoxTalk who would do it for free. It's not even so much about promotion, it's about production.

 

Right now, all we can do is brag about identifying and drafting Gio Gonzalez, Daniel Hudson, Brandon McCarthy, David Holmberg, Clayton Richard, etc.

 

Edited April 14, 2012 by caulfield12

[Cali]

Draft and Develop a freaking SUPERSTAR player from the system and we'll shut up about the system. It's been 20 years since Big Frank and it seems like a majority of teams have produced a superstar player in that time.

 

My definition of superstar by the way is a guy who puts up amazing numbers yes, but someone who gets national coverage, all-star STARTER considerations. Sports illustrated covers... That kind of s***.

[Jake]

Draft and Develop a freaking SUPERSTAR player from the system and we'll shut up about the system. It's been 20 years since Big Frank and it seems like a majority of teams have produced a superstar player in that time.

 

My definition of superstar by the way is a guy who puts up amazing numbers yes, but someone who gets national coverage, all-star STARTER considerations. Sports illustrated covers... That kind of s***.

 

Sounds like Mark Buehrle

[DukeNukeEm]

Yea pretty much Mark Buehrle on that one.

 

Its all random with prospects, all sorts of people pretend like they know but nobody does. Its all a giant gamble, we should've traded Beckham when his stock was high, trading Reed was a great move, Chris Young even better. Someone said we had the #1 farm system back in 00-01, aside from PK (who we traded for) where are those guys now?

[Balta1701]

Yea pretty much Mark Buehrle on that one.

 

Its all random with prospects, all sorts of people pretend like they know but nobody does. Its all a giant gamble, we should've traded Beckham when his stock was high, trading Reed was a great move, Chris Young even better. Someone said we had the #1 farm system back in 00-01, aside from PK (who we traded for) where are those guys now?

Not everyone pans out, but some do, and some get traded, and both of them can help you save money.

 

We had the #1 farm system when we had guys like Garland, Buehrle, Kip Wells, Rauch, Reed, Olivo, Borchard, Crede making up the strong part of that system. Not all of them succeeded...but we won a world series in no small part because we had that top flight system.

[caulfield12]

Along with all those guys who succeeded, Jon Rauch was the #1 prospect, or at least in the top 5-10, on every list that came out.

 

Matt Guerrier would later be traded for Marte.

 

Josh Fogg would become part of the trade for Todd Ritchie, ouch.

 

The likes of Lorenzo Barcelo (White Flag trade), Brian West and Jason Stumm wouldn't make it, lots of injury problems, particularly with Barcelo, Stumm and Rauch (labrum and an attitude that didn't sit well with KW and many)

 

Danny Wright was productive for a couple of seasons and then flamed out.

 

Matt Ginter was on the US Olmpic team with Rauch and in the Top 5 of our system.

 

 

For most of that time, the two pitchers (other than Garland/Kip Wells) who made the most impact ended up being Buehrle and Josh Fogg, who were just on the outside of our Top 10 or in the 9-15 range during those years.

 

Just before that, you had Parque and Snyder, not to mention Durham/Ordonez/C-Lee. We also got Foulke and Howry from the White Flag deal, Caruso, etc.

 

 

Of course, this was the "These Kids Can Play" era and we had a lot of high draft picks at that time, to be fair.

 

Oh, and I just remembered Rocky Biddle and Gary Glover, although I think Glover came from either the Jays or Brewers. Scott Eyre, too.

 

So many.

Edited April 14, 2012 by caulfield12

[Cali]

That's not Mark Buehrle at all haha. Verlander is more like I'm talking about... Stud pitchers with ridic numbers and in commercials and s***. Cy Young winners.

 

Buehrle never had national attention....

[max power]

That's not Mark Buehrle at all haha. Verlander is more like I'm talking about... Stud pitchers with ridic numbers and in commercials and s***. Cy Young winners.

 

Buehrle never had national attention....

The guys you are talking about almost always get drafted early in the first round. There are more misses than hits early in the first round in baseball. And the sox very rarely get a chance to draft early in the first round.

[caulfield12]

Not since McDowell, Ventura, Frank Thomas and Alex Fernandez.

[southsider2k5]

Nice title that isn't taken anywhere out of the article... Joe would be proud.

[kapkomet]

Nice title that isn't taken anywhere out of the article... Joe would be proud.

 

He (it) is proud.

 

Any time it get to bash KW it will.

[GreenSox]

Chris Young, Gio Gonzales, Dan Hudson, Clayton Richard.

We have developed some players, primarily pitchers (and that was the strength of the systems 20 years ago and 12 years ago as well).

We basically cut Jon Rausch when he left the park during the game.

 

Our WS team had 3 starters who came up through the system. This team has 5, not including bullpen.

Edited April 14, 2012 by GreenSox

[Marty34]

Nice title that isn't taken anywhere out of the article... Joe would be proud.

 

You obviously don't have even the simplest understanding of how the newspaper business works. The writer of an article is not responsible for the headline. Hence the above statement does not work.

[chw42]

You obviously don't have even the simplest understanding of how the newspaper business works. The writer of an article is not responsible for the headline. Hence the above statement does not work.

 

We don't, but Joe Cowley does doesn't he?

[ptatc]

Not since McDowell, Ventura, Frank Thomas and Alex Fernandez.

