Now that the Manny Machado news has died down I’ve had some time to think. Does it suck that we didn’t land him because the front office basically played themselves? 100%. Does it mean that the rebuild is a complete failure? Definitely not.
Rick Hahn has always said even before this off season began that this plan was never going to be about one individual. And he’s right. One player cannot win you a World Series. Just ask Mike Trout.
While missing on Machado stings (that’s putting it lightly), the White Sox can eventually spend all the money they’ve saved up as soon as next season. The question is, where could/should that money go?
Improving The Rotation
Everyone knows that pitching wins championships. And while the rotation this year is going to have a ton of question marks, the rotation in 2020 could have the ability to carry the team. Carlos Rodon, a healthy Michael Kopech, and a full season of Dylan Cease should make for a dynamic top 3. But if the Sox want to really strike fear into other lineups, there’s another free agent pitcher on the market who they should absolutely zero in on. That would be Gerrit Cole.
Tell me you wouldn’t want this guy as the Ace of your staff. Good God this guy is disgusting. The odds of him resigning with Houston are probably on the slim side as well. They still need to think about keeping star infielders Alex Bregman and Carlos Correa. Those players are younger than Cole and figure to be around for much longer. In 2018 Cole pitched 200 innings, had a 2.88 ERA, and a whopping 6.3 WAR.
A contract that could be comparable to the one he will receive would be the one Patrick Corbin just got with Washington at 6 years, 140M. Like Corbin was, Cole will be 29 when he is a free agent.
Imagine a top 4 of Rodon/Cole/Kopech/Cease and then Lopez/Giolito/Dunning battling it out for the 5th spot. That is an ELECTRIC rotation that would produce an absurd amount of strikeouts and make any lineup uneasy.
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Bolstering The Lineup
While The White Sox rotation in 2020 could be a huge strength, the lineup will still need to see some upgrades. Especially if Jose Abreu is no longer on the team. Although he LOVES playing on the Sox so for all intensive purposes let’s assume he signs back with Chicago. Ideally the big signing here would be Nolan Arenado, but he’s going to get over 300 million and the White Sox for whatever reason have said they cannot hit that number (still pisses me off). One player that is out there could be a sneaky great signing and help bolster the outfield. That would be Nicholas Castellanos from Detroit.
As you could probably tell if you watched the video, this man is a White Sox KILLER. Absolutely destroyed us last year. In 2018 he put up a line of .298/.354/.500, had a wRC+ of 130 (meaning he was 30% better than league average at his position) and a 3.0 WAR. He’s viewed as maybe a tier below the elite, but it seems like no one really talks about him. He has good power (23 home runs last year, 26 the year before that), makes solid contact, gets on base, and plays solid D. Oh, and he’ll be 27 when he’s a free agent so he would fit in perfectly with the White Sox competitive timeline.
The other important point here is that it allows the White Sox to be more aggressive in trading from their surplus of outfield prospects. Eloy is obviously untouchable and would most likely play left field, while Castellanos would start in right. That means the center field job could be won by one of Luis Robert, Luis Gonzalez, Luis Basabe, or Blake Rutherford. Whoever doesn’t win the job could be a first man off the bench, but the rest are up for grabs. You can add Micker Adolfo and Steele Walker into this group of outfield prospects as well.
A hypothetical lineup in this scenario could look something like this in 2020:
2b- Nick Madrigal
3B- Yoan Moncada
LF- Eloy Jimenez
DH- Jose Abreu
CF- Luis Robert
RF- Nicholas Castellanos
SS- Tim Anderson
1B- Zack Collins
C- Seby Zavala
That’s a pretty solid lineup top to bottom to pair with what could be an elite pitching staff. With the A.L. Central as weak as it’s been in recent memory, 2020 can still be a year where the White Sox end their playoff drought and make an October run with the right moves.
