Month in a Box: The White Sox in July 2023

White Sox pitcher Aaron Bummer
(Photo by Matt Marton/USA TODAY Sports)
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HallofFrank

The August month in a box should just be “LOL” in the largest font Wordpress allows.

As Cirensica

Thanks for this. Must be hard to write this. Almost nothing cheerful here.

Alfornia Jones

The culture narrative is getting old. the clubhouse is bad because the hitters are last in the league in getting walks, while the pitching has issued the 2nd most. They are bottom ten in HRs hit, while giving up the 4th most. Bottom 6 in runs scored, while giving up the 6th most runs. The FO wants the focus on the culture because they can “fix” that, bad players are hard or impossible to fix. The numbers are the only thing that matter.

90 win teams that shit the bed in September have bad culture/chemistry. The White Sox are awful at playing baseball, and that relates more to the FO spending money horribly, and developing players worse. The fire should have been set in April, but instead we are tracking to virtually the same line up again in spring 2024. The only thing Hahn can do is preach how Middleton is a piece of crap. It’s nothing short of madness and JR couldn’t be happier.

Augusto Barojas

Great comment. To have a winning baseball team requires players who are good at hitting, pitching, and fielding, and the Sox have very few who are excellent or even average at any of those things. That is the actual problem. It’s the roster, which is about the ownership and GM, not culture. If their record was reversed, which might have been possible had they addressed their weaknesses since 2020 in meaningful ways rather than doing almost literally nothing and getting incrementally worse each year instead, there would be no talk of bad vibes or bad clubhouse anything.

roke1960

Teams that win don’t have a “culture” problem- only losers do. Which is why Hahn continues to talk about it. The minute Hahn walks out the door for the last time, the White Sox “culture” will improve tremendously.

Last edited 1 year ago by roke1960
upnorthsox

They focus on culture because there’s no visibility, no metrics, no accountability. Fans can’t go onto FG and find what’s the Sox’s culture WAR. It a mysterious value that can be attached to any ill.
As you say, they can run the same crap out there while referencing its failure on something that has no meaning. Worse yet they can blame others for not getting it or not living up to their empty standard. It’s a free pass for whatever they need.

roke1960

That’s a very good point. He never mentions that they can’t draw walks, their pitchers can’t throw consistent strikes, they play great defense, etc. So he harps on something that is not quantifiable so that he isn’t called a liar. But let’s face it, Hahn is a liar.

Last edited 1 year ago by roke1960
As Cirensica

Great comment indeed. Hahn tried to put the carriage before the horses. Create a culture to bring wins, but it is wins that bring the culture. Since Hahn can’t create a winning team, creating culture is a…what was the word Jim used the other day? Sisyphean task?

Last edited 1 year ago by As Cirensica
ParisSox

Ozzie’s famous quote: Good teams win, bad teams have meetings

zerobs

The culture begins at the top. The owner is an absentee who is completely out of touch with the paying customers and the day-to-day goings on of the team. Williams, the VP of baseball Ops, is an absentee and an ass: he had a continuing feud with Frank Thomas, he gave personal permission to Adam Laroche to bring his kid to the park every single day, among dozens of other incidents where the supposed leader of the team is overruled by King Kenny – and whoever complains gets ticketed for shipping out because the culture is “Kenny’s opinion always trumps yours.” This is why Hahn acts like the court jester he is – he knew from day one the only fireable offense is to disagree with Kenny; being bad at the actual job is not. So he has absorbed that culture to the point that he can no longer recognize it in himself.

The players know this. The ones who know they are on Kenny’s good side can do whatever they want – if you complain about any of them you will be in the doghouse. Konerko may have been a leader because he made himself available to the media win or lose – but he knew not to complain about Kenny’s protected class (cough*cough*AJ*cough). The current protected class are Anderson, Moncada, and Jimenez, with Andrus an honorable mention. One can tell this by how often they are put in the lineup besides other players being more productive. There was no baseball reason for Burger to be shifted to second base so that Moncada could play third, there’s no baseball reason for Andrus to be getting starts over Remillard and especially Sosa at this point, there was no baseball reason to non-tender Mendick, there was no baseball reason to offer 3 years to Leury, there was no baseball reason to keep Ventura at the helm for 4 years (and then make him fire himself because God forbid Kenny take any blame) – it’s nothing but Kenny’s clique getting preferential treatment. There are dozens of other examples but this post is long enough.