When they had high draft picks and were a bad mlb team.

[LittleHurt05]

The guys you are talking about almost always get drafted early in the first round. There are more misses than hits early in the first round in baseball. And the sox very rarely get a chance to draft early in the first round.

 

I remember the Sox had a streak of like 10-15 years or so without a top 10 pick. The only other team with a similar streak was the Yankees. The problem is that the Yankees were winning division, while the Sox were finishing around .500 usually. Never awful, but rarely a playoff team.

[ScottyDo]

I remember the Sox had a streak of like 10-15 years or so without a top 10 pick. The only other team with a similar streak was the Yankees. The problem is that the Yankees were winning division, while the Sox were finishing around .500 usually. Never awful, but rarely a playoff team.

The other difference is that the Yankees were willing to go over slot the entire time so they got higher-caliber players than us

[Balta1701]

The other difference is that the Yankees were willing to go over slot the entire time so they got higher-caliber players than us

Except, when you look at the Yankees roster, you find 1 legit star who came out of their organization during the last decade, (Cano), a couple of pitchers who have contributed some (Hughes and Nova), and a couple relievers, most notably Robertson.

 

So the Yankees roster may have gotten "Higher-caliber players", but their roster is overflowing with big money FA acquisitions and a couple guys they developed in the mid-90's who they've kept because of the amount of money they have.

[ScottyDo]

Except, when you look at the Yankees roster, you find 1 legit star who came out of their organization during the last decade, (Cano), a couple of pitchers who have contributed some (Hughes and Nova), and a couple relievers, most notably Robertson.

 

So the Yankees roster may have gotten "Higher-caliber players", but their roster is overflowing with big money FA acquisitions and a couple guys they developed in the mid-90's who they've kept because of the amount of money they have.

True enough, but they've traded away a number of legitimate prospects (see: the only Tiger with multiple hits today) because they could spend on the draft, and they could afford to trade them away because they've got buttloads of cash for free agency like you mentioned.

[caulfield12]

And then you have the "Core Four" in Pettite, Jeter, Rivera and Posada who they developed/signed on their own.

 

 

I'm still waiting for the central argument of this thread, Marty.

 

Exactly WHO should be involved in White Sox business? Scott Merkin? Chris Rongey? Buddy Bell? Robin Ventura?

 

I'm not understanding what you're even positing as a theory with that thread title.

 

Wait, let me guess. KW should be fired because even though our system is producing lots of players, it's not being well promoted? Hmmm....

 

I can just see the JR press conference on that one. "Despite our team being in first place, due to the fact that Kenny Williams hasn't reached out to Keith Law, Kevin Goldstein/John Sickels, Phil Rogers, Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus, etc., I've had to fire him as our General Manager." Ridiculous.

Edited April 15, 2012 by caulfield12

[Quin]

You obviously don't have even the simplest understanding of how the newspaper business works. The writer of an article is not responsible for the headline. Hence the above statement does not work.

 

Sorry, my experience here at the University of Missouri calls bulls*** on this. I have to submit 2 or 3 headlines per article.

[caulfield12]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseb...,3750059.column

 

Sounds like Williams is doing exactly what he's supposed to be doing.

 

 

[iamshack]

Terry Francona commented on the state of the White Sox farm system last Sunday night during the game...and it's hard to separate the honest commentary from the fluff commentary, and Francona even prefaced his comments by saying "I might be a little biased because I spent a lot of time around their development system," but he went on to say that it is better than one might think from reading most of the major publications. He said the White Sox system is "misunderstood." And then he went on to mention that a lot of pitchers in the mlb have come out of the White Sox system.

 

And he's right...we just haven't been in a great position to utilize them ourselves.

 

The argument used to be made that of all the White Sox prospects Kenny has traded, no one really has turned into much of anything, so why worry?

 

Well, in the past few years, we've seen Gio and Hudson be traded elsewhere and turn into a couple of the top young starters in the game.

 

I think many of us sit and think about what this rotation might look like with Gio and Hudson in it, along with Sale and Danks and Humber...

 

But the bottom line is, to claim that the system is decrepit and doesn't produce anything is insane. If you just look at those three SPs alone, you're not going to find too many systems that have produced a Gio/Hudson/Sale type trio in the last 5-6 years. Unfortunately, we only have one Sale to speak for it...but to me, it's starting to become clear that it's not the system that should bear the brunt of the blame, but more so our relative lack of success in trading them for players that would put us over the top and result in division championships. That can be blamed on Kenny, but it's more so an issue of everyone failing, from the players, the manager, and the GM on down.

[NorthSideSox72]

The problem in this discussion is that people assume depth of talent at any moment in time is the only measure of strength of the system. No, that is only part of the measurement of success. Obviously even more important is, how good has the system been at producing major league talent?

 

And as someone here posted a few months ago, looking at the draft class of 2008 to present, the Sox have produced more major leaguers than any other system in baseball. Let that sink in for a moment.

 

Now, that doesn't mean the Sox system is the best in baseball. What it does tell me is it isn't the worst either, as some have said. These publications are so obsessed with their own analysis of players in the system - which itself is a highly subjective and subject to lots of mistakes - that they focus only on that evaluation of supposed to talent to make their rankings. They are missing some some of the larger points.