It’s difficult to even know where to begin with this blog entry. Even though it’s many years in the making, it’s still difficult to put everything into words and try to lay the groundwork for an explanation. So this may seem long-winded and rambling but it’s the most important blog post I’ve ever written.
In late June I’m going to be walking away from social media and the Chicago White Sox. Yes, I know, I’ve said it before and did not follow through. This was a timing issue more than an issue of desire. I’ve been planning this out carefully, down to the last detail. And while I’ve been considering this move since at least 2011, the actual want to do this stretches back much further than that… 2001… 1997… As far as 1993.
I’ll begin with exactly what my plan is and why I want to do it. The plan part is easy, I want to play an entire college “dynasty,” or career, in the video game world. I want to play four seasons of college football, basketball and baseball. You may wonder what that has to do with the White Sox or social media, and I’ll get to that as I go on. The why, I can’t answer for sure. It may be a midlife crisis, it may be a longing for happier days, of which I’ve had many, back in the late 1990s and early 2000s. It may be a lot of things combined.
As a lot of you know, EA Sports stopped making college sports games in the 2010s (and at least one college franchise in the 2000s) due to the athletes not receiving any kind of royalties due to their likenesses being used in the games. The last college football game hit the shelves in 2014, the last college basketball game in 2010 (both on the PlayStation 3) and the last college baseball game (of which there were only two) in 2007 (on the PlayStation 2). So it is here that I made my decision to play the entire Dynasty on the 2007 games for the PlayStation 2. NCAA Football 07, NCAA March Madness 07 and MVP NCAA Baseball 07.
Yes, they’re severely outdated (like 16 years outdated), but that means less than one might imagine since updated rosters are available not only for download but on memory cards that can be purchased from eBay or other online stores. So while the graphics will be extremely dated, the experience won’t be.
Now, I want to take a step back in time and explain how I got to this point.
I have a long experience as a sports video gamer. One of the absolute highlights of this came back in 1993, when my friend Calvin and I spent a weekend playing Baseball Stars on the NES.
Baseball Stars was the first video game to include a fully programmable option, you could create your own teams and your own leagues, even with the ability to make players male or female. This was unheard of at the time, and that game was, and still is, one of my all time favorites. Calvin and I had what might be considered a fantasy draft, selecting players for our teams, as well as one minor league team each. We then created ourselves and our entire teams and proceeded to play an entire season.
The idea of “creating” yourself in a game stuck with me. My next favorite sports game (chronologically) was Tecmo Super Bowl. This was the first sports game to feature not only real teams but real players, but the “creation” option hadn’t reached it’s point in time yet. At this point, my senior year in high school, my friend Joe Nunez and I played a complete season, just “pretending” we were the players in the game, as Joe played as the Cleveland Browns and I played as the New Orleans Saints. But I wanted to “be” me.
In the summer of 1995, I bought a copy of an old NES game called John Elway’s Quarterback. This game had neither real players or real teams, just a bunch of bland players and city names instead of teams. It’s at this point I began the “dynasty” concept; I would play four “seasons” of football on John Elway’s Quarterback and then I would start playing Tecmo Super Bowl as an NFL draftee.
John Elway’s Quarterback doesn’t have any kind of stat saving ability, so while I played I kept a spiral notebook in my hand, and every time I completed a pass or ran for positive yardage, I would write that number down in parenthesis in my notebook, and if I threw an incomplete pass, I’d mark that with an “x.” Then I could figure out my completion percentage and total yards, as well as my touchdowns and interceptions. I used the “Los Angeles” team on the game as the UCLA Bruins, and when I finished, I was “drafted” by the Cleveland Browns. I proceeded to play seven seasons with the Browns on Tecmo Super Bowl, winning three Super Bowls before I quit. For whatever reason, I didn’t keep all of my stats like I wanted to.
The next time I decided to do a Dynasty was 1997, and it was much more advanced and involved than the 1995 version. This time, I was using the Super Nintendo and was playing both football and basketball at UCLA, using College Football USA 97 and NCAA Final Four Basketball and when I finished, I created myself on Madden 97. This was leaps and bounds ahead of what I had done before, with College Football USA 97 keeping all of the important stats I needed and, while NCAA Final Four Basketball didn’t really have a season option, I made the best of it and played what amounted to four full seasons. When this was finished, I was drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers on Madden 97 but I never got around to actually playing for them.
This was not my least successful run, but it was definitely not my best. While College Football USA 97 was a million miles ahead of keeping my own stats with a “fake” team, there was still no option to create myself (however, on the Sega Genesis version of College Football USA 97, player creation IS an option) and the game play was so unbelievably slow, there was no real enjoyment to be had playing the game. But the fact that I was able to play football AND basketball was a revelation and really did change everything.
Fast forward to 2001. I had upgraded to a Sony PlayStation and the first thing I did was purchase NCAA GameBreaker 2000 and NCAA Final Four 2000, as well as NFL GameDay 2000. These games were all produced by Sony’s 989 Studios, and what a major improvement compared to my previous dynasty. I could play a full career at UCLA in both football and basketball with real stats, schedules, etc.
I enjoyed this immensely, and allowed myself to be drafted on NFL GameDay 2000 and ended up with the Carolina Panthers as a second round pick. I decided to run with it. A couple of games into my second season with the Panthers, it said my character had suffered a knee injury and I ended up being out the rest of the season. This was doubly bad when, at the end of the year, I was on the Panthers’ list of retired players. This bothered me more than it should have, and it would be nine years before I decided to try again.
I went on to pick up MLB 2000, and by 2004 I was completely off on college (and pro) football and basketball, and subsequently bought MLB 2004 and MLB 2005. Once the MLB The Show series started, I bought every game every year, including 2023. As I mentioned, during this time, EA Sports stopped producing college sports games, and at some point in the early 2010s I did buy NCAA Football 10 and NCAA Basketball 10 and eventually bought NCAA Football 13 and NCAA Football 14. They were never used and, in fact, NCAA Football 14 has never been out of the case. I just didn’t feel anything anymore for college sports, I was all in on baseball.
The problem with that is I have burned myself out beyond the ability to even function anymore. My life has been all baseball, all day, 365 days a year since 2004. I got on social media in 2005 (MySpace) and it’s been posting stories and lineups and transactions every day for 18 years. And I am ready for a change.
And I’m ready to take a step back in time to happier days and even though I know the experience won’t be the same, I still want to take the time and do this one more time, a little better than the last time I did it, because now it’s time to play college football, basketball and baseball. The complete experience.
I have procured brand new, unopened copies of NCAA Football 07, NCAA March Madness 07 and MVP NCAA Baseball 07 as well as updated rosters for each. I’m going to create myself and play all the way through, all three sports, until I “graduate.” After that, I’m not sure what I’m going to do. I may “get drafted” on Madden 07 or I may buy the newest Madden (whenever that may be) for the PS5 or I may break down and play Road To The Show for the first time on MLB The Show. I’m not worried about it right now. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. Right now, my focus is on unfocusing on the White Sox.
I’ve not yet decided if I’m going to do this dynasty with the WVU Mountaineers or the UCLA Bruins but at the moment it’s definitely 90% UCLA. That decision will come within the next month. The other decision I’m battling with is what to do with social media. I know the vast majority of people who are friends or followers on social media are there for my White Sox posts, so my plan at the moment is to just create new social media accounts strictly for college sports. I’ll keep my other accounts in case this idea falls flat or something happens to hasten my return to the way things are now. I’m hopeful that doesn’t happen and I hope my friends who enjoy college sports will follow me to my new platforms. That decision will also be made in the next month.
So, in closing, as I stand right now, I’m fully planning on making this project a reality. And while I’ll be using PS2 games, I have a backward compatible PS3 that does upgrade the graphics slightly. Once I’ve made the decision, I’ll be boxing up all of my White Sox memorabilia and putting it in storage. I figure this project should take roundabout two years to finish completely, at which a White Sox return is certainly possible.
