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White Sox To Select Andrew Vaughn

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Prized White Sox prospect Andrew Vaughn has made the team’s Opening Day roster. He isn’t on Chicago’s 40-man, so the team will need to select him.

The White Sox could have gained an extra year of service time by keeping Vaughn down for the first few weeks of the season, but executive vice president Ken Williams said last week that wouldn’t be a motivating factor in their decision. The team was true to its word. If Vaughn doesn’t return to the minors, he’ll be controllable through 2026 and eligible for arbitration after 2023, though the White Sox could certainly extend him before then, as they’ve done on multiple occasions in recent years with offensive building blocks such as Yoan Moncada, Tim Anderson, Eloy Jimenez and Luis Robert.

General manager Rick Hahn stated Tuesday (via James Fegan of The Athletic), “Having Andrew around will be a positive for this offense.” The White Sox expect Vaughn to factor in at designated hitter, first base and left field, according to Hahn.

It became easier to envision Vaughn making Chicago’s season-opening roster when the club received the devastating news of Jimenez’s ruptured pectoral tendon last week. Jimenez underwent surgery Tuesday and remains likely to miss at least five to six months, Hahn said. The hope is that Vaughn will help fill Jimenez’s enormous offensive void.

Now 22 years old, Vaughn is a former University of California standout whom the White Sox drafted third overall in 2019 and then signed to a $7.2MM-plus bonus. Vaughn hasn’t gotten above High-A ball since then, but he has held his own in the minors, having slashed .278/.384/.449 in 245 plate appearances. He has also looked ready for prime time this spring with a .279/.375/.459 line and six extra-base hits (three doubles, two home runs and a triple) in 61 at-bats.

Along with Vaughn’s addition, the White Sox made a handful of other roster moves Tuesday. They optioned infielder Danny Mendick to their alternate site and reassigned fellow infielders Tim Beckham, Zach Remillard and Matt Reynolds, outfielder Nick Williams, and right-hander Ryan Burr. The club also made the previously reported release of catcher Jonathan Lucroy official.

White Sox Sign Jake Lamb

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TODAY: The Sox officially announced the deal, confirming that Lamb’s deal is a Major League pact.  In a corresponding move, left-hander Nik Turley was designated for assignment.  Turley was claimed off waivers from the Athletics last week.

MARCH 29: The White Sox have an agreement to sign free agent third baseman Jake Lamb, pending a physical, per Robert Murray of FanSided (via Twitter). Lamb spent the spring with the Atlanta Braves, who ultimately stuck with Pablo Sandoval as their backup at the hot corner. He will need to clear waivers before this deal is official.

Lamb should have a certain degree of comfort with White Sox manager Tony La Russa. La Russa was the Chief Baseball Officer of the Diamondbacks during Lamb’s heyday from 2014 to 2017. Lamb hit .250/.336/.462 with 69 home runs in 1,752 plate appearances over that span. Injuries hit Lamb hard since then, however.

He did have a small-sample resurgence with the A’s last year, posting a 141 wRC+ in 49 plate appearances with Oakland. Combined with 50 plate appearances in Arizona where he posted just a 14 wRC+, however, and the numbers balance to 77 wRC+, almost exactly matching his mark from the previous two seasons.

The White Sox are a little light on depth, but it’s not exactly clear where Lamb might fit. The logical jump is that Lamb’s signing is a reaction to losing Eloy Jimenez, but there’s not a natural way to shift the roster to make that line of thinking track. Yoan Moncada plays Lambs’ natural position at third, though he has offered to play the outfield in the past, including last offseason when Chicago was entertaining making a run at free agent Anthony Rendon. That would seem to be a lot to ask of Moncada coming off the difficult season he endured in 2020.

More than likely, he’s simply slated for organizational depth. If he’s added to the Major League roster, he could see time at designated hitter in the event that Andrew Vaughn either doesn’t make the roster or does make the roster and spends time in left field, where he’s started two of the past three spring games.

Eloy Jimenez Out At Least Four Months Due To Ruptured Pectoral Tendon

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MARCH 29: Jimenez will undergo surgery Tuesday, Jon Heyman of MLB Network tweets. His recovery will take four to five months.

MARCH 25: The White Sox roster has taken a crucial blow before the season is even underway, as general manager Rick Hahn announced Thursday that left fielder Eloy Jimenez has suffered a ruptured left pectoral tendon and will require surgery. He’s expected to miss five to six months of action, putting his season in jeopardy. Jimenez exited yesterday’s Cactus League game with an apparent injury to his left arm after he attempted to rob a home run.

