White Sox: Eloy Jimenez is a Rookie of the Year snub

It really looked like Chicago White Sox outfielder Eloy Jimenez was deserving of a Rookie of the Year nomination but it wasn’t meant to be as he was snubbed from the nomination.

The Chicago White Sox knew they were going to see an impressive season from Eloy Jimenez as soon as his rookie year. They were counting on him to come in and make an impact on the starting lineup in a positive way and he sure did. With two somewhat long stints on the injured list, he managed to have 31 home runs, 78 RBIs, and 69 runs scored. He slashed .267/.315/.513 over the course of 122 games played.

Those numbers didn’t start off so hot as he was clearly adapting to MLB pitching when he first started. Pitchers were attacking him with the offspeed junk early and often. Once he figured out how to avoid swinging at it he really started to get hot. In fact, he had one of the best Septembers amongst all players in the league. He slashed .340/.383/.710 with eight doubles, nine home runs, 25 runs batted in, and 19 runs scored over 24 games. He went 34/100 to get that .340 batting average. The way he ended should tell people that a big 2020 is ahead of him.

With all the success Jimenez had at the plate in 2019, he was snubbed from being nominated as an American League Rookie of the Year. The award goes to the best rookie in the American League and you can certainly argue that Jimenez was one of the three best. He was snubbed in favor of Yordan Alvarez of the Houston Astros, Brandon Lowe of the Tampa Bay Rays, and John Means of the Baltimore Orioles.

Those three guys all deserve the credit they are being given. Saying that Jimenez deserves a nomination is in no way ripping on those guys. Major League Baseball is loaded with young talent and we are lucky to be able to watch them all play. Eloy is certainly deserving of some recognition and those of us that are White Sox fans know that. This isn’t going to affect him going forward and 2020 should be the year that he truly breaks out. Everyone will certainly feel better about him not being nominated this year if he hits 50 home runs and bats .300 in 2020.

Individual awards are always fun to see won by players on your favorite team but the White Sox are building something much greater than that. The goal is to win the World Series with the nice young core they have built and they are certainly on the right track.