Adam Eaton

[Balta1701]

Hell, you don't even have to go back to 2014. LaRoche had a .760 OPS entering June. He keeps that pace the rest of the year, Samardzija doesn't completely fall apart after the deadline, and Sale repeats his first half ERA, there's a good chance we make the playoffs. And again, a 10-game improvement really isn't that much in baseball, that's turning 5 of your losses over 162 games into wins. The difference isn't as big as it might seem. My point is that we were a couple breaks away from a playoff berth even this year, yet a lot of posters here act like the situation is completely hopeless.

See, this thinking drives me completely batty because this is the thinking of the White Sox front office and it's so much the thinking of a losing organization. All you've got is a list of "excuses" even if you don't want to call them that. "Oh if LaRoche had kept this up", "If Sale had kept this up", "we're so close we're right there".

 

Every single losing organization can say stuff like that. They're still losing organizations. But you know what? The winning organizations could say that too, but they don't.

 

Put the Cardinals in that same mode. How many excuses could the Cardinals make this season? "Wainright missed almost the whole year. Holliday, our best hitter, was out for more than 1/2 the year. Molina has hit the DL. Adams has missed most of the year. Peralta has put up a .626 OPS the 2nd half. Yadier Molina has a .660 OPS on the season - that's his worst in 5 years. I could keep going if I wanted.

 

Winning organizations put together rosters that can take that. Losing organizations give a list of all the bad things that happened and pretend "oh if a few of those were different we'd be right there".

 

Some things always go wrong! Especially if you're buying guys who are in their mid to late 30s.

 

Play the excuse game the other way with the white sox and you can make them seem awfully lucky. In 2014, Abreu, Sale, Garcia, and Eaton all hit the DL. Nate Jones was out for the whole year. This year we've been remarkably healthy, out of that group the only thing resembling the DL was Sale missing 1 start. Eaton looked like an injury prone player last offseason and he's been almost 100% healthy. We've gotten great stints from Soto and Trayce Thompson that no one would have expected. How on Earth did the White Sox get that lucky? No one would have ever guessed all those positive things could happen.

 

The Cardinals could make excuses like that. Their excuses put ours to shame if they wanted to make them. Instead they went out and won >62% of their games and put away the only division in baseball that has 3 playoff teams with little stress. That's the difference between a winning and a losing organization and we're the latter.

[Hatchetman]

OMG. Dead last in position WAR in all MLB. This lineup needs a massive talent infusion to be a World Series contender.

[OmarComing25]

See, this thinking drives me completely batty because this is the thinking of the White Sox front office and it's so much the thinking of a losing organization. All you've got is a list of "excuses" even if you don't want to call them that. "Oh if LaRoche had kept this up", "If Sale had kept this up", "we're so close we're right there".

 

Every single losing organization can say stuff like that. They're still losing organizations. But you know what? The winning organizations could say that too, but they don't.

 

Put the Cardinals in that same mode. How many excuses could the Cardinals make this season? "Wainright missed almost the whole year. Holliday, our best hitter, was out for more than 1/2 the year. Molina has hit the DL. Adams has missed most of the year. Peralta has put up a .626 OPS the 2nd half. Yadier Molina has a .660 OPS on the season - that's his worst in 5 years. I could keep going if I wanted.

 

Winning organizations put together rosters that can take that. Losing organizations give a list of all the bad things that happened and pretend "oh if a few of those were different we'd be right there".

 

Some things always go wrong! Especially if you're buying guys who are in their mid to late 30s.

 

Play the excuse game the other way with the white sox and you can make them seem awfully lucky. In 2014, Abreu, Sale, Garcia, and Eaton all hit the DL. Nate Jones was out for the whole year. This year we've been remarkably healthy, out of that group the only thing resembling the DL was Sale missing 1 start. Eaton looked like an injury prone player last offseason and he's been almost 100% healthy. We've gotten great stints from Soto and Trayce Thompson that no one would have expected. How on Earth did the White Sox get that lucky? No one would have ever guessed all those positive things could happen.

