TODAY: Amaya has cleared waivers and been outrighted to Triple-A, according to Sox Machine’s James Fegan.
MAY 16: The White Sox announced Friday morning that infielder Jacob Amaya has been designated for assignment. He’ll be the corresponding roster move for Chicago’s previously reported acquisition of reliever Miguel Castro. The Sox also added infielder Vinny Capra, whom they claimed off waivers from the Brewers, to their active roster. Left-hander Jared Shuster was optioned to Triple-A to clear a second roster spot.
Amaya, 26, originally came to the White Sox via waivers last August. He was briefly jettisoned from the 40-man roster in January and claimed by the Orioles. The South Siders claimed Amaya back from Baltimore two weeks later when the O’s tried to pass him through waivers themselves.
Amaya is regarded as a gifted defender but offers little with the bat. He’s appeared in 56 games with the ChiSox and totaled 139 plate appearances but has just a .140/.174/.155 batting line to show for it — including a .097/.119/.113 slash in 68 plate appearances this season. Though he’s yet to provide any offense in the big leagues, Amaya has a more palatable (albeit still below average) .246/.342/.380 batting line in 1219 plate appearances at the Triple-A level.
Because Amaya is out of minor league options, the Sox couldn’t simply send him directly to Triple-A Charlotte. He’d first need to pass through outright waivers for the Sox to be able to assign him to a minor league affiliate. Major League Baseball’s DFA window lasts a week, and the Sox are free to explore trade possibilities or place Amaya during that time. Waivers are a 48-hour process, however, so if they find a trade partner it’d need to happen within the next five days. Given Amaya’s struggles this year, waivers seem likelier, but a team with a short-term need at shortstop could show some interest.
Imagine being Jacob Amaya and getting DFA’d in favor of a guy hitting 23 points less than you are…
Imagine not understanding that Jacob Amaya doesn’t deserve a roster spot, as a -1
WAR player in only 33 games.
I’m not saying Capra’s a great replacement, but Amaya has been stealing a paycheck for nearly 2 months.
139 ABs. Yep, That’s enough of a sample to dismiss the best defensive SS with some good MiLB history and scouting reports of hitting.
Funny. Some people don’t watch the games and comment on them as though they did.
Amaya has been unplayable. Really worthless to the team.
Some teams have better 4A players starving for an opportunity.
Imagine being Jacob Amaya and getting DFA’d by the White Sox
Thank God.
He had to go. He can’t even bunt effectively.
Mlb needs to sign more kbo players, Mexican baseball players, free agents
Vs what the White Sox are fielding, yes
CWS are like the guy in your fantasy football league that picks up the 4th best receiver on a NFL team because the 3rd best didn’t practice on Wednesday.
And NPB Players
Don’t pay much attention to draft since it’s more about competent orgztn player development than who the groupthink “experts” believe should be picked, but hope when it comes to OF they have a decent one in mind (with power) so they add more potential to system than just Braden Montgomery.
The White Sox are in transition now. They have brought in some new players, young players acquired in trades last summer and last winter, and they are getting rid of some (like Amaya) who can’t cut it, and they are getting significantly better. It would not surprise me if they played about .500 from here this season. Commentors who take shots at the Sox reveal to us that they haven’t really watched them lately, and are just assuming they are the same as they were last year. But, as the Reds found out this week and I see the Cubs are finding out even as we speak, they are not the same.
Does this mean serious contention is just around the corner? No. The Sox will have to compete for top free agents, as a big-market team should, before that can happen. For that to happen, Reinsdorf will probably have to sell the team. But the apparent interest of the Ishbia (spelling?) group is encouraging on that front. Time will tell.
I appreciate your thoughtful comments, Alan53.
I think you forgot that they will trade everyone they can at the deadline and have a brutal 2nd half
No they won’t. There’s no one to trade.
An extended stretch of .500-ish baseball simply will not happen with that bullpen.
Sigh… I guess I appreciate the positivity, but look. there are some things you cannot over look, like the Sox having an identical record to what they had in 2024.. Let that sink in.
That only a smattering of guys on this roster are doing anything right now.. A rebuild needs more than that. As they are bringing up these ‘prospects’ now, the clock on all of them is ticking and we KNOW the ‘Mummy’ will not pay in arb or FA, and after the last misfire rebuild, is likely not giving any extensions out to any good prospects either (maybe other than to make them more appealing to trade). So that means either this flips the ‘rebuild’ immediately OR many of these guys they just got will be gone before the ‘window to win’ appears.
Having half of the ‘coaching’ staff sticking around from the horrendously bad last season does not help. They should have cleaned house and every coach should have been gone, but no they saddled Venable (who looks more and more like Grifol every day) with these losers.. and what does that tell a bunch of young guys? Be mediocre but if the owner knows your name, you are safe.
The only likely way they break this cycle is if ‘the Mummy’ sells his ownership to someone that wants the team to stay in Chicago, cares about the club and winning, and just not getting sweetheart deals, including real estate around the new stadium location,for him and his cronies.
To be fair, the extensions were team friendly deals which would cancel their arb years.
The only reason Amaya was even here was as a placeholder for Colson Montgomery. Colson’s struggles this year in AAA affected the makeup of the club in many ways. There’s no way they were looking at Meidroth at SS, but when it was apparent it wouldn’t be Montgomery displacing Amaya at the end of April, Meidroth got his chance. Amaya was at best planned for a 3-4 week April stint to delay Super 2 status for Colson.
Montgomery is just any example of how bad the scouting and player development is for the White Sox (unless you are a pitcher and even then they have to rely on top draft slots to get many of those guys), which the current GM was supposed to have fixed in his last role… Whoops.
Ugh. He accepted the assignment.
Sorry Jacob. There’s only room for one player named Amaya in Chicago.
Fun times.