Grading the 2023 White Sox position players
This is the first of two installments in which I’ll be looking back and evaluating all of the players that had a significant role as members of the 2023 White Sox. These grades are more art than science due to the subjective nature of how much expectations for a player should affect their grade. My goal is to balance actual player performance against their expectations and probable role (both short-term and long-term) entering the season.
Per usual, I consider an average grade to be someplace on the C/C+ borderline. ‘A’ is the top grade on the scale, and ‘F’ is the lowest.
My typical cutoff of 100 plate appearances isn’t ideal this year because Romy Gonzalez barely missed the cut, and he seems important enough to the White Sox (for some reason) to justify a write-up, but you can all grade him yourselves. In ascending order of plate appearances…
Zach Remillard (INF): 160 PA, .252/.295/.320, 1 HR, 30.0% K, 5.0% BB, 67 wRC+, 0.2 fWAR, 0.1 bWAR
At 29 years old, it was a bit surprising to see Remillard finally snag a big league opportunity. He was completely unfazed by the promotion, as BABIP-y goodness had him hitting .395/.489/.474 through his first 14 games. That stretch included some of the most clutch hits of the season, which led to Remillard somehow finishing third on the team in Win Probabilty Added. Predictably, he collapsed thereafter, as he only hit .202/.216/.266 the rest of the way. The league figured out that he was helpless against sliders, as he whiffed on nearly half of the ones he saw. Remillard provided some good defense and a fresh breath of competence when the already-flimsy depth chart was tested, but there’s not much to dream on here. Grade: C-
Lenyn Sosa (INF): 173 PA, .201/.224/.348, 6 HR, 23.1% K, 2.9% BB, 47 wRC+, -0.7 fWAR, -0.8 bWAR
Predictably, Sosa was overmatched in the major leagues as he typically has been when attacking a new level. However, we’re 209 plate appearances into this movie and given how far he has to go, it’s fair to question if and when he’s going to make what has been his usual successful adjustments to more advanced competition. On the plus side, he’s only 23, and that strikeout rate is probably a lot lower than what you were thinking it was before reading this review. His .227 BABIP was pretty unlucky, and his wOBA trailed his xwOBA by about 56 points. On the minus side…. Grade: F
Seby Zavala (C): 176 PA, .155/.207/.304, 7 HR, 38.6% K, 5.7% BB, 34 wRC+, 0.1 fWAR
That Zavala posted that putrid batting line and still doesn’t have a minus sign in his fWAR is a testament to his framing ability behind the plate. Alas, Zavala’s quest to suppress offense on both sides of the ball ended in early September with a DFA. In the realm of stuff you probably didn’t know happened, the Diamondbacks scooped him up and he drew a walk and scored in a pinch hitting appearance against the Sox during a Sept. 26 blowout. That’s a Seby Zavala “revenge game.” Grade: D
Oscar Colás (RF): 263 PA, .216/.257/.314, 5 HR, 27.0% K, 4.6% BB, 53 wRC+, -1.3 fWAR, -1.5 bWAR
The White Sox have made it a habit of never truly addressing their right field problem, but coming into this season, there was at least some hope that it might work out. Colás entered the season as a fringe top-100 prospect and ended it as someone who should be nowhere near the White Sox’s near-term plans.
There wasn’t much positive to point to besides a six-game stretch at Charlotte in which Colás hit seven home runs, which would account for half the homers he’d hit in 2023 at either level. There was palpable frustration among teammates for his lack of baseball instinct, which raises plenty of flags about the coaching in the minor leagues. His play was so unacceptable that a team with nothing to play for demoted him in the middle of September, so the writing is firmly on the wall. This was a spectacular failure. Grade: F
Jake Burger (3B): 323 PA, .214/.279/.527, 25 HR, 31.6% K, 6.8% BB, 113 wRC+, 1.4 fWAR, 1.4 bWAR
Burger took yet another unexpected leap forward in 2023, as he significantly improved his infield defense and performed much better against right-handed pitching. His improvement was enough to convince almost everyone but the White Sox, who chose to deal away five more years of Burger for some guy who’s now saddled with expectations he didn’t ask for and is unlikely to meet. The Sox may not have been able to see Burger significantly slashing his strikeout rate so suddenly with the Marlins, but they certainly should have understood that his .225 BABIP with the White Sox didn’t scan with how hard he hits the ball and how well he runs.
