White Sox big deal with shortstop Tim Anderson

[Boris13c]

White Sox reportedly reach record-setting deal with shortstop Tim Anderson

On Tuesday, the White Sox and Anderson reportedly reached an agreement on a six-year pact that includes a pair of option years. The deal’s potential value will top $50 million, according to Bob Nightengale of USA Today. Additionally, the $25 million guarantee will make it the largest ever handed to a player with less than a year of major league service time, per Ken Rosenthal:

Shortstop Tim Anderson can earn total of $51.5 million if #Whitesox pick up 2 club option years of record deal https://t.co/VDFF5raaos" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) March 21, 2017

First report of Anderson talks: @scottmerkin. Deal should beat Archer’s record $20M guarantee for player with less than one year service.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) March 21, 2017

Anderson, who won’t turn 24 until June, appeared in 99 games last season. He hit .283/.306/.432 with 10 steals on 12 tries and quality defense at shortstop. The biggest question about his game is whether he can tighten his approach at the plate. Anderson walked in just three percent of his plate appearances, all the while striking out in 27 percent. That 9-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio was the worst among big-league hitters who had more than 400 plate appearances. (The worst among qualifying hitters belonged to Rougned Odor, who checked in at 7.11 strikeouts per walk.)

If Anderson can make gains with his strike-zone management and/or his pitch-identification skills, he could blossom into a star. Based on the knowledge that improving those skills is difficult -- especially against big-league pitching -- it seems more likely that he levels off as a solid-to-good two-way player with a big hole in his offensive game. Still, he’s young and toolsy and his strikeout-to-walk ratio improved to 5.6 over his final 50 games, so who knows. Realistically, he’s probably not going to strikeout nine times per walk heading forward.

You can understand why the White Sox -- who have little in the way of meaningful long-term investments -- would bet on Anderson here. At minimum, it could save them some money through the arbitration process -- a process that’s more likely to overvalue Anderson’s contributions based on his high batting average. At maximum? The White Sox just locked in two additional seasons from a potential All-Star-caliber shortstop for less than today’s market rate. It’s a worthy bet on a homegrown player.