Rundown:
1:46: Are the White Sox good enough as is to win the AL Pennant?
4:15: Offensive struggles vs. RHP
13:30: White Sox Bullpen usage
28:57: Minor League Report
33:16: St. Louis Cardinals preview
42:47: P.O. Sox
Click play below to listen:
Podcast: Bad Weekend in New York
I think they are clearly good enough to with the AL pennant – if healthy. If 2/3 or more of their outfield is injured, they may still have a chance with really good pitching… but their chances would not be great, that’s just the reality. I think same could be said for all teams, no team is the same if they are missing a couple of their best players. Fortunately both Eloy and Robert should return before season end (along with Engel pretty soon), so the Sox should have a different team in the playoffs than they have been trying to get by with. If everybody is healthy for September, giving all of their guys a chance to play at least a month so they are in a groove going into October, they are probably the team to beat in the AL, one would think/hope.
Maybe it was just meant as a joke, but I got curious about the three batter comment. I knew there were cases I had seen a pitcher face a batter and not come back out so looked back. For example, 4/6, Ruiz faces one hitter in the 6th, doesn’t come out for the 7th.
My Bevington question came to mind because the kinds of questions about competence we are seeing are ones I don’t recall since Bevington’s reign of error. Bevington was also gruff with the media, though in a more defensive way than La Russa’s indifferent belligerence.
The one terrible thing Bevington did that La Russa has not yet done was absolutely hang his starting pitcher out to dry. Schuler signing Jaime Navarro was not a good move, but who knows if the pitcher would have been more effective without Bevington’s abuse?
When Schuler hired Bevington away from the Blue Jays organization as a coach for Lamont, he touted him as a bright young future manager. The last three words of that description were accurate, if only because Schuler elevated him to the job. Bevington was objectively terrible at the job, but I can’t say I’d expect him to be worse than what we have seen from Tony La Russa in 2021. (And I’d imagine Bevington would not have the clout with the owner to pull crap like what we saw in Minneapolis.)
Jim Margalus: “Everybody involved is so weird that I can’t predict it.”
I think Jim’s words of wisdom sum up a lot of the TLR 2021 experience.
Thinking about this a bit more, I want to add something. When talking about the best managers of his lifetime, Jim said the first TLR reign seems like it was great although he doesn’t really remember it. TLR 1.0 was different in a lot of ways (he was a change-the-game guy instead of a keep-the-game-the-same guy) and the 1983 starting rotation led to one great season. However, TLR’s ego was just as big and he was just as arrogant and stubborn so he could still drive fans up the wall.
He was joyless, too, as he was in Oakland. I guess one possible improvement over the years is he was thin-skinned with the media, and now he’s just dismissive of them.
You can be that way when you’re a Hall of Fame Baseball Person.
Jim summed up my feelings on LaRussa best when he says it would be nice not to have a reason to talk about him for once.