With a preposterously important three-game series between the White Sox and Guardians looming on Tuesday, Josh and I had a surplus of things to cover on today's Sox Machine Podcast even before we could open up a teeming P.O. Sox mailbag. Here's a Patreon-exclusive post on Sox Machine in its place, where I give you $2 of my two cents.
(There's a question from Aswinwreck about Michael Kopech, but it overlaps with a post I want to write about it, so I'm withholding it for tomorrow morning.)
I don't think there is room on next year's roster for both Abreu and Eloy. Abreu is still our most consistent hitter, and I'm thinking we might be able to trade Eloy to the Diamondbacks for one of their surplus of left handed hitting outfielders. Any chance Arizona would trade Daulton Varsho?
-- Dan
I imagine Varsho could be had because he appears likely to be a Super Two, and it's going to be hard for him to maintain this current 5 WAR form because it's built on extremely good right field defense. The bat is solid (.243/.309/.459), and he'd be leading the White Sox in homers in 25, but the Gold Glove-caliber corner play is what's making him a Rich Man's Kole Calhoun right now.
It'd make all the sense in the world if the White Sox acquired him, but I'd be a little wary about sending Jiménez to make it happen. Calhoun is effectively a platoon bat, with an .817 OPS against righties and a .589 OPS against lefties ... but Jiménez is even better against righties (.920 OPS this year), without the weakness against lefties (.849 OPS). If you're looking to bolster your production against righties, trading Jiménez to make it happen is robbing Pedro to pay Paul.
Perhaps I'm also slightly resistant to paying market rates for a guy distinguished by right field defense. The Sox have had that guy twice over the last decade -- Alex Rios and Adam Eaton -- and while they were both excellent out there, it's tough to sustain that identity, either because the player gets hurt, sees a more ordinary array of batted balls, or the team keeps trying to make a center fielder out of him.
Would you start Elvis or Tim at Shortstop? I think they need to have Tim prove that he's back before he gets put into the lineup.
-- Doug W.
Sight unseen, I would start Elvis Andrus at shortstop the rest of the way. There's a pragmatic element -- neither has experience at second base, and Anderson could get a few games in during a rehab stint -- but it's more an emotional, hard-line rejection of what had been an unacceptable status quo before he got hurt. ("Sure, you were shortstop. And Tony La Russa was the manager. Complain to him and see where that gets you.")
Ultimately, I'm fine either way. I'm more concerned that Anderson gets a couple of rehab games with Charlotte. Anderson has suggested that they might not be necessary, but the experience of the 2022 White Sox suggests they absolutely are.
Assuming a healthy Tim and Luis, what is your ideal lineup the rest of the way?
-- William T.
I think there are a couple of ways to define "healthy" under these circumstances. I think the pre-injury "healthy" is out until we see otherwise, so I'm going with the version that's simply "more playable than the best alternatives," which would be Romy González and Adam Engel.
If that's the case, then it's Andrus, followed by Vaughn, Abreu and Jiménez in some order, because while I understand why Yoán Moncada is batting second for lineup balance, I don't like seeing him get in the way of the hitters you really want in the box close and late. Then you can have Pollock or Sheets, followed by Moncada/Robert/Zavala/Anderson.
Will this 11th hour "surge" end up being a horrible double edge sword that gives the White Sox justification for making little to no changes to the coaching staff and front office this off season?
-- Jonathan L.
It's possible, but I still think they're still throwing enough clunkers during a hot streak to emphasize the ways they're fundamentally flawed. To go back to my griping about the White Sox's adherence to the status quo, I'd hope they'd take this upswing with Miguel Cairo in the dugout as evidence of what happens when they actually address something that hasn't proven to work.
Finishing second in this AL Central should be alarming enough, especially one where Cleveland doesn't win 90 games and Detroit and Kansas City are worse than everybody thought. The Guardians might win the division when they weren't even trying, beating a White Sox team that spent years and record payrolls carefully aligning everything to this point in time. That really shouldn't be acceptable.
