After rumors of being connected to Mike Clevinger, Lance Lynn, Robbie Ray, Starling Marte, and others, and with most fans expecting the White Sox to make some sort of move before the trade deadline, Rick Hahn and company stood pat at the deadline. 3:00 CT came and went, and when it was all said and done, a lot of names moved without being tied to the White Sox. Talk about a tease.
First, my personal thoughts. I’m surprised by the fact that the Sox made absolutely no moves. A big-time move was probably out of the picture from the beginning, and we will get into that. However, I’m surprised there were no rental moves made for players that, likely, would’ve cost the White Sox very little to obtain. It seems a tad short-sighted to me that, in a season where the White Sox could theoretically make some noise in the playoffs, nothing was done to improve the shattered depth of the team.
Take a step back though, and that surprise starts to fade away, even just a little bit. It’s been about an hour now, so let’s walk away from the immediate reactions and give some thoughts on what this deadline means for the White Sox, and why it might’ve ended up this way.
How the White Sox View 2020
We learned a lot today about how Rick Hahn and Kenny Williams view the 2020 White Sox. This is a team that is playing for experience in 2020. The White Sox view any success this season as purely lucky for them to be able to experience in the middle of a pandemic-shortened season and temporary expanded playoffs. Rick Hahn has talked about this year still being a “development” year of sorts, where the team takes major steps forward, but is not yet a finished product. Per Scott Merkin earlier this month:
“We are a work in progress and we know that. We know this year was always going to be about taking that next step to putting ourselves in the best long term position. Doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t have high expectations for this season. Doesn’t mean we won’t be able to meet the high expectations for this season. But we wanted to see this team progress, becoming a championship caliber team.
We’ve shown flashes of that. If we were fully healthy, I would probably feel a little better seeing those flashes on a more consistent basis. September is going to be good regardless of who is out there. But the optimism that comes with some of these guys getting healthy should make it even more exciting.”
Rick Hahn on the 2020 White Sox
I mean, he’s not wrong. With a team decimated by injuries, there’s still a lot of potential left to be seen from guys like Michael Kopech, Andrew Vaughn, and Dane Dunning. Even though those were the three names most often thrown around, it appears the White Sox still value these pieces far too highly to make any moves that they felt did not reciprocate the value in return. This was echoed in statements Hahn made not too long ago:
Again, I would’ve liked some short-term moves, but I also get why it wasn’t done. Short term moves are the ones you make when you’re *one move* away from being World Series favorites. I don’t think any rentals the Sox would’ve explored would’ve moved the needle all that much. Heck, I wanted Kevin Gausman big time, but he provides nothing but depth. That’s fine, as long as you’re not looking for guys that move the needle. As for big time moves like Lance Lynn or Mike Clevinger:
1) If you want Clevinger, you have to pay the AL Central tax. That means trading with someone in your own division will likely cost you more than what it costs another team. See the return the Indians got as an example of this.
2) Texas was not sold on being sellers at the deadline. The price point was likely set incredibly high, and no one – Braves, Yankees, or White Sox – felt it was worth it to match it. The same could be said for guys like Gausman in fact – it appears the Giants were in no position to want to sell off either. It’s all a function of a wacky 2020 season.
The White Sox are letting their long-term pieces sink or swim on their own this season. That’s fine with me, so long as….
The 2020 Offseason is Pretty Important Now
… they spend the money a couple months from now. I think the White Sox can pretty clearly self-identify the weaknesses in the current roster: SP depth, RP depth, RF. No particular order there. But if you aren’t, as Rick Hahn said, happy with the multi-year player trades that were explored, then the only avenue left with which to finish off a championship-caliber team is through free agency. Not completing any trades is perfectly fine, but it places more emphasis on the 2020 offseason. The good news is that the White Sox’ aggressive 2019 offseason put them in the position they are today. The bad news is that the pandemic is going to have a large effect on free agency this offseason.
The Effect of the Lost MiLB Season
I think this is something that a lot of people take for granted that likely played a large role in the White Sox’ inability to make any moves during the trade deadline. The question now becomes this: why didn’t the White Sox make any moves? There was nothing in reach?
The problem is this: every team wants to make informed decisions before pulling off a deal. Teams nowadays used data/statistics to make their decisions. However, in this case, there is very little data for teams to work off of. Outside of pitch data from Schaumburg (or any other team’s alternate site), the only other source of recent data from which to make decisions off of is the 2019 MiLB season. For the White Sox, many of their prospects – Rutherford, Sheets, Adolfo, Hansen, etc – had poor 2019 seasons. For others – Thompson, Stiever, Dalquist – there simply is not enough of a track record from which to pull from to rope teams in and sell them on their potential. The Sox are in a rough situation simply because of the pandemic and the players’ struggles in 2019.
I know it sounds easy to just trade Stiever, Thompson, and others just because we know the names and believe in them. However, it’s just purely not that easy, as we learned throughout the offseason and this trade deadline. Teams want to be sure before they trade any commodity. The White Sox were just out of luck here.
2020 Playoffs: Bonus Round for the Rebuild
I think the headline encapsulates everything that we learned. The White Sox weren’t willing to make any moves that prevented them from fully evaluating all of the talent remaining in the system, at least at the highest levels. Sure, it certainly sounds easy to trade Michael Kopech – heck, I suggested they should consider doing so. By the sounds of it, it appears they considered it (and Dunning too). However, at the end of the day, the payoff wasn’t great enough for Hahn and Williams to decide to pull the trigger.
Instead, the White Sox have decided to use this season purely for experience and development, while letting winning become a natural by-product of that experience and development. It’s a fine strategy, and one that likely puts the White Sox in the 2020 playoffs. Though I would’ve preferred some relief arms to be added to the team, the Sox feel confident with what is in Schaumburg currently. I can’t sit here and evaluate players I have no data on, so this is a situation where you just have to trust Hahn and the development staff at their word.
Remember, too, that the 2020 season in general played a huge part in how today ended up. I didn’t put it in a whole section, because it’s been talked about ad nauseam. However, more buyers and less sellers drives up the prices for players being sold (except in the case of Mike Clevinger… man the Indians’ return was underwhelming). Even so, fringe sellers like the Rangers, Giants, and Marlins decided to stand pat or buy. I don’t think that’s a great move for these types of teams, but I’m not the GM at the end of the day. All it means is that less commodities were available, and the ones that were weren’t enticing enough to give up pieces that the White Sox deem valuable for their future. That’s not to say it’ll never happen… just not today.
If the expanded playoffs are truly here to stay, what we saw today may be a long-term outlook for how the Trade Deadline will go. The good news is that it can make the offseason more exciting. The bad news is that it could make both the offseason and Trade Deadline less exciting and place more emphasis – again – on homegrown talent.
The long-term outlook has yet to be seen, but let’s stay upbeat White Sox fans. This team has a lot of talent and a bright future. Let’s enjoy the rest of 2020, which starts with going out and beating the Twins today.
The trades and signings can wait for the offseason now. However, there’s something particularly fun about the Trade Deadline, even if it was only just a tease of more exciting days to come.
Thoughts? Comments? Let me know on Twitter! @jlazowski14
Featured Photo: Chicago White Sox (@whitesox) / Twitter