We here at Sox Machine wish Jake the best in Miami and congratulate him on leading his new team back to the playoffs. Grade: B+
Gavin Sheets (1B): 344 PA, .203/.267/.331, 10 HR, 19.2% K, 8.1% BB, 61 wRC+, -1.4 fWAR, -1.4 bWAR
It’s totally understandable if you didn’t know before now that it was this bad. Sheets front-loaded his production in 2023 and bears plenty of responsibility for the team sinking as deep as they did into the abyss. He hit .181/.242/.295 from May 11 onward as a bat-only player, and while that would get you booted from the roster on most teams, the White Sox carried him all the way through September while tweeting videos of him and his dog and stuff. This should be the end of the line, but knowing this organization, we’ll see him next year. Grade: F
Yoan Moncada (3B): 357 PA, .260/.305/.425, 11 HR, 30.0% K, 5.6% BB, 98 wRC+, 1.2 fWAR, 0.6 bWAR
Moncada was healthy to begin the season and to end the season, but not often enough in-between. An early-season bout with lower-back soreness sapped his explosiveness and he was on and off the IL for several months. He closed the season out on a really good note, hitting .330/.381/.608 over the final five weeks and belting seven of his 11 home runs in that span.
We know that a banged-up Moncada has no ability to punish a fastball; he’s finished with a negative run value against the fourseam in each of the last three seasons. He’s a fantastic player when his body is cooperating, but that caveat is doing a lot of work. Grade: D+
Yasmani Grandal (C): 405 PA, .234/.309/.339, 8 HR, 21.2% K, 8.9% BB, 80 wRC+, -0.1 fWAR
Grandal didn’t give the Sox the bounce-back season they were hoping for after his production dove off a cliff in 2022. He did put together a more passable batting line, but further erosion to his exit velocity, framing ability, and walk rate prevented him from providing any real value. Further concerning were the rumors that he fought with Tim Anderson after asking to leave the team early for the All-Star break and that he’s “no friend to the pitchers,” the latter of which might partly explain why the pitchers have dropped such positive comments about James McCann and Seby Zavala these last four years. It seems like Grandal won’t be missed. Grade: F
Elvis Andrus (INF): 406 PA, .251/.304/.358, 6 HR, 17.5% K, 6.2% BB, 81 wRC+, 1.1 fWAR, 0.6 bWAR
As someone who has done his fair share of procrastinating, I can appreciate Andrus’ approach to 2022 and 2023. He didn’t get a whole lot done in the first four months of either year, but then turned on the gas in August and September when it looked like the lethargy might come back to bite him. His .318/.330/.480 line down the stretch will likely be enough to get him to stick on someone’s roster for most of 2024. With a sea of chaos surrounding him, Andrus conducted himself as a professional and gets further points for performing actual acts of leadership on a team notoriously devoid of it. Grade: C-
Eloy Jiménez (DH): 489 PA, .272/.317/.441, 18 HR, 19.0% K, 6.1% BB, 105 wRC+, 0.4 fWAR, 0.3 bWAR
Jimenez’ 489 plate appearances were the most since his 2019 rookie season, but he didn’t do a whole lot with them. Contact quality became an issue, as Jimenez increased his already-problematic ground-ball rate, hit more popups, and had significantly fewer barrels. Jimenez has been with the White Sox for five years and has yet to clear 2 WAR in a season, and he looks to be on track for the White Sox to buy him out after 2024. That is, unless he finds a way to combine health and effectiveness for the first time in his career. Grade: D-
Tim Anderson (SS): 524 PA, .245/.286/.296, 1 HR, 23.3% K, 5.0% BB, 60 wRC+, -0.5 fWAR, -2.0 bWAR