Is it only the games i happen to watch or does graveman look pretty shaky lately? I feel like every time he pitches the bases are crowded even if he doesn't give up runs. Should Cairo consider a different option for the 8th?
-- George M.
He does, although that's partially a product of known attributes. His 2022 season is basically a continuation of what he did for Houston after the midseason trade in 2021. He has the same exact same fastball velocity (96.6 mph), the same gap between strikeout and walks rates (11.9 percent), and similarly high BABIPs (.339 for Houston, .320 here). He's getting an above-average amount of ground-balls and suppressing homers, and just like Aaron Bummer, the things that happen on the surface can be a bit of an adventure. Back-to-back days have also been a problem all season, but he hadn't proven capable of being ridden hard the year before, either. He's still relatively new to high-leverage work, and he also had a benign spinal tumor to deal with before that.
What's weird is that he's throwing way more four-seamers this month. He's gone from a typical sinker-slider mix to somebody who throws fastballs nearly two-thirds of the time. It's doing well as an individual pitch, but I wonder if there's a little bit of identity crisis, or if he noticed the wobbling sensation you're feeling and is trying to do something about it.
The good news is that Reynaldo López looks like a guy Cairo trusts as interchangeable with Graveman in the inning before Liam Hendriks. López is a lot more straightforward with his attack, both in terms of pitch mix and walk rate, so I think there are a couple of different styles Cairo can manage depending on what kind of ground-ball rate he needs.
Let’s assume Cueto is gone and Giolito is not offered arbitration. Let’s also assume Jerry keeps his trench coat closed in terms of payroll. Who from the organization is penciled in at 4 and 5 in the rotation for 2023?
-- Brian S.
I'm not sure why Giolito wouldn't be offered arbitration, because a one-year make-good deal seems like it'd be in everybody's best interest, and the price tag shouldn't be exorbitant. I understand that it's probably just for an exercise, but I just wanted to submit that for the record.
I imagine it'd be Davis Martin for the fourth spot behind Dylan Cease, Lance Lynn and Michael Kopech, and there really isn't a case for a fifth starter at the moment. Jimmy Lambert probably has the closest thing to it, but I think they've shut the door on him being effective more than one turn through the order. That's why Martin's contributions to this point in the season should not go underappreciated, no matter what's asked of him -- and how he responds -- the rest of the way.
Eloy has been awesome lately, but his front leg is confusing. He twists it back during his load rather than a leg kick. On a video of a recent Oscar Colas home run, he’s doing the same thing. Question - what on earth are they doing and how is that leg twist beneficial?
-- Steve G.
His front foot looks like an energy storage device to me, although it's been especially pronounced lately. A lot of hitters stand pigeon-toed because it keeps their hips closed for longer, and the force that's generated from opening them up at the point of contact is stronger. I don't know if you ever had action figures that swiveled at the waist, but twisting them as far as they can go and holding the torso in place until the right time to make an impact is kind of the same idea.
In this case, the front foot is closed at the start and the time of the lift, but it's open when it plants, and that's when the bat comes through. A lot of hitters start closed and end open like that, but not as severely Perhaps Jiménez just has more ankle, knee and hip flexibility to where it's comfortable. Jose Bautista did the same thing, and it worked well for him.
Will Cleveland win a playoff game this year?
-- Rob L.
Cleveland is the only team in the Central with a winning record against winning teams, and I think their formula -- high contact, good defense, deep pitching staff -- allows them a better chance to keep games close. I don't think they can win a slugfest, but if they can draw Tampa Bay in the first round, those two clubs are cut from the same cloth.
Must sweep.
-- Dennis
Pretty much! Right now, it looks like the Twins are back to useless, so the White Sox are looking at a four-game deficit entering the series. Even if they take two of three, they'll effectively be four back with 12 to play, because they'll lose the tiebreaker.
(Speaking of which, I hope we see the return of the Game 163, because as a regular-season baseball enthusiast, needing a 163rd game to settle what 162 couldn't is the highest form of validating baseball's ridiculously large single-season sample size.)