It is with mixed emotions that I present this blog entry, as I have spent the better part of two years deciding exactly how, and when, I would need to write it.
After much thought and discussion, I have decided that the time is now for me to walk away from social media and the Chicago White Sox. The reasons for this are varied but it all comes down to needing to do what’s right for my mental health and well-being.
Regarding the White Sox, I have reached a low point in my fandom, after 32 years, I just don’t have the desire to continue watching this clown show. Most everyone knows I’ve dropped tens of thousands of dollars right into Jerry Reinsdorf’s pocket over the years, in addition to paying $150 a year for MLB.TV, just for the pleasure of being disgusted and aggravated.
For over 20 years I’ve wanted to redo a little project I did back in 2001 (and once previously in 1995-96) that requires my full attention and I have decided that the time to do it is now. I have to remove outside influences and that means spending my money elsewhere, not on the White Sox or MLB, in general. It requires spending my time elsewhere, as well.
Which brings me to social media. I first joined MySpace in September 2005, and I’ve been completely connected ever since. This has been both a blessing and a curse, and while I love all of my White Sox friends, I need to take a step back and isolate myself for a while. This is not to say I’m going to go away forever; in fact, I’m not closing my accounts, I’m just removing them from my phone/tablet/PC and letting them sit. I don’t want to oversell what I’m doing, this is a mental health break, and if my project goes to plan, it should take around two years to finish.
I don’t expect this to be easy, but I’m going to give it everything I have. And until I return, I hope the White Sox find some way to turn things around and I hope everyone has happy, fulfilling and productive lives, myself included. Thank you for being a friend.
This is going to be one of my shorter blog entries, because I don’t want to spend a lot of time dwelling on 2022 (or 2021 or 2020 or any of the past 18 years) or over-hyping what may be another year in a long line of really bad years.
If you roll back in my blog to December 2019 you’ll see how much I looked forward to the 2020s beginning and the miserable 2010s finally coming to an end. Not much in my life has gone well or been pleasant since around 2004, and I know most of this is due to the fact that I got home internet service in 2005, and life has gone downhill ever since.
While the first six weeks of 2020 were amazing, the second week of February brought about a lot of things I don’t like to even think about (COVID, people I had discarded returning to my life) and 2021 and 2022 would prove to be even worse.
I’m not saying they were 2010s worse, because I really don’t know how life could have been any worse than it was during the 2010s. I wouldn’t wish that decade on my worst enemy, and I’m hopeful things will never be that bad again.
The main difference between standing in 2019 and looking toward 2020 and standing in 2022 and looking into 2023 is at least I had a plan for 2020. It may have crashed spectacularly in a mere month and a half, but I still had a plan in place.
I have no plan for 2023. I have some contingencies in place, in case whatever I do decide to do doesn’t work out. For example, my baseball burnout is so extreme I’ve been trying to decide what to do when it finally engulfs me. I am 99% sure at that point I’ll begin following either UCLA or West Virginia University sports.
As everyone knows, I love my White Sox and I’m trying as hard as I can to focus myself on it but things that have happened this offseason have hampered that, not the least of which was my loss of my MLB The Show 22 roster files I had been working on for seven weeks. I have since restarted my work using my previous year’s files from MLB The Show 21, which I preferred far more than the 2022 version anyway.
I want to do all the things I wanted to do in 2020. And 2021 and 2022. And while I did a few of them (specifically my two trips to Chicago in 2021 to see the White Sox in person) I have yet to “turn the corner” with my life. All I’ve done is waste it. And feeling the way I do (lack of sleep, lack of eating right, lack of exercise, etc) has done nothing but cause me more issues than I had before. Things have got to change.
And while I know there’s nothing special about another trip around the sun I do still want to improve my situation. I’m 45 years old and have a number of contemporaries who have passed away due to heart attacks and other issues I could be just as susceptible to at my age. If that happens, so be it. But I want to be better than that.
It’s time to leave all the trash in the past. Not just the trash of 2022, but all the trash since 2005. And there has been a landfill full of it. I just want to be happy. For the first time in almost 20 years, I just want to have an extended period of happy
Normally, I would hold my yearly retrospective until closer to the end of the year, like I did in 2020 (which was published on December 18, 2020).
However, it wouldn’t matter if I won the lottery every week for the rest of the year and if Paige Spiranac showed up at my door and asked me to marry her, I don’t think this trainwreck of a year could be saved. It’s been that bad.
It’s amazing to think that three short years ago I sat here and penned a blog about how good I thought the 2020’s would be. I suffered through a miserable decade in the 2010’s, I wouldn’t wish a decade like that on my worst enemy.
The 2020’s have been worse, so far.
The year 2020 brought us COVID and the subsequent illegal lockdown. As bad as that year seemed at the time, it would pale in comparison to what was ahead for me. In 2021, I nearly lost one of my closest friends over personal nonsense, and she and I barely spoke the entire year. I got into a relationship I had no business getting into (the “personal nonsense”) and in September I lost my mother after a battle with dementia.
Which brings us to 2022. And the downhill slide continued.
The nonsensical relationship I was in dominated the first nine months of the year. Even though it was of the long-distance variety, I felt like a prisoner. How to explain what it was like? I cringed when my phone went off, whether it was a text or a call. I cried myself to sleep many nights, which in itself is completely pathetic. I could have walked away at any time, but I didn’t. It’s the same story I’ve lived 15 times before, I’m in a situation that makes me want to die but I don’t have the good sense to walk away.
Mercifully, she walked away in late September, and a weight was lifted off me. But a new one quickly emerged. While I was happy that miserable experience was over, it reinforced something that had been bothering me for some time; I have a 100% failure rate when it comes to relationships. I’ve mentioned this in a previous blog, and it’s something I just have a hard time coming to grips with it. A success rate of 0% over 35 years. I don’t know how anything could be more pathetic. And it will never improve.
Having that black cloud of misery hanging over my head for almost 10 months, I also got to experience what may well be the worst baseball season for the Chicago White Sox I have ever seen, and possibly the worst ever for the organization.
While an 81-81 record doesn’t sound as bad as, say, the Pittsburgh Pirates season (62-100), the Pirates went into their season knowing they were likely going to finish in last place. The White Sox were expected to make a run at the World Series. Instead, they finished 11 games out of first place and failed to make the playoffs.
I preached the entire season that this team wasn’t good enough to contend, but I was met at every turn by fan boys who insisted they’d be just fine and just to wait. I waited, and it went just about like I had predicted it would.
Speaking of fan boys, I have begun to wonder lately if every sports team has fan boys, who refuse to criticize the team no matter what happens. I just don’t understand how anyone could support every move a team makes even when they know it’s the wrong one. A real fan wants to see his team succeed, not just kiss their collective asses every time something happens, good or bad. Do all teams have fans like that?
The stress of that stupid relationship and this stupid ball club got me back into stress eating, something I hadn’t done in over a decade. Now I’m even more overweight and even more miserable, and I’m sitting here again placing all my hopes and dreams on the turning over of the calendar to make everything right again.
I’ve started laying out plans for 2023. I’m once again updating the MLB The Show rosters for next season because I hope to start a franchise next spring with the White Sox. If that fails (again, for what would probably be the 23rd straight year), I have made the decision that it may be time to cut ties with the White Sox, and Chicago in general and bring my world closer to home. I may start following the WVU Mountaineers.
So much time has been spent thinking on this situation. I would be walking away from a lot, friends, important connections, an excellent network of fans and a social media presence. I’d be giving all that up to start again at the bottom, going from Major League Baseball back to the college ranks and a university I’ve barely followed at all since the mid 1990s. But if baseball fails me again, I am truly ready to make the move.
I have also made the decision that, if this happens, I will be ready to completely start over with new social media accounts, email accounts and maybe even a new phone number. This is a move I should have made before 2020 began, but I decided to just push forward with where I am now. I won’t make the same mistake twice.
