Luke Keaschall's hot start makes the White Sox trade for Miguel Vargas look even worse

The Chicago White Sox could have easily avoided having Luke Keaschall score two runs in last night's defeat.

Heck, the White Sox could have had baseball's No. 57 prospect (according to MLB Pipeline) scoring those for runs for them had they not been petty and unrealistic at last year's trade deadline.

General manager Chris Getz reportedly made a crazy demand for either Walker Jenkins or Emmanuel Rodriguez to headline a return for Erick Fedde. Obviously, the Twins balked, but they did reportedly consider countering with a trade package built around Keaschall.

Instead of being the only team that would have walked away with a top 100 prospect at last year's trade deadline, Getz passed because he did not want to help a division rival get better, even though the White Sox went 1-12 against Minnesota last season.

That's organizational negligence, especially since Keaschall is the ideal bat-to-ball hitter with great running skills. The Sox always need power to thrive at Rate Field, but if you look at some of the best lineups the team has had, they need a couple of guys who hit singles or walk and then wreak havoc on the bases.

Being petty blinded the Sox from bringing Keaschall to Chicago. Instead, the White Sox pivoted toward a three-team deal that sent Fedde and Tommy Pham to the St. Louis Cardinals and Michael Kopech to the Los Angeles Dodgers. In return, the White Sox got Miguel Vargas, two Low-A prospects with one of them having a broken leg.

At the time, the return looked pretty light, and as time marches on, acquiring Vargas over Keaschall's keeps looking awful.

Keaschall's hot start to his big-league career is one reason. He is 5-for-14 with three runs scored and three stolen bases.

He is giving off vibes that he will be a problem for the White Sox for the rest of the decade. The White Sox do not need another Twins boogeyman when the club already has to deal with Byron Buxton. His latest haunt was robbing Andrew Benintendi of a game-tying double last night.

It does not help that Miguel Vargas is off to a terrible start. He has a .139/.236/.203 slash line with a wRC+ of 32. The only difference between Vargas' terrible second half with the White Sox in 2024 and his first 22 games this season is that he no longer looks traumatized to be on Chicago's roster.

Well, he is also playing better defensively at third. Otherwise, he is still not producing at the plate despite some of the auxiliary metrics showing he should be doing better.

The other thing that Keaschall's fast start shows is that the White Sox made a huge mistake bundling Fedde and Kopech together in one trade when they likely could have gotten Keaschall for Fedde and Vargas for Kopech.

Maybe the Dodgers scoff at giving up Vargas for Kopech, despite Michael's final five games with the White Sox being strong. Considering the Dodgers ran out of patience with Vargas and their wanting a power arm in the pen, it would have made sense for the Dodgers to make the swap.

Instead, Los Angeles took advantage of the White Sox's pettiness and Jedi-mind-tricked Getz into bundling his three best assets into one deal.

Now the Sox are stuck with Vargas.

By not trading Fedde to the Twins and living with him beating when wins and losses do not matter, the Sox might have helped Minnesota improve in the long run, as they now get to reap the benefits of having Keaschall.