How did we get here? Maybe it’s a combination of the groin and hand injuries Anderson sustained in 2022, plus a knee injury sustained when he collided with Matt Wallner on April 10 of this season. Maybe his off-the-field situation has reduced his focus on baseball. Maybe — and this is speculation — he’s just not happy here? In any event, he has hit just two home runs in the last 10 baseball months and has seen his defense significantly deteriorate. Tim Anderson has been behind some of the best moments of the last eight years for the White Sox, but this relationship feels like it’s over. Grade: F
Luis Robert Jr. (CF): 595 PA, .264/.315/.542, 38 HR, 28.9% K, 5.0% BB, 128 wRC+, 5.0 fWAR, 5.1 bWAR
We’ve been waiting to see what Robert looks like over a full, healthy season, and with the exception of a few weeks scattered in there, we finally got it. Robert was a beast in 2023 and would have easily eclipsed 40 homers if not for those few aforementioned weeks. He regained the speed and agility that he seemed to be lacking in 2022, and as a result, he graded out as one of the league’s best outfield defenders. It was a masterful breakout, and one we can only pray his oft-injured body allows him to repeat in the coming years. Grade: A
Andrew Vaughn (1B): 615 PA, .258/.314/.429, 21 HR, 21.0% K, 5.9% BB, 103 wRC+, 0.2 fWAR, 1.0 bWAR
Vaughn got the opportunity to move to his natural position in 2023. Many hoped this would help him focus on his offense, but score yet another point for those who believe hitting ability is independent of the place you stand on defense. Vaughn gave us more of the same at the plate and only improved his WAR metrics because he stopped hemorrhaging runs with his brutal outfield play. A sluggish baserunner who doesn’t play first base particularly well simply has to hit more than this to have any semblance of value. Grade: D-
Andrew Benintendi (LF): 621 PA, .262/.326/.356, 5 HR, 14.3% K, 8.4% BB, 87 wRC+, 0.0 fWAR, 0.2 bWAR
There were a lot of similarities between Vaughn and Benintendi’s seasons, both of which I’d describe as “watchably bad.” Both guys gave competitive at-bats, made plenty of contact, and hit for a respectable batting average. Both guys played mostly clean defense, but rated as pretty bad defenders because of all the plays they didn’t make that couldn’t be considered errors. These aren’t the players who were maddening because of strikeouts, sloppy fielding, or mental lapses. They hurt the team because of all that they didn’t do.
It’s easy to watch the games and look past Benintendi’s lack of home runs because no one watches an individual plate appearance expecting a player to hit a home run. As long as the player delivers a good at-bat, makes contact, and succeeds a reasonable percentage of the time, he’ll successfully avoid the boo birds. Homers are a low-percentage outcome, and they’re a pleasant surprise when they happen. However, when your 621 plate appearances are this devoid of pleasant surprises, and you can’t point to anything else you did at a high level, you didn’t do your job. Just four years, $64 million to go. Grade: F
THE CLASS RANK
- Luis Robert Jr. – A
- Jake Burger – B+
- Elvis Andrus – C-
- Zach Remillard – C-
- Yoan Moncada – D+
- Seby Zavala – D
- Andrew Vaughn – D-
- Eloy Jimenez – D-
- Andrew Benintendi – F
- Yasmani Grandal – F
- Lenyn Sosa – F
- Tim Anderson – F
- Gavin Sheets – F
- Óscar Colás – F
(Photo by Kamil Krzaczynski/USA TODAY Sports)
Hard to argue with much of any of that, Id probably knock Seb to a D-, tick up Vaughn to a D, and downgrade Andrus to a D cause when we needed him he was god awful. Really amazing we have never gotten a 2 war season out of Eloy… laughable really.
I cant stomach another season of guys like Sheets sticking around. The 2024 roster construction needs an entirely new focus.
