The Antonacci Situation

Sam Antonacci is getting called up to the majors, or maybe not, well, the White Sox are considering it. It’s been a fun weekend of people living and dying with the news around whether we’ll see Antonacci in Chicago this week with top prospect Noah Schultz. While Schultz is surely the story, there seems to be a ton of anticipation around Antonacci’s call up. We talked a bit about it this past Thursday on the FromThe108 podcast:

The excitement feels outsized to me. When I read about Antonacci, I see a similar refrain from all the outlets:

“Antonacci’s skills and constant energy are more impressive than his tools” –mlb.com

“Antonacci doesn’t have any true standout tools, but he does everything relatively well” –Baseball America

“Antonacci already has a reputation for the kind of relentless motor that minor league skippers love, and he’ll need one if he’s going to transcend a bench role” –FanGraphs

“his energy and skills standout over his actual tools” –Future Sox

This doesn’t sound like a guy you need to manipulate service time for. It sounds like a utility infielder, possibly a super utility guy. I also don’t understand why fans would be so excited for this call up, but I’ll take a few guesses:

The Outfield Stinks

Going into the season, we knew the outfield was a huge question mark. We talked about the “outfield chaos” throughout the off-season. It has resulted in not much output at all. So fans are dying for any type of production from out there and are probably plenty tired of outfielders trying to bunt to get on base.

Hitting Profile Disconnect

There may be hope for more power than is actually there. Now, there has been an increase in the power, so this could be something everyone needs to catch up to and Antonacci really does have corner outfield power. The problem I have with that is what a massive jump that would be. He hit 5 home runs in the minors last year across 116 games. We all saw the home run in the WBC, but that was 1 of his 2 hits in the tourney. He has a couple of homers in Charlotte, which is great, but I just don’t think that points to him being a 20 HR guy. If you look at players that played 50% or more of their games in LF, you’ll see the power profile that is typical:

To exist in that lower half and be a major contributor, the hit/on-base skills will need to match that of someone like Steven Kwan. That’s a big expectation.

Prospects!!!

I think there is just a love for prospects and the unknown that I don’t quite share. I mean, unless we’re talking aliens and dinosaurs. Maybe this is simply a rehash of “the team stinks”, but I think there is some desperation in the fanbase for meaningful progress. Without anyone on the offensive side really taking a big leap out of the gates, the fans will seek it out wherever it may come from.

My parting thoughts on this is that Sam Antonacci will probably be an enjoyable baseball player to watch: solid defense, good eye, very good contact, occasional power, and maybe more hit by pitches than you want to stomach. That’s great! I would love that. I am a bit worried that it won’t be enough to fulfill current expectations of the fanbase.

-Chorizy-E