Oscar Colás returns to White Sox sans excitement
Ideally, Oscar Colás would’ve made his White Sox debut in the middle of the season, whether as a short-term injury replacement or somebody who knocked down the door with his performance. That would’ve meant the White Sox tried harder to solve right field the first time, and everybody would’ve been able to enjoy that new-prospect promise.
You could say Colás is getting that chance now, but you have to be the forgiving sort. The combination of Gavin Sheets, Eloy Jiménez and Clint Frazier wasn’t getting it done, and Colás hit seven homers over his last seven games with the Knights.
That just requires you to erase your memories of Colás’ first MLB stint. First-month struggles shouldn’t be held against him, but they do temper excitement for one of the few potential internal jolts this team had in storage, because everybody knows what it looks like when it doesn’t work, and Lenyn Sosa showed everybody that the second take might not go any better.
Colás has plenty of company among the refurbished goods. Garrett Crochet is ramping back up toward multi-inning work as his rehab stint shifts from Birmingham to Charlotte, but from what we witnessed, he doesn’t look he’s ready to supplant Aaron Bummer as the go-to lefty. Liam Hendriks’ feel-good story got put on hiatus pretty quickly, and nobody should trust Yoán Moncada’s back. At least Colas’ problems are all typical developmental hurdles, and nothing that jeopardizes his physical well being.
Pedro Grifol said before the game that Colás “can help us turn this thing around,” but again, immediate success proved elusive.
Sure enough, the White Sox suffered a too-typical loss in Colás’ first game back, although he didn’t stand out. He went 1-for-4 with a bunt single, and while he struck out in his final plate appearance, he looked no worse than Andrew Vaughn or Jake Burger, who also flailed helplessly against Jordan Romano.
It’ll be pretty easy to tell whether anything has changed with Colás from his first audition to now, because his contact in April was terrible. He had the 18th-highest infield fly ball rate at 18.8 percent, and while “18th-highest” doesn’t sound especially damning, there’s a second part to this.
Among the 17 players with higher pop-up rates, Aledmys Diaz had the highest ground-ball rate at 48.4 percent.
Colás’ ground-ball rate during that stretch? 59.6 percent. Now throw in that 18.8 percent pop-up rate, and nearly 80 percent of his contact stood no chance of doing any kind of damage before luck got involved.
Colás has talent, and it’s always possible that he finds a key to unlock his production, but he also has so much room to improve before “progress” resembles “impact” that it’s hard to pin immediate hopes on him. The primary objective for his season is figuring out what he might be by 2025, and if Rick Hahn has difficult decisions to make well before then, well, whose fault is that.
Speaking of Hahn, it sounds like he did that thing where he answers a question by restating the premise of the question, at least if Daryl Van Schouwen framed the exchange correctly:
“Buyers or sellers?” is the question of the hour for a team trying to say it’s still in a division race after coming off losing a series to the 24-63 Athletics. The only reason deadline uncertainty might even exist is because of the poor division the Sox inhabit.
[…]“I’m not going to put a marker in the sand and say, ‘We need to rattle off 10 out of 14 or we’re doing this,’ ’’ Hahn said before the Sox gave up a lead in the eighth inning. “At the same time, we can see the calendar, we can see the games back. You want to have a reason to believe that this thing’s going to get right between now and Aug. 1.
“Obviously, we’ve got big decisions to make by Aug. 1.”
The White Sox went on to lose a late-inning lead to fall a game further back of the “top” two teams in the AL Central. When they’re within five games, you can talk yourself into a good week changing everything. When they’re seven games back, the only strong argument against selling is the guy who would be tasked with doing it.
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Your last sentence sums up my feelings. I do NOT want Hahn selling anything. He needs to go before the retool or whatever it is that they will do. Is there any other organization in baseball in which Hahn would still be employed? I have a hard time believing any other team would allow 10 years of failure with only a shortened season and the first half of 2021 being considered successful. They completely botched this rebuild and this team is so incomplete even though their payroll is $180M or whatever it is. He does not know how to build a roster- that is very obvious now. He does not know how to choose a manager. He does not know how to manage injuries. He is a horrible communicator. Just what does he bring to the table Jerry?
