PHOENIX -- It can induce eye rolls when team officials claim ignorance of public projections or claim to not even come close to looking at the internet, or when a highly regarded team conjures up a fake "nobody believed in us!" rallying cry. So it could be seen as refreshing that Pedro Grifol, manager of a White Sox team no one is buying as even dark horse AL Central threats in 2024, acknowledged dire PECOTA projections and didn't even use it as an excuse for anti-analytic diatribe either -- another too common move.
Or, it goes to show that when a team has been losing and doesn't appear to have any immediate answers for it, even simple defiance is a hard sell.
"We come out with 0.00 percent chance of making the playoffs, that motivates the heck out of me," said Grifol. "I know it's a little bit of a talk in [the clubhouse]. This is a division that obviously no one is scheduled to run away with it. Why not us? We're here. We've got to play 162 games. If we were out of it already, then why play? We're not out of it. We've got 162 games to play. We've got close to 40 days to prepare for those 162 games. I know they've got to do their job and the percentages are the percentages. Our job is to prove them wrong."
An updated PECOTA projection actually has the White Sox all the way up to a 0.2 percent chance to make the playoffs. Only Colorado and Washington, playing in far superior divisions, are still sitting at 0.0 percent. But the perception that the White Sox have no chance and need to conjure some alternate purpose to their season is still something that they have to actively push back on.
"We’re not here with the mindset that we’re going to lose," said Dylan Cease, when asked if there was an excitement at the prospect of being dealt to a contending team. In the same answer he acknowledged that yes, there would be.
"It's motivating everybody," Grifol said. "It's got to be motivating everybody in the building. If it's not, you've got to check yourself at that door. I don't know if it's the right place for you. Zero point zero percent after turning over a roster the way we've turned it over and new front office members and new coaches and new vibe and energy in the work that was done in the offseason. It's good. It's good to hang up on the wall."
Grifol was speaking at the end of the White Sox first workout day with pitchers and catchers, and the author only noticed pitching and conditioning schedules, and abuse hotlines printed out in four different languages decorating the Camelback Ranch clubhouse walls. If the manager follows through with his idea, the Sox will depart this facility at the end of March, and only complex league players would be around to appreciate irony if the major league team still makes a beeline toward their expectedly dreary finish. It's a low-stakes motivational tactic, unless you count getting clowned on Twitter.
The first day's pass through the White Sox clubhouse indicated a similar defiance, but turned down to more listenable volume. They think they could be better: better than they were, better than you think. If they play defense, run the bases better, and avoid the mistakes that kneecapped them so regularly over the past two years, they could surely outpace 61 wins. Once they clear that, the 66-win barrier set by PECOTA doesn't sound too crazy to them either.
"I don't think anybody in that clubhouse was talking about last year," Grifol said. "As a matter of fact, I know nobody in that clubhouse is talking about last year. I haven't heard one comment made from 2023. And if I do, that's where the last word ends. We've turned the page and we're looking forward to having these position players here. Work out those four days and get ready for some Cactus League games."
The turnover level in the White Sox clubhouse is really striking when trying to pick out familiar faces, and a suddenly less readable jersey font surely doesn't help:
The organization started doing postmortems and recriminations about the 2023 season last July, so being done with relitigating the disaster makes sense, even if a satisfactory answer for it all remains elusive.
But once again, Grifol overstated for the sake of making a point. This team, with its emphasis on defense, has been assembled in response to last year's flaws. Players train all offseason addressing flaws the previous year revealed. Grifol himself refers to lessons learned from his disastrous first season. And remembering all the failures of 2023 provides a roadmap for what could make for satisfying progress, in a year where maxing out their potential is still unlikely to result in a playoff push.
One player offered the rationale that while the team has not replaced the star power of last year's group, in many cases they're trying to improve upon the production of the worst years of those star players' careers. Tim Anderson, Lance Lynn, Aaron Bummer, Yasmani Grandal and Joe Kelly are all gone, but they combined for five wins below replacement in Sox uniforms last season per Baseball-Reference.com. Dominic Fletcher and Zach DeLoach were both blocked prospects at their old club, but they're stepping into a right field picture where the Sox's top two options last season combined for three wins below replacement. Few relievers in camp are even on guaranteed contracts, but the Sox had the most expensive Opening Day bullpen in the sport last season, and they issued walks and blew leads at a rate exceeded only by fellow cellar dwellers.
If nothing else, few players have the standing to fail to that degree without being replaced. A more common motivational line in the Sox clubhouse is that they have to perform or they will soon be elsewhere, facing a more fraught opportunity. One of just a handful of guys who can count on the team riding through their lows this year spent the afternoon talking about playing through the specter of an inevitable trade, and still conjured a usable group rationale.
"I just want to perform," Cease said. "Baseball is one of those games where anything can happen. So I think we’re all prepared to do the best that we can and see what happens.”
That writing is already on the wall, so nothing new needs to be taped up.
Lightning Round(-Up)
*With pitching coach Ethan Katz away from the team attending to a personal matter (Katz announced his mother passed away), senior advisor to pitching Brian Bannister was the most vocal instructor as Sox pitchers threw bullpens. He took a particularly active role in Michael Kopech's throwing session; directing his former Red Sox protege to come across his body more in finishing his pitches, hoping to reduce the frequency of balls popping out of Kopech's hand and missing high and to the arm side.
*Prospect arm Nick Nastrini bumped into Cease in Atlanta during the offseason as they both worked out at the Maven Baseball facility.
"Coming from the Dodgers, we had really good player development, so I was seeking something similar," Nastrini said. "It's more so, how can I dumb it down? Because the numbers are so advanced, you just try to figure out how can I simplify everything in ways that I can go out there onto the field each day and work on them, so I'm not out there focusing on the exact force plate numbers, or how much pressure I'm putting into the ground or anything like that."
*Free agent addition Erick Fedde, who ties a lot of his recent success to accepting his natural arm slot and commanding his two-seamer better as a result, thinks he sees a commonality in the pitching profiles the Sox have brought in this year.
"Obviously everyone's different, but there's a lot of guys I see who are sinker-sweeper guys," Fedde said. "A couple years ago I feel like everyone was into the ride and high fastballs. It's exciting to see a plan and a true goal. There's a lot of guys that fit that sinker-sweeper profile."
