3 Reasons Why the Rebuilt White Sox Aren't Ready to Challenge Twins

Nice article, but falling short on Harper and Machado is not being cheap.  Only two teams over spent enough to get them and I believe the results of those two teams shows how much real value there is in such stud players.  If it were worth throwing that kind of money at players San Diego and Philadelphia would not be hiring new managers.  Mike Trout is the acknowledged superdooper surefire HOF player and he cannot get his team to the playoffs. 

I have issues with all the FA discussions - would we have really been better if we had broken the bank for Yu Darvish the year before?  Ask the Cubs fans.

I agree that they have not acquired the prospects that the Twins did, but I do believe they are still on the rise and pitchers sometimes take a year or two to get over the rookie blues - see the career of J O Berrios.

They have tremendous upside in their young starters.

Giolito, Kopech, Lopez and Cease In the rotation. Rodon and Dunning returning during the season. The oldest of these Lopez is 26 (turns 27 in December).

I think the Twins better be paying attention.

Not so fast, Mr. Walker. 

We can all recall when similar criticisms were aimed at all those position players on the Twins who just had breakout years here in 2019. The performance flaws you're pointing out pertaining to Anderson, Jiminez, and Moncada sound eerily familiar regarding Sano, Buxton, Rosario...

Let's not assume those three won't continue to develop. And now add their monster prospect, Luis Robert, to the mix, a guy more highly regarded than Royce Lewis, and Madrigal, whose bat control is better than even Luis Arraez and whose prospect value is almost on a par with Alex Kirilloff.

I also wonder if you aren't dramatically underrating those young starters. The Twins would very quickly trade either Graterol or any other pitching prospect for Kopech, and Dunning is equally regarded, I believe, as either Balazovic or Duran.

In my view, the key to the Twin's ability to stay a step ahead of the White Sox revolves around three things:

1. What we do to acquire front line pitching help this winter via FA and trades.

2. Graterol, Duran, and Balasozic AND OTHERS amounting to something, and soon, so that they can avoid having to pay even steeper costs in prospect capital and cash in FA in future years to make up for guys like Thorpe, Alcala, and Dobnak possibly not making the grade.

3. Lewis, Kirilloff, Arraez and Larnach becoming core pieces, thereby allowing them to trade redundant players like Rooker, Gordon, Rosario, and Cave for value.

One really positive thing, in my mind, is that Fangraphs gives a 40FV or better to 17 Twins pitching prospects, most of them starters currently, whereas they give only nine pitching prospects for CWS the same grades. Numbers matter when it comes to developing pitching.

Another positive, IMO, is that, whereas CWS only has 5 non-US prospects at 40FV or better, the Twins have 17. I believe this because I believe the only way to truly gain an advantage through the US amateur draft is by having a favorable draft order. 

The Twins have 40 prospects with a 40FV or higher. The CWS have 24.

3 Reasons why the White Sox won't rival the Twins.

1. They have to live in Chicago.

2. They have to live in Chicago.

3. They have to live in Chicago.

I disagree with the frugal comment. The White Sox have been a top 10 payroll team multiple times in the last decade and even a top 5.

The fact that they were even interested in Machado and Harper says they have more capital potential than us. They have a much better shot at landing someone like Cole, Strasburg or Rendon than the Twins do.

Saying that they had a low payroll the last 3 years, when they had no intentions of winning, is not representative of what a White Sox "trying to win" team will look like. The Astros were 29th or 30th in payroll for 4 straight seasons from 2013 - 2016. Now Houston has about 200M in payroll. Rebuilding teams don't pay for players until they are at the end of the rebuild and the White Sox have reached that point. Like the Twins, they have no long term/high dollar commitments and loads of talented youth. The White Sox are in a good position to do some major spending soon. I expect them to be serious bidders in FA this year, more so than the Twins. They might not be serious contenders until 2021 or later but they should start spending now.

"Cease finished the year strong with a 3.00 ERA in September, but his last three starts came against the Angels, Mariners, and Tigers."

You could make a similar comment about literally every good number a Twins pitcher (or hitter) posted in 2019. The Twins strength of schedule in 2019 was historically low. Like, about as low as any team has had in recent history.

The Twins won 32 of 69 games they played against >.500 teams. The White Sox won 29 of 69 games they played against >.500 teams (not including the Twins).

Having said that, I think the White Sox are probably another year away...2021...we'll see what this off-season brings. But, it certainly looks like they're coming. It's just a matter of when.