You have to sell the would be free agents, even if its Hahn doing that which sucks but thats how this organization operates. He won’t be fired and he wont step down. I expect all operations to ramp up for the trade deadline once the draft is over.
Hahn may not know how to build a roster, but Jerry would never allow him to add the right players anyway. The payroll is meaningless when it is relatively high for just one or two years, and the highest contract Hahn is allowed to give is for bleeping Benintendi. Hahn sucks, but his hands are also tied. There is literally nobody who he would have been allowed to sign that could have helped them. Joc Pederson would have been better than nothing, but hasn’t had a WAR over 2 since 2019. That’s the kind of players Hahn is left to choose from, and it isn’t a high enough quality player. Not even close. All the guys who could have helped would have been 9 figure contracts. They needed no less than Semien and/or Harper, and Jerry wouldn’t allow it. A different GM might have done better, but anybody who thinks that this club could be remotely close to championship caliber under a different GM with Jerry as owner is fooling themselves. Hahn is by far the lesser evil of the two.
They aren’t going to fire Hahn, not before August. Gio and others are leaving after this season and the next, they have no choice but to sell or get nothing. It’s obvious that their best choice is to get what they can. Hahn has gotten good players via trade including Gio, it is possible that he gets something decent in return for him plus others. Even one or two interesting prospects would help a farm system devoid of them.
If Jerry allowed a payroll of $190M last year, a competent GM would have put together a better roster than the misfits that Hahn cobbled together. I don’t think Jerry told him to spend $50M on relievers. Yes, Jerry would not spend for Harper and Semien and the like, but I could have put together a better roster for $190M than Hahn did.
Yes, I agree that Hahn is the lesser of 2 evils to some extent. But he is completely incapable of putting together a balanced roster, or hiring a good manager, or… And we know Jerry isn’t going anywhere, so the next best thing is to get rid of Hahn.
You would think, but also you wonder what sort of length restrictions get placed on things. Reliever contracts have tended to be shorter than impact position players or starters. Liam was a best available guy and only took 4 years. Even Benintendi required 5 years, and it’s not like he was a top of the market guy.
I agree with what Jim has said elsewhere: there’s really no point in dividing blame at this point. It’s all the fault of the mass that is the Sox FO.
After all, it’s really not all that hard to imagine this being mostly Hahn’s fault. It certainly seems like JR is a meddler, but we really don’t know to what extent. Suppose JR told Hahn in 2017: “we’re cutting payroll in ’18-20, but you can have $140m payroll in ’21, ~$200m in ’22, then ~$180,000 in ’23 and we’ll reevaluate then.” Sure – that may be short of where we’d hoped they’d be at the start of the rebuild, but a good GM could certainly win with that. Good GMs win with less than that every year.
I agree. With a $190M payroll, there is absolutely no reason to ever have a lineup with Vaughn in left AND Sheets in right, yet there were times when that was the case last year. That is just flat-out GM malpractice.
And yet, it is nearly impossible to name a single player that Hahn could actually have gotten instead of relievers that would have been much better, given the constraint of not committing payroll beyond 1-2 years. Because good players get multi year deals, not 1-2 year lottery picks like Eaton, Harrison, etc. There is literally not a single player who signed for a short term deal that could have fixed RF/2b in a meaningful way, none that I can come up with. Joc Pederson came to mind, he would have helped – but just a little bit. Conforto, for all who thought he might be an answer, has a WAR of only 0.2. The gap between the Sox and top teams is not small, it is large. It is about QUALITY. And with free agency, QUALITY comes with longer term deals, almost exclusively. All of the players Hahn was allowed to sign were mediocre/half ass. People emphasizing their payroll being high last year are missing the bigger picture entirely. Name some better players that Hahn could have actually gotten, that would have been real difference makers. I don’t think there are/were any.
