The White Sox announced Monday that they’ve activated outfielder Jon Jay from the 60-day injured list for his season debut and designated right-hander Odrisamer Despaigne for assignment in order to open a roster spot.
Jay, 34, was signed to a one-year deal worth $4MM in the offseason — perhaps in part as an unsuccessful enticement to close friend Manny Machado, whom the Sox recruited heavily — but has yet to play in 2019 due to a hip injury. Jay hit .358/.382/.396 in 13 games with Triple-A Charlotte while rehabbing and batted a combined .268/.330/.347 through 586 combined plate appearances with the Royals and D-backs in 2018.
The veteran Jay is capable of manning all three outfield spots, and while he’s lacking in power, he has a knack for putting the ball in play at a high rate (career 16.5 percent strikeout rate). A lifetime .285/.352/.378 hitter, he’ll join an outfield mix that currently contains Eloy Jimenez, Leury Garcia, Charlie Tilson and Ryan Cordell.
Despaigne, 32, was tattooed for 14 runs on 24 hits and seven walks with seven strikeouts in 13 1/3 innings for the South Siders. The Cuban-born righty has appeared in the big leagues in each of the past six seasons but hasn’t found success outside of his 2014 rookie season in San Diego and a solid run with the Marlins in 2017. Overall, he has a career 5.11 ERA with 224 strikeouts against 130 walks in 363 MLB innings.
If they actually sign a decent pitcher instead of trying to find a miracle minor league signing that somehow takes off, they wouldn’t have to worry about this carousel of pitchers.
Jays tried that with Buchholz, Shoemaker, and Richard and they still have that carousel going on. Doesn’t always work out lol.
Edwin Jackson as well with the Blue Jays
But that would mean, spending money. And Reinsdork doesn’t like to part with his money – only if he can get the taxpayers money to spend.
He should move to California. He would fit in great.
That would cost money. The worst owner in baseball is against that
I agree. It looks like Hector Santiago will be next up in the search for someone to eat innings. I agree also that giving Shields a call would be a good idea, but my guess is that the front office has long since been in contact with Shields and his agent, and for reasons unknown to the public the reunion of the pitcher and the team will not take place.
Probably because he was awful for 3 years and wants something close to what he was making being awful. Then, at his age, he wont even be ready until August, and you get 2 month of uselessness and wasted money. There absolutely no guarantee he will be any better than last year, which is right in line with everyone else they are getting to fill this hole
Give Shields a shot
The fact that he remains unsigned is still baffling to me. There must be some medical or character issue going on, because you’d think any team would want a guy that can pitched 200+ innings of decent pitching a season ago.
Yeah some rebuilding team could use those innings. As a Sox fan, I actually miss him when you look at Nova, Santana, Despaigne, Banuelos.
And Dylan Cease has been as bad as these bums, except in AAA. Sox rebuild still has a long way to go.
K.
It’s very difficult for any starting pitcher to produce strong numbers playing half of their games in AAA Charlotte’s bandbox downtown ballpark. The numbers that Dylan Cease has put up actually exceeded those of Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez at Charlotte in 2017. Michael Kopech also struggled mightily with his numbers last summer until a light switch turned on in his final month in AAA when he became unhittable without the walks. He finally became Noah Syndergaard up until his last outing for the White Sox on September 5th when he allowed 7 runs to the Tigers pitching with a torn UCL that required TJ surgery.
Shields a shot….maybe a firing squad
Don’t know if it’s the case, but he may only pitch if the money is right, and at this point in the season, I can’t see paying him more than maybe a couple million. It will take at least a month for him to get back into pitching form, and then which Shields will the Sox (or any other team) get, the one from ’18 or the one from ’16 and ’17?
That’s my guess: he’s being particular about where he plays and how much he’s paid, and if he doesn’t get what he wants he’s content to sit it out. He wouldn’t be the first or last veteran to approach possible retirement that way
Hector Santiago will be called up next.
lmao they signed john jay and traded for yonder alonso to try and get machado and now they’re stuck with both of them
Stuck? Jay is on a one year deal and Alonso if a FA after next year…
Would it make sense for the Padres and White Sox to build a trade around Jay and one of the Padres’ younger corner OFs, considering SD’s outside shot at a Wild Card and their limited CF options?
Padres had Jay at one time. He was bad then and bad now.
@partyatnapolis
Yes, that combined $12MM is certainly weighing the team down. Oh, and let’s not forget the $1MM they will have to fork out to Alonso next year (for declining his option) will cripple the Sox for years.
if Jay was healthy it wouldve been a very good signing.
Jon Jay is awful. Bad signing. He should never take at bats away from anyone, especially a prospect who needs those at bats.
Good thing he’s not taking at bats from any legitimate prospects right now.
I bet they wish they had Clint Frazier.
Nope. #tool
I bet they wish they had Jimenez and Robert. Oh wait, they do.
Frazier is better than both
This right here is the most hilarious hot take I’ve seen on this site in a long time. Good Lord.
Insane bud….keep dreaming.
Stephen A. Smith, is that you?
Lay of the booze pinstripes.
@pinstripes17
Congratulations, pinstripes17! You just won the Idiotic Comment of the Day!
Frazier will never play for the White Sox. Remember he sued the club for that injury last year.
That was Dustin Fowler
Was it Fowler? My bad.
Odrisamer Despaigne, 80 name tool, 20’s, everything else.
