Sox got back almost nothing from break up of 2012 squad

[VAfan]

Someone posted in another thread a comment about how the Cubs were able to use the sell off of their assets to help build their current team. That got me thinking about what happened to the Sox roster of 2012, which finished 85-77, in second place in the AL Central. And that club led most of the season, until running out of gas late and watching the Tigers overtake us.

 

Here's the hitting roster of that team.

 

Alex Rios 157 605 93 184 37 8 25 91 26 3 92 .304 .334 .516

Alexei Ramirez 158 593 59 157 24 4 9 73 16 2 77 .265 .287 .364

Adam Dunn 151 539 87 110 19 0 41 96 105 3 222 .204 .333 .468

Paul Konerko 144 533 66 159 22 0 26 75 56 4 83 .298 .371 .486

Gordon Beckham 151 525 62 123 24 0 16 60 40 0 89 .234 .297 .371

Alejandro De Aza 131 524 81 147 29 6 9 50 47 3 109 .281 .349 .410

Dayan Viciedo 147 505 64 129 18 1 25 78 28 0 120 .255 .302 .444

A.J. Pierzynski 135 479 68 133 18 4 27 77 28 5 78 .278 .326 .501

Kevin Youkilis 80 292 47 69 8 1 15 46 37 2 69 .236 .347 .425

Dewayne Wise 45 163 20 42 7 1 5 22 9 0 40 .258 .301 .405

Orlando Hudson 51 137 10 27 3 3 2 17 12 1 24 .197 .262 .307

Tyler Flowers 52 136 19 29 6 0 7 13 12 0 56 .213 .296 .412

Brent Morel 35 113 14 20 2 0 0 5 7 0 39 .177 .225 .195

Eduardo Escobar 36 87 14 18 4 1 0 3 9 0 23 .207 .281 .276

Jordan Danks 50 67 12 15 1 0 1 4 6 0 16 .224 .288 .284

Brent Lillibridge 49 63 10 11 1 0 0 2 4 0 26 .175 .235 .190

 

Gone from that team?

 

Rios -- payoff Leury Garcia. Was a salary dump.

Dunn -- traded for scrap (Nolan Sanburn). Retired.

Konerko -- retired. No return.

Beckham -- traded for scrap. Re-signed. Will be gone again.

De Aza -- traded to Baltimore for scrap (Miguel Chalas and Mark Blackmar).

Viciedo -- DFA'ed. No return.

A.J. -- Free agent. No return.

Youklis -- Free agent. No return.

Wise -- Free agent. No return.

Hudson -- No return.

Morel -- not in majors. No return.

Escobar -- traded (along with Pedro Hernandez) for Francisco Liriano. See below for what happened to Liriano.

Lillibridge traded with Zack Stewart for Youklis.

Danks -- free agent. No return.

 

In short, the White Sox got back ABSOLUTELY NOTHING from all these players. If they got a compensatory draft pick or two from the free agents who left, please add it to the comments. I'm not able to quickly look that up.

 

On the pitching side the Sox did a little better. But not much better. Here's the staff ranked by innings pitched.

 

Jake Peavy 32 32 11 12 .478 3.37 0 219.0 191 82 88 27 49 194

Chris Sale 31 30 17 8 .680 3.05 0 192.0 167 65 66 19 51 192

Gavin Floyd 29 29 12 11 .522 4.29 0 168.0 166 80 84 22 63 144

Jose Quintana 25 22 6 6 .500 3.76 0 136.1 142 57 62 14 42 81

Philip Humber 26 16 5 5 .500 6.44 0 102.0 113 73 74 23 44 85

Nate Jones 65 0 8 0 1.000 2.39 0 71.2 67 19 19 4 32 65

Hector Santiago 42 5 4 1 .800 3.33 4 70.1 54 26 26 10 40 79

Matt Thornton 74 0 4 10 .286 3.46 3 65.0 63 25 27 4 17 53

Francisco Liriano 12 11 3 2 .600 5.40 0 56.2 54 34 34 7 32 58

Addison Reed 62 0 3 2 .600 4.75 29 55.0 57 29 30 6 18 54

John Danks 9 9 3 4 .429 5.70 0 53.2 57 34 35 7 23 30

Dylan Axelrod 14 7 2 2 .500 5.47 0 51.0 56 31 32 8 21 40

Jesse Crain 51 0 2 3 .400 2.44 0 48.0 29 13 14 5 23 60

Brett Myers 35 0 3 4 .429 3.12 0 34.2 30 12 13 4 9 21

Zach Stewart 18 1 1 2 .333 6.00 0 30.0 41 20 26 10 4 16

Will Ohman 32 0 0 2 .000 6.41 0 26.2 23 19 19 6 5 13

Brian Omogrosso 17 0 0 0 .000 2.57 0 21.0 20 6 6 3 9 18

Leyson Septimo 21 0 0 2 .000 5.02 0 14.1 8 8 8 3 6 14

Donnie Veal 24 0 0 0 .000 1.38 1 13.0 5 2 2 0 4 19

 

What did we get for these guys?