I can deal with the losing if they try to truly reconstruct the roster next year, but if it’s patchwork while keeping guys who should have no place on the roster then I don’t know how long I can stick around. Right now, I’m just curious to see this play out.
I have no idea how much work is going to go in to the sox this offseason, are they going to rely on prospects and look towards a window more conducive to 2025 or are they really gonna try and sell the idea they can compete in 2024 which would require them going balls to the walls in free agency and on the trade market.
But
I am judging every move through a very narrow scope. I need to see some easily definable key things that for one reason or another the sox have totally ignored ….
Hitters: Need to walk, put the ball in the air, hit homers, play a defensive position above league average.
Pitchers: Need good walk rates, induce ground balls, have a semi decent injury history.
Every player added needs to start meeting these requirements.
IMO Moncada pulled himself up to C- in my book (same as Elvis and Remillard), but still 5th in Class Rank makes sense. Sosa gets a D from me based on his Aug-Sept. Around the Seby spot Class Rank. Overall, I agree. Great write-ups.
In grading the Sox, of note is the fact that the Twins had 7 hitters with a WAR over 2, and 11 with a WAR over 1. The Sox had 1 hitter with a WAR over 1. ONE! (they had 2, but Burger is now on another team.)
The Sox deserve an F minus, and an F you.
Moncada, Vaughn Eloy and Benintendi all need to be Bs or C+s with an A from one of them for this team to have any success next year. Those 4 will probably occupy spots in the top 6 of the order next year. Hopefully they add an actual bat that can join them and Robert in the top 6. Of the 14 guys that were reviewed, we had 10 Ds/Fs. How pathetic is that. And the pitching might be worse!
The trade of Burger still has me in wtf mode. Beyond just the numbers, he was a positive, as a player and personality, something in woefully short supply. Plus, Moncadas penchant for perpetual injuries and only having 1 year left. For all the talk of culture, they sure were quick to trade it away.
Sheets continues to prove himself as a probably never ready for prime time player. I would openly laugh when other teams would make moves centered around sheets. He’s living proof that some teams just don’t pay attention and they see Tarzan but never look beyond the exterior. With all the sophisticated yet rest to parse stats available, you have to wonder how much of that actually makes it to the field with some teams, when they make move to, “try and neutralize sheets bat”. If they were actually paying attention they should have been baiting the Sox to bring sheets to the plate.
sadly the sox didnt need to be baited into giving sheets almost 1000 useless mlb at bats
They White Sox sucked, the worst in fact!, at getting on base, which is necessary to score runs and win games, and Jake Burger sucks at getting on base.
Jake Burger sucked at getting on base with the White Sox when his OB% was .279 but as a Marlin, he no longer sucked, posting a .355 OB%.
Shockingly, Burger credited the Marlins’ coaches for correcting a problem with his hitting approach. Who would have thunk it?
Wow, where does Getz start to clean up this mess? Less than good players with bad contracts. Gaping holes in RF and 2B. Mediocrity at 1B. No speed; no defense; no power. One good guy in Robert, but he often takes days off even when he’s playing.
Contend in 2024? This mess was years in the making. It can’t be cleaned up in one off- season. But Getz needs to establish credibility with the fans, and, with players’ agents. A good start would be to fire Grifol and promote Montoya. He wasn’t bad at Toronto and he has the Rays in his background. I think he has a good reputation with players.
A better start would be to fire Grifol and hire Kapler, especially because the Sox are stuck with underachieving players with bad contracts. And he’s a guy who plays match ups and uses platoons which will come in handy with a roster that will, at best, be full of mediocre hold overs, non roster invitees and 2nd tier free agents in 2024.
Always looking forward to read your score Patrick. This time, however, I have a small quibble with your grade to Lenyn Sosa. Yes, he overall numbers were atrocious, but his bad stats were heavily front loaded. Sosa was starting to figure things out in the 2nd half this year. Still not great but a wRC+ of 88 in the 2nd half gives hope to believe that once again, Sosa took his time to acclimate himself to a new level of baseball. He also played decent defense without being nowhere near Yolmer Sanchez good. He looked professional. I wouldn’t have given him an F.
