The White Sox complete Rebuild Discussion Thread

[Lip Man 1]

A true rebuild will never happen when JR is in charge. The fans are too fickle and he is still mocked to this day for the last full rebuild he attempted (White Flag trades).

 

That was not a true rebuild the only reason Hernandez and Alvarez were traded was because they were going to become free agents, were represented by Scott Boras and the Sox knew they'd never be able to resign them.

 

In fact a few days before the "White Flag Trade" Scheuler attempted to sign those guys to a new deal and was rebuffed. That's when JR said 'go ahead'.

 

And as it turned out of the six minor league players only two Foulke and Howry ever made any type of impact at the major league level.

 

Mark

 

 

[LDF]

I was told by in May from a source that the topic of "selling" has come up from time to time this year. But as long as the Sox are continuing to make the kind of money they are I can't see major changes especially to ownership.

 

The same source told me at the same time that JR was so pissed off at the way things were going he was almost ready to let Kenny leave.

 

We'll never know for sure.

 

In my opinion though and I've said this for a long time including a recent column at Chicago Now / Sox Net, this organization has become stale and set in their ways. Major changes are needed including bringing in successful front office and scouting people from organizations that have consistently won. The Sox desperately need new ideas and a fresh way of looking at their problems.

 

I just don't see that happening however until JR is no longer on the scene.

 

Mark

 

let me asked this question, if KW goes, do you think that Hahn can guide the org like KW have done??

 

and this is not including jr hands on appch.

 

ref the bold, does jr ever see himself as partly to blame as well???

 

[Lip Man 1]

let me asked this question, if KW goes, do you think that Hahn can guide the org like KW have done??

 

and this is not including jr hands on appch.

 

ref the bold, does jr ever see himself as partly to blame as well???

 

I think Hahn can do a better job simply because he doesn't let emotion get that involved that it carries him away. (Remember Kenny tipping over the post game food spread in Baltimore after a Sox loss and calling the players b****es for one example?)

 

Have no idea if JR ever thinks that or not. I've met him twice but don't know him well enough to know how big of an ego he has.

 

Mark

 

[LDF]

I think Hahn can do a better job simply because he doesn't let emotion get that involved that it carries him away. (Remember Kenny tipping over the post game food spread in Baltimore after a Sox loss and calling the players b****es for one example?)

 

Have no idea if JR ever thinks that or not. I've met him twice but don't know him well enough to know how big of an ego he has.

 

Mark

 

crap.... ref the bold, i really meant that as a rhetorical question and not a real question or a snarky one.

 

i am sorry.

 

i don't know why, i was never a fan of KW ever since the 90's. but i have always cheered for the sox.

 

this good ole boy setup with the sox FO drove me crazy.

 

interesting point, rhetorical question, i really wonder if there was a power struggle during the trade deadline and a subtle switch of a power transfer.

[OmarComing25]

I think a rebuild is LOOOONG over due!

I asked in an earlier post, when should we have done a complete rebuild? There was no logical situation for it until 2013, which wasn't intended to be a rebuilding year but turned into one anyway. How does that mean we're LOOOONG overdue for one? There was nothing to tear down at the end of 2013, our only assets were Quintana and Sale, both at 24 years old and both the exact kind of players you rebuild around. What year should we have gone for the rebuild? As others have pointed out, there's not necessarily a need to do a complete rebuild with the parity and second wildcard. Look at this season, 84 wins could end up being enough for both wildcard positions the way things are playing out right now.

Edited August 5, 2015 by OmarComing25

[Jerksticks]

That was not a true rebuild the only reason Hernandez and Alvarez were traded was because they were going to become free agents, were represented by Scott Boras and the Sox knew they'd never be able to resign them.

 

In fact a few days before the "White Flag Trade" Scheuler attempted to sign those guys to a new deal and was rebuffed. That's when JR said 'go ahead'.

 

And as it turned out of the six minor league players only two Foulke and Howry ever made any type of impact at the major league level.

 

Mark

Man, why do you do it? I think we all deserve the explanation. All love brother I assure you, but we deserve to know. Nobody else does it. Why do you have to?