An absence of any length for Jimenez would have been a notable hit to the White Sox’ chances, but losing Jimenez for the majority of the season is a particularly emphatic gut punch for the South Siders. Jimenez, 24, belted 31 homers as a rookie in 2019 and improved across the board in his rate stats in 2020, slashing .296/.332/.559 with 14 dingers and 14 doubles in just 226 trips to the plate. He was on a tear this spring as well, hitting .319/.360/.532 with two homers, two doubles and a triple in 50 plate appearances.

The injury is particularly significant for the Sox due to the lack of experienced replacements in camp. Utilityman Leury Garcia has outfield experience but seems unlikely to be pressed into an everyday role, and the top options on the 40-man roster — Blake Rutherford, Micker Adolfo, Luis Gonzalez — have yet to play in the Majors beyond two stray plate appearances for Gonzalez. The Sox do have Billy Hamilton and Nick Williams on minor league deals, but neither has hit much in his recent sample of big league work.

Meanwhile, Hahn called the notion of recently signed prospect Yoelki Cespedes (Yoenis’ younger brother) jumping directly to the big leagues “premature” (Twitter link via MLB.com’s Scott Merkin). The GM also suggested that the club will get presumptive designated hitter Andrew Vaughn some work in left field as the Sox evaluate internal options (Twitter link via Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune). Vaughn is already looking likely to be thrust into the Majors after skipping both Double-A and Triple-A, and tackling left field would present another challenge given that his history is as a first baseman. Speculatively, this seems like a case where the solution lies outside the organization.

There ought to be multiple options around the league for the White Sox to consider in the coming days as veterans opt out of minor league contracts with other teams. Jay Bruce has just such a clause in his Yankees contract, for instance, and he’s not a lock to make the club. New York also has the out-of-options Mike Tauchman, who has drawn trade interest from as many as eight teams. The Reds are facing a similar quandary with slugger Aristides Aquino. Unsigned options on the free-agent market include Josh Reddick, Yoenis Cespedes and Yasiel Puig.

Jonathan Lucroy Granted Release By White Sox

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The White Sox have released veteran catcher Jonathan Lucroy from his minor league contract, reports FanSided’s Robert Murray (via Twitter). The decision leaves Zack Collins and Yermin Mercedes as backup catching options still in camp. The Sox have already optioned Seby Zavala, and Yasmani Grandal is of course slated to serve as the primary catcher again in 2021. The Athletic’s James Fegan tweets that Lucroy asked for his release after being informed that he would not crack the Opening Day roster.

Lucroy, 34, appeared in 14 games with the Sox during Spring Training but only tallied 23 trips to the plate. It’s a small sample of work, but he hit well in that time, going 6-for-18 with a double and drawing five walks against just one strikeout. He’d long looked like a very plausible backup option behind Grandal, but it seems the Sox will instead turn things over to younger, in-house alternatives.

Keeping Lucroy would’ve required opening another 40-man roster spot. They’ll already need to do so for Andrew Vaughn at the very least — assuming he makes the club, as expected — and could need to do so for Jake Lamb, depending on the terms of the agreement he reached with the South Siders earlier this morning. Eloy Jimenez can be moved to the 60-day IL to create one such opening, but the Sox may not be keen on finding ways to open too many additional spots.

Lucroy was arguably MLB’s premier catcher at one point, but that was back in 2016 and his subsequent decline has been precipitous, to say the least. Since Opening Day 2017, Lucroy has posted a combined .248/.315/.305 batting line that clocks in at 24 percent worse than league-average production by measure of both OPS+ and wRC+. His once-vaunted framing numbers have tumbled as well, as has his ability to catch opposing base thieves. Lucroy appeared in just one big league game last year, with the Red Sox, and did not tally a plate appearance.

Gio Gonzalez Announces Retirement

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Veteran left-hander Gio Gonzalez took to Instagram this afternoon to announce his retirement from baseball after a 13-year Major League career. The 35-year-old Hialeah, Fla. native was in camp with the Marlins on a minor league deal and called simply donning the jersey of his hometown club one of his “biggest dreams.” However, Gonzalez also added that his “body wasn’t keeping up with [his] mind.” The lefty offered a heartfelt thanks to the Athletics, Nationals, Brewers, White Sox, Yankees and Marlins organizations.

Gio Gonzalez | Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

“My heart and mind are finally at peace with my decision,” Gonzalez wrote at the conclusion of his post. “Here’s one last tip of the cap! I’m coming home to my wonderful family. I love u!”