The players the Sox needed were Semien and Harper, there really were not any close alternatives. No GM in existence would have been allowed to sign either of them. I can point to Kelly, Garcia, Diekman, Alberto, Andrus being almost Semien’s salary, but that doesn’t mean any GM could have actually signed Semien instead just b/c the payroll for ONE year would have been the same. Any idiot GM would have probably signed someone better than Benintendi since 2019, if the owner wasn’t a cheap ass. It’s not even close how much more Jerry is responsible for this disaster than Hahn.
ha-seong Kim signed by the Padres for 28 million and 4 years. That looks affordable. Kim ranks 2nd as the best second basemen in the Majors.
Kim signed with them prior to the 2021 season, when the Sox still had Madrigal penciled in as their 2b. There was no perceived need at the time. And what looks affordable to us isn’t necessarily what Hahn is allowed, besides. He settled for Harrison after 2021, on a bleeping 1 year, along with Garcia, when Semien was available.
There will never be getting around that Hahn is forced to operate like a small market team while Chicago remains the 3rd largest market. That is an obstacle that no GM is going to overcome. Hence why they have won a playoff series in one season under Reinsdorf’s 4 decades of ownership.
GMs succeed under similar parameters. They just have to have somebody with a Dipoto-like mindset, and Hahn is just about the opposite of that.
Rick Hahn is a bad general manager, you should stop defending him
I don’t understand how you can defend Hahn- his actions are indefensable. And again, I can’t stand Jerry, but you are stating limitations on contracts that you have no idea are there.
You use this, ” given the constraint of not committing payroll beyond 1-2 years.” Where did that come from? They signed Eloy, Robert, TA, Grandal, Moncada, Keuchel, Hendriks and Benintendi to 3 or more year contracts. Saying that Hahn is restricted to 1-2 year deals is just nonsense.
I completely agree that they should have signed BOTH Harper and Semien to complete the rebuild. And it’s likely Jerry put the stop to any thoughts of those. But to say Hahn could have done nothing to fix the mess is just ridiculous. How does Tampa do it? How did Oakland do it before they started tanking? Let’s face it, Hahn is just as awful of a GM as Jerry is an owner.
Hahn sucks. I am not defending him, only stating that placing the majority of blame on him for their disappointing 3 offseasons is misplaced. The difference between the Sox and good teams that have a legit shot at a WS is probably some combination of Semien, Harper, Machado, Springer, at least two of them. The reason they have none of those is Jerry. I mean come on now, are you going to seriously suggest that a different GM could have signed even one of them, under Jerry? Please. A different owner, and Hahn might have signed one if not two of them. I think that’s a fair statement. And it doesn’t make Hahn smart. Even the most idiotic GM knows that Semien and Harper are worlds better than Eaton, Harrison. Even Hahn.
Hahn sucks, but I don’t buy the narrative that if the Sox had a good GM instead of Hahn since 2020, that this team would be winning tons of games without being able to sign a FA better than Beni. Only like 3 teams have not signed someone to a 9 figure contract, and one of them is the cheap ass Sox. Drury or India would be better than Andrus, but not enough to be a real difference maker like Semien. They wouldn’t win even this pitiful division with Drury or India. Jerry could have let Hahn sign one or two guys way the F better than Drury or Beni, without signing Beni, or Garcia, Harrison, Eaton, etc for that matter.
Given the choice between a great new owner or a great new GM, the right answer is pretty clear. I’d much, much rather have Hahn under Cohen than Jim Click or anybody considered brilliant under Jerry. Having said that, Hahn needs to go. Just not nearly as much as Jerry.
So how does Tampa continually win? How did Oakland have competitive teams all those years when their biggest free agent signing is $66M? I’ll tell you how- a creative GM who can work within the constraints of the imposed budget. Hahn does not have a creative bone in him. Billy Beane would kill for a $180M budget. Hahn has no clue how to work within Jerry’s constraints. They both suck, Jerry is a meddling owner who won’t give out huge contracts, but Hahn is just a pathetic GM.
