The position players
There are some position players worth trading for the White Sox.
Finally, we have the position players. A group highlighted by the likes of Luis Robert Jr., Andrew Vaughn, Tim Anderson, and Eloy Jiménez should not be struggling as mightily as they have been this year, but yet here we are.
While none of those four are pending free agents, the White Sox do have infielder Elvis Andrus and catcher Yasmani Grandal on hand as players who fit that mold.
Between the two of them, it's difficult to find any way that Andrus has more value than Grandal does at this point. Andrus, 34, was brought back to the White Sox after a solid 43-game showing last year, but he's looking like a shell of the player he once was.
In 50 games this year, Andrus has just one home run with 13 runs driven in, posting a .195 average, .520 OPS, and ghastly 45 OPS+. He's been one of the worst run producers in the game this year and one has to imagine that his trade value is closer to zero than ever before.
Then there's Grandal, who is finally beginning to look like a major league player at the plate. The switch-hitter had a dreadful offensive season last year, but he has already hit five home runs with 18 RBI in 58 games this year.
Along the way, he has raised his batting average all the way up to .268 with an OPS+ of 99, which is 35 ticks higher than it was in 2022.
What complicates things a bit for the 34-year-old is the fact that his defense has gone way downhill. Grandal ranks near the bottom of the league in Pop Time to 2B and Framing, which are two of the most important statistics used to measure a catcher's defensive prowess.
While he is a respected veteran behind the plate, he has been so awful this season that it's almost worth wondering if a team in contention brings him aboard as a designated hitter rather than a legitimate catching option.