 

The Cardinals could make excuses like that. Their excuses put ours to shame if they wanted to make them. Instead they went out and won >62% of their games and put away the only division in baseball that has 3 playoff teams with little stress. That's the difference between a winning and a losing organization and we're the latter.

First of all you're comparing us to the best organization in the MLB, yeah the Cardinals are very good at developing talent. Secondly, Nate Jones was hurt most of the year, as was Albers, and Sale got off to a rough start due to a lack of Spring Training, but I'll give you the breaks we've had on health. That's about it for breaks though. Literally everyone had a massive drop-off from 2014 except for Q, Eaton, Danks and a couple bullpen guys. I get there were risks of guys not repeating those years but there was a HUGE drop-off from almost all of them. Very few guys performed how they were projected to do, and the projections were pretty pessimistic as it was. I'm not trying to make excuses, I'm pointing out that the difference between the White Sox this year and contention is not as large as people are making it out to be. I still think 2016 should be a rebuilding year, and there's still a lot of work to do, I just don't see the reason for extreme pessimism like so many have here.

[Soxfest]

The way some Sox fans talk you'd think we're on pace to lose 100 games this season. If two of LaRoche, Melky, and Alexei just repeated their 2014 seasons, we'd be right there for a playoff spot this year. Throw in one of Samardzija and Sale coming even kind of close to their 2014 ERAs and we probably win the second wildcard. The difference between 76 wins and 88-89 wins is really not that much in baseball, teams make that kind of jump every year, and we have done it several times in the last decade. All it takes is a couple breaks going your way.

IF the favorite word of the Sox front office every offseason.

[kitekrazy]

See, this thinking drives me completely batty because this is the thinking of the White Sox front office and it's so much the thinking of a losing organization. All you've got is a list of "excuses" even if you don't want to call them that. "Oh if LaRoche had kept this up", "If Sale had kept this up", "we're so close we're right there".

 

Every single losing organization can say stuff like that. They're still losing organizations. But you know what? The winning organizations could say that too, but they don't.

 

Put the Cardinals in that same mode. How many excuses could the Cardinals make this season? "Wainright missed almost the whole year. Holliday, our best hitter, was out for more than 1/2 the year. Molina has hit the DL. Adams has missed most of the year. Peralta has put up a .626 OPS the 2nd half. Yadier Molina has a .660 OPS on the season - that's his worst in 5 years. I could keep going if I wanted.

 

Winning organizations put together rosters that can take that. Losing organizations give a list of all the bad things that happened and pretend "oh if a few of those were different we'd be right there".

 

Some things always go wrong! Especially if you're buying guys who are in their mid to late 30s.

 

Play the excuse game the other way with the white sox and you can make them seem awfully lucky. In 2014, Abreu, Sale, Garcia, and Eaton all hit the DL. Nate Jones was out for the whole year. This year we've been remarkably healthy, out of that group the only thing resembling the DL was Sale missing 1 start. Eaton looked like an injury prone player last offseason and he's been almost 100% healthy. We've gotten great stints from Soto and Trayce Thompson that no one would have expected. How on Earth did the White Sox get that lucky? No one would have ever guessed all those positive things could happen.

 

The Cardinals could make excuses like that. Their excuses put ours to shame if they wanted to make them. Instead they went out and won >62% of their games and put away the only division in baseball that has 3 playoff teams with little stress. That's the difference between a winning and a losing organization and we're the latter.

 

Post of the week!

 

[chisoxt]

No contradiction.

He's a "keeper" in the sense that he's a decent baseball player. I hope the Sox trade him because he's not as good as his numbers, he'd return value and you can't build a team trading prospects only.

 

Trayce Thompson is a building block and should be our CF next year.

But Robbie boy keeps wheeling out Melky, Alexei and Eaton day after day after day.