It’s also time to get back into physical fitness. I bought a new weight bench which I plan to put together over the next several weeks, and starting in January I plan on putting my broken, swollen and disgusting body back together again.
The thing that has made this year so much worse than the previous few is that I have completely lost my desire to do anything. I’ve had to force myself to work on the baseball rosters even though I have wanted to do a franchise on MLB The Show for as long as that has been an option. I want to get back into watching The “Chicago” shows (Chicago Fire, Chicago P.D. and Chicago Med). Can’t seem to do that either.
But I’m finally at what feels like rock bottom and I’m ready to start making the climb back up. And I hope that finally, when that calendar turns from 2022 to 2023, things start looking better than they have lately because I can’t deal with much more of this. I’d rather have another 2020 than another 2022. This year can absolutely fuck off. If I could, I’d wipe it from my mind. While admittedly it wasn’t as bad as 2017, it was still bad enough that I’d rank it in the bottom three years of my life (2017, 2022 and 1996).
So, we’ll see where things go from here. One thing is for certain, there’s nowhere to go but up. But I’ve also said that in the past and was wrong. I just want to be happy.
Every year the Sox Machine blog posts a template for what is known as the “offseason plan project,” where anyone can give their thoughts on what they would like the White Sox to do in the offseason, in terms of whether to tender or non-tender eligible players, sign or not sign pending free agents, propose trades and things like that.
This year I’m going to do this a little differently, I’m going to list not only what I would do in terms of roster construction, but what I think the team will do as well, because there will definitely be a lack of consensus between myself and the Sox front office.
PREAMBLE
This is going to be a difficult season for the White Sox, possibly worse than 2022. The lack of talent, health, depth and camaraderie are going to sink the team for the remainder of the “contention window.” This team was poorly built and too many players were paid before they had actually accomplished anything, thus we have a roster full of overpaid bums who can’t stay healthy and have no reason to try.
ARBITRATION-ELIGIBLE PLAYERS
Lucas Giolito: $10.8M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Dylan Cease: $5.3M (the Sox will tender, I would tender and try to work on an extension)
Reynaldo Lopez: $3.3M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Adam Engel: $2.3M (non-tender, I think the Sox will non-tender)
Michael Kopech: $2.2M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Kyle Crick: $1.5M (non-tender, I think the Sox will non-tender)
Jose Ruiz: $1M (non-tender, the Sox are in love with him and will tender)
Danny Mendick: $1M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
CLUB OPTIONS
Tim Anderson: $12.5M ($1M buyout) (pick up, I would trade if possible, I think the Sox will pick up)
Josh Harrison: $5.625M ($1.5M buyout) (buyout, I think the Sox will tender due to lack of options)
PLAYER OPTIONS
AJ Pollock: $13M ($5 million buyout) (No way he leaves $13 million on the table, exercise option)
OTHER IMPENDING FREE AGENTS
Jose Abreu (Made $18M in 2021) (resign, 2 years for $20 million, I think the Sox let him walk)
Johnny Cueto($4.2M) (let him walk, I think the Sox let him walk)
Vince Velasquez ($3M) (let him walk, I think the Sox let him walk)
Elvis Andrus ($14.25M) (let him walk, I think the Sox let him walk)
MANAGER
My pick: Ozzie Guillen. You want a manager with a successful body of work and championship pedigree? Here he is. You want a guy who knows it’s his final chance and wants to right his previous wrongs? Here he is. I don’t want to hear about what happened in 2011, that’s ancient history. This is 2022.
The Sox pick: Mike Shildt. I know this guy has cooled down considerably as a candidate but here is my rationale: Kenny Williams wants Ron Washington. Rick Hahn wants Joe Espada. I think Tony La Russa will have Jerry Reisndorf’s ear and like the last time the White Sox hired a manager, Jerry gets the final say.
FREE AGENTS
No. 1:Jose Abreu (two years, $20 million). You just don’t let the face of the franchise walk away because you have some kid who was a high draft pick waiting to take his spot. Mark my words, Andrew Vaughn will be more Greg Walker than Jose Abreu or Paul Konerko when all is said and done.
No. 2: Willson Contreras (two years, $32 million). I’m not a huge fan of this signing, but something has to be done. Can’t go into another season with Yasmani Grandal at the top of the depth chart. Let Contreras do the bulk of the catching through the remainder of the contention window, and he can still sign another free agent deal after the 2024 season as a 33-year old.
No. 3: Adam Frazier (one year, $7 million). Frazier is coming off his worst season and should be had for a small amount. He set full-season career lows in just about every category (.238/.301/.311 line with an OPS+ of 80 and a 0.7 WAR) but he plays every day (156 games in 2022 with the Mariners) and his defense is certainly passable (6 errors in 435 chances at second base in 2022). It’s an upgrade from nothing.
As for what I think the White Sox will do in free agency, I see a couple of low-end fifth starter candidates on minor league deals (someone like Jordan Lyles or Michael Pineda), a fourth or fifth outfielder to replace Adam Engel (Ben Gamel? Jackie Bradley? Chad Pinder?). Other than that, and maybe a flier on a bullpen arm or two for “depth,” I don’t see the Sox making any free agent signings. The roster is full.
TRADES
This is the hardest thing to try to forecast, because no one knows who is available or who could be traded for whom.
No. 1: Trade Yoan Moncada and Colson Montgomery to the Seattle Mariners for Eugenio Suarez and Jarred Kelenic. Yes, it’s giving up the Sox #1 prospect and not getting a ton in return but it’s not a straight salary dump and Suarez fills in third base for the remainder of the contention window and Kelenic isn’t the superstar prospect he was two years ago. This opens up some salary room for the White Sox and eliminates one of the team’s biggest issues, and if Kelenic can outplay Gavin Sheets in RF, you could have a solid OF lineup for years (Kelenic, Luis Robert and Oscar Colas) after the contention window closes.
No. 2: Trade Leury Garcia and Bryan Ramos to the Oakland A’s for Tony Kemp. The A’s take on a little extra salary (Kemp is expected to make around $3.2 million in arbitration this season while Garcia will make a little over $5 million in the second year of his three-year deal) in order to pick up a decent prospect in Ramos and the Sox get their replacement for Garcia. Seems like a win/win trade to me.
No. 3: Trade Yasmani Grandal to any team that will take him for any price they’ll pay, and agree to pay half of his salary. Straight salary dump, find some team that could use an occasional switch hitter at the DH position and could be a once-a-week or even emergency catcher, for $9 million. Trade him for some team’s 50th ranked prospect. Anything to get him off the payroll and out of the organization.
As for what I think the Sox will do in the trade market, I think they’ll strongly consider trading Gavin Sheets (likely to the Orioles in a nice homecoming) because he is still a man without a position (he’s a 1B/DH and those spots are filled) and I think they could get a minor league pitching prospect in return, maybe a future piece for the back end of the rotation. I don’t think the front office has the balls to really move a Moncada or an Eloy Jimenez or a Lucas Giolito for anything.
SUMMARY
This would be my every day lineup: Contreras (catcher), Abreu (1B), Frazier (2B), Anderson (SS), Suarez (3B), Pollock (LF), Robert (CF), Kelenic (RF) and Jimenez (DH). Kemp would be my top utility player. For those wondering, I’d either trade Andrew Vaughn or just let him play 1B or DH when Abreu or Eloy need a day off. Remember, he’s making the MLB minimum. At best he’s a .280/20/80 hitter, he’s not the second coming of Frank Thomas.
The pitching rotation: Cease, Lance Lynn, Kopech, Giolito and Davis Martin.
The bullpen: Liam Hendriks (closer), Reynaldo Lopez, Kendall Graveman, Joe Kelly, Tanner Banks, Aaron Bummer and Jake Diekman.