It all starts with Jerry – he thinks he’s a genius for putting Kenny into the GM chair and winning one World Series by gutting the farm system for that one shot. It paid off, but at the cost of 15+ years of total humiliation and embarrassment. The sinking ship of the last 15 years gets ignored and the captain of the garbage scow still trades off 2005 like Al Bundy trading off his high school football glory.

As Cirensica

This is an interesting view.

JazznFunk

there’s no baseball reason for Andrus to be getting starts over Remillard

that one kind of undermines the argument

bobsquad

Culture is an excuse, but it’s also what allows Eloy, Tim, Vaughn, and Moncada to combine for 0 WAR. This team sucks, but I won’t accept that in 2023 those are all replacement level guys even with the injuries. This is just a sub-replacement level organization.

ayeitsfabes

You’re attempting to write off culture as a primary factor while ending your post with a cultural problem.

670WMAQtheElder

Yes, this is a bad baseball team with bad players. Ain’t no culture going to fix that.

ChiSportsDrummerMJ

I remember when the A’s series was considered the low mark, feels like a lifetime ago of watching this team. Well, on the bright side of all the none sense, the White Sox officially declared themselves unserious, so we fans can now just live freely, no longer hurt or punished for generations of support passed down over time…just kidding, this feels personal still lol ineptitude of this proportion is a reminder rich people dont live by the same rules as the rest of us

roke1960

Do we have an over/under on the date they cancel Soxfest yet?

asinwreck

I read this, and rather than think a second further about this misbegotten roster, thoughts turn to possible futures.

The Wirtz family is friends with the Reinsdorfs, and Danny Wirtz just assumed his late father’s role as head of that booze and sports empire. Rocky’s Sun-Times obituary noted that Forbes estimated the family’s net worth at over $4 billion eight years ago. Point is, these are local deep pockets already involved in local sports and who Jerry actually knows. Now that Danny Wirtz is in charge, maybe he’d have an appetite for taking on another team.

There are other possibilities for local ownership, maybe by your pick of the Pritzkers or Crowns in town. But I wonder if this is the connection that might somehow lead to Reinsdorf selling before that decision is in the hands of his heirs.

zerobs

I don’t whether to LMAO or shudder in horror at Pritzker. “Standard Bank Stadium” has a nice ring to it – a ring of bankruptcy. Lori Lightfoot as GM.

a-t

Why the horror exactly? I don’t have the faintest love for the Pritzker clan, but as hypothetical baseball team owners go, I think we could do a lot worse. They’ve got very deep pockets (~$37B combined), they aren’t far-right wackos like the Giants’ owners, and they definitely care about positive public perception. Additionally, as heirs to an already built fortune, they appear to be the type of rich people who hire experts to run their various businesses, instead of insisting on running things directly.

Hiring smart baseball people, giving them a big budget, and letting said smart baseball people do what they want is what good owners do. I think it’s not a coincidence that the meddlesome owners like Jerry or Moreno are self-made billionaires, not heirs.

ChiSportsDrummerMJ

As much as new ownership would be great, I fear petty Jerry would sell to someone who wants to relocate the team. His actions have lead me to believe he would rather take less money on a sale if it meant a petty owner he likes and knows personally takes over. But its fun to fantasize about the future anyways…better than the existential state this team puts die hard fans in daily lol

steelydan52

My take on that is to let Jerry sell the team to someone who wants to relocate. Chicago has proven that it can handle 2 baseball teams so I doubt we would be without a team too long. I just don’t understand JR’s hatred for the fans. I have the old Tribune when Fisk was let go in 1993 and Reinsdorf’s comment was that he stood behind the decision to let him go because he couldn’t possibly help the team. He should have said that it was a very tough decision because Fisk meant so much to the team and he was going to be a future HOFer. The prick just can’t get out of his own way.

Joliet Orange Sox

I think Robert, Jr. was the July mvp although I understand he’s the boring choice.

July
Robert 0.300 obp 0.521 slg 6 sb 1 cs and great defense
Burger 0.308 obp 0.557 slg 0 sb 0 cs and below average defense