2025 ZiPS Projections: Chicago White Sox

For the 21st consecutive season, the ZiPS projection system is unleashing a full set of prognostications. For more information on the ZiPS projections, please consult this year’s introduction and MLB’s glossary entry. The team order is selected by lot, and the next team up is the Chicago White Sox.

Batters

What can you say about Chicago’s 2024 season? The White Sox lost 121 games, which is just five fewer games than the Dodgers have lost in the last two years. If there’s good news about 2025, the team is likely to win more games — and probably quite a few more — if merely by happenstance. For a major league team to lose 120-plus games, something magical has to happen, with so much more going very, very wrong than the fates suggested was in order. I’m fairly confident the White Sox will win more games this year than last, and ZiPS projects a 20-win improvement, which would be quite impressive for most teams.

But is that a good thing? Looking at the lineup as it currently stands, I’m not quite so sure. One of the amazing things about the 2024 White Sox is that they didn’t enter the season looking to dramatically rebuild. As far as I can tell, this was a franchise that thought it was a going to be at least mildly competitive in a weak division. But when you look at the current depth chart, it doesn’t really resemble what you’d expect to see from an organization drastically changing directions. The Sox have added some competent role players, but they’re older types who are best cast as capable contributors on a good team, not starters on a team trying to build on ruin. Josh Rojas, Mike Tauchman, and Austin Slater can bolster a contender, but if any of them get the playing time they’re currently allotted on our Depth Charts, it suggests a team without any ideas. A third year of Andrew Benintendi starting doesn’t do much to disspell that impression, and if Andrew Vaughn actually has any upside remaining, it doesn’t like seem the White Sox have any idea of how to find it.

Luis Robert Jr. easily gets the best projection here — don’t forget he was a damn good player in 2023 — but the Sox may have already missed the best window to trade him. Even if his options get picked up, there’s little chance that he’ll contribute to a good White Sox team before he hits free agency.

I’m happier with catcher and shortstop than basically all of the team’s other positions. There’s interesting talent available at catcher, so playing it by ear and seeing how things shake out isn’t a bad approach. Kyle Teel has the best short- and long-term projections of any of the backstops, and as he was one of the main players the Sox got in return for Garrett Crochet, they likely won’t skimp on giving him chances. I just hope they don’t decide that they should prematurely convert him into a 1-WAR first baseman. ZiPS appeared to be coming around on Colson Montgomery in 2023, but the system has re-soured a bit after an (untranslated) wRC+ of 88 in Triple-A. If he shows anything in Charlotte this year, I hope he’s called up quickly and given every chance to roll with the position.

The White Sox have a good farm system now, but there aren’t any big bats who will do much to change the team’s short-term narrative.

Pitchers

Here’s something I don’t think I’ve ever seen from ZiPS before: There isn’t a single pitcher on the White Sox, including those who are still listed with the team but are actually free agents, who is projected to have at least a league-average ERA. That’s pretty shocking — most teams, even the absolutely horrific ones, will usually have some random middling reliever who just barely sneaks into adequacy. The lowest projected ERA here belongs to Penn Murfee, who hasn’t even been healthy since 2022.

ZiPS projects the rotation to likely be above replacement level, but doesn’t see a great deal of upside outside of Drew Thorpe. It’s never been keen on Jonathan Cannon, who hasn’t really mastered minor league batters in his short professional career. Martín Pérez is just around to eat innings so that games actually end, and Davis Martin and Sean Burke are basically just-a-guys. Noah Schultz easily has the most fascinating long-term projection — at least in a good way — and could certainly have a Tarik Skubal-esque breakout, but the Sox are unlikely to push him too aggressively this season. ZiPS has long recovered from it’s mild crush on Bryse Wilson, and doesn’t see Nick Nastrini as having big league-ready command at this point.

The bullpen projects… worse. Indeed, this is the worst unit that ZiPS has ever projected, but I’m not inclined to rag on a dozen org guys on a terrible team. Of the projected relief corps, Prelander Berroa is probably the name to watch — though you don’t have to watch the White Sox, I promise — as his plus fastball and slider at least could be good. Problem is, he’s definitely far more of a thrower than a pitcher at this point; his pitches often intersect with the strike zone purely by chance.

As I said up top, the White Sox may win 20 more games in 2025 than in 2024, but at this point, I have very little faith that they’ve done anywhere near enough to put themselves in a position to be a good team in the future. I almost wonder if they need another record-breaking season to really turn around how the franchise is run.

Ballpark graphic courtesy Eephus League. Depth charts constructed by way of those listed here. Size of player names is very roughly proportional to Depth Chart playing time. The final team projections may differ considerably from our Depth Chart playing time.

Players are listed with their most recent teams wherever possible. This includes players who are unsigned or have retired, players who will miss 2025 due to injury, and players who were released in 2024. So yes, if you see Joe Schmoe, who quit baseball back in August to form a Norwegian Ukulele Dixieland Jazz band that only covers songs by The Smiths, he’s still listed here intentionally. ZiPS is assuming a league with an ERA of 4.11.

Hitters are ranked by zWAR, which is to say, WAR values as calculated by me, Dan Szymborski, whose surname is spelled with a z. WAR values might differ slightly from those that appear in the full release of ZiPS. Finally, I will advise anyone against — and might karate chop anyone guilty of — merely adding up WAR totals on a depth chart to produce projected team WAR. It is important to remember that ZiPS is agnostic about playing time, and has no information about, for example, how quickly a team will call up a prospect or what veteran has fallen into disfavor.

As always, incorrect projections are either caused by misinformation, a non-pragmatic reality, or by the skillful sabotage of our friend and former editor. You can, however, still get mad at me on Twitter or on BlueSky.