Measuring by money spent, infielder Josh Rojas was the biggest White Sox free-agent addition to their position player crop.
To be clear, it was a team coming off the losingest season in MLB history, signing the now 31-year-old for one year and $3.5 million, which was less than the projected $4.3 million he would be owed in arbitration that the Mariners declined to tender him. So there's no reason to gussy up the expectations that were placed upon him, which Chris Getz never put in highfalutin terms.
"He wanted to sign here, candidly, because he saw opportunity," Getz said after the signing. "A guy that has made such strides at the major league level as a defender, and to have him in our clubhouse with other players as well as they break into the major leagues is big. This is a guy that is determined to match what he’s done in the past from an offensive standpoint."
Rojas echoed Getz's sentiments on the roster upon arrival, saying "I'm still trying to show that I can be an everyday guy," which probably wouldn't have been on the table for the contending teams pursuing him in free agency as a high-level role player. But the selling points were good, versatile defense and clubhouse leadership. The idea of returning to the 2021-22 run where Rojas' on-base skills made him an above-average hitter existed as more of a stretch goal.
In an ironic turn, Rojas' unabashed enthusiasm for backpicks combined with the team's eager-to-impress rookie catchers has made his leadership -- so often a canard used to sell fans on underwhelming veterans -- actually the easiest element of his game for outsiders to appreciate.
Rojas' defense has looked sharper of recent, after a spate of early misplays immediately upon being activated from the injured list tanked his metrics to the point where he's still sitting at a -1 Outs Above Average (OAA) and -2 Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) on the season. But he's simply hitting too poorly -- .179/.255/.224 in 150 plate appearances through 48 games -- for any other element of his game to take center stage, and he knows it, perhaps too well.
"When I first got here, those first three weeks where everybody's hitting .250, .280, .300 and I'm at .100," Rojas said. "You try not to let it get in your head, but it definitely does where you're trying to catch up and perform and show why you belong and all the things that come with being on a team, where you have eight other guys relying on you to keep the line moving."
Rojas was signed on the heels of a 91 wRC+ campaign in 2024, which would be good enough to earn his keep on any White Sox team of the last three years. But he personally viewed his performance critically, describing it as the result of him focusing too much on power after a brief midseason spate of homers, becoming too fly ball-oriented and losing his approach en route to more strikeouts.
In that vein, a toe fracture at the end of spring that cost Rojas the first month of the season was a far more jarring shock to an offensive profile that didn't have a ton of margin for error, and it's having much more long-lasting impact.
"It's definitely been a long process," Rojas said of re-finding his offensive timing mid-season. "There's been spurts where I feel like I have it, and the next day it's gone. Last couple of weeks I've realized that it's kind of more of a mentality thing. I've tried so many mechanical changes, I went to a little toe tap for a second. I was trying so many different mechanical things to try to make solid contact, consistent contact."
In some respects, Rojas is adhering to some of his offensive goals. His 17.6 percent swing rate on pitches outside of the strike zone is one of the lower marks in the league and the best of his seven-year career. He's reduced his fly-ball rate -- which ballooned over 40 percent for the first time in his career last season -- by nearly 4 percentage points. Rojas doesn't have the raw power to build his game around lifting the ball, and felt his best on-base rates and most consistent extra-base production would come with a more line-drive trajectory.
But Rojas averaged 10 homers per year during his 2021-22 run as an everyday guy with the Diamondbacks, and going 150 plate appearances without one as he has thus far this season counts as an unwelcome departure. In recent days, Rojas has found his struggles aligning with the larger issues of the White Sox offense as a whole. A disciplined plate approach is great, but its end goal is to coax hittable fastballs from opposing pitchers, and neither Rojas nor his teammates have been able to do enough with them. Rojas is slugging .225 against fastballs on the season.
"We've had so many conversations this year on controlling the strike zone, and with controlling the strike zone comes seeing the ball a little deeper, and sometimes you miss your pitch when you do that," Rojas said. "My swing decisions are really good. I'm not chasing, but I'm getting fastballs over the plate that I either foul off or I swing and miss. I'm taking the one I should take, but I'm missing the ones I should hit."
Rojas has long hit with a leg kick, so the toe tap was an effort to mechanically juice his efforts to catch up with velocity. But as his troubles with fastballs persisted, he's shifted toward viewing it as a mental approach matter, and accepting some sacrifices of his patience in exchange for the production he's seeking.
"I was having a conversation with Grady [Sizemore], just hitting in the cage with the machine and everything's flying off really well. He brought up the point that I've just got to be free in the box: Go up there and be on time for the fastball and eliminate other thoughts," Rojas said. "When I'm hitting off the velo machine and I know the fastball is coming, I can hit it square almost every time. Then I get in the game and it's, 'Where are my hands? Where are my legs? Make sure you don't chase the curveball, make sure you lay off the changeup.' There's so much going on in your head that it makes you late, or it makes you just miss. So I've dialed it in to a mentality thing. I'm trying to eliminate all the mechanical stuff and just go to, 'I'm going to be on time for the fastball, and I'm going to trust my eyes on all the other stuff.'"
Risking a higher chase rate is usually an anathema for a hitter whose primary aspiration is getting on base, but Rojas is already striking out at a career-high 25.3 percent clip, and is seeking a fix for a career-worst offensive season that has already fast-forwarded to the midpoint for him. Even if he were having a good year, the nearing trade deadline would bring uncertainty for Rojas' future this month, and if anything, Colson Montgomery is behind schedule for bringing a playing time crunch to the major league infield mix.
So other than the whole daily effort of winning games, the project of getting Rojas right might not have particularly enduring effects on the White Sox, even if he quietly has the fifth-highest salary on the team. But with their free agent outlays likely hanging around a similar tier and skill set this coming winter, and Rojas' mixture of defense and plate discipline so tightly fitting the profile the White Sox have sought on the open market, the ability to get him right would be a transferrable skill.
He just needs to stay on the fastball, after all, something every hitter needs to do.