Hahn’s job is far beyond signing the right players in free agency, which he is bad at. The White Sox have shown to be consistently near the bottom in every aspect of baseball operations:
Amateur Scouting: One of the worst drafting teams in the league despite a period of tanking and having high picks. The only real drafting success based on where a player was picked in the 11 years Hahn has been GM was Anderson, 10 years ago.
International Scouting: They’ve had success paying big money to Abreu and Robert, players who nobody doubted were really good. Otherwise it’s been terrible. There’s a severe lack of creativity, given they’ve consistently signed small classes, don’t even try to find the best 16-year olds from Venezuela and the DR that have proven to be the most valuable assets in baseball, and have at times traded international spending space to get out of paying option buyouts to teams that actually have a developed international scouting operation.
Pro Scouting: They’ve been terrible at waiver claims and minor league free agents. They’re incredibly inactive, don’t even try to sign 6-year free agents who have upside, and the guys they have signed have rarely worked out. When they were in sell mode they managed to trade for some prospects who’ve worked out, but again these guys weren’t surprises, they were trading highly valuable players for top prospects, some of whom worked out. They’ve had no ability to ‘find guys’ who the average Baseball America reader didn’t know about who turned into something worthwhile.
Player Development. Goes with all the scouting departments to an extent, but the players they’ve drafted, traded for, or signed internationally have by and large not been contributors at the MLB level, nor they do have value in trade for established big leaguers.
So the argument about the budget Hahn has been given and who he’s signed as free agents is just a very small piece of the puzzle. He’s in charge of all these departments, not one of which is in the top-20 in the league.
To sum up Hahn’s career as a GM, one event will do: James Shields for Fernando Tatis Jr.
Brandon Drury has an .822 OPS with 14 homers as mostly a 2nd baseman for the Angels. Jonathan India was available when the Sox drafted. There’s 2 2nd basemen for you.
Can’t agree more, well said.
Thanks for the analysis and perspective on Colas, had hope for him and still think there is something there, but overall not confident in the white sox development ability to maximize what he can bring to the table in the show. Totally agree with that last sentiment, I do not trust Hahn, Kenny or anyone in the front office to make trades. So, instead, I am rooting for natural things to take place, like an overwhelming amount of loser cigars and the effect on the human body…unless we are dealing with Vampires…then its time for Blade. You happy White Sox? This where we are at…hoping Blade will take out the vampires that presumably run this thing.
I like Colas but I really wanted the Sox to sign Pham to give him more time and have an actual legit OFer for a change but I guess he was too expensive for Jerry.
Honestly you could just tack on “sans excitement” to every headline for the rest of the season, maybe the next 2-3 years as well!
The thing is that “this thing’s going to get it right” only makes sense if “this thing” isn’t already right. I believe it is right already. Many fans, me included until not long ago, and Hahn believe that the White Sox are underperforming. That there is an event in the future where “things will get right”. Things are already right!!!! This level of performance of the White Sox matches or it is very close to match the players, the manager and the GM we have.
One of Hahn’s greatest accomplishment has been selling the “hype”. The parades. The mythical homers by Eloy hitting the light poles. The 40 to 50 doubles and 20+ homers that Vaughn carries in his bat. The electrifying bullpen that will assure us that any lead after 6 innings is locked. Fans ate it all up. I ate it up all.
Somebody here mentions that Hahn should trade Vaughn or Eloy, and some fans are up in arms as if we are trading Mike Trouts or an emblematic player. They are 2 WAR players at best. They are 2018 Yolmer Sanchezes for crying out loud. They are not special. But Hahn’s machinery has sold them as the “core” that will bring parades. The White Sox won’t be significantly any better or worse if Vaughn or Eloy aren’t here! Sure, they hit above average, but they subtract that value by being the worse fielders and runners combo money can buy.
Hahn needs to start trading players now. The Royals are already unloading (Aroldis). If Hahn waits, instead of potentially getting [————this————], he will get [–that–]
I think I’m the singular fan who was “up in arms” in the other thread. A lot of people agree with you based on upvotes.
I know I hold a minority view with most people favoring selling everyone no matter what it takes.