I think the White Sox will try to find someone/anyone to be their fifth starter because they have absolutely no faith in their own homegrown pitchers (Cease came from the Cubs, Lynn from the Rangers, Kopech from the Red Sox and Giolito from the Nationals; Banks and Bummer are the only homegrown relievers), and they’ll sign a guy who is looking to rebound (like Johnny Cueto in 2022 or Ervin Santana in 2019, just showing the extremes of how those kinds of deals can work out).
So, here is what I see the Sox running out there every day:
Everyday lineup: Grandal (catcher), Vaughn (1B), Harrison/Leury (2B), Anderson (SS), Moncada (3B), Pollock (LF), Robert (CF), Sheets/Colas (RF) and Jimenez (DH). Leury will be the top utility player but Danny Mendick is going to get a good look after a solid (but short) 2022 season (.289/.343/.443, OPS+ of 121 and 0.5 WAR in only 97 at-bats).
I can see my version of the 2023 White Sox finishing 85-77, thanks to the power provided by Contreras, Suarez and Kelenic to push a few more runs across the plate. The pitching was middle-of-the-pack and I expect Cease and Kopech to get better, so I think “my” 2023 White Sox could finish second to the Guardians (again) but maybe a little closer (five or six games out).
I see the real 2023 White Sox finishing 79-83, spending the season wondering if Vaughn or Moncada or Robert is going to break out, if they can get anything close to a positive WAR out of second base and hoping Colas finally fills the hole in RF that’s basically been there since Jermaine Dye left. This is not a good team, and removing the best player (Abreu lead the team in WAR, games played, hits and batting average, period) isn’t going to make the offense better, and if you believe that, you’re a moron.
Things may eventually start to look up once Grandal and Moncada and Giolito and Hendriks and the other massive drains on payroll are gone and the Sox could potentially do a legitimate reload in 2025 with all that available cash. However, I have absolutely no faith in this front office. Luckily, as Rick Hahn said, they know when they’re not doing the job anymore so once the guy who has had 2 winning seasons out of 10 as a general manager figures out he can’t do the job, it will get better.
I knew this day was coming, I’ve known it for years.
Technically, it had come once before, in 1996.
But in 2005 I made some stupid decisions that have haunted me since then.
At the age of 19, I knew my dating life was over and that I wasn’t someone who should ever be in a relationship. I wasn’t built for relationships. I’m too independent and I don’t know what love is. It’s not fair of me to waste anyone’s time or to have my time wasted.
At that point, I embarked on the happiest period of my life, by far. I didn’t date or talk to girls in any way, and it lasted for nine glorious years. It just went to prove the point I had known all along. The only way I could be happy is to be single, and anyone I get involved with I’m going to make miserable, and no one deserves that in either direction.
In 2005, I stepped out of the shadows and let the internet start introducing me to women.
To call that a mistake doesn’t even begin to cover just how much of a mistake it was.
I would spend the following 16 years in one bad relationship after another, one in the mid to late 2000s with the most horrible human being I’ve ever known. One that lasted seven years with a piece of garbage I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. One that lasted 10 months with a girl 600 miles away who changed personalities so overwhelmingly that it felt like the girl she was at first had passed away and I was left with a mean, hateful, loveless replacement I didn’t love or want. One that lasted six weeks before she left me for her ex-husband. Who didn’t want her back. One that chased me for four years and I couldn’t get away from fast enough.
Now, before anyone says it (or thinks it), yes, I take responsibility for my part in this whole situation. I should never have been in any of those relationships. I should never have been in one at any time in my life. My failure rate is 100%, and the law of averages says that should be impossible. In 35 years of having one girlfriend or another, one of them should have worked out instead of every one of them being failures of ultimate dimension.
But they have all been ultimate failures. Some were at least 75% my fault. But I’m not putting “fault” on anyone because I never should have been in those situations in the first place. They were doomed to fail so putting “blame” on anyone doesn’t make sense.
I can’t believe that as recently as a year ago I still had this idea that maybe someday something would work out. Despite one failure after another, all my life, I still had the idea that I could love and be loved, too. That somehow I “deserved” it. Even though everything pointed in the same direction. And I knew that eventually the day would come where I would finally give up and accept things as they are. And that day is today.
Making this perfectly clear so anyone who ever finds this has no questions or qualms about what I’m saying: Never again. NEVER. I will never get involved with another woman again as long as I live, whether I die tomorrow or 50 years from now. I know, without a doubt, I was never intended to be with anyone. I can say without hesitation that any female I’ve been involved with in the past was a mistake and I’d take every one back if I could, there’s nothing in the past that’s even worth the memories I have left of them.
That 100% failure rate will stick with me forever. Guys who couldn’t tie their own shoes in high school managed to get married, guys who never had a girlfriend back then. But I didn’t know then that I would be the one guy who would never find a soulmate to spend my life with, maybe because I have no soul, I don’t know. Whatever the reason, I know it and I accept it and I’m ready to go forward with no expectations and a “no” ready for any female who ever approaches me again.
I’ve been a single man again for 10 months and I’m not speaking out of anger or any need to get my rocks off, I just know this is how it’s supposed to be and I’m finally accepting of it. I’m glad I didn’t have to suffer any further before I finally figured this out.
Like last year, I’m posting my season review immediately after the final game so the emotion remains and the fact that I’m beyond annoyed with this franchise isn’t lost on anyone.
I’ve been a fan of the White Sox since 1991. This was, without question, the most aggravating, disappointing and rage-inducing season of my life. A few seasons have been close (1994 due to the player’s strike, 1995 due to the Sox pitching staff completely imploding, definitely 2018 when the Sox bottomed out during the rebuild with a 62-100 record) but nothing was this bad.
For a team with a short contention window (which is generally accepted to be ending after the 2024 season) the fact that the White Sox wasted two years of contention with Tony LaRussa managing the team is unforgivable. Last year, I said the team won in spite of TLR, and in 2022 they couldn’t overcome whatever negative cloud TLR brought back to the organization.
I’ll begin my player review with the offense. And it was not good. Only one player managed to play 140 games this season, and only one player managed to attain a WAR over 2.2, the heart and soul of the White Sox, Jose Abreu, who played 157 games with a 4.2 WAR. The only other player with a WAR over 2.0 was Luis Robert, in 98 games. Truly a pathetic performance.
TEAM LEADERS: OFFENSE
Games: Jose Abreu (157) Hits: Jose Abreu (183) Doubles: Jose Abreu (40) Triples: Josh Harrison (2) Home Runs: Andrew Vaughn (17) RBI: Andrew Vaughn (76) Stolen Bases: Adam Engel (12) Walks: Jose Abreu (62) Batting Average: Jose Abreu (.304) OPS+: Eloy Jimenez (140) WAR: Jose Abreu (4.2)
It was really a very sad season for the White Sox offense. It was the first time since 1990 that the White Sox offense was this bad. That year, Carlton Fisk lead the team in home runs (18) and the team leader in RBI was the late Ivan Calderon (74). That team, amazingly, finished the year in 2nd place with a 94-68 record, a game better than the 2021 AL Central champion White Sox. That was due to exceptional pitching, as the team had two 14-game winners, a 13-game winner, a 12-game winner and an 11-game winner in the bullpen, not to mention Bobby Thigpen and his (at the time) record of 57 saves.
Speaking of pitching, the 2022 White Sox pitching staff didn’t set the world on fire, but it was solid enough that they should have finished in a better position than 81-81. Dylan Cease had his breakout season, but no one else showed any level of superiority in the rotation, though a couple of names did stand out in the bullpen; Reynaldo Lopez and Jimmy Lambert.
Let’s take a look at the White Sox pitching leaders in 2022.
*special mention to Johnny Cueto who finished third on the team in WAR with a 3.4 despite a losing record.
The pitching staff certainly was not as good as the 1990 staff, or the 1993 staff or 1994 or 1983 or 2005 but it also didn’t get the ending it deserved.
