Blue Jays 7, White Sox 0: Nothing doing
The White Sox heard your complaints about scoring in only one inning, and resolved it by scoring in zero innings.
José Berríos entered this game with a 6.23 ERA, and he leaves it with a 4.71 ERA after throwing seven shutout innings. He allowed just four singles and a walk while striking out nine, and the White Sox only had two at-bats with runners in scoring position all night.
Meanwhile, Mike Clevinger’s path down the Mat Latos Timeline continued apace. Danny Jansen hit a three-run homer from the eighth spot in the second inning (he’d add a second homer later off Tanner Banks), and Kevin Kiermaier’s two-run triple two innings later officially kicked the game out of reach.
Clevinger at least sopped up five innings, but he allowed 10 baserunners and generated only eight whiffs over 100 pitches, so the stuff problem remains.
But it’s unfair to single him out, because the White Sox have so many other problems, and one of them spilled into the dugout. Luis Robert Jr. twice cut in front of Eloy Jiménez on fly balls that Jiménez called for/camped under, and Jiménez took his frustration to the telestrator after the second occurrence.
After the game, Elvis Andrus was seen mediating a discussion between the two. The White Sox issued a bobblehead of Robert catching a ball in front of a miffed Jiménez last year, but like so many other developments of the past few years, it’s not as funny anymore.
Robert and Jiménez both went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts, so nobody held an edge when it came to contributions elsewhere on the field.
Bullet points:
*Romy González went 0-for-3 with a strikeout to drop to .103/.103/.103 on the season, even though he twice got to three-ball counts.
*Yasmani Grandal was replaced by Seby Zavala after Grandal appeared to tweak his back on a checked-swing attempt in the top of the seventh.
*Banks shook off the Jansen homer to throw the final three innings, so he served the classic long man purpose.
*The White Sox are now 0-7-1 in series this season, and now they’ll hope to avoid a second consecutive sweep and a seventh consecutive loss Wednesday afternoon.
Record: 7-17 | Box score | Statcast
Great recap and I hate to nitpick, but tonight was their 6th consecutive loss and tomorrow would be their 7th.
In fairness, it’s been over two hours since the game ended and MLB still hasn’t updated their standings.
Yup, corrected. MLB.com’s standings are stuck right now.
I don’t want to nitpick either, but I would change “would be their 7th.” to “will be their 7th.”
Ahhh, the good ole days when we could count on Leury being an everyday player.
Well the good news is if the offense isnt going to do anything there isnt much reason to get bent out of shape by the pitching staff! Its the little things.
No, there are always reasons to get bent out of shape about tonight’s pitcher.
Only 138 more games to endure before we can share our OPPs
Why wait? Semi serious remark, how about a Trade Deadline Project? At this rate we don’t have anything to trade, but I would be interested in the ideas.
10 more losses than wins before May’s even here is impressive.
I’m not longer rooting for the White Sox; I’m rooting for Jerry’s various presumed health issues, given that he refuses to sell the team before dying for tax reasons.
The Twins won again, now 7 games ahead of the Sox. They play 4 vs the Royals this weekend, followed by 3 against us.
If the Twins sweep the Royals and the Sox get swept by the Rays, and then the Twins sweep us, it is not impossible that by next week the Sox will be 14 out.
Let’s bloody do this!
Now living in KS, I’ll be mercifully blacked out.
I honestly feel bad for Grifol. That’s not to say he’s good at his job. No evidence of that. It just sucks to see a guy get an opportunity at his dream job and subsequently fail spectacularly.
To be fair to Pedro i dont even think 1998 Joe Torre could make this team work.
Rick Renteria was set up to fail and got fired the instant he succeeded.
I feel bad for any non- permanent white sox employees.
One truly impressive stat is that the White Sox only have one fewer loss, just ONE, than the A’s. A team with a -102 run differential as I typed this.
Positives…
Every White Sox fan’s latest drug test.
Vampires can be killed, Van Hellsing assures me.
When Reinsdorf does finally fire Hahn and Williams, you just know he’ll replace them with AJ Pierzynski and/or Ozzie.
