Is This a Playoff Team in 2015?

[witesoxfan]

Why is Zach Braff holding a vacuum in front of an ocean that has a car driving in it?

 

[Kyyle23]

Why is Zach Braff holding a vacuum in front of an ocean that has a car driving in it?

 

all good questions

[caulfield12]

Are we joking about Josh Hamilton, or being serious?

 

Haven't we been fighting for 4 years to get Adam Dunn's contract off the books? Then we're going to turn around and add a probable $16-22 million contract commitment? Seriously?

 

He's 33 now and is going to be coming off two 1-2 WAR seasons, where his OPS was more or less Dayan Viciedo 2012 territory. Not to mention the damage that he did to his body in his teens and early twenties from all the drug abuse, that doesn't exactly help the aging process.

 

 

[thedoctor]

i don't really see it. i've always kind of looked at 2016 is the year that with the right moves the team could be a legitimate contender.

 

i suppose next year's team could surprise and earn a playoff spot. that would be excellent but i still don't see that enough moves could be made this offseason where the sox would head into october with a strong chance to win it all (which to me is the goal, not successive wild cards).

 

i hope that hahn approaches this offseason like he did the previous one. not sure it is even smart to lay out big cash as we did for abreu last year. to me, adding a few key pieces and letting some younger guys mature is smart, with the goal of perhaps adding the big pieces the following year.

[caulfield12]

i don't really see it. i've always kind of looked at 2016 is the year that with the right moves the team could be a legitimate contender.

 

i suppose next year's team could surprise and earn a playoff spot. that would be excellent but i still don't see that enough moves could be made this offseason where the sox would head into october with a strong chance to win it all (which to me is the goal, not successive wild cards).

 

i hope that hahn approaches this offseason like he did the previous one. not sure it is even smart to lay out big cash as we did for abreu last year. to me, adding a few key pieces and letting some younger guys mature is smart, with the goal of perhaps adding the big pieces the following year.

 

 

This is pretty much exactly where the Cubs are...the difference is we already have Sale/Abreu/Quintana/Garcia/Eaton/Ramirez at the major league level, whereas they have Rizzo/Castro/Arrieta and all of their prospects and more resources to work with, including the relationship with Lester and Epstein. Similar bullpen troubles, although it's hard to say anyone is actually WORSE than the Sox right now.

 

 

[Chicago White Sox]

I still think James Shields and few other additions can make us a legit contender next year.

 

Look at this rotation and tell me we wouldn't be in most games:

 

1) Sale

2) Shields

3) Quintana

4) Rodon

5) Danks

 

On top of that, we'd actually have some depth in the upper minors with Beck, Johnson, & Bassitt in AAA and Danish & Montas in AA.

 

I get that Shields is on the wrong side of 30, will be extremely expensive, and cost a draft pick, but we have tons of financial flexibility and not much to spend it on. Even if he regresses some over the life of the deal, he can be an extremely productive player and quality veteran for the clubhouse. Maybe he'll end up being overpaid, but teams win World Series due to production NOT surplus value.

 

Honestly, if I were Hahn, I'd make him my priority while other teams are focused on Scherzer & Lester. I'd be willing to go as high as $80M/4 years if that would get a deal done. Again, would probably be an overpay from a surplus value perspective, but we can afford to pay a premium for Shields as long as he remains a 3+ WAR pitcher.

 

[thedoctor]

This is pretty much exactly where the Cubs are...the difference is we already have Sale/Abreu/Quintana/Garcia/Eaton/Ramirez at the major league level, whereas they have Rizzo/Castro/Arrieta and all of their prospects and more resources to work with, including the relationship with Lester and Epstein. Similar bullpen troubles, although it's hard to say anyone is actually WORSE than the Sox right now.

 

i don't disagree with most of that. and i do think the team must take another step next year and some moves are warranted/necessary. someone mentioned earlier that next year is more of a tweener year, similar to this year's cleveland team. i'd agree with that.

 

while i think you could spend more money with the goal of winning it next year, i don't feel that you'd really get there. there are just still so many holes.

[Dick Allen]

Hamilton lost 20 pounds after he signed with the Angels and was never fat. He said he lost weight by drinking vegetable juices. Now he hits half as many homers, and strikes out about 40% more often.

 

Anyone thinking the Sox should pick him up after his history and his performance the last 2.5 years is crazy.

[kitekrazy]

oh hey look guys, greg's overreacting again while looking at things in a vacuum

 

 

 

As I recall, Reinsdorf is the one who really pushed the envelope in signing Abreu. Seems to me Williams really didn't want to go above like $45-50 million, and Jerry said "if this guy is as good as you say, we may as well spend as much as we have to [sic]"

 

I'm going to use Greg's words from a previous thread for his quote. "I've never read something so horrible from a Sox fan."

[beautox]

I have been watching several Cuban players and Asian players for the past several months. with re to

Alfredo Despaigne, he was playing in mexico with a fake passport, waiting to get some time in so he can

petition mlb. however, mlb powers investigated and forced mexico to banned him for life. he then went

back home to cuba. here it is discovered that he does not want to give up his citizenship to cuba b/c of

some family ties to the gov or something. long story, he is now in japan playing,

 

he is 1 or 3 or 4 players I would love to the sox to get. oh well.

thats not true at all, MLB has gone on record saying they wouldn't enforce the ban of the mexican league on mlb. if Despaigne wants to play in the bigs he has to defect from cuba and establish residency somewhere else, simple as that.

[2nd_city_saint787]

thats not true at all, MLB has gone on record saying they wouldn't enforce the ban of the mexican league on mlb. if Despaigne wants to play in the bigs he has to defect from cuba and establish residency somewhere else, simple as that.

 

And I really hope that happens, dudes numbers were right up there with Abreus in Cuba.