I don’t want to bring in a lot of other outside influences into my review, but this will be forever looked at as the worst White Sox season I have ever endured and some of that is due to some outside influences that are not necessarily directly related to the team, but are related to the city. So that’s why I’m keeping my review somewhat short and, dare I say, “sanitized.”
In closing, I can say this was basically the second wasted season in a row of this “contention window,” and with a $190+ million payroll in 2022 (and not a lot coming off and a lot of players getting hefty raises next season due to either long-term contracts or through salary arbitration) there won’t be much wiggle room unless the team is able to unload one of the bigger contracts that’s on the books for next season, especially the dead weight (Yoan Moncada and Yasmani Grandal who will both be making in the neighborhood of $17 to $18 million for minimal production).
I’m hoping this will be a fun offseason, beginning with the search for a new manager and hopefully some improvement to the roster. Time will tell. I’ll go more in-depth when I post my Sox Machine 2022-23 Offseason Plan Project blog entry, which I usually drop around mid-November. By that point, I’m assuming the team will have named a manager and we’ll have some idea what direction the team is going, especially in regard to Jose Abreu.
As I enter the final quarter of 2022, my life hasn’t been this confusing in years.
This has been one of the worst years I’ve had to put it, between my personal life, my spiritual life, my health and my life as a sports fan. In fact, when you put it all together, 2022 may well rank as the worst year of my life. And I can’t wait for 2023 to get here and put an end to this.
To be fair, I need to put the blame where it belongs, right on top of my head. I’m the reason, my poor decisions have lead to everything that today makes my life very confusing and unhappy. But I’ll tackle all of that in my end-of-the-year blog entry. Right now, lets look at the road signs.
This Chicago White Sox season was miserable. A team that was supposed to contend for a World Series championship finished 81-81 and couldn’t even make the playoffs, let alone make an extended playoff run. And I watched all but maybe 5 of those games this season.
In the post season, since 2015, one of my favorite projects has been doing updates to the MLB The Show rosters to upload to the servers for others to use, then I can use it to build my own White Sox roster to play franchise mode on the game, putting myself in the general manager position and making the trades and signings I would make if I had the opportunity to do so.
But I don’t feel the excitement about that this offseason, due to the poor season overall as well as the potential loss of free agent first baseman Jose Abreu, who has been my favorite player on the team since he signed prior to the 2014 season. If he leaves, I am not even sure I want to continue following the White Sox, let alone putting months of work into updating rosters.
So, I look to what I used to do immediately after the season during the White Sox rebuild, I would completely immerse myself in the DC Universe, playing the Batman Arkham video game series, watching Justice League cartoons and The Dark Knight trilogy until the MLB postseason was over, also listening to old Superman radio shows and watching shows like Gotham and the old 1950s The Adventures Of Superman and the 1960s Batman series.
While I’ve started out by playing my way through Batman Arkham Asylum and I’m currently working on Batman Arkham City I don’t have the same excitement I used to have in the past.
Finally, a little project I’ve covered previously in my blog, is my NCAA project, which is basically me running through franchise mode on NCAA Football, NCAA Basketball and MVP NCAA Baseball on the PlayStation, and ultimately moving on to either Madden NFL or MLB The Show after finishing my “college eligibility.” I’ve done the project twice in the past (in 1995 using John Elway’s Quarterback and Tecmo Super Bowl on the NES and again in 2001 with NCAA GameBreaker and NFL GameDay on the PlayStation. At this point, I have everything I need to do the best job I’ve ever done but like everything else, I lack the motivation and desire to do it.
I should say I don’t lack the desire or motivation, because that’s not entirely accurate. I think I’m in the middle of a deep depression based on everything that has happened in 2022 and I’m just waiting for the next “bad thing” to happen. Basically, I’m dealing with a form of mental block.
I have decided, after talking to a number of people, that I’m going to basically take the month of October off before making a decision. I’ll continue playing Arkham City and follow it up with Arkham Origins and at the end of the month, I will make a decision. We’ll see how that works.
In a perfect world, I’d take this month off and focus 100% on the DC Universe and in November, when free agency begins, I’ll start updating my rosters on MLB The Show with a renewed vigor. And there’s every chance that may happen. But the stress of this year has beaten me down physically and spiritually and I need to make improvements there as well. I need to get back into a routine, including a workout program, eating right and finally sleeping again, which is something that I’ve been neglecting for close to 18 months due to my personal life.
On the flip side, I can see me having no desire to do anything when this month-long sabbatical ends. If that’s the case, I’ll know I’m in a deeper depression than I realize. And I’ll have to deal with that when, and if, the time comes. But for now, I want to focus on the potential positives.
So, we’ll see what happens in about a month, and I’ll go from there. Thank you for taking the time to read, I really am not one for posting publicly about my issues, but sometimes just laying it out there is the best way to get it out of my head. Whether anyone sees it or not.
To say the 2022 season has been disappointing would be an understatement of epic proportions. This is easily the sorriest season I’ve seen in 31 years of being a Chicago White Sox fan. Supposedly, help is on the way. But I’m very skeptical.
I don’t have any faith in the White Sox, due to the constant mistakes the club has made since the 2016 rebuild began.
One of the biggest mistakes the organization made was hiring Tony La Russa as the team’s manager prior to the 2021 season. La Russa had been retired as a manager since 2011, and it showed in his poor decision making. The Sox were able to overcome those shortcomings with talent in 2021, winning 93 games and the American League Central Division title.
Fast forward one year and the talent just couldn’t carry the team anymore and they’ll likely finish right around .500 in a year they were considered to be a World Series contender.
As of today (October 3, 2022) La Russa is now officially out as manager of the White Sox. While the decision for La Russa to leave was based on some medical issues (one being a pacemaker and the other La Russa refused to elaborate on), everyone agrees that retirement is the best thing for both La Russa and the organization.
Now, that brings us to his potential replacements.
Some ridiculous names have been thrown around (as usual, a number of former Sox players like A.J. Pierzynski, Jim Thome and Paul Konerko, none of whom have any on-field coaching or managing experience). I’m hopeful the White Sox remember the Robin Ventura era and don’t repeat the mistake of hiring a first-time manager with no experience.
A number of bench coaches and base coaches are being considered, including Astros bench coach Joe Espada and Rays bench coach Matt Quatraro, and Indians, er, Guardians first base coach Sandy Alomar, Jr. Former MLB managers Bruce Bochy and Fredi Gonzalez have also been mentioned.
But the name I keep hearing that fits all the boxes this organization likes to check is Chicago Cubs third base coach Willie Harris.
Former White Sox player? Check. Pulling a fast one on the Cubs? Check. Would make less money than any other potential manager? Check.
The White Sox haven’t hired a manager who didn’t have any White Sox connections since Jerry Manuel, who was hired in 1998. In 2004, the Sox hired former Sox shortstop Ozzie Guillen as manager. In 2012, Ozzie’s former teammate Robin Ventura was hired. In 2017, Ventura’s bench coach, Ricky Renteria was hired, followed by La Russa.
No other team in baseball has such a track record. Most teams hire the best available option, the White Sox hire the best available option who has played for or coached for the team at some point in the past.
While Thome, Konerko and Pierzynski are ridiculous to even consider, Harris does have minor league managerial experience and MLB coaching experience.
This is exactly why he’s going to be the White Sox manager of the future.
Harris will be compared to Ozzie Guillen, as Harris was a member of the 2005 White Sox roster (he played for the organization from 2002 through 2005) and is currently serving as an MLB base coach (Guillen was hired after serving as a coach with the Montreal Expos (2001) and Miami Marlins (2002-03).
Most importantly, Harris will likely command the smallest salary among all the options listed, and that will play a very important role to White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf.
Am I saying Harris would be a poor choice? No, I think he would bring a fresh perspective to the organization and an infusion of youth (Harris is 34 years younger than La Russa). Is he a perfect choice? Absolutely not. A team that is contending should be hiring a manager with managerial experience, not someone who is going to require on the job training.
