The South Side Sox 2014-15 White Sox offseason plan project

For the second straight season, the White Sox got a jump on their winter before the end of the summer, eliminating a couple of potentially difficult decisions in August. You don't have to worry about (non-)tendering Alejandro De Aza or Gordon Beckham because Rick Hahn traded them. He also dealt Adam Dunn, and Dunn excused himself from free-agent candidacy by retiring.

But there's still some work to be done, and that's where you, the discriminating, rosterbating fan, come into play.

Below, you'll find a White Sox offseason plan template that you can copy and paste into a FanPost on the right rail. It starts with tying up loose ends on the White Sox roster. After that, the floor is open, and you have the entire league and open market at your disposal.

A couple of guidelines:

• Cot's Baseball Contracts has the White Sox's payroll obligations. Try to keep it under $110 million, because that's what Hahn has to do, in all likelihood.
• MLB Trade Rumors has a list of 2014-15 MLB free agents. Note the players with  options, and exercise logic in whether the team will exercise those options.
• Unofficial potential International free agents (Jose Fernandez, Kenta Maeda) count, but have a backup plan in case they end up not being available for one reason or another.

If you have some big ideas, copy and paste it into a new FanPost with the subject line "[SSS Name]'s Offseason Plan." Fill in your answers, and share it with us. There are no dumb ideas. OK, there are, but sometimes they actually happen in real life.

[INSERT YOUR NAME]'s Offseason Plan

Arbitration-eligible (with projected salaries from MLBTR):

Write "tender" or "non-tender" after each of the following names:

• Ronald Belisario, $3.9M
• Tyler Flowers, $2.1M
• Dayan Viciedo, $4.4M
• Hector Noesi, $1.9M
• Nate Jones, $600,000.
• Javy Guerra $1.3M (if he is a Super Two)

Explain the toughest calls:

Contract options (pick up or buy out):

• Felipe Paulino: $4M for 2015 or $250,000 buyout

Explain if you have to:

Free agents (re-sign or let go?):

• Matt Lindstrom: $4M salary in 2014

Explain if you have to:

Free agents

Peruse the list of potential free agents and name two (or more) you would pursue, the max offer you would extend to them, and a brief explainer. A good bad example:

No. 1. Adam Dunn (four years, $56M). I'd be curious whether the second attempt at this contract could go any worse than the first.

Trades

Propose two (or more) trades that you think sound reasonable for both sides, and the rationale behind them. A good bad example:

No. 1. Acquire Addison Reed from Arizona for Matt Davidson. The White Sox need bullpen help, the Diamondbacks could use depth at third after trading Martin Prado, and  Reed will outperform his peripherals one of these years.

This section works better if you stay away from the Sale-for-Puig kind of trade that would only happen between fantasy baseball owners. But if you can't help yourself, at least try to have more sane suggestions outnumbering it.

Summary

If you end up with a concrete 25-man roster, feel free to list it. What's more important is describing how you resolved key positions, whether they're ones we know (second base, left field, high-leverage relief) or previously stable areas you altered on your own with a shocking trade.

For some, part of the game might be trying to guess as much of the 2015 roster as possible. But really, you don't need to be a comprehensive roster architect to participate, because you might have one idea that gets people talking, and that's just as worth it. The point of this project is to survey the community and consider as many realistic names and angles as possible before the Sox start making the moves that count.