I believe:
I think I’m the realist in this discussion. You think you’re the realist. All we can do is agree to disagree.
100% agree with you
Moncada is sunk cost at this point. Tim Anderson has a relatively cheap option (I think that remains if traded). So Anderson might have some value to some GM that thinks there is a rebound in sight. I am actually thinking Hahn’s best scenario is to keep Anderson until the end. Hope for a rebound, exercise option and trade him in the off season.
Eloy is not affordable. Vaughn is affordable but affordable is meaningless without production. Kopech is affordable, and I wouldn’t trade him. Unlike the other two, there is upside there, and pitchers are more valuable commodities than slow mediocre DH hitters
Here is the only thing we both disagree. Why should the White Sox keep underwhelming players? Because you wouldn’t get a decent prospect you are stuck with a player? They would bring prospects with little value because they provide little value. Let them provide little value else where.
I have stated here that the main reason I think Hahn should sell is not, I repeat, is not to get prospects back. It is to avoid coming into 2024 with the same players we have now, but 1 year older. I do not know if you have been watching the White Sox games as much as I have. I think I have missed 3 games this year. We have too many players that cannot field, cannot stay healthy, cannot run, cannot hit RHP, cannot get on base. We can’t start 2024 with those players. We just can’t. It is illogical unless the goal is to lose. Trading them now has higher value than trading them in the off season. I estimate the White Sox can keep one. Maybe Burger or Vaughn because they are cheap.
100% agree
It does not matter to me. This is a baseball blog. We are fans. We moan. We celebrate. We opine. As long as it is done respectfully, all is good.
Agree with pretty much everything you said. You’ve watched almost every game. I’ve watched 2 (both wins!). But I saw enough last year to not renew my MLB.TV subscription this year. I was going to wait and see if Grifol brought changes to how this team performed. It seems like he has, but in the wrong direction. Last year’s team had Tony as the manager, more injuries, Vaughn primarily in the outfield, Giolito was bad, and yet they were still .500. Going into the season, I thought it couldn’t be any worse than last season, but somehow it is. You have made this statement for awhile now:
I have stated here that the main reason I think Hahn should sell is not, I repeat, is not to get prospects back. It is to avoid coming into 2024 with the same players we have now, but 1 year older.
I haven’t really agreed with that until now, but I’ve come to the realization that you are absolutely right on this matter. It’s long past time to become a more athletic, defensively sound team. That means having 1 or maybe 2 of Vaughn, Eloy, Burger and Sheets on the roster (I would vote for Eloy and/or Vaughn). I can’t imagine the pain of having watched almost every game this year- the play last year was almost unwatchable, and this year is worse. Time for Timmy to move on. Moncada will be in the last guaranteed year next year, so it’s put up or shut up for him. Montgomery should be ready to play short in 2025. Hopefully there will be a new GM by this winter, so they can retool around Cease, Robert, Kopech, Colas, Benintendi, Eloy, maybe Vaughn, maybe Sosa and then Montgomery/Ramos and hopefully a couple of guys they can acquire for Giolito and the others. This rebuild failed miserably. Time for find someone else for this retooling.
The problem for next year is that even though $60-90M could be coming off the books (Giolito, Grandal, Lynn, Kelly, TA, Andrus, Lopez, Clevinger), there is really no one in free agency that would make a significant impact. There are some decent starting pitchers that are available in the Sox price range, but no middle infielders or catchers are worth anything this winter.
I generally agree with you, but only under the assumption that ownership plans to compete in ’24-’25. Beyond trading expiring contracts, the question of how much they sell should, to my mind, be directly tied to how much ownership is willing to invest into the team in the near future. If ownership plans to pull back the payroll for the next several years, I don’t see any reason to keep Jimenez, Vaughn, and Kopech—or, for that matter, Robert or Cease. If they want to reinvest the money and try again in 2024, then okay—keep all those guys. The tricky part is if ownership wants to take a step back in 2024, but is willing to go at it again in 2025. Then, I think you keep Cease and Robert, but it’s worth at least shopping the other three. Though, again, I tend to agree with your 3rd point.
