clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Terrerobytes: Daniel Fields, the White Sox prospect the Tigers had

Plus: Everybody's feeling the grind of the sluggish outfielder market, Juan Uribe could return to the AL, and more

Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports

While the White Sox have waited for the outfielder market to resort to their restrictions, they have been stocking the cupboard with faded prospects, because the Charlotte Knights need outfielders themselves. Jason Coats is the only returning incumbent at the moment, since Trayce Thompson was traded and the other corner spot was a revolving door for Triple-A names.

After the claiming of Daniel Fields last week, that part of the depth chart is covered, as the Sox can mix and match him with some combination of Coats, Jerry Sands, Jacob May and Leury Garcia, depending on who else is acquired, who survives outrighting, etc.

The Fields news floated underneath the Hall of Fame announcement. Then again, a story about Fields being claimed fails the "novelty" part of the newsworthiness test. He was DFA'd by the Tigers with strange timing in September, after which he was claimed by the Brewers, then the Dodgers and now the White Sox.

More than that, his minor-league story is a familiar one, even if it happened with the Tigers.

Family ties: He was selected out of a Detroit high school in the 2009 draft, and paid the princely sum of $1.625 million to forgo his commitment to the University of Michigan. He was a local boy because he's the son of Bruce Fields, who was the Tigers' hitting coach at the time.

Aggressively promoted: He didn't play at all in his draft year, but started his first pro season in high-A ball. He kept his head above water in his first year, but lost ground when repeating the level in 2011, and his career has never quite found its track since.

Toolsy, not skillsy: He can run and has some power, but he strikes out too much (146 over 122 games in 2015) for the amount of dingers (seven).

A banged-up history: He has an alternate-year luck pattern going on when it comes to health. Before the 122 games last year, he played in 118 games in 2013, and 124 in 2011. In between?

He has had his share of the flip side: a torn abdominal muscle that messed up his 2012 season, a concussion in 2013, and then, last year, a fractured thumb that slashed two months from what stood to be meaningful time for an outfielder the Tigers could soon need.

This pretty much makes him the prototypical White Sox prospect from several years ago; the kind that created a reputation even if the Sox have mostly moved on from that mold. It'd be slightly easier to dispel that notion if Fields ended up in Charlotte alongside May and Coats, who share few similarities either with that mold or each other. That particular permutation would make for a pretty diverse trio, even if it's a little short on name-brand (and home run) power.

Terrerobytes

Speaking of sounding familiar, Rob Rogacki opens this post saying, "I'm starting to get sick of talking about this outfield." They're in the same boat -- J.D. Martinez isn't going anywhere in right, but the other two spots involve Cameron Maybin, Anthony Gose and Tyler Collins.

Dexter Fowler is yet another victim of the bottleneck of outfielders, except, unlike us, he has real money on the line.

It's been easy rooting for Juan Uribe throughout his post-Sox career, as his stops have all included irrelevant-to-us teams in the National League. This one would hurt a little more.

The Dodgers are putting "you can never have too much pitching" to the test, as they have 10 possible starters and an 11th, Brandon McCarthy, on the mend.

The details of the Cardinals' data breach of the Houston Astros are pretty alluring, at least as far as baseball data breaches go. The way this story unfolded provided some enlightenment about the inner workings of organizations for fans, but it has serious consequences for Chris Correa, the Cards' former scouting director who pleaded guilty:

The charges carry a sentence of up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Under federal sentencing guidelines, he could face three to four years.