JUNE 15: Chicago has placed Rollins on release waivers, Colleen Kane of the Chicago Tribune reports on Twitter.
JUNE 10: The White Sox announced today that they have promoted top shortstop prospect Tim Anderson to the Majors and designated struggling veteran Jimmy Rollins for assignment in order to clear space on the roster. Anderson entered the season rated as the game’s No. 42 prospect in the eyes of Jim Callis and Jonathan Mayo of MLB.com, and he rated 45th on the Top 100 prospect lists penned by Baseball America and Keith Law of ESPN.com.
Anderson, a first-round pick of the White Sox in 2013 (No. 17 overall), is batting .304/.325/.409 with four homers and 11 steals through his first 55 games at the Triple-A level this season. He’ll presumably get a chance to replace Rollins as the team’s everyday shortstop, with defensive standout Tyler Saladino representing a fallback option in the event that Anderson is overmatched by Major League pitching.
The scouting reports on Anderson offer mixed reviews on his work at shortstop, with MLB.com noting that he has plenty of arm strength but lacks soft hands and has erratic footwork. His tools profile in center field if he can’t handle short, per MLB.com, though BA and Law are a bit more optimistic on his chances to stick at short. BA notes that he has a penchant for highlight-reel plays but sometimes doesn’t play the right hop and doesn’t consistently make good throws from the hole. Law notes that he made improvements in his actions at shortstop in 2015 as well. What all of the reports do agree on is that Anderson is a plus-plus runner with the contact skills to hit between .280 and .300 in the Majors even if it comes with a pedestrian on-base percentage. However, as Dan Hayes of CSN Chicago points out (on Twitter), Anderson has cut his strikeout rate dramatically as his first Triple-A season has worn on; the 23-year-old whiffed 29 times in his first 103 PAs with Charlotte (28.1 percent), but it took him another 158 PAs to punch out another 29 times (18.8 percent).
By delaying his promotion until June 10, the White Sox have almost certainly prevented Anderson from reaching Super Two designation, which would allow him to be arbitration eligible four times instead of three. The largest amount of service time he could accrue at this stage of the season would be 114 days, and the lowest Super Two cutoff in recent years has been two years, 122 days (in both 2013 and 2010). If he’s in the Majors for good, Anderson would project to be eligible for free agency following the 2022 season and would not be eligible for arbitration until the completion of the 2019 campaign.
Rollins, 37, is of course a Phillies icon due to his storied and excellent career with Philadelphia, where he batted .267/.327/.424 across parts of 15 Major League seasons. With the Phils, Rollins was a three-time All-Star, a four-time Gold Glover and the 2007 National League MVP in a season that saw him bat .296/.344/.531 with 30 homers and 41 stolen bases. (He won a Silver Slugger that season as well.) However, since being traded to the Dodgers prior to the 2015 campaign (Philadelphia picked up right-hander Zach Eflin and lefty Tom Windle in the swap), Rollins’ offensive numbers have flatlined. He batted a mere .224/.285/.358 in his lone season wearing Dodger Blue, and his production with the South Siders hasn’t been any better. He’s produced a sub-par .221/.295/.329 slash in 166 trips to the plate this season.
Dave Williams of Barstool Sports first reported the Anderson promotion (via Twitter).
Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
well this is exciting for the white sox! great draft yesterday and now TA is up. Hopefully he flashes some of that hit tool
Sad to see Rollins get DFAed after a great career with the Phillies!
thanks jimmy for helping get rid of adam and drake. will never forget that. go timmy go. if you hit, you will play
Amen
lol so true
Don’t you dare speak ill of Drake. That boy is a leader of grown men.
He should retire
Hope Robin hits him 2nd. Putting him at 7, 8, 9 would just be setting him up for failure IMO. Doesn’t walk much or hit for power but hopefully he can be a Mark Grudzielanek or Placido Polanco type. He’ll need to cut down the strikeouts though.
Yeah because Addison Russell clearly failed last season when he got called up and hit 9th…
I didn’t know . 242/.307/.389 was succeeding.
That with plus defense is an above average everyday SS.
Unless you’re someone with unrealistic expectations for every 21 year old that gets called up to the Majors, that’s very successful.
While I agree that he had a decent season for a 21 year old getting called up to the Majors, your expectations are way too low if that’s a “very successful” season. I’d be fine calling it successful, but “very” is a reach.
2.9 fwar for a 21 year old? I’ll call that very successful.
What are you expecting out of Tim Anderson
Not much…
Well sslow that is because you do not understand baseball
He bats 9th b/c he can’t hit. His value is from his defense.
Can’t hit? Didn’t know one of the best clutch hitters on that team can’t hit. Interesting
He can hit, just not very well yet.
Maxmadsen that would be the worse thing for Ventura to do. Hit him in the bottom of the order and let him get his feet wet. Ventura will prolly make the stupid move of doing exactly what your wanting however, which is one of the many reasons he needs to be fired.
In my not so storied career in baseball I preferred batting lower in the lineup, batting second sucks because pitchers give their best to the 2-5 hitters to get outs. When your batting 6-9 you can possibly get a mistake from the pitcher who is trying to sneak pitches through the bottom of the order. I think Anderson should bat maybe 7 or 8
I hope Robin gets fired along with Williams and Hahn.
‘Swing big or go home’ I am not a sox fan, but I give the sox credit for making bold moves. They have more work to do. It will be interesting to see how they address starting pitching and the bullpen
And the revolving door continues for sox players. The door should have included Williams and Hahn! I hope this staff doesn’t ruin Anderson or the very good players they drafted yesterday.