 

Jake Peavy -- netted Avi Garcia (and Frankie Montas). This should have been a cornerstone young controlled player. But he's looking like a bust, which REALLY hurts.

Floyd. Free agent. No return.

Humber. Pitched perfect game, but was waived in the same year. Nothing.

Santiago. Traded for Adam Eaton. This is the ONLY player of value the White Sox got from their 2012 roster.

Thornton. Traded to Boston for Brandon Jacobs, but was traded to Arizona as part of the Eaton trade before he played for the Sox.

Liriano. Free agent. No return.

Reed. Traded for Matt Davidson, who's been a minor league bust. No return so far.

Crain. Traded to the Rays for what turned into Sean Bierman and Ben Klein. In other words. Nothing.

Myers. Free agent. No return.

Stewart. Part of deal (with Brett Lillibridge) for Kevin Youklis, who left after 2012. No long term return.

Ohman. Free agent. Hasn't pitched in majors since.

Omogrosso. Released.

Septimo. Released.

Veal. DFA'ed.

 

So there you have it.

 

For all the guys on our last winning ballclub that are no longer with us (14 hitters and 14 pitchers), the White Sox front office got back:

 

Adam Eaton

Avisail Garcia

Leury Garcia

(Edit -- as has been pointed out Frankie Montas came in the Peavy trade)

 

No one else has even played for the Sox in the majors (other than the short term rentals Kevin Youklis and Francisco Liriano we got in 2012).

 

I think this has to be exhibit #1 as to why the Sox have been struggling in their rebuild process.

Edited October 9, 2015 by VAfan

[lasttriptotulsa]

They also got Montas from the Peavy trade.

[TaylorStSox]

The only players that had any real value were retained, aside from Peavy.

[VAfan]

They also got Montas from the Peavy trade.

 

Thanks. I corrected the original post.

 

Does anyone know if we got any compensatory picks for all the free agents who left us?

[Bigsoxhurt35]

Meh. Peavy was about the only one who had value. Alexei had some but that was it.

[GGajewski18]

I don't get what the argument you're trying to make here because 80% of those players aren't even in the league anymore and were just fillers to a 25 man roster.

 

You forgot to mention that we also got Montas, Wendelken, and Rondon for Peavy. Montas already in the majors and Wendelken will eventually get to the majors as a reliever.

 

For 2 months of Gordon Beckham, we got Yency Almonte who was really good this year.

 

For De Aza, Chalas could be a bullpen piece, Blackmar probably nothing.

 

The other guys like Rios, Dunn, Konerko, and all the other nobodies literally had 0 trade value.

[Hatchetman]

can't make chicken salad.....

[Vance Law]

They got a ton of salary relief which allowed them to buy Jose Abreu among other free agents. We got someone to pay Rios' salary. That's a win.

[caulfield12]

I guess the main point is to say that teams like the Cubs, Royals and Astros got a lot more back in return if you compared their 2012 rosters with ours.

 

Surely, we rode a lot of our players into the ground when we should have rebuilt as early as 2011.

 

We also got nothing to show for Crede, Jenks, Floyd, Crain, Uribe, Humber, etc. And, of course, Davidson for Reed has been a huge disappointment. Not to mention Viciedo and Beckham and basically most of our free agent adds other than Abreu and Alexei.

[GreenSox]

Sox didn't have much to trade. Peavy was really it. Perhaps we sold light with Rios.

 

Astros got very little from their breakup, and they had a lot more to trade than the Sox did, including an in his prime Hunter Pence. They seem to have made out okay.

The Cubs, however, did phenomenally well.

[VAfan]

I don't get what the argument you're trying to make here because 80% of those players aren't even in the league anymore and were just fillers to a 25 man roster.

 

You forgot to mention that we also got Montas, Wendelken, and Rondon for Peavy. Montas already in the majors and Wendelken will eventually get to the majors as a reliever.

 

For 2 months of Gordon Beckham, we got Yency Almonte who was really good this year.

 

For De Aza, Chalas could be a bullpen piece, Blackmar probably nothing.

