Rival Roundup, Vol. 9: Eaton good in the neighborhood

The holiday season is officially here, and already the four other franchises around the division are loading up their stockings with sweet, sweet wins above replacement.

Chicago White Sox

• The White Sox got busy this week. With their new core having earned a playoff appearance, the Sox are looking to fill out the roster and make a serious bid at the American League Central title. This week, they made a pair of moves in pursuit of that goal — the first being the trade acquisition of former Twin, starting pitcher Lance Lynn.

• The addition of another frontline starter comes at the expense of two young-ish pitchers, Dane Dunning and Avery Weems. Earlier this week, our fearless leader delved into why a similar return wouldn’t have made sense for the Twins.
• Fun fact — Lance Lynn played under Tony La Russa, as a member of the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals. I’m sure he never expected this reunion.
• The Rangers get some much-needed prospects as their franchise flounders around in pursuit of a direction. Meanwhile, the savvy Rick Hahn continues a trade tree that produced Lucas Giolito and Lance Lynn out of Adam Eaton — which made it all the more surprising when Chicago just signed his butt up, too.

• South Side Sox’s initial reaction: “Holy god, Adam Eaton is coming back.” Our sister site doles out some quick reactions to the news, including reminders that Eaton was all in on Team Drake LaRoche when he was previously in Chicago.
• It may be that Eaton winds up a more minor addition of the winter, but you can understand the skepticism of Chicago fans when other big-ticket outfield items such as Michael Brantley and George Springer remain in the mix. After a disappointing 2020, it would have made sense to see Eaton go most of the offseason without a deal; instead, he’s one of the only players to have put pen to paper this winter.

Cleveland Spiders

• Rumors have been heating up this week about Francisco Lindor’s potential destination. While such talks have been a nearly annual occurrence since Cleveland lost the World Series in 2016, it seems like this is the year a deal actually goes through. Could he be headed north of the border?
• This was something I didn’t know about — Eddie Robinson has a podcast. You don’t remember Eddie Robinson? Well, that might be because he last took the field over 60 years ago; Robinson is the only living member of Cleveland’s last championship team, all the way back in 1948. And now he does podcasts. The dude is 99 years old!

Kansas City Royals

• I dig what the Royals are doing.

• With the Spiders always sneaking into the mix, the White Sox transforming into a contender, and the Twins having locked down the division two years in a row, nobody could blame Kansas City for standing pat and playing the young guys. But they’ve handed out a good deal to a good player that could have helped a lot of teams. In an era dominated by the Rebuild/Window paradigm, it’s nice to see a team reject the notion that contenders have to take turns, and actually make an effort toward improving their ballclub of today.
• Santana is no stranger to the division, having played nearly his entire career in Cleveland, leaving for Philadelphia for a year and immediately coming back. The on-base threat will help establish an offensive identity for the Royals, who have been a bit top-heavy in recent years.

Detroit Tigers

• Well, it’s another quiet week in the Motor City. The Tigers have been without a major announcement since A.J. Hinch was named manager; although they may be testing out some new logos?

• As covered earlier this week because it pertained to us, the Tigers grabbed Akil Baddoo in the Rule 5 draft.

We did some similar check-ins this spring; with movement beginning to pick up, I thought it would be time to take the pulse of the offseason.