Gonzalez was the No. 38 overall draft pick by the White Sox back in 2004 and had, to say the least, an unconventional career arc with the team. Chicago traded him to the Phillies in Dec. 2005 as part of the Jim Thome blockbuster, only to reacquire him a year later alongside Gavin Floyd in the trade that sent Freddy Garcia to Philadelphia. Gonzalez was close to big league ready at that point and looked as though he could make his debut with the team that originally drafted him … until the White Sox again traded him away — this time to the Athletics as part of the return for Nick Swisher.

Between his draft status, his inclusion in trades for three high-profile big leaguers and his annual placement on Baseball America’s Top 100 prospect list from 2006-09, it was clear that Gonzalez was highly regarded within the industry. It took him a bit to deliver on that talent, but he did so in a big way with a breakout showing in 2010, when he tossed 200 2/3 innings of 3.23 ERA ball and solidified himself as part of the Athletics’ rotation.

That marked the first of six consecutive seasons in which the durable Gonzalez would make at least 27 starts and pitch to a sub-4.00 ERA. Oakland, as is often the case, traded him when he was on the cusp of arbitration eligibility, shipping him to the Nationals in return for a prospect package of four future big leaguers: A.J. Cole, Tommy Milone, Derek Norris and Brad Peacock.

Gonzalez was nothing short of excellent in Washington, finishing third in National League Cy Young voting in his first season as a Nat. He inked a five-year, $42MM contract extension with the Nats in Jan. 2012 and would go on to spend the next seven seasons in D.C. under the terms of that deal (which contained a pair of club options). Gonzalez’s first season with the Nationals was his best, but he finished sixth in NL Cy Young voting in 2017 — his final full year with the club. In parts of seven years there overall, Gonzalez racked up 1263 1/3 innings of 3.62 ERA ball and helped the Nats to four postseason berths.

With the Nats out of playoff contention in 2018, they traded Gonzalez to the Brewers for a pair of prospects. Gonzalez was brilliant in five starts down the stretch with Milwaukee, helping pitch the Brewers into the postseason. He re-signed with the Brewers in April 2019 after being granted his release from a minor league deal with the Yankees organization and again pitched quite well, tossing 87 1/3 frames of 3.50 ERA ball.

In the 2019-20 offseason, Gonzalez had a full-circle moment when he signed a one-year contract to return to the White Sox. He finally took the mound with his original organization on July 26 last summer. Gonzalez was tagged for six runs in his first appearance, but he bounced back with 28 innings of 3.54 ERA ball for the South Siders the rest of the way.

Gonzalez will walk away from baseball as a two-time All-Star who twice finished sixth or better in his league’s Cy Young voting. Long one of the game’s more underrated starters, his career body of work stands as a testament to his consistency: in 1933 innings, Gonzalez went 131-101 a 3.70 ERA and 1860 strikeouts. He earned more than $73MM in a career valued by Baseball-Reference at 30.1 wins above replacement and valued by FanGraphs at 32.1 WAR. Gonzalez never won a ring but appeared in the postseason five different times, made a pair of All-Star Games and was always good for an entertaining interview. It was a strong career by any measure, and Gonzalez will head into retirement having left his mark on several fanbases and countless teammates and coaches around the sport.

Billy Hamilton Looks Likely To Make White Sox's Opening Day Roster

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  • Billy Hamilton looks likely to make the White Sox Opening Day roster, Scott Merkin of MLB.com writes as part of a reader mailbag. The speedster is in camp as a non-roster invitee. Presumptive fourth outfielder Adam Engel will start the season on the injured list, aiding Hamilton’s chances of breaking camp with the team. Hamilton has really struggled at the plate in recent years, but his speed and outfield defense should make him a useful bench piece. If he indeed makes the club, he’ll need to be added to the Sox’s 40-man roster.

Williams: White Sox Won’t Hold Vaughn Back For Service-Time Reasons

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The White Sox have had extension talks with top prospect Andrew Vaughn, the No. 3 overall pick from the 2019 draft, but they’re willing to carry him on the Opening Day roster even without a long-term deal in place, writes USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. White Sox vice president Kenny Williams wouldn’t directly confirm that Vaughn is likely to make the Opening Day roster, though he certainly implied that could be in the works.

“We’d like to have that message coming from the manager,” Williams tells Nightengale, “and not me through USA Today.” Sox skipper Tony La Russa tells Nightengale that Vaughn “hasn’t made the club yet” but has made a “very good impression” to this point in camp.

That’s probably understating the matter. Vaughn has never played a game at the Double-A level, but he’s nevertheless tattooed Cactus League pitching at a .289/.396/.489 clip through 53 plate appearances. He’s fanned just nine times against an impressive seven walks, adding a pair of homers, a double and a triple to the mix.

While many clubs around the game would keep Vaughn down at the alternate training site for three weeks to buy an extra year of service time, Williams indicates that the team won’t sacrifice immediate wins even for benefit down the line.