[LDF]

thats not true at all, MLB has gone on record saying they wouldn't enforce the ban of the mexican league on mlb. if Despaigne wants to play in the bigs he has to defect from cuba and establish residency somewhere else, simple as that.

 

 

first, it was the mlb powers to be that force mexico to banned him for the fake passport. what is

your point is he not playing in Japan? doesn't he need to defect in order to play in mlb? does

he not have family high in the cuban gov?? and lastly isn't he not going to defect????

 

where are you coming from to try to argue this point.

[2nd_city_saint787]

first, it was the mlb powers to be that force mexico to banned him for the fake passport. what is

your point is he not playing in Japan? doesn't he need to defect in order to play in mlb? does

he not have family high in the cuban gov?? and lastly isn't he not going to defect????

 

where are you coming from to try to argue this point.

 

Point is we don't know if he's going to defect or not. Like he said, and I researched to be true, because he was banned from the Mexican league doesn't mean he can't play in the bigs.

 

From MLBtraderumors

It’s not known whether or not we will ever see Despaigne in Major League Baseball, but MLB did inform Badler last month that Despaigne’s lifetime ban from the Mexican League won’t have any bearing on his potential free agent stock; MLB does not have an agreement to honor any suspensions from the Mexican League.

 

 

 

To my earlier point about his numbers being comparable to Abreus, a website broke down a 3 year period of stats between the 2..

 

Abreu- 1015 ABs .356/.478/.681 180 OPS+ 224 ISO+

Despaigne- 1183 ABs .353/.456/.670 183 OPS+ 252 ISO+

 

 

 

 

[greg775]

I'm going to use Greg's words from a previous thread for his quote. "I've never read something so horrible from a Sox fan."

I didn't mean to offend you, I was just horrified you were quoted as saying you wanted the team to move. That was too wacky for me.

[LDF]

Point is we don't know if he's going to defect or not. Like he said, and I researched to be true, because

he was banned from the Mexican league doesn't mean he can't play in the bigs.

 

From MLBtraderumors

 

 

 

 

To my earlier point about his numbers being comparable to Abreus, a website broke down a 3 year period of stats between the 2..

 

Abreu- 1015 ABs .356/.478/.681 180 OPS+ 224 ISO+

Despaigne- 1183 ABs .353/.456/.670 183 OPS+ 252 ISO+

 

and I never said he was or was not going to defect. he was banned. banned from baseball in mexico b/c

mlb advised it. june of 2014. I can not find the mag quote to prove it.

 

mlb will honor the ban them came back and did some backtracking by adding if he defect and so on and so on.

Mexico trust him for several reason, in all of 2013 he could have defected and didn't and them waiting for the

update of the Mexican baseball he rtn to cuba.

 

that is all I said, someone wanted to know an update on him. not to cause a debate. here is some of the

snippets of what I found. I wish I know where the rest is.

 

now show me where I said that mlb is not interested nor will never sign him.

 

http://www.baseballamerica.com/internation...mexican-league/

 

http://www.baseballamerica.com/internation...gne-play-japan/

 

 

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2125637...isk-high-reward

[LDF]

Just doing a quick rundown of the expected 2014 lineup with no changes

 

Star:

 

Abreu

Eaton (assume for argument sake he plays 140 games next year)

Garcia (assume he takes next step forward. He looks good. Projection systems and scouts really love him, I think there is a reason why. He can makes the game look easy at times, eg that sliding play tonight and hr)

 

Solid Starter:

Conor (needs a platoon partner but mashes 2/3 of the starters in MLB, aka righties)

Ramirez (aging, but still solid, obviously is trade bait)

 

Adequate starter:

Flowers (hey, the bar at catcher is low, the defensive metrics like him and so do Cooper and Hahn, that's enough for me)

De Aza (is going to finish around 1 fWAR although is trending downhill, again, trade bait)

 

Gaping Holes:

Beckham (his wRC+ is currently 62. He'd have to be Ozzie Smith to carry that bat, and he ain't even half that. There are other players (Marcus Semian hello) cheaper and probably better on the 40 man)

Viciedo (his time in Chicago is numbered, clearly out of favor against RHP when team is healthy the only way he comes back is as a part time platoon DH/OF and even then he's a marginal roster spot at median case)

Dunn/DH (should be easy to fill but DH has dogged the Sox for awhile now.)

 

 

I trust the Sox to find better pitching assuming they spend some money. As for the position players they are going to need some luck and some positive influxes from home grown youth in order to fill out the every day lineup. The good news is that a lot of surplus value stars like Jose, Q, Sale and Eaton are already on the team. They have the stars. Now they need some scrubs, and better ones than Beckham and Carroll and pretty much anyone everyone in the pen.

 

man, I am at a lost to figure flowers. you stat guys prob have a better read on him. for me, I like

him. a while back there was a story of him and how,to me, he is a student of the game. to practice

the fundamental. I think he might even be a coach in the making. but can the sox still keep him for

next yr without finding a replacement?

 

[GreenSox]

The other reason I don't see this team being a playoff team is that there remains a startling lack of starting pitching depth.

Sox have a 1, a 3 and a 5. Sox need about 3-4 more 3s. Rodon might be one; might sign a FA. That still leaves the team short.

But when I see plans with Danks in there (he'd be in the pen, if that, on a playoff team); it's just not a serious effort.

 

The bullpen needs a couple of top end pitchers. I hope we don't panic and trade real prospects for bullpen pitchers, but I suspect we might see that.

I also would prefer that the Sox not make sorry excuses for losing - the Lindstrom injury as an excuse for not contending was silly (when healthy, Lindstrom is a mediocre bullpen pitcher) .

[Chicago White Sox]

Sox have a 1, a 3 and a 5. Sox need about 3-4 more 3s.

Wait, what??