Will Venable's team couldn't snap the White Sox's 21-year World Series drought, but it did enough to snap the franchise's Manager of the Year drought.
As expected, the Baseball Writers Association of America named Will Venable the American League Manager of the Year for his work in helping engineer a historic turnaround for the White Sox. He's the sixth manager to win the honor, and the first since Ozzie Guillén, who won it to cap off the magical season that was 2005.
The vote was far from unanimous, as Venable earned just 15 of 30 first-place votes on the three-spot ballot, and was left off one ballot entirely. It was still enough to deny Kevin Cash the honor for a third straight season, as he earned just 12 first-place votes and was left off four ballots.
Cash wouldn't have been a crazy choice, what with the under-funded Rays once again leading the American League in wins and more or less looking like the class of the Junior Circuit from the end of June through their six-game victory over the Cleveland Guardians in the ALCS.
But although Venable's Sox came up a game short of winning the AL Central, his team otherwise checked off the boxes that make for ideal Manager of the Year material.
The team overperformed: And historically so. The White Sox had lost 100-plus games in each of the previous three seasons, and entered the year with a miniscule probability of making the postseason (PECOTA had their October odds at 1.5 percent). That made sense, not just because of the lack of track records on the White Sox roster, but because no team had ever made the postseason after two 100-loss seasons. That one of those three doomed Sox seasons set the modern MLB record for losses made the turnaround all the more improbable.
He managed, hard: Running the 2026 White Sox meant managing a rotation that provided the fewest innings in baseball while manipulating a lineup that was usually one-third rookies and had to cover for swing-and-miss issues in the middle of the order. The sheer number of moves left himself open to copious amounts of second-guessing, but the strain didn't show nearly as often as it could have.
And in a way, the inventive, unconventional bullpen usage almost made him unjudgeable. It often resembled panic, but his placid demeanor always suggested he had it under control, even if it was one bad inning from completely blowing up. Most of the season was like watching him wrench at a stickshift while navigating the Circle Interchange in a 1966 Trabi. By all means, try telling him what he's doing wrong. Even if you're right, there's too much engine noise to hear a damn word you're saying.
The team got along famously well: You may never again see a clubhouse as harmonious as the 2026 White Sox's one appeared to be, and while Venable didn't present himself as a Cool Stepdad/Joe Maddon type who sought to actively foster such an environment, he and his staff didn't get in the way of a good thing, while also maintaining standards and accountability.
It'll be a difficult act to follow, but managing the 2026 White Sox was by definition a difficult act, and one that Venable would probably prefer not to make the blueprint going forward. If the roster -- particularly the pitching depth -- allows him to resemble a more conventional manager in 2027, his award-winning work in 2026 should make him hyper-equipped to solve the fewer and less frequent problems that arise.