“…[O]ur feeling is that when you’re ready to help the major-league club, there’s a spot for you,” says Williams. “…I think there is a residual effect if you play those type of service-time games. As a former player, maybe I’m a little more sensitive to it than others. If you do that, the player and the agent don’t forget any time soon.”

Last offseason, the White Sox inked veteran slugger Edwin Encarnacion to serve as their primary designated hitter, but they’ve made no efforts to bring in a full-time DH this time around. The South Siders quickly brought Adam Eaton back to serve as their right fielder early in the offseason, but he’s been the lone bat added to a lineup composed largely of impressive young players.

Vaughn, one of the sport’s most promising young hitters, would only further the ChiSox’ youth movement. The former Cal star raked at a .374/.495/.688 clip in 745 NCAA plate appearances, launching 50 homers and drawing 123 walks against just 75 strikeouts along the way. He played in 55 pro games after being drafted in ’19 and put together a strong .278/.384/.449 slash through 245 plate appearances. Because the 2020 minor league season was canceled, that’s the only pro experience to date for Vaughn, though the young slugger tells Nightengale he feels he learned quite a bit while taking as many as seven to eight plate appearances daily against high-end pitching at the Sox’ alternate training site last summer.

If Vaughn were to break camp with the White Sox and never be sent back to the minors, he’d be controlled via arbitration through the 2026 season, reaching arbitration eligibility after the 2023 campaign. Leaving him in the minors for just three weeks would push that free-agent trajectory back to the 2027-28 offseason, but Williams’ comments and the White Sox’ past actions strongly suggest that’s not a priority for them. And even if Vaughn does break camp without first agreeing to a contract extension, the two sides could always continue talks about a long-term pact — be they early in the spring or next offseason.

Eloy Jimenez Dealing With Left Shoulder Discomfort

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White Sox outfielder Eloy Jimenez departed the team’s game Wednesday with discomfort in his left shoulder, James Fegan of The Athletic was among those to report. He suffered the injury while trying to rob Athletics catcher Sean Murphy of a home run. The White Sox will have more information on Jimenez’s status Thursday.

While it’s unknown whether Jimenez will miss any regular-season time as a result of this issue, he’s one of the last players the World Series-hopeful White Sox can afford to lose. Jimenez had a terrific rookie year offensively in 2019 and then posted even better numbers last season, when he slashed .296/.332/.559 with 14 home runs in 226 plate appearances. The 24-year-old’s 140 wRC+ ranked 28th among 142 qualified hitters.

If healthy, Jimenez will join center fielder Luis Robert and right fielder Adam Eaton in the grass at the outset of the season. The White Sox also have Leury Garcia, Luis Gonzalez, Micker Adolfo and Blake Rutherford on their 40-man roster in the event of a Jimenez injured list stint, and veterans Billy Hamilton and Nick Williams are in the organization as further outfield depth.

White Sox Option Reynaldo Lopez

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The White Sox optioned right-hander Reynaldo Lopez to their alternate site Monday, per a team announcement. The move means Lopez won’t open the season on the big league roster.

Lopez, who came to Chicago in a blockbuster trade with Washington heading into 2017, has had an up-and-down run with the White Sox. Now 27 years old, Lopez has pitched to a 4.76 ERA/4.98 SIERA across 446 2/3 innings as a member of the club. The previous two seasons were especially rough for Lopez, who combined for a 5.52 ERA/4.96 SIERA over 210 1/3 frames. He also walked a career-worst 12.4 percent of batters last year.

Lopez entered spring training with the hope of claiming a season-opening roster spot, but he allowed 11 earned runs in as many innings, gave up 16 hits, and totaled just six strikeouts against four walks in exhibition play before the White Sox demoted him. As of now, the White Sox appear as if they’ll enter 2021 with a rotation consisting of Lucas Giolito (whom they acquired in the same trade as Lopez), Dallas Keuchel, Lance Lynn, Dylan Cease and Carlos Rodon.

Adam Engel To Begin Season On Injured List

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Adam Engel will begin the season the injured list, as White Sox manager Tony La Russa told reporters (including Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times) that Engel will miss “at least a couple of weeks” due to a right hamstring strain.  Long known for his glovework moreso than his bat, Engel hit .295/.333/.477 over 93 plate appearances in 2020, and was projected to serve as Chicago’s fourth outfielder this year, also getting his share of right field platoon duty with the left-handed hitting Adam Eaton.  [UPDATE: Engel told The Athletic’s James Fegan and other reporters that his injury carries a normal recovery timeline of 2-4 weeks, though that projection will depend on how his body responds to treatment.]

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