I would give Hahn more credit. He is in a difficult spot as Kenny Williams has authority over him and interferes
They are both bums! If Reinsdorf were still with us he’d wouldn’t tolerate such mediocrity.
This might not be the last move the White sox move either to continue out what has been a very busy week or so beginning with the Shields trade. John Heyman was on with Darren Smith on xx1090 yesterday in San Diego and said there were discussions last week of a separate trade between the two with Matt Kemp being the focal point heading back to Chicago. It could be building steam due to Kemps 14 Hr’s and 43 Rbi’s before the all-star break when everybody knows he is traditionally a second half performer. The White Sox could Bank on that and want to add to what they have already started doing.
Matt Kemp has a wRC+ of 86. He is bad, old,expensive and broken.
In that case, he sounds like a perfect match for the White Sox strategists.
He wouldn’t be “that” expensive for them, though. How much are the Dodgers paying? If San Diego eats some of what’s left, who knows how much the White Sox would actually be responsible for. It might not be a bad idea.
The dodgers are 3.5 mill a year but that doesn’t make sense as there is only 1 dh lol. He’s a terrible defensive player also has been but now no longer has the make up speed.
Yep. Padres owe around 20 million a year through the 2019 season. Kemp isn’t any good, which is the much bigger problem.
I hope he wasn’t rushed like Gordon beckham or Josh fields cause that would be unfortunate. However, they should absolutely put TA in the 2 spot in the lineup, the sox have been looking for a 2 spot hitter for years and it’s never panned out. This is the guy because of his speed and contact rate.
I’m so sick of hearing about Gordon Beckham being “rushed.” He hit .270/.347/.460 in 103 games his rookie year. After that, big league pitchers figured him out and he couldn’t make the necessary adjustments to be successful. Spending time in the minors against lower level pitching wouldn’t change that.
I think it’s funny that the story referred to Saladino as a “defensive standout.”
They were really grasping at straws trying to say anything about him, it seems.
The White Sox front office continues to slam their fists on the panic button and make yet another rash move.
Woodhead you must have pencil shavings for brains. Latos, Rollins, and danks all over stayed there welcome.
They suck in so many ways. Williams should be tarred and feathered. Too bad Reinsdorf isn’t around anymore.
I think if Chairman Reinsdorf were here today, he would tell us all how he was at Jackie Robinson’s first day, and how great a job Kenny and Jerry and Doug and Ozzie were doing today.
Dysfunctional organization grasping for straws.
Dodgers jimmy Rollins at 3b and turner gone
Angels hey jimmy
I sincerely doubt that the same WS front office person that pushed for the Latos and Rollins signings pulled the trigger on the DFA’s.
A palace coup – or at least a clarification of Who’s In Charge – may be in the works.
Dodgers need a third-base guy who could hit Better then turner so jimmy should sign deal
So now Turner is no good at all? And Rollins and his zero games played at 3B and two-buck BA is better? Talk about your fickle fans. You’re taking it to a new level.
No because Rollins can’t catch up to a fastball. Rollins at this point in career is a defensive first SS. Dodgers need Turner to find his timing. He always provides quality ABs but has fouled off fb that he hasn’t missed the last two years.
Wow. Jimmy’s offense is bad enough to call him a defensive first SS? His defense blows too. I don’t even think you can call him a baseball player right now.
Time for J-Roll to hang them up. Next stop: Cooperstown
Hall of very good, probably not hall of fame.
Would love to see Jimmy Rollins come back to the Phillies and end his career there as a utility player. He’s a valuable presence in the clubhouse.
Rollins as a Phillies ute and clubhouse icon? Is this sarcasm? That’s unrealistic when you consider that they already employ three of those guys between Galvis, Hernandez, and Blanco. And all three provide more offense than Jimmy in 2016. This is before even getting into the fact that Blanco is a far superior clubhouse leader for a young team.
A more likely return would be as the successor to Bowa or as a replacement for Samuel at 3B Coach. Jimmy could kick around as a ronin for a year or two if he really wants to, but he’s on borrowed time at this point if he can’t find get his way on base. It looked like he wanted to hang on until 3000 hits, like Ichiro, but that’s impossible at this point. He’d have to play far too long to get 540 more hits.
Have the Phil’s considered signing Drake LaRoche to fill the clubhouse leader role?
Somebody should hook onto Rollins with the idea of moving him into a coaching position after he retires.
As a long time White Sox fan
I expect that whatever is the worst thing for Robin to do to Anderson will be done by Robin..
For all of these moves (and Jackson is out with an injury and Coats is back up) as long as Robin is here I see more slumps in the future for the Sox.
They should’ve kept Rollins around to take some pressure off of beckham. Now the spotlight is only on him
I’m sure Atlanta would appreciate the White Sox keeping Rollins around to take some pressure off of Gordon Beckahm.
Red Sox should trade cash for Rollins and use him as a back up
Rutledge, Marco Hernandez and Holt when he gets back are more than enough. We need outfield depth and pitching.
Adam LaRoche was NOT a big team loss. However, I never understood why the ChiSox let Alexei Ramirez walk. He’s still one of the better SS in MLB.. He never got the credit; he deserved the AL’s SS GG in 4 out of the past 5 years but got none.
Kenny Williams is seriously overrated.
Huh? Who overrates Kenny Williams? He’s pretty much universally hated…