And as he started to show a little life, he struggled to get consistent playing time in favor of a resurgent Andrus. And some of that time came at 3B to spell Moncada. I’m not ready to give up on him, and I wouldn’t give him an F for this year. Perhaps his ceiling is utility infielder, but if the Sox don’t sign a truly legit answer at 2B, he should get a chance to develop at second.
woof
What a disaster of a roster. Where do you even begin to address how consistently terrible everyone is up and down? And not just in one aspect, but they are bad at defense, baserunning, and can’t hit. It takes a special skill to assemble such a sad group of professional athletes.
What’s even worse is that the farm system is also a mess, with no help coming soon from that bunch. The free agent class is pretty devoid of any top-end talent. So, they need to turn into the Rays real quick if they want any sort of success, yet they promoted the same Bozo that has been in charge of a bottom-barrel farm system for years.
I think it’s pretty obvious this will be a tear down, as you aren’t milking 85 wins from this roster no matter how healthy they are. Time to look forward to 2028.
The only way the Sox could compete in the next two years would be if they traded their entire roster for a team that won 85 games. Their roster is so bad that there is no place to begin. They have the worst pitching and defense possible, and lose every position player matchup to the Twins by a mile, other than Robert. The Sox need almost a whole new roster, and are not going to be competitive again in less than probably 4 years. By then it will be time for Robert to leave.
They need to trade Cease for sure, taking the best offer they can get, and listen to offers on Robert as well. They should ask a king’s ransom for him, but they’re not going to do a thing until he’s gone, even if that’s 4 years away. Any notion that the Sox could splurge in the FA market and compete next year or in 2025 is just ridiculous. They finished 26 behind the Twins (and 17 out of 2nd place), and have a worse roster than they played with through July. They aren’t competing next year, or the year after, or the year after that. Jerry hasn’t spent a dime on a single top tier free agent in 25 years besides.
The Sox are scorched earth. 2028 as you suggest might be when they could have an interesting group again – only if they get good returns for Cease and Robert, draft wisely with pretty high picks the next 4 years, and start being smart and bold instead of moronic and cheap.
Does a healthy Robert beat a healthy Buxton? Maybe, but it’s damn close.
Everything is predicated by the early moves. We should have a good sense on where they are going and what can be accomplished by the end of the winter meetings.
It’s probably a fair read that they’ll accomplish precious little by then, we’ll see.
A healthy Buxton is an oxymoron.
There is a way they can win 85 games next year, but it involves Jerry doing something he never does, spend lots of money.
Starting pitching- He would need to add two quality starters, one from the top tier of free agents, and one from the second tier. Kopech would have to become a decent starter again. Toussaint or Nastrini becomes a credible number 5 starter.
Bullpen- Crochet or Santos is the closer. Bummer recovers to be a late inning option. They add one quality free agent reliever. 3 or 4 of the young guys step up and contribute to the bullpen.
Infield- Moncada stays healthy and has a year somewhere between his 2019 and 2021 years. Vaughn has an OPS above 110. One of the young guys grabs 2nd base and plays well. They sign a decent stopgap shortstop who performs well until Montgomery is ready.
Catcher- Korey Lee learns how to hit and he and Perez are an average to slightly below average catching tandem.
Outfield- Robert stays awesome, Benintendi has a career average year (for him). They spend big for Bellinger to play RF and he shows 2023 was not a fluke.
Eloy stays healthy and hits 30 home runs.
They fire Grifol and replace him with a real manager.
That’s 17 IFs. If 14-15 of them pan out, they could win 85. See, not too difficult. And the odds of that happening are 1:1,000,000.
I think the market has already proven that money alone won’t attract top tier talent. They see an owner that fucks everything up, a GM who won’t get rid of an incompetent manager and talk from every team that plays the WS about how they just aren’t present.