“When….”?
It’ll never happen, Jerry will die first.
I actually think that Reinsdorf will make a change if the team continues to play this badly. He did eventually get rid of GarPax. But yeah, he won’t fire them – he’ll just kick Hahn upstairs and let Kenny “retire.”
Everyone I hear/read/talk to says Michael Reinsdorf makes the decisions for the Bulls. GarPax was also way better than this, which is a point in the favor of those who believe MR runs the Bulls
Jerry won’t die…
Yeah, it really seems like Robert is going out of his way to humiliate Elroy for some reason. He’s looking like an ass doing it.
I guess many fans liked it, but I never liked the bobblehead giveaway. I thought it showed a lack of seriousness by the organization. Inept play is something to fix on the field. It should not be considered a marketing opportunity. Maybe next season’s opening day giveaway can be a ‘100 Loss’ poster.
I think a relatively long stint in Charlotte would be good for Robert. He’s really struggling with the strike zone and cutting in front of Eloy is immature. I mean that’s a Little League thing. Time for him to grow up as a professional baseball player. Might send a message to the other guys. Grifol has to be tougher on these guys, too.
The coverage of this team is so much better than the team itself. Jim, James, Sox fans populate the hosts on The Score and their broadcasts are on ESPN 1000. The Sox media deserve a better product to cover. Fans deserve more meaningful analysis than what this season will bring.
Well at least dissociating Abreu has been replaced.
Jerry Reinsdorf hates SoxMachine so much now that he declares all ticket prices are increasing $5 effective for Tampa Bay series and all beer is now $3 more to help pay off the contracts of Joe Kelly, Mike Clevinger and Leury Garcia’s remaining fortune.
Romy’s OPS is near the Mendoza line.
Romy, in about 1/4th the ABs as last year, has “doubled” his -.3 WAR to -.6.
This spiraling out of control is going to be Grifol’s biggest test.
Eloy gets traded at deadline. I hate to see it happen. He’s just genuinely likeable and it’s a dick move by Robert to cut him off.
Luis Robert is not and will never be the captain of our outfield. That’s just not his thing. Those same tendencies make him hard to root for; the fact that key pieces on the team (including but not limited to Robert) are hard to root for means that it is hard to sustain positive feelings about the team. We have a bunch guys who aren’t very good, and some of the best players aren’t very likable.
How could we go from being so far ahead of Pittsburgh to being so far behind Pittsburgh?
We know the answer and it’s just infuriating.
I could really recommend moving to Europe to all Sox fans. Because I live in Holland I’m not even able to attend games and I miss a lot because they are played at night. The disappointment I feel is confined to the moment I pick up my phone in the morning to check the score.
I would like to request Guaranteed Rate to change there logo and use a green arrow pointing up. It’s no wonder things keep getting worse with this logo decorating our park. In the same line it’s logical things keep going south on the South side, so let’s change that to Upside or something.
The logo should remain unchanged as long as Jerry Reinsdorf is minding the store. It’s perfectly on-brand for everything he’s done the past 15 years.
I am convinced Pedro Grifol is not the right person to manage the White Sox under Hahn. Yesterday, I saw a team that has already given up. Players were playing for individual purposes and pride. I didn’t see a team. Like larry told me yesterday, this team already mail it in. It is not even May.
Grifol is just an extension of Hahn. Grifol emanates an acceptance of being “mired in mediocrity” (Hahn’s Freudian slip). The lack of accountability is palpable with Grifol who does not appear to know how to care. I’m pretty sure he cares, but he is lifeless. Full of excuses and empty phrases. Any other manager would have had at least a closed clubhouse meeting. Showed some emotion. Grifol just goes in his business doing and saying the same things day after day unwilling to try or say something that can shake up this team. Do the players respect Grifol? I am sure they do, but they also seem to not care about him one bit.
I know half of you will disagree with me, but complacency and lack of accountability have destroyed this team, and the fastest way to regain some of that is to bring in a manager like Ozzie. I am starting to believe that Grifol won’t be the manager by the last day of the season. It will be Charlie Montoyo.
