It’s easy to fall in love with your guys when they are making you look smart as a general manager, but Rick Hahn knows he’ll have to break up with players like Alex Colome or James McCann if someone makes an offer he can’t refuse.
Hahn did not bat a thousand this past offseason, but he did connect on getting Colome -- who is 13-for-13 in save opportunities as a closer -- for catcher Omar Narvaez, and by signing McCann for $2.5 million as a free agent. McCann is batting .325 and is second among American League catchers in the All-Star voting.
Those two, who are under arbitration contract control for another season, might fill Hahn’s phone with calls and texts from other general managers. Colome would be in the highest demand because contenders almost always want more bullpen help. Then again, the Sox are in year three of their rebuild, not one. They entered their game against the Nationals Monday two games below .500, not 19 under like they were a year ago.
“That’s an interesting question,” Hahn said Monday. “Perhaps a tricky one here over the next few weeks. We are going to have guys who other teams want. For our standpoint, it’s always going to be about putting us in the best long-term position. We haven’t quite pivoted to that strictly win-now short-term focus.”
Whether to keep or ship will depend on how badly they’re wanted elsewhere. Opponents are 2-for-42 with two walks in save situations against Colome. McCann was batting .325, working to thumbs-up reviews from Sox pitchers for pitch calling and sequencing and is a good guy in the clubhouse. These are guys the Sox can win with next season.
“When you are talking about guys who could potentially play a role on the 2020 White Sox, a year we expect to take yet another step forward in the process and start being in the mix for playing in October,” Hahn said, “the calculus becomes a little more heavily weighted in terms of keeping a guy. In the end this will be about market value. It’s going to be about demand for our players and what they are able to potentially bring back and then balancing that off against the value they have to us in a White Sox uniform in 2020.”
There would be demand for Tim Anderson, Yoan Moncada, Eloy Jimenez, Lucas Giolito and Aaron Bummer and Reynaldo Lopez, too, but as key pieces of the Sox young core, they aren’t going anywhere.
Leury Garcia, 28, batting .281.318.348 as an everyday player who can play multiple positions, is another one with value with two more seasons of club control. Then there’s first baseman Jose Abreu, 32, who is in the final year of his contract. That automatically makes him tradeable, but Hahn has suggested more than a passing desire to bring him back.
Baseball has abolished August trades, switching to one non-waiver trade deadline July 31, and that could get trade talks moving sooner than usual.
“Because of the removal of August trades, you are going to probably see more activity earlier than you’ve had in the past,” Hahn said. “Not only do teams have to pick a lane in terms of whether they are buyers or sellers, the sellers basically have to get their work done sooner rather than later. It will be interesting to see how it plays out over the course of the next five, six weeks with more activity starting up right around the All-Star break.”