This is so laughable I had to chime in. So you want to trade a decent young player with the team friendly contract to get prospects in the hopes that maybe one of them will be as good as the player you're getting rid of? I will say this however - I don't think the White Sox really like Eaton (and why would they? He's a good player). Every time Robin opens his mouth he's always seems to be ripping on him. I don't think the White Sox will trade him, but if he had a second have similar to one that he had in the first half, I guess anything would have been possible

[Balta1701]

First of all you're comparing us to the best organization in the MLB, yeah the Cardinals are very good at developing talent. Secondly, Nate Jones was hurt most of the year, as was Albers, and Sale got off to a rough start due to a lack of Spring Training, but I'll give you the breaks we've had on health. That's about it for breaks though. Literally everyone had a massive drop-off from 2014 except for Q, Eaton, Danks and a couple bullpen guys. I get there were risks of guys not repeating those years but there was a HUGE drop-off from almost all of them. Very few guys performed how they were projected to do, and the projections were pretty pessimistic as it was. I'm not trying to make excuses, I'm pointing out that the difference between the White Sox this year and contention is not as large as people are making it out to be. I still think 2016 should be a rebuilding year, and there's still a lot of work to do, I just don't see the reason for extreme pessimism like so many have here.

So your response to "The White Sox are a losing organization who can't stop making excuses" is "Here's my list of excuses".

 

That's the problem right there. Every. Single. Organization. Can. List. Their Excuses.

 

Winning organizations win despite them. Losing organizations dwell on them. Ask yourself this question: If the White Sox lost just Chris Sale to a torn achilles in April where would they be? The Cardinals had the equivalent of that and laughed it off. We had Chris healthy the full year and somehow we're unlucky.

[kitekrazy]

So your response to "The White Sox are a losing organization who can't stop making excuses" is "Here's my list of excuses".

 

That's the problem right there. Every. Single. Organization. Can. List. Their Excuses.

 

Winning organizations win despite them. Losing organizations dwell on them. Ask yourself this question: If the White Sox lost just Chris Sale to a torn achilles in April where would they be? The Cardinals had the equivalent of that and laughed it off. We had Chris healthy the full year and somehow we're unlucky.

 

I thought he missed the beginning of the season. It was like a start or two.

 

I also believe losing and winning are habits. That was KC until last year. (still didn't win it all) Then there's the Cardinals.

 

[GreenSox]

Dude, prospects flop all the time. You trade Eaton for two of them you'll be lucky to even get one that turns out as good as him in the long-run. Sure, there's a small chance you end up with a better player or both prospects work out, but the odds are incredibly low. If you're going to take that gamble, you might as well trade the rest of your assets (Sale, Quintana, & Abreu) and straight-up rebuild, because you're pushing your timeline back another year or two.

Of course prospects flop. But how have those veterans worked out?

Look at the playoff teams. Which built their team by looting their farm and trading for veterans?

The Sox have done that for years, and it has a 100% failure rate.

Young talent wins.

As disappointing as this season has been, we still have a playoff caliber pitching staff in place.

The Sox staff is 15th in team ERA. Middle of the pack.

That said, the Sox have a lot of pitching talent in the low minors....which is another reason they can trade a veteran.

As for the timetable, Hahn and Williams pushed that back with their inane signing and trades for declining veterans before the foundation had been laid. (letting Cooper and Ventura run the operation hasn't helped either).

As it is, my top suggestion is to trade Eaton, not a pitcher.

Edited September 27, 2015 by GreenSox

[Dick Allen]

The Pirates only had 20 losing seasons in a row. That is who a rebuild should be modeled. Trading Eaton fro a couple of prospects, because he supposedly is not as good as his numbers, and building around Trayce Thompson because he clearly is, is a great way to start.

Edited September 27, 2015 by Dick Allen

[Kyyle23]

Of course prospects flop. But how have those veterans worked out?

Look at the playoff teams. Which built their team by looting their farm and trading for veterans?

The Sox have done that for years, and it has a 100% failure rate.

Young talent wins.

 

The Sox staff is 15th in team ERA. Middle of the pack.

That said, the Sox have a lot of pitching talent in the low minors....which is another reason they can trade a veteran.

As for the timetable, Hahn and Williams pushed that back with their inane signing and trades for declining veterans before the foundation had been laid. (letting Cooper and Ventura run the operation hasn't helped either).