Who wants that when they can get into a much better situation?
The odds of them winning 85 next year, or signing Bellinger, are exactly zero – unless Jerry dies, and the team is sold to someone like Cohen. And even then, the odds of winning 85 remain zero, but there would be a non-zero chance they could sign Bellinger.
That’s why I said 1:1,000,000, which is essentially zero.
But a lineup with best case Yoan, Eloy, Robert, Vaughn and adding Bellinger- and adding 3 quality pitchers to an effective Cease and Kopech would make them a decent team. Again, that has a very nearly zero chance of happening.
Bellinger can’t hit a fastball anymore, why would you want him?
Maybe because he was 4.4 WAR, 133 OPS+, .356 OBP, plays good defense and steal bases.
And the season before that he was a 1.2 WAR, 81 OPS+, and .265 OBP
And the season before that he was a -1.7 WAR, 44 OPS+, and .240 OBP
And he doesn’t hit the fastball, so which one are you going to get? And are you willing to spend 6/$200 Mil to find out. Sometimes there are deals you make that you’ll instantly regret, there’s so many red flags on this one that there’s no way it will turn out differently.
That’s why I call them Chicago Whatif Sox
Agree 100% except you forgot a zero at the end.
Sheets is the definition of “Looks like Tarzan, plays like Jane”. How are you 6’5, 230 lbs and slugging below .400 the last 2 years?
Probably because he isn’t good at baseball.
while also almost exclusively playing to your platoon strength….
Worst Sox lineup since…1986, I think? At least that team had Baines.
Just need to draft McDowell, Ventura, Thomas, and Fernandez and we’ll be fine!
MLB Trade Rumors is up with the Sox offseason outlook. Read it and then stab your eyes out. It’s nothing we don’t already know, but it just seems so bleak as Tim Dierkes lays it out.
The conclusion of that post manages to find the smallest sliver of optimism
I would add a SS but yeah that’s all we need is C, 2B, SS, RF, 3 SP, and multiple RP. All for around $75 mil. No problem right?
Some things take time, and a plan. This is a 110 loss roster right now. The Astros lost 105+ for 3 straight years, then 90, before putting together a really good team – the right way. The Sox are at the front end of that. It makes no sense to spend $75M trying to make a 110 loss team a 95 or 100 loss team. The Twins had a lot of positive developments this year, and led the league in homers. Royce Lewis posted a 2.4 WAR in less than 60 games, he looks like a stud. They have depth, and can field. They were 13 over .500 in the 2nd half, and are more likely to win 90+ next year than the Sox are to lose less than 100, no matter what they do.
All they can do now is be patient, accept that they are 3 or 4 years away, minimum, take advantage of high draft picks the next 4 years, get good prospects for Cease and Robert, and not waste tons of money on garbage free agents, or decent ones who won’t even be here if/when they hope to have a good roster again by like 2028.
You’re right- that’s the right approach. But they did that in 2017-2019, and all we got out of it were 2 playoff games won. Jerry will try to cobble together a decent team with castoffs and modest free agent signings like he’s done in the past. To go scorched-earth rebuild only a few years after a scorched-earth rebuild would just admit that they royally screwed up the last rebuild. That would make Jerry look bad. So he’ll add a few free agents and lose only 95-100 instead of 110. He probably thinks that would make him look good. He just needs to go away-and fast.
Or completely change the way he does things .Most likely they’ll add a few free agents, waste 20-50M on nobody of any quality, and lose 107 instead of 110. They are not adding 10-15 WAR in free agents under Jerry in any universe.
The way the anti-tanking rules work, they won’t be getting very high picks in consecutive seasons. They may as well fill out the roster with actual major league players (i.e., no more Sheets) on short deals who they can potentially flip at the deadline.
Quibbler
I’m sorry if a .258/.314/.429 103 wRC+ gets you a D- (which is totally fair), then a .214/.279/.527 113 wRC+ is at best a C. Burger is fun and a great story, but he was/is very very very bad at getting on base.