[LDF]

I asked in an earlier post, when should we have done a complete rebuild? There was no logical situation for it until 2013, which wasn't intended to be a rebuilding year but turned into one anyway. How does that mean we're LOOOONG overdue for one? There was nothing to tear down at the end of 2013, our only assets were Quintana and Sale, both at 24 years old and both the exact kind of players you rebuild around. What year should we have gone for the rebuild? As others have pointed out, there's not necessarily a need to do a complete rebuild with the parity and second wildcard. Look at this season, 84 wins could end up being enough for both wildcard positions the way things are playing out right now.

 

i agree, i do not think a complete rebuild is necessary esp now, i think a couple of final pieces are necessary. whether that is address via trade or the fa's rt.

 

if the beginning of this season, which is a mystery to me, never happen the way it did, and the team won a little more than 1/2 of their games, this would have been a different season. better yet, a little more than a 500 record in the al central would have been better.

[Panerista]

i agree, i do not think a complete rebuild is necessary esp now, i think a couple of final pieces are necessary. whether that is address via trade or the fa's rt.

 

if the beginning of this season, which is a mystery to me, never happen the way it did, and the team won a little more than 1/2 of their games, this would have been a different season. better yet, a little more than a 500 record in the al central would have been better.

The bold is indicative that you are not watching games.

 

New right fielder

New DH

New Third baseman

New Shortstop

New Second Baseman

 

By that logic, everyone is a few pieces from contention.

[OmarComing25]

The Cubs are held up as an example of a complete rebuild yielding results, yet by far the biggest reason for their success this year - their pitching, had largely nothing to do with the rebuild. You have the free agents (Lester, Hammel) and the guys picked up off the scrap heap (Arrieta, Strop, Rondon, James Russell). Those are moves that can be done without rebuilding, and they're going to drop another $25 million/year on a pitcher this offseason as well. Their best position player was also acquired through sketchy means (Rizzo). If Arrieta pitched like he did in Baltimore and Hammel pitched like he did in Oakland last year, then the Cubs are likely nowhere near a playoff spot. You could argue that their eye for talent is great and the reason why so many of their scrap heap moves work out, and I wouldn't disagree, and yes they still have a lot of young talent that came from the rebuild, but my main point is so far it's the non-rebuilding moves that have led to their success. If we had a few similar scrap heap moves break right for us on the position side, then we'd be right there for a playoff spot too.

 

I'm just not convinced a complete breakdown is the right move. For one I don't trust this organization to execute it correctly, and also the Pirates and Royals were in rebuilding mode for 20+ years before it finally worked out. We'd be punting on several seasons, and there's no guarantee we'd be better off afterwards than we are now. You can rebuild without doing a complete teardown.

Edited August 5, 2015 by OmarComing25

[Soxfest]

Until KW is no longer evaluating talent all this is a pipe dream.

[Lip Man 1]

Man, why do you do it? I think we all deserve the explanation. All love brother I assure you, but we deserve to know. Nobody else does it. Why do you have to?

 

Jerk:

 

I'm afraid you've lost me completely with this one.

 

Mark

 

[LDF]

name='AustinIllini' date='Aug 5, 2015 -> 11:17 PM' post='3217182'

 

 

New right fielder - Avi is the rf.

New DH - Adam L is under contract

New Third baseman - yes i agree

New Shortstop - anderson for all concerns is the ss of the future until he is not, then there is saladino

New Second Baseman - sanchez and MJ????

 

i would like a sp to be added.

 

so with the existing contracts and what is needed. i see 2 maybe 3 players.

 

and no one talking about a catcher.

 

i really don't understand this insistent need to have a rf hit hrs by the bucket, lets see how Avi does at the end of the season. he is young.