As it is, my top suggestion is to trade Eaton, not a pitcher.

 

I understand your aversion to veterans, but at some point you have to hold on to the young performing players. All you do is talk about flipping young players because of the boogeyman of veterans. Newsflash, veterans are on every team, even the young Cubs and the young royals and the young pirates. These other teams don't constantly flip their young players in order to acquire more, they hold on to them and build around them.

 

That doesn't mean they shouldn't trade any young players if possible, but position players in this organization are few and far between, and now that the sox have one you want to flip him and hope that the return is equal. It probably won't be, and then the Sox will have to do something you hate to do, which is sign a veteran to plug a hole that was created for no reason.

 

Quintana by far would generate the best return(outside of sale of course) and there is a player that is ready to step into his spot named Carlos Rodon. And what does this do? It creates opportunity for two young, homegrown players in Fulmer and Johnson.

[Brian]

I was thinking Rodon would take Shark's spot. Back to the days of having a crappy rotating #5 starter!

[Bob Sacamano]

I was thinking Rodon would take Shark's spot. Back to the days of having a crappy rotating #5 starter!

 

Huh? Rodon is already in the rotation lol Johnson is likely replacing Samardzija in the rotation.

[Jose Abreu]

The Sox staff is 15th in team ERA. Middle of the pack.

The Sox do have a playoff caliber pitching staff. I'm amazed that a Sox fan such as yourself would use ERA to try and prove that we have an average pitching staff after having watched games in which Sox pitchers allow "earned" runs that are clearly due to defensive miscues.

 

The Sox are 8th in pitching fWAR and 1st in starting pitching fWAR. That looks like a playoff caliber staff to me.

[Jerksticks]

The Sox do have a playoff caliber pitching staff. I'm amazed that a Sox fan such as yourself would use ERA to try and prove that we have an average pitching staff after having watched games in which Sox pitchers allow "earned" runs that are clearly due to defensive miscues.

 

The Sox are 8th in pitching fWAR and 1st in starting pitching fWAR. That looks like a playoff caliber staff to me.

1st??? Holy s***! And that is despite early Noesi, the Danks highs n lows, & Shark being pure toilet? Amazing if that's true.

[Jose Abreu]

1st??? Holy s***! And that is despite early Noesi, the Danks highs n lows, & Shark being pure toilet? Amazing if that's true.

Yup, first.

 

We have Sale, Quintana, and Rodon to thank for that.

[Hatchetman]

Baseball Reference has them at 19th in Wins Above Average. So you can pick your stat to support whatever case you want. Regardless the pitching is pretty good. Lineup is horrific.

[GreenSox]

I understand your aversion to veterans, but at some point you have to hold on to the young performing players. All you do is talk about flipping young players because of the boogeyman of veterans. Newsflash, veterans are on every team, even the young Cubs and the young royals and the young pirates. These other teams don't constantly flip their young players in order to acquire more, they hold on to them and build around them.

 

That doesn't mean they shouldn't trade any young players if possible, but position players in this organization are few and far between, and now that the sox have one you want to flip him and hope that the return is equal. It probably won't be, and then the Sox will have to do something you hate to do, which is sign a veteran to plug a hole that was created for no reason.

 

Quintana by far would generate the best return(outside of sale of course) and there is a player that is ready to step into his spot named Carlos Rodon. And what does this do? It creates opportunity for two young, homegrown players in Fulmer and Johnson.

Okay - trade Quintana. No objection. But who takes Rodon's spot? Pass on rushing Fulmer (who needs to get his delivery straightened out) or Adams (who's a ways away).

Of course teams have veterans. But winning teams aren't built with veterans. They plug a hole or two or provide depth. Building with vets is what the Sox tried to do and what the fans want them to do (I can't wait until Todd Frazier and Lucroy are put on the block this winter...the hero-worship will break records; and if someone mentions Longoria......).

As for Eaton, I simply don't believe he plays to his offensive numbers. Thus, it would be a value trade. Thompson is a better CF than he is anyway. Okay, don't trade him for prospects. Trade him for an equivalent 3b.

