The White Sox are heading into an offseason where even the fine print could shape how aggressive they get.
With Milwaukee finishing off the Dodgers on Thursday night to punch its ticket to the World Series, the league’s attention has turned to the winter. That comes with a wrinkle: a lockout is expected in December, but before that hits, teams have a stretch of offseason deadlines to navigate. One of the biggest is the qualifying offer, which forces clubs to decide whether to make a one-year offer to certain free agents or risk losing them for only draft-pick compensation.
Chicago doesn’t have any players who will receive a qualifying offer this year. But that doesn’t mean the system won’t matter to the White Sox. It absolutely could, because other teams’ decisions may knock some of Chicago’s potential targets out of reach.
For the 2026-2027 offseason, the qualifying offer sits at one year and $23.15 million. Players who get one have until November 18 to accept or reject it.
If they reject and sign elsewhere, their old team gets draft-pick compensation. For the White Sox, signing a player tied to a qualifying offer would cost their second-highest pick in the 2027 draft - not the kind of penalty it used to be, but still enough to make a team pause before diving in.
That’s not a new kind of calculation for Chicago. Since the qualifying offer was created after the 2012 season, the White Sox have signed only two players who had one attached.
They brought in closer David Robertson on a four-year, $46 million deal after he turned down the Yankees’ offer, costing them their second-round pick in 2015. That same offseason, they landed outfielder Melky Cabrera on a three-year, $42 million contract from the Blue Jays and gave up their third-round pick.
They haven’t done it again since.
This winter’s list already includes some names that line up neatly with White Sox needs. New York Post’s Jon Heyman identified several players expected to get qualifying offers, and among them are Randy Arozarena, Seiya Suzuki, and Trevor Rogers. Arozarena and Suzuki would both fit as outfield additions, while Rogers would bring upside to a rotation that could use it.
The list also includes David Bednar, Brandon Lowe, Ryan Jeffers, and Adrián Morejón as likely to receive qualifying offers, while Jazz Chisholm Jr. is considered unlikely to get one.
Whether any of those players would actually accept the offer remains to be seen, but the qualifying offer can still complicate Chicago’s pursuit. A team weighing the cost of a draft-pick penalty may decide to stay out of the bidding altogether, especially when it comes to clubs that have leaned hard on protecting draft capital.
There’s also another layer here: the qualifying offer system itself may be on shaky ground because of the looming lockout. Teams could be reluctant to commit early to players with QO baggage if there’s a chance the rule changes or disappears. That likely won’t be resolved this offseason, but it’s still part of the calculus.
The White Sox haven’t said how far they’re willing to go in free agency, but the areas that stand out are clear enough: the outfield and the rotation. Whether they choose to make a real push or settle for smaller additions and trust internal development may determine how sustainable this run can be. And that decision starts now, with the offseason already taking shape around them.
In Other News...
White Sox Surprising Finish Created An Offseason Question Fans Can't Ignore
For White Sox fans, the latest debate is less about what happened on the field than what it means for the months ahead. The season and playoff run left the fan base split on how to judge the year, and the conversation has only gotten louder because some of the wilder claims floating around about Dodgers ownership and playoff manipulation for salary-cap leverage do not hold up. What does remain is a familiar winter storyline for Chicago, where the real questions now turn to how aggressively the front office should push the roster forward.
The bigger issue is the path to improvement, and it does not sound like the kind that starts with a splashy free-agent bidding war for pitching. The White Sox are more likely to look for upgrades through trades, with the club also sorting through its own internal options as it weighs possible roster moves. Caleb Bonemer is getting a look in the outfield in Arizona, and his versatility could end up mattering if the Sox decide to reshuffle the infield mix, which is the sort of detail that can quietly shape a lot of the offseason even before the bigger moves arrive. [Read more 🡒]