Of Course The White Sox Lost Out On Signing A Young Juan Soto Due To A Measly $50,000

In case you haven't noticed, White Sox fans are exceptionally pissed off at the organization right now. I shit on other fanbases quite a bit, especially Yankees fans, and when I do I'm always reminded that I root for the lowly White Sox, the biggest loser amongst loser organization.

I want to make this loud and clear to all people who rip on both me and the White Sox: There is NOTHING bad you can say about me or the white sox that I will find offensive. I know I'm a loser. I know they're losers. I know they're a nothing, rudderless organization. You ripping on me for all those things is nothing more than preaching to the choir. We Sox fans HATE the White Sox. Nobody hates them more than we do. So save your digs for those who aren't in complete and total agreement with them. 

Anyways - when the organization traded Chris Sale, Adam Eaton and Jose Quintana back in 2016 and 2017, we were promised by the organization that things would be different. That the White Sox would no longer be "mired in mediocrity" and that they would become an organization that was both a destination for blue chip free agents and that they would be hell bent on putting themselves in a position to win multiple world series titles throughout their window.

That hasn't happened yet over 5 years after those promises were made. Instead they're now the exact same .500 or worse team they typically have been for the better part of the last 15 or so years, and just to add insult to injury, today we're reminded that the White Sox lost out on signing Juan Soto to the paltry sum of $50,000:

The guy talking in the video is White Sox Director of Scouting, Doug Laumann. Yep!!! That's a nice little kick to the nuts after we as fans have been kicked in the nuts continually since the organization named Tony LaRussa manager about 2 years ago. In case you're not keeping track at home, here are a few of the names we know the White Sox have missed out on over the last handful of years: 

- White Sox acquire Jake Arrieta for reliever Jesse Crain in 2013. The deal was apparently agreed upon pending a physical, a physical which Crain failed due to a strained shoulder

- Fernando Tatis, Jr. for James Shields. Everyone and their mother knows about this trade because I broke it. More importantly, Tatis, Jr. became a superstar in due time (though he's constantly hurt/juicing/doing stupid shit now) and James Shields went on to have like a 12.50ERA and 4-83 record for the White Sox

- Juan Soto reneging on his handshake deal with Chicago and signing with Washington for $50,000 more in 2015

Now, there are two ways to look at this in my eyes. 

1. #2 is obviously completely on the White Sox. No excusing that, even if Tatis, Jr. was a scrawny nothing prospect when they traded him. 

But the Arrieta and Soto situations aren't the White Sox fault. Not their fault Crain got hurt at the worst time possible and it's not their fault Soto reneged on his handshake deal. The latter happens ALL the time in baseball. The international market for teenage talent is a dirty, dirty business in baseball and this kinda stuff happens all the time. Only thing is we don't hear about it unless it's a superstar like Soto. That's just the nature of the beast. 

Also (extremely) worth noting that it is EXTREMELY difficult to project 15-16 year olds that aren't close to physically developed. It's not like Soto had every team in baseball hot after him - even in the current days of finite pool money to sign LatAm talent with, $1.5MM isn't THAT much and it was even less back in 2015 when he signed, as there was no cap on what teams could spend - just overage taxes.

2. The White Sox have been cursed by the Baseball Gods for being a half assed organization. They created their own luck with the Crain and Soto situations and due to said half assed-ness, they lost out on two stud assets they would have probably had to trade due to lack of competitiveness down the road anyways.

Whichever way you look at it all leads back down the same path, though. The White Sox don't operate with an insatiable appetite for success. I blame the owner for 99% of this mess, which is obviously subjective, while others place blame elsewhere. What matters in the end is that regardless of where blame is placed is that we as fans feel hoodwinked. This ain't what we signed up for, and what sucks the absolute most is we know this team is close. The core is good. There is still a ton of extremely high end talent in each of the guys we know are here for the long haul. But they won't be properly built around, even with guys like Carlos Correa, Trea Turner, Xander Boegarts and others ripe for the plucking as free agents this winter.

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It really sucks; I watch the crowds in Philly, Cleveland and San Diego going BANANAS rooting for their teams right now. It brought me back to the 2022 blackout game and how electric that experience was. We're dying for the sustained success we were promised as White Sox fans back in 2016. We just don't get it though. We get a couple of ball tickling playoff runs followed up by an 81-81 season right in the heart of the "World Series window".

It makes me sick, and the Juan Soto nugget from interview above makes it all the worse, even if there was nothing the White Sox could do about it. 

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