 

 

 

 

[Balta1701]

The Cubs are held up as an example of a complete rebuild yielding results, yet by far the biggest reason for their success this year - their pitching, had largely nothing to do with the rebuild. You have the free agents (Lester, Hammel) and the guys picked up off the scrap heap (Arrieta, Strop, Rondon, James Russell). Those are moves that can be done without rebuilding, and they're going to drop another $25 million/year on a pitcher this offseason as well. Their best position player was also acquired through sketchy means (Rizzo). If Arrieta pitched like he did in Baltimore and Hammel pitched like he did in Oakland last year, then the Cubs are likely nowhere near a playoff spot. You could argue that their eye for talent is great and the reason why so many of their scrap heap moves work out, and I wouldn't disagree, and yes they still have a lot of young talent that came from the rebuild, but my main point is so far it's the non-rebuilding moves that have led to their success. If we had a few similar scrap heap moves break right for us on the position side, then we'd be right there for a playoff spot too.

 

I'm just not convinced a complete breakdown is the right move. For one I don't trust this organization to execute it correctly, and also the Pirates and Royals were in rebuilding mode for 20+ years before it finally worked out. We'd be punting on several seasons, and there's no guarantee we'd be better off afterwards than we are now. You can rebuild without doing a complete teardown.

But looking beyond how they got Bryant...look at the other parts of that list and how they got them. With Rizzo they didn't just defraud the Padres, they did something really important. They gave him time to struggle. They gave him the 2013 season where he hit .233 and they didn't say "this 23 year old is going to be a key part right now and he's going to carry us to the division". They picked up Arrieta and didn't discard him when he put up a 1.5 WHIP in his first 7 starts at Iowa. They gave a talented but failed 27 year old a chance to see if he could turn into anything. They did that with enough guys and turned one of them into an ace quality pitcher.

 

Why were they able to do that? Because in addition to piling up draft picks like Bryant...they also piled up castoffs from teams that were ready to "win now". From teams that did "all in" deals and left themselves no room for the guys that weren't 100% ready to go right now. They picked up scrap heap guys and used their other big advantage - time - to turn as many of them into contributing, controlled, long term pieces as they could because they didn't insist that their team was ready to go because it had to be.

[Thad Bosley]

A true rebuild will never happen when JR is in charge. The fans are too fickle and he is still mocked to this day for the last full rebuild he attempted (White Flag trades).

Let's be very clear here. JR was not "mocked" because he attempted a "full rebuild". White Sox fans are just as fine with a rebuild as any fan base. In 1997, the year of the White Flag trade, the Sox were only a few years removed from a full rebuild that netted the Sox the likes of Thomas, Ventura, McDowell, Bere, Alvarez, Fernandez, Johnson, Melido Perez - just to name a few. The fan base lived through that rebuild in the late '80s, even as it was going on concurrently with the very real fan base-killing drama of the wonderful JR threatening to move the team to Tampa. If the fan base could survive all that was going on during that time period, they could easily handle a rebuild now.

 

No, what JR was "mocked" for back then, and ever so rightly so, was for trading Alvarez, Hernandez, and Darwin away at the deadline when the Sox were in 2nd place and "only" 3 1/2 games out of first place. It was a travesty then and criticized not only by a fan base excited about a potential trip to the postseason - a rarity in the JR ownership years - but across baseball circles as well.

Edited August 6, 2015 by Thad Bosley

[Balta1701]

I asked in an earlier post, when should we have done a complete rebuild? There was no logical situation for it until 2013, which wasn't intended to be a rebuilding year but turned into one anyway. How does that mean we're LOOOONG overdue for one? There was nothing to tear down at the end of 2013, our only assets were Quintana and Sale, both at 24 years old and both the exact kind of players you rebuild around. What year should we have gone for the rebuild? As others have pointed out, there's not necessarily a need to do a complete rebuild with the parity and second wildcard. Look at this season, 84 wins could end up being enough for both wildcard positions the way things are playing out right now.

I think the thought process really went off the rails in the 2014 offseason. Fine, Adam Dunn and the 2011 team turned into a disaster. 2012 was somehow better, then in 2013 we had to begin tearing things down. We moved off Peavy, we cleared salary, we started giving time to young guys. We successfully brought in Abreu, so we started gathering pieces...then the 2014 offseason hit.