 

The other guys like Rios, Dunn, Konerko, and all the other nobodies literally had 0 trade value.

 

I know it's hindsight, but perhaps the Sox could have done better had they traded some of these "assets" earlier.

 

Peavy was a deadline trade. What would he have returned if traded at the end of the 2012 season?

Rios was a deadline trade. But he had a great 2012. Shouldn't we have sold high and gotten something back in addition to salary relief?

Dunn -- did he have any value at the end of 2012? He finished with an .801 OPS.

De Aza -- didn't we hold him too long?

Crain -- could he have been traded before he got hurt?

Thornton -- should have been traded earlier.

Viciedo -- held him too long as well.

 

Looking at the current club, we once again skipped making moves at the trade deadline. Shark might have netted more than the draft pick. Soto? Bullpen pieces? Ramirez?

 

What we've been left with is the draft, which is a slow way to build, and free agency, which is expensive and prone to overpayment for production.

 

If we'd hit on the Garcia trade, the Sox' fortunes would look a lot better. Because we didn't, we have been left with only two plus offensive players -- Eaton and Abreu. And if we want to trade for more, our only option seems to be to cannibalize our pitching staff, which will rob from Peter to pay Paul. Not really a net gain.

[southsideirish71]

We seem to have an issue with scouting not only other organizations but our own. We hold on to players too long. We promote flawed players who either strike out at a large clip or show a single tool "Power" or "Glove". This is either because we are hoping to showcase them to other teams or we believe that these flaws will disappear. We fail to examine the numbers and use small sample sizes to evaluate if we are all in ( See this years trading deadline ). And in the end we worry about short term attendance over the long term health of the organization. During the late 80s we were terrible and used our draft position to select some franchise changing talent. Instead of continuing on this model we injected some recognizable players to help feed the attendance stream ( still horrible attendance ) while milking the rebuilding process along. The problem is the players have not really panned out overall.

 

We need to draft advanced bats in the next couple of drafts. We need to start to evaluate our scouting department because outside of pitching something is horribly wrong. We look at teams like the Dodgers, RedSox and Angels. They historically draft later in the rounds and still load up on talent. We now have draft position. There is no reason we are wasting potential draft picks on FA pick ups. We need to reload our minor leagues and build something sustainable. We need to have talent to either add to the major league roster, or utilize in trades to bring in areas we do not have. Either way the continued method of putting out bad to mediocre teams is a franchise killing operation. We need to break this cycle of circling the toliet and come up with a game plan. Its that or we are stuck in the 70'ish win territory for a while hoping that a miracle happens and we have a weak division.

Edited October 9, 2015 by southsideirish71

[Dick Allen]

The 2012 Cubs got Russell for Shark and Justin Grimm for Garza. Is there anything else?

[southsider2k5]

I know it's hindsight, but perhaps the Sox could have done better had they traded some of these "assets" earlier.

 

Peavy was a deadline trade. What would he have returned if traded at the end of the 2012 season?

Rios was a deadline trade. But he had a great 2012. Shouldn't we have sold high and gotten something back in addition to salary relief?

Dunn -- did he have any value at the end of 2012? He finished with an .801 OPS.

De Aza -- didn't we hold him too long?

Crain -- could he have been traded before he got hurt?

Thornton -- should have been traded earlier.

Viciedo -- held him too long as well.

 

Looking at the current club, we once again skipped making moves at the trade deadline. Shark might have netted more than the draft pick. Soto? Bullpen pieces? Ramirez?

 

What we've been left with is the draft, which is a slow way to build, and free agency, which is expensive and prone to overpayment for production.

 

If we'd hit on the Garcia trade, the Sox' fortunes would look a lot better. Because we didn't, we have been left with only two plus offensive players -- Eaton and Abreu. And if we want to trade for more, our only option seems to be to cannibalize our pitching staff, which will rob from Peter to pay Paul. Not really a net gain.

 

Trading half of the team after spending most of the season in first place is a ridiculous idea to propose.

 

[Vance Law]

Astros got very little from their breakup, and they had a lot more to trade than the Sox did, including an in his prime Hunter Pence. They seem to have made out okay.

The Cubs, however, did phenomenally well.

 

A couple people have mentioned this. Who the hell did the Cubs get?

 

Who did they get for:

 

Geo Soto

Derek Lee

Alfonso Soriano

Aramis Ramirez

Marlon Byrd

Ryan Dempster

Carlos Zambrano

Matt Garza

 

[Vance Law]

Trading half of the team after spending most of the season in first place is a ridiculous idea to propose.

Precisely.