My first choice? Dave Martinez of the Washington Nationals. Yes, they’re having a horrible season but they’ve also stripped the team down to the bare bones. He has a sub-.500 record but also has a World Series championship, something not a lot of guys can say. And with the Nats in a major rebuild and a sale of the franchise, it seems like the new owner would want to clean house and begin anew. Which would be great for the White Sox.
Martinez also is a former White Sox player so that clicks the important box for the Sox.
A new manager should be in place within the next three weeks, due to the fact that the organization needs to have a staff in place to help sell to potential free agent signings.
So, we’ll wait and see what happens. Right now, I’ll put $100 on Willie Harris as the next White Sox manager. He does seem to be a relatively good fit and I do think there are worse options out there. There are also better options, but I don’t think that’s going to matter.
This is a blog I’ve been thinking of doing for a long time, and something I’ve touched on in previous blog entries stretching back to 2018. This may draw the ire of the Chicago White Sox fan boys, who think this team can do no wrong regardless of what they do, but the fact of the matter is, this rebuild has not gone to plan in spite of the back to back playoff appearances in 2020 and 2021. While the original trades that set off the rebuild were universally praised, I think they need to be revisited, as well as the free agent signings and pursuits that have taken place since the rebuild was instituted following the 2016 season.
I want to take a look at the rebuild in a season-by-season view:
2016
This is where it all began. In December 2016, the White Sox made three moves that would have a profound effect on the organization, two trades and one Rule 5 Draft pick.
– On December 6, the White Sox traded LHP Chris Sale to the Boston Red Sox for IF Yoan Moncada (at the time the #1 prospect in baseball), RHP Michael Kopech, OF Luis Alexander Basabe and RHP Victor Diaz.
– On December 7, the White Sox traded OF Adam Eaton to the Washington Nationals for RHP’s Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo Lopez and Dane Dunning.
– And on December 8, the White Sox selected RHP Dylan Covey in the Rule 5 Draft from the Oakland A’s.
This was also the year the White Sox hired career loser Rick Renteria to be their manager, once again sniffing fumes from the Chicago Cubs, who had hired Renteria four years earlier to handle their rebuild on-field.
2017
Now fully into the rebuild, not much was expected in terms of free agent signings or trades, as the Sox had little left with which to deal (though they still made a major deal before the trade deadline).
– On May 27, the White Sox signed OF Luis Robert as an international free agent from Cuba.
– On July 13, the White Sox traded LHP Jose Quintana to the Chicago Cubs for RHP Dylan Cease, OF Eloy Jimenez, 1B Matt Rose and IF Bryant Flete.
– On July 19, the White Sox traded 3B Todd Frazier, RHP David Robertson and RHP Tommy Kahnle to the New York Yankees for RHP Tyler Clippard, OF Blake Rutherford, OF Tito Polo and LHP Ian Clarkin.
In the first season of the rebuild, the Sox finished the 2017 season with a 67-95 record.
2018
The worst season of the rebuild, by far. The Sox finished with a record of 62-100.
– On November 23, 2017, the White Sox signed OF Daniel Palka off waivers from the Minnesota Twins.
– On December 1, 2017, the White Sox signed C Wellington Castillo to a two-year deal with an option to lock down the catcher position that had been in flux since A.J. Pierzynski was let go.
– On December 22, 2017, the White Sox signed RHP Jose Ruiz off waivers from the San Diego Padres.
The Wellington Castillo deal was one of the first ones to implode on this team, as Castillo was suspended 80 games for violating the league’s performance-enhancing drug policy on May 24, 2018. Unaware of it at the time, this was going to be an omen of things to come, not in terms of drug policy violations but in terms of poor free agent signings and a poor performance in free agency, in general.
2019
This is where the rebuild really started to go south. Prior to the season, the White Sox were considered one of the front runners to sign free agents Manny Machado or Bryce Harper. In fact, some media outlets said there was a chance the White Sox could sign both. Instead, their offseason acquisitions amounted to:
– On December 15, 2018, the White Sox traded minor league OF Alex Call to the Cleveland Indians for 1B/DH Yonder Alonso.
– On December 19, 2018, the White Sox signed C James McCann as a free agent from the Detroit Tigers.
– On January 10, the White Sox signed OF Jon Jay as a free agent from the Arizona Diamondbacks.
– On March 22, the White Sox signed OF Eloy Jimenez to a six-year, $43 million extension.
The Chicago press pointed out that Alonso and Jay were offseason workout buddies of Machado, while the Sox front office did everything they could to downplay the connection publicly.
While the Chicago media circled the wagons around the franchise, the rest of the country was laughing at the White Sox over the attempt to sign Machado. After announcing they had made an eight-year, $250 million offer, and Machado had signed a 10-year, $300 million offer, White Sox team president Kenny Williams was left to try to justify that the offer could have reached 10 years and $350 million if all options were exercised and all criteria were met in on-field performance. In the same breath, he said the White Sox just couldn’t afford to go to $300 million guaranteed. I feel like this was lost on most people, saying “we can’t afford to pay you $300 million, but we can afford to pay you $350 million.” The White Sox were the laughingstock of baseball outside of the city of Chicago (and were publicly laughed at during Machado’s press conference announcing his signing with the Padres) and the Sox finished the season with a 72-89 record, a 10-game improvement from hitting rock bottom the previous year with a 100-loss season.
2020
The window of contention begins to open. And the White Sox struck hard and fast.
– On November 21, 2019, the White Sox signed C Yasmani Grandal to the largest contract in team history, four years and $73 million.
– On December 10, 2019, in an attempt to shore up right field for the contention window, they traded OF Steele Walker to the Texas Rangers for OF Nomar Mazara.
– On December 30, 2019, in an attempt to shore up the rotation, they signed free agent LHP Dallas Keuchel.
– On January 2, the White Sox signed minor league OF Luis Robert to a six-year contract worth $50 million with options that could push the deal to $88 million.
– On January 9, the White Sox signed Edwin Encarnacion as a free agent to plug a hole at DH.
The White Sox were rumored for months to be in the market for RHP Zack Wheeler, who signed with the Phillies for less money than the White Sox offered (no monetary information was ever released but the significant facts were never disputed by the White Sox or Wheeler) and for the second straight offseason the Sox were left with egg on their faces, and as I’ll address later, I think this was the end of the big market free agent pursuits by the White Sox. Whether they were scared or just figured it wasn’t worth it, I don’t know.
In the season shortened to 60 games due to COVID-19, the White Sox finished with a 35-25 record.
2021
The White Sox entered 2021 as legitimate World Series contenders, according to the press. They fortified the roster with the following moves:
– On October 29, 2020, the White Sox hired Tony La Russa as manager, replacing Renteria.
– On December 7, 2020, the White Sox traded Dane Dunning to the Texas Rangers for Lance Lynn.
– On December 10, 2020, after failing to acquire Joc Pederson for the third consecutive offseason and releasing Nomar Mazara after he fell flat on his face as the everyday right fielder, the White Sox signed Adam Eaton as a free agent from the Washington Nationals.
And while I can’t find the exact date, at some point during this period, the White Sox signed 3B Yoan Moncada to a five-year, $70 million extension.
– On January 15, the White Sox had a big day. They signed Liam Hendriks and signed international free agents Yoelqui Cespedes and Norge Vera.
The White Sox let C James McCann go, and he signed a $40 million deal with the New York Mets, a little more than half what Yasmani Grandal would make in the same four years.
The Chicago media was all in, thinking the White Sox would acquire everyone from Trevor Bauer to Michael Brantley to George Springer to Kris Bryant. The Chicago fan boys were picturing a $400 million payroll. What the White Sox got was a 93-69 record, an AL Central Division title, and a first-round loss in the playoffs.