 

In the 2014 offseason was where we really blew it. We made so many basic errors, so many flaws in our thought process. That's where we shortcut the path we were on that could have actually worked and could have actually worked at building a strong, deep roster. First on that list is that we couldn't be patient, we couldn't give time for guys to adapt to the big leagues, we knew with absolute certainty that they were ready to go and big leaguers never need time to grow into the league. Avi Garcia was ready right now and we were sure of it. Micah Johnson could jump completely over AAA because we said he would. Carlos Rodon was going to improve our record this season by 10 wins.

 

Then we threw in a nice batch of assuming some guys would develop while other guys never would, because we said so. Phegley and Semien would never develop into anything useful because we said they wouldn't. Bassitt was talented but he's a reliever, guys never improve on their offspeed stuff. But hey, here's a big name pitcher off of a career best year. And the fan base fully bought in, continued declaring in the same breath that we gave up so little for that pitcher and then wondering how we had an organization with so little depth.

 

Then there's the failure to assess risk. Conor Gillaspie and Tyler Flowers were going to be solid players because they had 1 year that showed it. There was no risk of them taking steps back. Abreu and Eaton were guaranteed to have better seasons than 2014. Alexei Ramirez had no risk of getting older and therefore we had to hold him because we can't afford to give anyone time to grow into his spot. Chris Sale's arm is rubber.

 

Then there's the failure to think about defense. And yes, some of the guys they traded away weren't going to help with that, but then we plugged in guys who were no better, and we weren't willing to give guys time to improve on their defense or grow into positions.

 

Then there's the assumption that paying full value on the free agent market is a good deal. That's just a lesson we need to learn, it's flat out not working for us. Or really, most teams - the teams that had great FA spending sprees last offseason are overwhelmingly disappointing right now.

 

So fine, the team didn't have an obvious time to "rebuild" coming into 2014, but then they started the process in 2014 and then short circuited it. They couldn't be patient. They couldn't pass on 2015 and use it as a year to grow some guys up while filtering out the unsuccessful ones. They couldn't give people time to grow into their roles. They went for the big names instead of making sure they were deep with guys who could grow into contributors. They bet hugely on the whole roster taking big steps forwards and in the process, they set themselves back substantially. They had time, they had a roster that could have grown together and then had tiny holes to fill, instead they went for the big splashes, they had to compete right now, full speed ahead and bleep the torpedoes.

 

And the end result is that now we're back to having to fill gaping holes on the FA market and worrying about a roster with little depth and we'll need to rely on rookies and we've got a lot of weak defenders but I'm sure it'll work better in 2016 so let's spend big again.

[captain54]

No, what JR was "mocked" for back then, and ever so rightly so, was for trading Alvarez, Hernandez, and Darwin away at the deadline when the Sox were in 2nd place and "only" 3 1/2 games out of first place. It was a travesty then and criticized not only by a fan base excited about a potential trip to the postseason - a rarity in the JR ownership years - but across baseball circles as well.

 

add to that the fact that Ventura had just come back from a bad injury and was just hitting his stride.

 

The funny thing was, even without Alvarez, Hernandez, and Darwin, the Sox continued to make a run and even closed the gap somewhat until Cleveland finally pulled away..

[captain54]

I think the thought process really went off the rails in the 2014 offseason. Fine, Adam Dunn and the 2011 team turned into a disaster. 2012 was somehow better, then in 2013 we had to begin tearing things down. We moved off Peavy, we cleared salary, we started giving time to young guys. We successfully brought in Abreu, so we started gathering pieces...then the 2014 offseason hit.

 

In the 2014 offseason was where we really blew it. We made so many basic errors, so many flaws in our thought process. That's where we shortcut the path we were on that could have actually worked and could have actually worked at building a strong, deep roster.

 

And the end result is that now we're back to having to fill gaping holes on the FA market and worrying about a roster with little depth and we'll need to rely on rookies and we've got a lot of weak defenders but I'm sure it'll work better in 2016 so let's spend big again.

 

Outstanding post. Required reading for every Sox fan

 

[2nd_city_saint787]

To me, the question is do you think you have a better chance at winning with Sale-Q-Rodon-Fulmer-EJ/Montas and free agent hitters

or do you think you can get fair value on guys like Sale and Q to "Rebuild" that way.

 

I think maybe you entertain trading Q for hitting, but I wouldn't really call that a rebuild.