And….another topic for perhaps Jim to explore in the future. Hahn’s mediocrity might have made the White Sox a team no players want to play. So, to attract premium free agents, Hahn will have to truly pay a “hidden fee” he created. Perhaps, that’s the real reason Zack Wheeler didn’t sign with the Sox, and who knows if there were other players approached, and they told Hahn right away “No way, I ain’t playing for your team for all the gold in the world”
The reason they have not signed a premium FA is Jerry, not Hahn. Aside from Albert Belle the Sox have not signed one in 30 years. I mean come on now. Players go where the money is given.
And nobody is managing this half ass roster to any success, even if I share your negative view of Grifol. It’s the roster, which stems from Jerry’s unwillingness to give out the money for premium free agents that is the primary reason this team has won a playoff series in 1 season since the inception of playoffs.
Hahn blows, but change the GM and manager all you want, it’s the owner that is the biggest albatross.
The lack of timely spending in a contention window is maddening, but a competent GM could manage a $180MM payroll.
Agreed, a good GM knows how to spend money and show the long term projections to ownership. Not sure Machado or Harper would ever get past JR, but deals like Nimmo, Springer, Semien, etc would have presented ok. Paying it forward on three young players hurt Hahn, and also the overspend on the bullpen. Everything adds up to poor spending habits, then ultimately throwing more bad money at filling holes on a yearly basis.
Hahn had a chance to resign in honor after the forced Larussa hire and DUI. He chose not to and is the ultimate bag holder, he needs to go now.
I agree Ozzie was the right hire to provide a heart beat to a lifeless team. Grifol is not in a good position. He’s a first time manager trying to teach a fundamentally unsound roster how to play baseball at the MLB level, and at the same time he is expected to win. This was never going to work as a quick fix, Ozzie was the only quick fix option, and that probably would not have worked either.
I don’t know what to make of what Grifol is trying to do. Sure, any manager coming in would need to do some fundamental work with a few of these guys. But they look to be on the downside of their competitive window. Too late to treat this as a rebuild where you can break everything down and build it back up.
Seems more sensible to bring in an experienced manager who said, ‘give me 2 seasons and I will get as much out of these guys as I can and then you can tear it all down and start over with guys like Montgomery.’ Not sure that should have been Ozzie, but at least there would have been a logic to it. Instead, if willing to take a chance on a rookie manager, it should have happened when TLR was hired. If anything, you try the rookie manager first, then go the experienced manager. Not vice versa.
It’s feeling like another Ricky hire… when you fired Ricky.
Why do you think Grifol got hired? If Hahn made the final decision, then Grifol said all the right things that Hahn needed to hear. As you said, he is just like Hahn. I’m not sure he ever had control of this team, but he has certainly lost any control he had. He has no idea what to do to bring this team out of this. And it’s becoming very clear that the players are giving up. It is likelier to get worse before it gets any better.
There are so many things that need to happen right now. Romy doesn’t need to go back to Charlotte- he just needs to be released. Robert needs to sit for a few days and when he return, he should be batting 6th. Haseley needs to play center while Robert sits. The bullpen needs to have defined roles so pitchers know what to expect when they come to the park every day.
We are going to look back on the LaRussa years as the “good old days”. That’s how bad it has become. And there is only one solution. Reinsdorf needs to sell- NOW.
You spoke to larry? I thought he was dead.
We briefly interacted on Twitter during last night’s game.
I’ll tell you one thing though. The team really worked hard this spring training making sure that every time someone gets a hit, that person performs what looks to be a “check mark” back to the dugout signifying what I would assume to be a successful conclusion to their at-bat. Great to see them working as a team and wondering if this was one of the items Rick Hahn was referring to when he suggested we would see a different team this year with a different attitude. Unfortunately, there hasn’t been many check marks after the games so far this year.
Yesterday was another exhausting one to be a White Sox fan, this team is relentless in their approach to annoy fans. It feels like trolling but not intentional since I don’t think this team knows what that even means. Fandom is a hell of a drug lol Go Sox!