2022
Again, the idea that the White Sox were going to break the bank hung over the team as free agency started in November, 2021. Such arrogant statements as “we’re going to sign Marcus Semien but in case we don’t, Eduardo Escobar is our backup plan.” (Escobar signed with the New York Mets before Semien signed with the Texas Rangers and the White Sox were clearly never in on either of them). Another embarrassing situation revolved around OF Michael Conforto, whose name was bandied about for months until it was revealed he wouldn’t be playing in 2022 due to shoulder surgery. (Prior to this announcement, a White Sox “news” site had posted a column saying that the Sox had a massive offer on the table for Conforto, but because he wasn’t vaccinated the team wouldn’t sign the deal. Every bit of that was subsequently proven to be completely fabricated in someone’s brain).
The 2022 MLB lockout lasted from December to March, and the White Sox made two moves prior to the beginning of the lockout (during which MLB transactions were not allowed):
– On November 30, 2021, the White Sox signed RHP Kendall Graveman as a free agent.
– On December 1, 2021, the White Sox resigned IF/OF Leury Garcia.
Following the lockout, and with most of the top-flight talent off the board, the White Sox made the following transactions:
– On March 14, the White Sox signed RHP Joe Kelly as a free agent.
– On March 15, the White Sox signed IF Josh Harrison as a free agent.
– On April 1, the White Sox traded RHP Craig Kimbrel to the Los Angeles Dodgers for OF A.J. Pollock.
– On April 3, the White Sox traded C Zack Collins to the Toronto Blue Jays for C Reese McGuire.
– On April 5, the White Sox signed RHP Johnny Cueto as a free agent.
At the trade deadline, the White Sox sent McGuire to the Boston Red Sox for LHP Jake Diekman.
Not mentioned in the transactions (as I made those strictly important acquisitions) was LHP Dallas Keuchel was designated for assignment on May 28.
Now, I went through all of those transactions so we can look on a case-by-case basis how the rebuilt roster looks and how the players who were acquired for and during the rebuild have fared. I’m going to list the most relevant statistics to each player listed above in bold and these numbers are the stats the player accumulated as a member of the White Sox ONLY. And I’ll start at the beginning:
Yoan Moncada: In six seasons with the White Sox, Moncada has compiled a 13.2 WAR and a .254/.337/.425 stat line. His 2019 season is an outlier, with a 5.2 WAR and .315/.367/.548 line and 25 home runs. A consistent stolen base threat in the minor leagues, he’s stolen 3 bases in 5 attempts since the beginning of the 2020 season.
Michael Kopech: Kopech missed the 2019 season with Tommy John surgery and the 2020 season with “personal problems” as best as I can describe them. He seems to finally be putting it together in 2022, but has compiled a 9-12 career record and a 4.1 WAR (four of those victories and 2.6 WAR coming in 2022). Hopefully his best years are ahead of him because he seems to really be perfecting his craft.
Lucas Giolito: This was the guy I thought would be the centerpiece of the rebuild. Like Moncada, he’s had one very good season and a lot of average-to-below-average seasons around that. In 2019, Gio made the All Star team and finished with 14 wins, a 3.41 ERA, a 134 ERA+ and a 5.5 WAR, all career highs. His 2022 season has been poor, with eight wins, a 4.91 ERA, an 81 ERA+ and a 0.1 WAR.
Reynaldo Lopez: Like Kopech, Lopez has really hit his stride this season, but not as a starter, as a high-leverage reliever. A failed starter (in 2019, Lopez compiled a 10-15 record with a 5.38 ERA in 33 starts, with an 85 ERA+ and 0.3 WAR). In 2022, after corrective eye surgery and a move to the bullpen, Lopez is 5-2 with a 2.84 ERA, 141 ERA+ and 1.0 WAR.
Dylan Covey: My choice for the worst player acquisition during the rebuild (and everyone knows my feelings about Adam Eaton). In three seasons with the White Sox, Dylan Covey compiled a 6-29 record, a 6.54 ERA, a 66 ERA+ and a -3.0 WAR. I don’t know who saw what in this guy, he is literally one of the worst pitchers I have ever seen in 30+ years of watching baseball. Absolutely pathetic. Thankfully he was let go in 2019.
Luis Robert: This is a guy that I can honestly say, the numbers don’t tell the story. Robert has a career .297/.342/.488 line with an OPS+ of 128 and an 8.0 WAR in three seasons. The problem is, he’s played in 206 of 335 games (as of the time of this writing), which means he has missed roughly 40% of the Sox games he’s been eligible to play up to this point. The talent is definitely there. But if you can’t play the game, those “five tools” are completely worthless.
Dylan Cease: The real gem of the rebuild, Dylan has compiled a 34-23 record with a 3.66 ERA, 118 ERA+ and 7.3 WAR since 2019. His 2021 season was excellent, featuring 13 wins and leading the league in starts with 32, to go along with 226 strikeouts in 165.2 innings. His 2022 season has been transcendent, with 12 wins, a 1.96 ERA, 204 ERA+, a 4.4 WAR and 174 strikeouts in 128.2 innings. There is either a Cy Young award or a massive free agent deal with a better team in his future. Or maybe both.
Eloy Jimenez: Being honest, Eloy is my second favorite player on the White Sox after Jose Abreu. But he suffers from the same issue as Luis Robert: An inability to stay healthy. Eloy has played 271 games for the White Sox over the past four seasons, out of 497 possible. That’s roughly 55%. Just a little more than half of the games he could have played in. While his stat line is certainly solid (.273/.319/.498 with an .817 OPS and 118 OPS+), it doesn’t really matter if you can’t stay in the lineup.
Blake Rutherford: Blake was going to be the third outfielder with Robert and Eloy. He was highly-touted coming from the Yankees. However, in his six-year minor league career, he has compiled a .250/.286/.404 stat line with an OPS of .731. Those numbers wouldn’t cut it at the MLB level, let alone the MiLB level, and he was designated for assignment before being brought back off the 40 man roster.
Jose Ruiz: It’s amazing to think this guy is in his fifth season on the south side. Ruiz looked like he had turned a corner in 2021 (3.05 ERA, 144 ERA+, 1.1 WAR) but he has quickly fallen back to earth in 2022 (4.03 ERA, 99 ERA+, 0.5 WAR). Good stuff but nothing more than a spare arm that should never see a high-leverage situation.
James McCann: Even though he’s no longer on the team, I just wanted to point out that McCann signed a four-year, $40 million deal with the Mets the year after Yasmani Grandal signed a four-year, $73 million deal with the White Sox. Considering both of their numbers with those teams, I can’t imagine anyone would want four years of Grandal at $33 million more than McCann. Neither can hit a beach ball but McCann is certainly more mobile behind the plate. For the record, McCann’s stat line with the Mets (.223/.285/.335) compared with Grandal’s line with the Sox (.225/.368/.408 and Grandal’s OBP is out of whack due to his insane 2021 season and .420 OBP). Nothing will ever convince me that Grandal is $33 million better than McCann.
Yasmani Grandal: See above. I don’t know if the Sox thought they were getting Carlton Fisk 2.0 but they didn’t. Grandal was on the wrong side of 30 and was coming off a 2019 season with the Milwaukee Brewers in which he hit a career-high 28 home runs and drove in a career-high 77. He’s come nowhere near those numbers since while making $18 million a year. His 2022 batting line (.203/.307/.264) will be the worst of his career by far and he still has another season to go at $18 million. I know it’s unpopular to say, especially among the fan boys, but that was a truly poor signing.
Nomar Mazara: This deal made me angry because I really started to notice the Sox had decided to take the cheap way out in their future acquisitions. The Chicago press presented him as untapped potential, even though he had over 2,000 plate appearances at the MLB level. I heard numbers thrown about like “35 home runs and 100 RBI” from a guy who had never hit more than 20. I told everyone who would listen it was a bad signing. Come to find out, it was a bad signing. Mazara hit .228/.295/.294 with 3 home runs in 42 games and was not brought back after the season.