[2nd_city_saint787]

What should have been done in 2014?

 

Just pick up scrap heap players and mail it in?

 

Trade Sale? Q?

Edited August 6, 2015 by scs787

[Bigsoxhurt35]

Until KW is no longer evaluating talent all this is a pipe dream.

KW was all in on Abreu wasn't he?

[Bigsoxhurt35]

To me, the question is do you think you have a better chance at winning with Sale-Q-Rodon-Fulmer-EJ/Montas and free agent hitters

or do you think you can get fair value on guys like Sale and Q to "Rebuild" that way.

 

I think maybe you entertain trading Q for hitting, but I wouldn't really call that a rebuild.

IMO, I keep the rotation minus Shark and Danks. I go get a Cespedes or Heyward and platoon them with Avi in RF/DH. I fill Sharks spot with EJ and Fulmer takes Danks spot. (If Fulmer is ready. Montas needs at least another year). I'm not moving Quintana now. I was all for it but the more I think about this rotation, we need him if we don't keep Shark and get rid of Danks. (Not sure what Danks contract is remaining).

[LDF]

But looking beyond how they got Bryant...look at the other parts of that list and how they got them. With Rizzo they didn't just defraud the Padres, they did something really important. They gave him time to struggle. They gave him the 2013 season where he hit .233 and they didn't say "this 23 year old is going to be a key part right now and he's going to carry us to the division". They picked up Arrieta and didn't discard him when he put up a 1.5 WHIP in his first 7 starts at Iowa. They gave a talented but failed 27 year old a chance to see if he could turn into anything. They did that with enough guys and turned one of them into an ace quality pitcher.

 

Why were they able to do that? Because in addition to piling up draft picks like Bryant...they also piled up castoffs from teams that were ready to "win now". From teams that did "all in" deals and left themselves no room for the guys that weren't 100% ready to go right now. They picked up scrap heap guys and used their other big advantage - time - to turn as many of them into contributing, controlled, long term pieces as they could because they didn't insist that their team was ready to go because it had to be.

 

i like this very much.

 

but it also means 2 things,

1. a scouting dept that know what they are look for

2. a gm who is smart and in tune with what to look for.

 

all this was done before what, 2 yrs ago. but that trade for shark, where shark went from the northside to al west really helped. adding more to #2 having a gm who know what his job is.

[LDF]

KW was all in on Abreu wasn't he?

 

every once in a while someone can get lucky.

[LDF]

What should have been done in 2014?

 

Just pick up scrap heap players and mail it in?

 

Trade Sale? Q?

 

no but trading a shark before the asg was a rt to go, maybe not the same haul as before.

[BigFinn]

Let's be very clear here. JR was not "mocked" because he attempted a "full rebuild". White Sox fans are just as fine with a rebuild as any fan base. In 1997, the year of the White Flag trade, the Sox were only a few years removed from a full rebuild that netted the Sox the likes of Thomas, Ventura, McDowell, Bere, Alvarez, Fernandez, Johnson, Melido Perez - just to name a few. The fan base lived through that rebuild in the late '80s, even as it was going on concurrently with the very real fan base-killing drama of the wonderful JR threatening to move the team to Tampa. If the fan base could survive all that was going on during that time period, they could easily handle a rebuild now.

 

No, what JR was "mocked" for back then, and ever so rightly so, was for trading Alvarez, Hernandez, and Darwin away at the deadline when the Sox were in 2nd place and "only" 3 1/2 games out of first place. It was a travesty then and criticized not only by a fan base excited about a potential trip to the postseason - a rarity in the JR ownership years - but across baseball circles as well.

The worst part of the "White flag" trade was how the White Sox front office betrayed Robin Ventura. If I remember correctly, Robin had a horrific knee injury on a play at the plate during spring training. Robin was busting his ass in rehab while the Sox were fighting with Cleveland all summer. Just as Robin was ready to rejoin the club, Alvarez, Hernandez, and Darwin got traded to the Giants.

 

The Sox brass has been working to rebuild that sense of loyalty throughout the organization, but the "White flag" trade was a true low point in the history of this franchise.