The difference is defense, defensive position, and baserunning.
Also expectation? Burger didn’t make the team out of ST.
Yes — I neglected to include that, but expectation was a factor as well.
The Sox will tell us all we need to know about their commitment to 2024 with their Clevinger decision. If they don’t try to keep their best pitcher (who they already tried to dump in 2023), they have no intention of competing in 2024.
I love all of this speculation about what they’re going to do about RF, 2B, SS, C. Let’s just imagine that they spend through the roof to address these positions. Of course, we know they won’t do that and oh, by the way, George Steinbrenner couldn’t solve all of those holes with this upcoming FA class. They don’t have trade chips beyond Robert and Cease. Vaughn and Jimenez are known bum quality players by the rest of MLB.
OK, even if they patched all of those holes, their pitching staff, even with Clevinger, is not even remotely MLB caliber. I don’t think anyone could turn this around in 2024. I’ll keep watching the games out of morbid curiosity and a lack of anything better to do, but I will bet the under on their win total if it is 74 or above.
By the way, I would grade AB above and F; he at least showed up and shut up.
Since it’s a mutual option, I have a hard time seeing Clevinger agree to come back. He can at least get a 2 year deal on the open market. I don’t mind the Sox bringing him back for 2/$20M or 2/$24M.
I think the grades on a few people were too dour. To give Beni and Grandal the same grade as Anderson, Sheets, and Colas is laughable so I would move them up into D territory. Eloy moves up to a D+ for me since he was a competent, if uninspiring, major league DH.
I’d bump Vaughn up to a C-. Yes, I’d like to see more, but he actually played through a compete season without a drop-off at the end. He had 53 extra-base hits and 80 RBIs. Maybe he didn’t have a “good” season but he certainly didn’t have a bad one. Being a slow 1B should already be baked into his expectations.
Seemed pretty clear that expectations are a factor. Totally not “laughable” to give Benintendi that grade given his contract and wretched defensive performance paired with below league average offense.
Vaughn is 39th among MLB 1B in fWAR. If you can’t crack the top 30 at your position, how is that not failing?
The F range is a wide range. If you think of percentages, the D range is 60-69, C is 70-79.
F is everywhere from 0-59. Benintendi would be in the high 50s. Colas would be in the single digits.
I am glad I understood your grades as school grades. I typed this response, and then let it go. Wasn’t sure if you expected a normal distribution around C or something.
Can’t wait to see this lineup go at it again next season. Barring some creativity, the White Sox have historically lacked, suddenly happening I don’t think Grifol can get a team to outperform it’s deficiencies given how this season went. This team did not respond to him on the field or show respect off. When players are talking about clubhouse stuff, for whatever reasons, this often I can’t imagine that it was only because of Kenny and Rick drama. The start of Spring Training was a trainwreck and it somehow got worse as the season wore on. Unfortunately I don’t think we have seen the bottom of this yet. At least it will be funny since as much as it hurts as a fan, I don’t take anything the White Sox do seriously. Is what it is. My only hope is for them to prove my ass wrong so I can feel like they earned it this time.
Next year Pedro won’t be wearing so many hats and won’t be burdened by our disappointments from 2022 and plus he’ll have help from Chris Getz, so you know…
Single hat slow hook
More like a balaclava without eye-holes. Think of Renee Magritte “The Lovers” painting.
I wonder how this compares to Patrick’s usual grade distribution…
Poorly!
Grades from start of season to when games stopped mattering:
Robert B+
Benintendi B-
Vaughn C+
Burger C+
Eloy C
Grandal D-
TA F
Moncada F
The harsh grades were very earned.
This winter will be a slow-motion train wreck if history repeats itself. We will watch it frame by frame and once again surprised when they turn off the water while it is still burning.
I don’t think stagnation counts as slow motion.
Might be interesting to provide the preseason projections to help anchor expectations.