The White Sox WAH factor

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29-03-2025

The WAH when you first learn you've been born into a White Sox family. | tenor.com
Some baseball teams rate a WOW factor. The White Sox instead rate a WAH factor.
WAH, a statistic reserved for teams with at least 121 losses, goes along with Baseball-Reference's or FanGraph's Wins Above Replacement, or WAR, or B-R's less-often-used Wins Above Average, or WAA. While WAR is generally considered to have a zero base of 47 or so wins and WAA is based off 81 wins, WAH has a comfortably lower base of 41 wins, given last year's record.
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It is, therefore, Wins Above Horrible.
As the regular season approaches next week, it's time to try to figure out whether the 2025 White Sox are apt to be better than the 2024 team, and, if so, by how much. Rather than just take an overall guess, though, let's examine the WAH values by position.
POSITION PLAYERS
Catcher
With the two stars of the future (we hope) sent to the minor leagues already, this will be a repeat of Korey Lee, with Matt Thaiss taking the place of Martín Maldonado. Thaiss isn't much, but Maldonado was horrible.
WAH +2
First base
Andrew Vaughn is same-same Andrew Vaughn, as he has proven for four years.
WAH 0
Second base
There's a lot of messing around with the rest of the infield possibilities, but let's allow the highest ceiling here, which would be Brandon Drury, a once-excellent hitter who has had a solid spring. He's a much worse fielder than Nicky Lopez, but usually much better at the plate.
WAH +2
Third base
Likely some of the same players as last year, with Josh Rojas tossed into the mix. Miguel Vargas and Lenyn Sosa have hit well this spring, which probably means nothing, but let's be optimistic and say they've both improved, at least on offense, and give them a WAH of +2 over themselves.
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Shortstop
There apparently will be one, Whoever it is will be awful.
WAH -3
Left field
Bound to be Andrew Benintendi, just to get something for all that money.
WAH 0
Center field
Luis Robert Jr. is apt to be better than last year, even if he does go into the doldrums on occasion again. Would be a bigger WAH jump but he's likely to be gone no later than the trade deadline, so just WAH +2.
Right field
This has been a black hole, but maybe this time it could just be a dark gray one. Let's say mostly Mike Tauchman, maybe some Nick Maton or Michael Taylor or Travis Jankowski. Whichever, they might get the WAH as high as +2.
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Designated hitter
Similar blah to last year.
WAH 0
For those keeping track at home, that's a hitting net WAH of +7.
PITCHERS
Starting pitching was the one area where B-R had the Sox above average in 2024, but Garrett Crochet, Erick Fedde and even Chris Flexen and his long losing streak are gone, taking with them 10.3 bWAR. Jonathan Cannon was good then, but he's terrible right now, so that's a negative, too.
Even if you get really, really optimistic and expect Sean Burke to be a star despite his latest shellacking, toss in a whole year of Davis Martin, and an adequate Shame Smith and/or Bryse Wilson and some veteran prowess from Martin Pérez, you'll be lucky to get more than seven wins back, so a WAH of -3.
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As for the bullpen, it was lousy last year, but one evaluating outfit say this year's is the worst it's ever seen, so at best WAH 0.
Totals so far, a WAH of +4, which would get us to 117 losses.
OTHER STUFF
Will Venable as manager instead of Pedro Grifol, WAH +5. That's a lot for a manager, but Grifol was such a disaster it may come to pass.
Now we're at 112 losses, but I went wild and crazy and said in a Sharing Sox podcast the White Sox would only lose 108, so let's factor in better research, better equipment like the marvelous Trajekt machine, and call all that an intangibles WAH of +4, whether it makes sense or not.
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Voilá! A mere 108 losses.
If we're really, really optimistic.
But remember, there's another new milkshake this year.
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