Comparing rebuilds: San Diego Padres vs. Chicago White Sox

Rebuilding the farm system

Any rebuild starts with building up the farm system and bringing in as much young talent as possible. You know not all of that talent is going to come through, but if you hit on just a couple then you have something to build around.

A.J. Preller traded away almost his entire farm system before the 2015 season in order to try and win. That didn’t work out, and after the 2015 season he immediately started building up the system.

He traded Craig Kimbrel to the Boston Red Sox for Logan Allen, Carlos Asuaje, Javy Guerra, and Manuel Margot.

Interestingly enough, in 2016 they traded James Shields to the Chicago White Sox for Erik Johnson and Fernando Tatis Jr. And later that year they traded Fernando Rodney to the Miami Marlins for Chris Paddack.

Those two moves specifically would end up doing wonders for the rebuild.

They later traded Drew Pomeranz to the Red Sox for Anderson Espinoza. San Diego sent Andrew Cashner, Tayron Guerrero, and Colin Rea to the Marlins for Carter Capps, Luis Castillo, Jarred Cosart, and Josh Naylor.

In 2017 they traded Ryan Buchter, Trevor Cahill, and Brandon Maurer to the Kansas City Roylals for Esteury Ruiz, Matt Strahm, and Travis Wood.

They also did a great job in the draft with their high picks taking MacKenzie Gore, CJ Abrams, Luis Campusano, Cal Quantrill, Eric Lauer, Buddy Reed, and Reggie Lawson.

The international market has treated them well with the signings of Luis Patino, Luis Urias, and Adrian Morejon.

Chicago didn’t start their rebuild until after the 2016 season when they traded Chris Sale to the Red Sox for Luis Alexander Basabe, Victor Diaz, Michael Kopech, and Yoan Moncada.

Then they turned around and traded Adam Eaton to the Washington Nationals for Dane Dunning, Lucas Giolito, and Reynaldo Lopez.

In 2017 they traded Jose Quintana to the Chicago Cubs for Bryant Flete, Matt Rose, Dylan Cease, and Eloy Jimenez.

Those three trades really helped them turn things around with highly touted prospects like Kopech, Moncada, Giolito, Cease, and Jimenez.

They’ve done well recently in the draft taking Andrew Vaughn, Nick Madrigal, and Jonathan Stiever.

The White Sox haven’t done quite as well in the international market, but they did hit a home run with Luis Robert who is right up there with Gore as one of the three best prospects in all of baseball.