Breaking Down the Adam Eaton trade

It’s weird as a White Sox fan to have two consecutive days in which you feel good about yourself, but fam, that day is today.  Move #2 of the rebuild was trading Adam Eaton to the Nationals for a pile of prospects that we will review below.  Today feels even better than yesterday, because although we weren’t completely sure yesterday would ever occur, the picture is becoming clearer as to what this will look like.  I have never been more goddamn excited to watch a 100 loss baseball team than I am for the 2017 White Sox, its going to be beautiful……kudos to Rick Hahn and Kenny Williams and the rest of the White Sox brass for doing this for us, the fans.  Now onto the review………….

Nationals Get – Adam Eaton OF   Everyone in these parts knows Adam Eaton well, he’s short, bearded, super grindy and was worth ~6 WAR last year.  He was really fucking good on a meh team in 2016.  He’s also a bit of a pain in the ass.  His hot takes on the Drake LaRoche situation bordered on idiocy and there has always been whispers that he rubs others the wrong way in the locker room.  Regardless, he was a fan favorite and our take in the 108 is we don’t give a fuck if the player is a nazi cannibal off the field, as long as he can play and Adam Eaton can play.  Now, the Nationals are planning to play Adam Eaton in CF, and that saps some of his value but they have no choice as even pencilling in Bryce Harper in CF would cause a 15 day DL stint (now 10 days, fucking CBA) and Jason Werth’s corpse in LF ain’t moving, so CF it is, for now.  Eaton’s bat plays though and that’s the key for this move, the Nationals pitchers strike out a ton of hitters, so defense is less important than offense and Adam Eaton’s bat will certainly play.  There is one issue, much like I noted with the Chris Sale lovers, the Adam Eaton lovers are 50 times worse…….they act like Adam Eaton cured cancer and gave birth to puppies all season in RF.  It wasn’t really stalker time, it was more blubbery, gross, embarrassing adult behavior time.  We might start a camp for those recovering from Adam Eaton withdrawal over in the 108, Slumpbuster will buy you a beer and Chorizy-E will tell you how silly you is.

White Sox Get – Lucas Giolito P   A short 12 months ago Lucas Giolito was an eyelash behind Byron Buxton for top prospect in baseball, then, 2016 happened, and he got hit around in MLB and wasn’t that great in AAA either and at 22 years old, everyone shit their pants and gave up on him as the future best pitcher that’s ever touched a baseball.  The bottom line is lots of pitchers have short set backs and then become gigantic stars……..in fact, the majority of our favorite hurlers of the last 20 years pretty much sucked at the start of their MLB careers.  But suddenly, the wonks at Fangraphs think ~20 IP is a sample size and now Giolito might have to go to the bullpen.  This is total bullshit and the White Sox realize it.  This is the sort of thing that seems obvious, Rick Hahn is taking advantage of a market overreaction to steal Giolito.  When I was sitting at work and saw this trade come through, I thought Mike Rizzo had hired Dave Stewart as special consultant, yes, this was the closest to Shelby Miller trade bad in recent memory.  If he reaches his potential, he’ll be the best right handed starter in the majors………….think Curt Schilling……..if he doesn’t reach his potential, think EITHER, young Alex Fernandez if he is a starter, or think PED’d to the point of jaundice Eric Gagne if he is a closer.

White Sox Get – Reynaldo Lopez P   Of the prospects that Rick Hahn has gone out and harvested this week, Lopez is the biggest favorite to be in Chicago on April 3rd.  He spent significant time in Washington last year as a 22 year old and there really isn’t anything for him to learn in AAA, so I suspect he starts the 3rd or 4th game of the season for the 2017 White Sox.  If Don Cooper is worth the money, he becomes Freddy Garcia…..if not, he’s Scott Linebrink.

White Sox Get – Dane Dunning P   Seriously, this sounds like a fake name………I heard this is a pitcher, but it sounds like a vineyard in Sonoma.  To be honest, if this guy skipped his flight and went backpacking in Europe, never to be seen again, it wouldn’t effect this deal at all.  Dane Dunning’s highest value, currently, to the 108 members is to help push Courtney Hawkins closer and closer to being off the top 30 White Sox prospect list.  Truthfully, he’s a low ceiling low floor guy.  If he reaches his potential, he’s prime Jesse Crain, if he doesn’t he’ll probably still be pitching somewhere, only issue is it will be while you are fast asleep.