There's talent in this org. It needs time and the org needs more talent. You need a foundation first.

Edited September 27, 2015 by GreenSox

[Jose Abreu]

Baseball Reference has them at 19th in Wins Above Average. So you can pick your stat to support whatever case you want. Regardless the pitching is pretty good. Lineup is horrific.

Isn't fWAR considered better than bWAR?

[GreenSox]

 

The Sox do have a playoff caliber pitching staff. I'm amazed that a Sox fan such as yourself would use ERA to try and prove that we have an average pitching staff after having watched games in which Sox pitchers allow "earned" runs that are clearly due to defensive miscues.

 

The Sox are 8th in pitching fWAR and 1st in starting pitching fWAR. That looks like a playoff caliber staff to me.

Marginal playoff caliber using your stats. All we need is a playoff caliber offense and defense and we're right there....just this close.

And of course the defensive issues are in the OF, but oh lord help anyone who suggests moving Melky and Eaton. (Yes, I know, it's all on Avi).

 

 

[Chicago White Sox]

Okay - trade Quintana. No objection. But who takes Rodon's spot? Pass on rushing Fulmer (who needs to get his delivery straightened out) or Adams (who's a ways away).

Of course teams have veterans. But winning teams aren't built with veterans. They plug a hole or two or provide depth. Building with vets is what the Sox tried to do and what the fans want them to do (I can't wait until Todd Frazier and Lucroy are put on the block this winter...the hero-worship will break records; and if someone mentions Longoria......).

As for Eaton, I simply don't believe he plays to his offensive numbers. Thus, it would be a value trade. Thompson is a better CF than he is anyway. Okay, don't trade him for prospects. Trade him for an equivalent 3b.

Can you elaborate on this "don't believe he plays to his offensive numbers"? Not sure what that really means.

 

Also, as great as Thompson has looked so far, it would foolish IMO to hand him a starting job next year. Let him be your 4th OF and platoon partner for LaRoche (playing CF those days, with Eaton in LF & Melky at DH). If the need arises, then you give him a chance as an everyday starter. Given the question marks with this lineup, we're going to need a deep bench to hedge some of our risks and Trayce fills one of those roles perfectly.

[Chicago White Sox]

Isn't fWAR considered better than bWAR?

I think most sabes (as Greg calls them) feel fWAR is better because it values pitchers on what they specifically control (HRs, BBs, & Ks) and pulls out most of the impact defense has on their bottom line performance.

[BlackSox13]

Two problems I see with trading Eaton. 1) he is one of few players that are actually hitting for a team that is starved for hitting and 2) who replaces Eaton at the top of the order? This is why so many, including myself, see Thompson replacing Avi in RF making the most sense for the time being.

[Kyyle23]

Okay - trade Quintana. No objection. But who takes Rodon's spot? Pass on rushing Fulmer (who needs to get his delivery straightened out) or Adams (who's a ways away).

Of course teams have veterans. But winning teams aren't built with veterans. They plug a hole or two or provide depth. Building with vets is what the Sox tried to do and what the fans want them to do (I can't wait until Todd Frazier and Lucroy are put on the block this winter...the hero-worship will break records; and if someone mentions Longoria......).

As for Eaton, I simply don't believe he plays to his offensive numbers. Thus, it would be a value trade. Thompson is a better CF than he is anyway. Okay, don't trade him for prospects. Trade him for an equivalent 3b.

There's talent in this org. It needs time and the org needs more talent. You need a foundation first.

 

There is talent, and you want to trade it for the hope of more talent. Always.

 

And Fulmer is on the Sale/Rodon path. He is gonna have to suck hardcore next spring to spend next season in the minors

[greg775]

1st??? Holy s***! And that is despite early Noesi, the Danks highs n lows, & Shark being pure toilet? Amazing if that's true.

If the Sox are first in something and this bad ... you won't see the front office dealing its only strength IMO. I think we coulda dumped Shark when we had a chance and picked up something in return. Now it's too late for that.