Despaigne made it rain, with all that hard contact. Now he’s landed in the plain
Im looking forward to getting tickets to see Hamilton, Burr and John Jay play. Maybe Dolly Madison can hook me up.
Despaigne certainly made it easy for the Sox to decide which one to boot to put Jay on the 25-man roster.
It’s finally time to see if Jay’s worth the $4MM the Sox paid for him. Or at the very least, we’ll see if he is an upgrade to Tilson, Cordell, etc. No real loss if he isn’t, but if he is, maybe they can flip him at the deadline (even if it’s just a salary dump).
Jay is NOT worth anything, and he shouldn’t be playing.
@Nick Stevens
Not a big fan of Jay, are you? LOL
Can’t say I’m excited to have him on the team either, but it is what it is.
Now that there is finally a decent defense on the field resign hard luck Chris Volstad. He is not a true reliever and has never been injured,
Jon Jay is basically Leury Garcia this year, so yeah, would be great if they had a crystal ball before the year.
id be for shields if the balls werent juiced
It’s time to stick a fork in Despaigne’s career.
That pitch face gets an A
Jon Jay. The most over rated player in baseball.
How so? Nobody thinks he’s very good…
If nobody thinks Jay is good, why do they keep giving him guaranteed contracts for multi million dollars? One of these days maybe these GMs will wise up.
Because he’s capable of playing the outfield and can get on base. He’s a roster filler until prospects are ready. Being the “most overrated player in baseball” would require people to think very highly of him, which they don’t. You’re the only one acting like people think he’s some sort of savior. Everyone else is just accepting him for what he is – a placeholder for Luis Robert.
Fill the roster spot with a legit player. Take away all the times he gets hit on his massive azz and his OBP is just average. And his OF speed and arm are beyond awful.
No Palka ?
Hopefully after Alonso gets DFA’ed.
Alonzo will get DFAed once Castillo is back.
I’d like to believe you’re right, but I’d be willing to bet that just leads to Collins going back to AAA til September. You know, because 1 game of at-bats at the big league level was enough for him.
Jon Jay will have 5 weeks to build up a little more trade value to a contender with a need for a 4th outfielder who can play CF and potentially leadoff. The Cubs had Jay in a similar role back in 2017 and he performed well for them. Perhaps they would have a renewed interest in Jay to temporarily help in patching up their leadoff spot and move slugger Kyle Schwarber where he belongs in the #5 or #6 hole.
Schwarber’s OBP and SLG are fine but his BA is below par along with his foot speed atop a lineup. He also whiffs too much and lacks RBI opportunities hitting first, especially in the NL where the pitcher still hits at or near the bottom of the order. “Genius” Joe Maddon continues to believe that hitting the pitcher 8th more often than not can fix the Schwarber leadoff problem. It didn’t work in back in 2017 and hasn’t proved to be all that helpful in 2019 either.
Unfortunately, Albert Almora has failed to improve his OBP to warrant a full time crack at the top spot. It’s equally unfortunate that Ben Zobrist can’t help in that role with his off the field issue.
The front office has been the main culprit by not properly addressing the Cubs leadoff woes since the departure of Dexter Fowler following their 2016 championship season. I’d rather see Theo go all out in trying to acquire Whit Merrifield but the organization probably lacks the necessary prospects to entice a Royals organization just embarking on a new rebuild. Perhaps Jay can help fix the #1 spot for the Cubs down the stretch in 2019 while also putting Schwarber in better position to maximize his power behind high OBP sluggers Anthony Rizzo and Kris Bryant. Unlike with their last summer deadline trade back in 2017, the White Sox demands from the Cubs won’t be nearly as exorbitant this time around.
The Cubs will Not go after Jay. And no, he can’t play CF, and no he’s not good, and if he was so good, why did they let him walk after 2017? I know why. Because 12 hop singles, rag arm, turtle speed, no power, and horrible defense is not a recipe for success. You sound like a Cardinals fan promoting the great Jay.
The White Sox are finally back to having 5 OF’s on their active roster. Unfortunately, with the activation of Jon Jay from the IL, three of them share similar skill sets. Jay is basically a younger version of Charlie Tilson. Each are high contact, low SLG left-handed hitters who can play all 3 OF positions and run a little. Switch-hitter Leury Garcia has some similar attributes with a far better arm and even more versatility with his ability to also play 2B, SS and 3B.
Clearly the addition of Jay to the OF mix is temporary at best. The White Sox will need to add a 13th arm to their pitching staff sooner rather than later. They also desperately need to find another starter or three to fill the spot of Odrisamer Despaigne, not to mention Manny Banuelos and Dylan Covey. White Sox fans are hopeful that top pitching prospect Dylan Cease will fill one of those voids shortly.
As for the OF, Jay will be given every opportunity to play in order to help increase his trade value as the July 31st deadline approaches. This may cost Tilson his roster spot in the short term or perhaps even the job of reserve infielder Jose Rondon with Garcia able to play all of the latter’s positions on the diamond.
Why would teams want Jay?
Why are so many Sox fans still stuck on the present? Signing mediocre starting pitchers won’t change the outcome of this season, and it won’t help the team develop or acquire talent for the future. This team is on the cusp of becoming a power in the AL, but now is not the time to go crazy signing guys that aren’t a fit for the team.
Totally off topic but I just wanna sound off about some of these players and their gold chains. Maybe I’m just too old to get it but it seems like they’re getting a bit carried away. I think Moncada wears three of them. I like the dude but It looks a little silly to me.
That is all.
Carson Fulmer