2019 MLB Season: Rating the AL Central general managers
By Bill Felber
2019 MLB Season: The AL Central’s best GM
Rick Hahn, Chicago White Sox
This was supposed to be the season the White Sox began reaping the benefits of the tearing-down they underwent a couple of seasons ago. Certainly there was an improvement; Chicago’s 72 wins marked an inarguable 10-game improvement, and several of the team’s projected stars – notably Eloy Jimenez, Yoan Moncada, and Lucas Giolito – plainly improved.
Still there remains that matter of the yawning 28 and one-half game gap between the Sox and he division lead, a chasm that did not shrink from the depths of the teardown. That makes it an open question of how much ground Hahn’s rebuilding process has actually made up.
Contrary to the hopes and dreams of South Side fans, the raw data suggests that Hahn’s plan hasn’t yet escaped reverse. The collective impact of his 2018 moves was -6.5 games, a total that would be hard to overcome even if the team’s developing core was generating victories.
The problem was that core didn’t generate positive movement. True, the faces of the rebuild – Jimenez, Moncada and Giolito – did produce a collective +6.4 games of WAA in 2019. But the rest of the Sox nucleus – 19 players under control for 2019 prior to the end of the 2018 season – netted –7.9 games of impact.
Six – Wellington Castillo, Daniel Palka, Daniel Covey, Reynaldo Lopez, Charlie Tilson, and Jose Rondon – hampered the rebuild by at least one full game each. That’s a lot of dead weight for the youngsters to lug around.
Hahn’s short-term report card was actually negative in all five categories, by amounts ranging up to -2.1 games for the players he acquired in deals with other teams. That notably included first baseman/DH Yonder Alonso, obtained from Cleveland in exchange for a minor leaguer in December and released in July to minimize the damage imposed by his -1.8 WAA.
Short-term acquisitions: -2.1
Short-term trade losses: -0.4
Short-term free agent signings: -1.7
Short-term free agent losses: -0.3
Short-term rookie production: -2.0
Short-term total: -6.5