There is absolutely no way this team is competing in 2024. Probably not 2025. They will lose 3/5 of their rotation, I mean how could they possibly compete? They aren’t competing now. You think they will spend on 3 starting pitchers? I doubt they get one. They are back to 2013-2019 levels.
They can only look to 2025 and beyond. There is no 2024 for this team, that’s even more clear than this season is. Next year’s FA market is garbage even if they wanted to do something. Too late. Probably won’t have a team over .500 for 3-4 years, at least.
There’s simply no reason this team can’t compete in 2024 when the division is this weak. If they reinvested money off the books and were willing to be creative in the trade market, they should be the best team in this division.
The rotation holes shouldn’t be terribly difficult to replace if the Sox are willing to reinvest. Yes, they lose Gio, Lynn, and Clevinger—but that’s, what, $40m coming off the books? That production shouldn’t be difficult to replace with $40m—spread $18m/year over two pitchers plus an extra $5m for a depth starter. That, plus I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect one of Mena, Thompson, Burke, or Cannon to be a viable 5th starter/depth. Grandal and Kelly’s salaries just about cover raises (arb and otherwise) and buyouts.
Of course, all this is predicated on the FO’s willingness to spend. I completely expect them to go the worst of all possible routes: “try” again in 2024 while cutting payroll and running out an even worse team than this year.
Suggesting that the Sox should be the best team in this division next year is some serious nonsense. It sounds like something Hahn might tell people. They are 25th in OPS, ERA, and win percentage. With awful defense, a terrible manager, and a bottom 5 farm system. Robert might be the only position player with a WAR over 2. Half the team is negative. What more evidence do you need of how bad they are? I’d be shocked if over 2023/24 the Sox lose less than 185-190 games. You’ve tried to invent logic defying arguments denying how bad the Sox are for over a year, and have been proven wrong in a pronounced way every time. You’re not going to start being right (or sounding believable) after they lose Gio, Lynn, Clevinger, Grandal, Kelly, and possibly don’t pick up TA’s 14M option.
The notion of “IF” Jerry reinvests is laughable. They are 24th in attendance, likely to get worse. Coming off a year with terrible attendance and probably a 95 loss season, fan sentiment at a multi decade low, the chances are zero that Jerry is going to spend the money coming off the books. Next year will be even worse.
First, let’s get clear on one thing: being the best team in the Central is not the same as being good. I’m not suggesting a little tinkering makes this team a juggernaut. The best thing this team has going for it is its division—which is sad.
Since April, this is a .500 team. Last year, this was a .500 team. I don’t think the team is “awful” but rather awful relative to the height of the rebuild. And remember: the standard is “better than the other AL Central teams” not “good.” They are 15-11 vs. AL Central teams, 2nd in the division behind Minnesota’s 18-12. And, without looking, I’m guessing they are 2nd in the division in those stats you picked. I won’t deny that this team is worst than I expected. I certainly didn’t expect Tim Anderson to be the worst SS in baseball, for example. And I never denied this team is poorly contructed and in need of restructuring.
I agree (like I said above) that the FO likely won’t spend and 2024 will be a bigger mess than this year. But, back to what I said at the beginning: the important question is what are the FO’s plans? What they do at the deadline should be dictated by that. They might plan to compete in 2024 even if I’m pessimistic about their ability to do so.
Pretty much agree with everything you said. The key will be what kind of return they get at the deadline. If they can get one or two players that can help them next year, then it’s not inconceivable that they spend a little money on a couple of mid-level starters next year.
Going into next year, the outfield will likely be set with Benintendi, Robert and Colas. Vaughn and Moncada on the corners, Eloy DH. That leaves 2nd/SS/C. I would assume Sosa, Rodriguez, Romy and Remillard will be in the mix in the middle. Of course, they could keep TA and hope he rebounds next year. Zavala and Perez would share catching, though bringing back Narvaez to platoon with one of them would be a cheap option. They need to find a decent almost MLB-ready starter in a Giolito or TA trade, then add 2 starters via FA- plus possibly stretching out Crochet to be a spot starter like Kopech in 2020. They could do that and still have a payroll much less than this year with all the departures. Is that a good team- absolutely not. But could it compete in the AL Central? Possibly. That’s probably the direction they will take. A full rebuild will cause attendance to bottom out next year.
