As reported by Evan Grant of the Dallas News, the Chicago White Sox were among the teams interested in Nomar Mazara at the MLB Trade Deadline in 2019. Should the team pursue him again this offseason?
Nomar Mazara hasn’t quite lived up to expectations so far in his career as he has a career slash line of .266/.326/.464 to give himself a 97 wRC+ according to FanGraphs.
Defensively, he has -19 DRS and a -3.2 UZR in 4,172 innings split between left and right field.
The 2019 season was pretty much along the same lines for him as he hit .268/.318/.469 with 19 home runs and 66 RBI. That resulted in a 94 wRC+ and 0.5 fWAR.
In 878 1/3 innings in right field, Mazara had -4 DRS and -2.7 UZR this season.
Based on stats alone, acquiring Nomar Mazara makes little sense to acquire for the Chicago White Sox or any team in general.
That being said, Mazara was once heralded as one of the top prospects in the game and a change of scenery could do him some good.
Mazara is still 24-years-old and with only one more year of team control remaining, likely would not cost much at all in terms of assets to acquire him.
While the team probably would be more interested in acquiring someone that provides more certainty, Mazara could prove to be a major bargain.
According to Tim Dierkes of MLB Trade Rumors, Mazara is also only projected to make $3.3 million in his final year of arbitration this offseason.
For that price, the White Sox might want to seriously consider acquiring the outfielder if the price tag is somewhat low.
Mazara would not cost any of the team’s top prospects to get and maybe would only cost them one or two prospects inside their top 30 (MLB Pipeline).
Adding Mazara at his price instead of signing someone like Nicholas Castellanos would allow the team to fill their hole in right field while saving money to solve some of their other issues such as signing a first baseman (or re-signing in the case of Jose Abreu) and adding a starting pitcher or two.
The other advantage of adding Mazara is that he is a left-handed hitter, which the team lacked in their lineup last season outside of Yoan Moncada who’s a switch-hitter.
Nomar Mazara might not be the most enticing addition the Chicago White Sox could make this offseason, but he certainly could make sense at the right price.