[GreenSox]

A couple people have mentioned this. Who the hell did the Cubs get?

 

Who did they get for:

 

Geo Soto

Derek Lee

Alfonso Soriano

Aramis Ramirez

Marlon Byrd

Ryan Dempster

Carlos Zambrano

Matt Garza

That list is about like the Sox list - expiring contract, declining veterans.

Yet still, aside from a couple of still promising prospects, they got one of the best pitchers in the NL and a stud young SS in their sell-offs.

Tell me, where would they be without those 2?

 

But Kenny and Rick showed 'em how dumb they were trading the Shark.

Edited October 10, 2015 by GreenSox

[Vance Law]

That list is about like the Sox list - expiring contract, declining veterans.

Yet still, aside from a couple of still promising prospects, they got one of the best pitchers in the NL and a stud young SS in their sell-offs.

Tell me, where would they be without those 2?

 

But Kenny and Rick showed 'em how dumb they were trading the Shark.

 

Arrieta was trash with Baltimore. Cubs lucked out like the Sox did with Quintana.

 

And Shark was merely a result of good timing for the Cubs (and luck that he didn't accept their $80 mil offer). While tanking for 5 years straight, they had an above average starter primed to get a huge free agent payday just before they were about to start getting good.

[caulfield12]

They did hold onto Thornton too long, but the exact same happened with Marte...when you have the best or one of the top three lefties in the league, it's a natural tendency to ride him until it's too late.

 

With Matty, the beginning of the end was the All-Star game in 2010 and then definitely the game-winner he gave up to Thome late in that season. He was never the same after that, physically (lost 2-3 MPH off his fastball) or psychologically.

 

 

As far as the Cubs go, they really haven't had luck with guys such as Soler, Olt, Junior Lake, Alcantara, Almora (so far)....Baez struggled mightily last year, and Castro for most of this season, but they were still able to cover or patch up a lot of those holes. Another example, Edwin Jackson was terrible, and they overcame that (whereas Dunn/Danks/LaRoche seem to constantly weigh down the Sox).

 

Bryant, Rizzo, Montero, Fowler and Schwarber had a lot to do with that, and Chris Coghlan surprised as well.

 

When we look at the back end of that rotation five or ten years from now, I'm sure we will all be pretty surprised they did as well as they did after Arrieta and Lester.

 

Finally, their bullpen has been huge for them in the 2nd half...some of it coming via trades, some developed internally.

Edited October 10, 2015 by caulfield12

[Quin]

Yancy Almonte isn't trash.

[Dick Allen]

Arrieta was trash with Baltimore. Cubs lucked out like the Sox did with Quintana.

 

And Shark was merely a result of good timing for the Cubs (and luck that he didn't accept their $80 mil offer). While tanking for 5 years straight, they had an above average starter primed to get a huge free agent payday just before they were about to start getting good.

And Arietta wasn't acquired for anyone on the 2012 Cubs. Apparently Theo failed.

Edited October 10, 2015 by Dick Allen

[Jose Abreu]

If this hasn't been mentioned, the shedding of 2012 salary/losing players for "nothing" were instrumental in netting us the funds to sign Abreu.

[GreenSox]

They did hold onto Thornton too long,

They did hold onto him too long. Should have traded him after his career year...but the Sox buy career years, they don't sell them.

 

And then they didn't hold onto him too long - they couldn't wait to get rid of him in 2013 and basically gave him away for a Rule 5 eligible prospect. He's still an effective ML pitcher.

[GreenSox]

Arrieta was trash with Baltimore. Cubs lucked out like the Sox did with Quintana.

 

And Shark was merely a result of good timing for the Cubs (and luck that he didn't accept their $80 mil offer). While tanking for 5 years straight, they had an above average starter primed to get a huge free agent payday just before they were about to start getting good.

I agree on Arrieta. But you make your own luck sometimes. Get rid of mediocre parts for prospects, and you will hit oil eventually. There's little downside - because while Arrieta was trash, so was the player they traded for him. The Sox best moves under the Williams regime have always been the little doinky trades.

 

Credit the Cubs for timing. He was in the midst of a career year and they made an affirmative effort to set the market -move him before the Prices et al got moved. And they did.

The Sox then bought that career year.

The market for Shark this year would have been pretty salty had the Sox done similar and moved him after that shutout of the Blue Jays before the All Star break. His value was never going to get higher. But the Sox didn't.

 

Luck? Sure. But the more intelligent moves you make, the luckier you get.

Edited October 10, 2015 by GreenSox

[Quin]

I like that this thread is bascially complaining the Sox were holding onto productive players.