Dallas Keuchel: Another deal I didn’t like. Not that I didn’t like the signing at the time but the contract was insane from my perspective. Clearly on the downside of his career, Keuchel got a three-year deal from the White Sox for $55.5 million. This was nothing more than a way for the White Sox to save face after Zack Wheeler signed with the Philadelphia Phillies for less money, embarrassing the White Sox organization in the process. So what did the White Sox get for that $55.5 million? A 17-16 record, a 4.79 ERA, a 91 ERA+ and a 0.9 WAR. Also $18 million wasted that they have to pay him after he was DFA’d.
Edwin Encarnacion: Not much to say here, his contract wasn’t that outlandish (one year for $12 million) but in typical form, he was a free agent signing that woefully under performed. In 44 games, Encarnacion put up a .157/.250/.377 stat line with a 70 OPS+ with 10 home runs and 19 RBI. He topped off what is, in retrospect, and absolutely horrible offseason that was celebrated at the time.
Lance Lynn: I like Lance Lynn, and he’s been relatively successful in his White Sox tenure, but I would have stopped short of giving him the two-year, $38 million extension he received. While his first year was certainly acceptable (2.69 ERA, 163 ERA+, 5.3 WAR), he’s not looking like he’s worth the money in 2022 (5.88 ERA, 68 ERA+, -0.7 WAR). A starting pitcher could be found somewhere to put up better numbers than that at half the price.
Adam Eaton: This is just covering his second round with the White Sox. Eaton was signed to a $7 million deal after perennial target Joc Pederson refused to sign and instead took less money to play across town for the Cubs. Eaton’s return engagement was not quite as productive as his first, as he compiled a .201/.298/.344 stat line with a 75 OPS+ and 0 WAR. The hole in right field that Mazara was supposed to fill ate up Eaton as well. He was designated for assignment after 58 games.
Liam Hendriks: Another sore spot with me. The numbers didn’t tell the story with this guy, either. A failed starter who then became a failed middle reliever somehow caught lightning in a bottle and became a very good closer for a year and a half before the White Sox dumped a three-year, $54 million deal in his lap. Hendriks is a low-leverage closer who does his best work starting a clean inning with a three-run lead. Anything less than that and I’m on the edge of my seat waiting for him to blow it.
Kendall Graveman: A good signing (though a bit expensive for a set-up man at three years and $24 million) who has pitched very well and looks like a good investment so far, with a 2.59 ERA, 155 ERA+ and 1.1 WAR so far in 2022.
Leury Garcia: Longest-tenured White Sox player, been with the team for a full decade. And in that full decade, he has put up a .253/.294/.353 stat line with an OPS+ of 77 (remember, 100 is average and this is over the entire 10 years he’s played for the White Sox) and a WAR, over 10 years, of 4.5. And signed a three-year, $16.5 million contract prior to the 2022 season. I don’t care if he can play every position on the field, pop the corn and clean the toilets, you can pick up utility players every day that would make half that amount and put up superior statistics. No one will ever be able to explain this to me to my satisfaction.
Joe Kelly: “Let’s throw money at the bullpen” seemed to be the mantra of the White Sox front office during the 2021-22 offseason. Joe Kelly was not really a needed asset, and his multiple injuries in 2022 to go along with his 5.84 ERA and -0.4 WAR show this wasn’t a great investment. Yes, his numbers are skewed by his poor start to the season, but this is supposed to be a team that’s contending for a World Series, not nursing guys back to health that shouldn’t have been signed in the first place.
Josh Harrison: I like Josh Harrison, but I didn’t like this signing other than it would have been perfect as a replacement for Leury Garcia. Harrison’s days of being an everyday second baseman should have ended around 2017 in Pittsburgh, and he should be a full time utility player, a role I believe he would excel in. He started extremely poorly in 2022 but has since ramped up his stats to an acceptable level (.245/.312/.381 with a 96 OPS+ and 1.7 WAR) for a utility player, far better than Garcia is producing.
A.J. Pollock: I wanted to see the Sox acquire Pollock in 2019, when he left the Arizona Diamondbacks for the Los Angeles Dodgers as a free agent. That version of Pollock was coming off a 21 home run season, a .257/.316/.484 stat line with an OPS+ of 108 and a 2.2 WAR. The A.J. Pollock the White Sox got is hitting .236/.287/.351 with five home runs and a -0.1 WAR.
Johnny Cueto: After all those acquisitions that failed to pan out or even come close to what was expected, Johnny Cueto was a Godsend. A 2.91 ERA, 137 ERA+ and 2.9 WAR in 15 starts is outstanding, and I’d have to think there’s nothing less than a 100% chance he’ll get a free agent deal this offseason that prices him right out of the White Sox plans. In fact, to put it into perspective, Cueto is making roughly half what Lucas Giolito is making and about about ¼ what Lance Lynn is making.
If we look at this rebuild academically, with our minds instead of our hearts or fandom, it’s clear it’s been a massive failure pretty much across the board. This team, as it is built now, has no chance whatsoever of getting to the World Series. The offense is worse than any I’ve ever seen, regardless of how poor the opposing pitcher is. Pitchers with ERA’s above 5.00 routinely shut down the White Sox offense.
I’m worried about where we go from here. The concept of just saying “well, let’s just take the same group into next season and hope it’s better” isn’t going to do anything for anyone, and I’m sure Jerry Reinsdorf doesn’t want to spend another $200 million on a .500 team. But those long-term contracts that Eloy Jimenez and Tim Anderson and Yoan Moncada and Luis Robert signed, along with the overpays for Liam Hendriks and Leury Garcia and Kendall Graveman and Lance Lynn have the Sox in a precarious position, there isn’t going to be a lot of roster turnover (Cueto and Jose Abreu and Josh Harrison are the only pending free agents) unless the White Sox can somehow convince another team to take one of those overstuffed contracts off the books.
That’s not gonna be easy because I can’t picture anyone saying “sure, I’ll take two years of Yoan Moncada at $41 million and I’ll give you a nice prospect package or a serviceable veteran at a lower pay rate in return.” The long-term deals didn’t quite work out the way the deals for Chris Sale, Adam Eaton and Jose Quintana did. Those were the building blocks of the rebuild. This team is in a purgatory where they can’t really move those contracts to rebuild because the players attached to them are not worth the money they’re being paid, pretty much across the board (with the exception being Johnny Cueto). This is basically what happened to the Chicago Cubs, who priced their players right out of their payroll. But at least they got a World Series ring out of the deal. The only White Sox players with rings in their future will be getting wedding rings.
If I were running this organization, this offseason I would trade Tim Anderson and Lucas Giolito (both of whom I don’t expect to be around long term and both of whom are at the height of their value as trade pieces), I would see if Jake Burger is a legitimate full-season third base option and if I can’t trade Moncada, I’d DFA him after next season (it would be easier to accept blowing $20 million than $40 million for absolutely nothing). I’d also DFA Leury Garcia. The Sox were willing to do so with Dallas Keuchel and the money would be less if Garcia were DFA’d next season. The problem is I just don’t see the Sox being willing to either eat that much money in DFA’s or be willing to admit that chances that extreme need to be made. But the Sox managed to get rid of Chris Sale, who had far more success than Lucas Giolito (who is guaranteed gone as a free agent after the 2023 season anyway). The bottom line is, changes need to be made.
If you took the time to read this entire presentation, I thank you. I’ve worked on this for the better part of three days because I’m tired of arguing with people about the state of this franchise. It’s in a bad way right now. The Sox aren’t suddenly going to “get hot” and just mow through the rest of the season and the playoffs and win the World Series. Those things just don’t happen. Or don’t happen often. Everyone uses the 2021 Atlanta Braves as an example but what are the chances of that happening two years in a row?
I sincerely believe the Cleveland Guardians will win the AL Central in 2022, with the White Sox finishing second and the Minnesota Twins finishing third. The Sox will also fall short of the Wild Card. At that point, hopefully changes will be made. Or they’ll stand pat and say “if it wasn’t for all the injuries…”
The Jason J. Connor Experience 