I don’t buy that this is really a .500 team, and that the April games were an aberration. Robert may wind up the only position player with a WAR over 2. That’s not a .500 team. They are going to be further under before all is said and done.
Even if they were, they aren’t going to be .500 without Gio, Lynn, Clevinger, and Grandal. Picture their rotation sans Gio and an occasional good game from Lynn, plus Zavala catching every day. I think Tim is a good bet to be gone, either via trade or bypassing his 14M option. They are more likely to lose 100 than come close to winning 80, this year or next. It’s no guarantee that the Guards and Twins stay as bad as they are now, either. And their level of badness is not White Sox badness.
I’ve argued that the 1B/DH types are probably more valuable to the White Sox than to whomever they would trade with. Vaughn, Burger, and Jimenez are 3 of the 4 guys on the roster with a wRC+ over 100. Sheets is the only bench “power” bat.
Frankly, it would be a miracle to get a net improvement on offense by trading any of them given that, yeah, they’re probably 2 WAR players.
The Twins and CLE both have a bunch of games against KC, and the Twins get OAK also. If the Sox don’t sweep the 7 games against the Twins/CLE at the end of the month, pretty much no way to make up ground in July. Hopefully the Twins or CLE or both make a move to end this thing. Hahn comes just short of saying they need a 10 game win streak to right the ship. Half measures on the way down, half measures on the way up, and half measures on the way down again.
It took seven years to go from rebuilding to broken. We have a rebuild record but lack young talent in the waiting. The only reasonable explanation for this is that Jerry has been in coma for many years
The Colás return is indeed off to a rocky start.
https://twitter.com/CST_soxvan/status/1676702469588434944
For people who can’t see it:
Strange. Daryl Boston is supposed to remind each runner on first base how many outs are there. Isn’t that one of their jobs?
My thought exactly. What would you say that you do here, Daryl?
Yes, Daryl seems to have been underachieving since the dawn of time, but I still blame the player. Colas, Sheets et al can’t seem to maintain concentration on pivotal game situations. What issues are going through their heads? The final scene of Silo? Ginger or Mary Ann? Whatever, it’s not competing and winning baseball games. Shame on them and the entire joyless organization.
Yeah, Colas made a mistake, but I find it hard to believe that he’s not “competing”. My guess is that he is trying very, very hard to do well.
Wait, that’s not a statue at first base?
I know this isn’t the right time or place but… with MLB’s Draft on Sunday, can we get some profiles on those future IB-DH types the Sox will likely draft in rounds 1-3?
I’m more interested in if there are any college arms that profile only as relievers.
Or the guys who live within a 20 mile radius of Mike Shirley’s house in Indiana who give a good firm handshake and call him ‘Sir’.
The hyperlocal thing has been weirdly successful so far. Montgomery has been their most successful first round pick in quite a while, maybe since TA almost a decade ago. Schultz is showing remarkable command for such a gargantuan teenage specimen, which is very promising given that his only possible size/mechanics/slot comp is the Big Unit.
Got a call from the White Sox today. 4 or 5 years after I gave up my season tickets.
She wanted to know if I had been to any games recently and if I had intentions on going to any in the future.
I let her know that I had no intention of financially supporting the franchise as long as the clown show in the front office is still in charge. She laughed and said she’s been hearing that a lot.
I was busy and didn’t have time to ask her any questions, but she left her number and said she’d like to be my point person if I wanted to come to any games.
Can you imagine the desperation to sell tickets if they are calling season ticket holders from years ago?
Love the candor of your reply, lol. I wish more Sox fans felt and acted the same. There is no reason they should draw more than 2500 fans to any game, unless it’s to see Ohtani or some such thing.