As I added Johnny Cueto to this season's list of the most intriguing White Sox-adjacent players, I realized I never reviewed the list of 14 players to receive the honor in 2022 last April.
So, here are those 14 players.
PREVIOUS HOLDOVERS
Assuming their performances would hang around in the same neighborhood, the White Sox wouldn't yet have reason to regret spending the money to acquire their services. Even Harper, who missed a chunk of the 2022 and will be out for the first half of 2023 with Tommy John surgery. In between holding off the procedure, he posted a 145 OPS+and hit six postseason homers. Wheeler posted a sub-3.00 ERA for a third consecutive season, and a sub-3.00 ERA over six postseason starts, and Machado finished second in the MVP race.
FORMER WHITE SOX
Rodón proved the White Sox wrong. His second-half problems in 2021 did not carry over into 2022. Instead, he threw a career-high 178 innings for the Giants, striking out a career-high 237 and finishing sixth in the Cy Young race. He then opted out of his SF deal and signed a six-year, $162 million contract with the Yankees, so the Giants got a draft pick.
The White Sox were right about Madrigal, who played just 59 games due to issues with his back and both hamstrings. He hit just .249/.305/.282, and he struck out 27 times in 228 plate appearances. That K rate still looks admirable, but it pales in comparison to what he did with the White Sox (24 over 324 PA).
Kimbrel posted a superficially decent season for the Dodgers -- 22 saves, 3.75 ERA, 72 strikeouts over 60 innings -- but he lost the closer job before the end of the season.
PITCHERS
The White Sox had their choice of disappointing former Padres this winter, and they went with Clevinger for one year and $12 million, rather than Manaea for two and $25 million. Manaea has durability on his side, but all of his core peripherals went in the wrong direction, resulting in a 4.96 ERA. In San Diego, that's good for -0.9 WAR.
The White Sox wouldn't meet Oakland's asking price for Montas after the lockout, and Montas' recurring shoulder problems over the second half of the season showed they were correct to be reluctant about overcommitting. Ray signed a pretty cheap deal for a Cy Young winner (5/$115M), and while he didn't repeat his out-of-nowhere success with the Blue Jays from the year before, he gave the Mariners 189 good innings (3.71 ERA, 212 strikeouts, 2.1 WAR).
POSITION PLAYERS
Conforto didn't play in 2022, and he'll probably pop up on this list in a couple months after signing a two-year, $36 million to be a left-handed right fielder for the Giants. Suzuki solved right field for the Cubs adequately, but a strong April gave way to a more ordinary .258/.320/.413 line over the last five months, with a finger injury in June.
Semien ended up taking a scenic route to a competent season, hitting .248/.304/.429 with 26 homers and 25 stolen bases. Considering his batting average was in the .150s halfway into May, he was staring down the barrel of a worse start to his seven-year, $175 million contract. In the end, thanks to his defense and league-leading durability, he managed to be worth 5.9 bWAR. FanGraphs only has him at 4.2 WAR, but that's still plays.
I liked Barnhart among the backup-catcher candidates for most of the winter, but Reese McGuire did a better job with the same profile as a glove-first guy. Abrams, who struck me as a more exciting third-overall pick than Andrew Vaughn in 2019, is now on the Nationals after the Juan Soto trade. He made his debut last year, hitting .246/.280/.324 over 90 games between San Diego and Washington. Plate discipline is the big problem right now (50 strikeouts, five walks).
