Category Archives: Making Good Decisions

No One Loved Their Past More Than Me… And Now It’s Time To Leave It Behind

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Anyone who knows me, even a little bit, knows I’m completely obsessed with my past. I’m not talking about my relationships or my friendships. I’m talking about my experiences. From school to my toys to shows and movies I watched to stores my family shopped at. I had the happiest childhood of anyone I’ve ever met. I still enjoy the shows I enjoyed as a child, including He-Man And The Masters Of The Universe, The Lone Ranger and Looney Tunes.

The happiest period of my life was from whatever point I can originally remember (probably the age of four) through the spring of 2005. At that point, things went downhill and, being honest, they continued in a downward spiral for the next 18 years. The negative points of my life were definitely a result of unhappy relationships but that’s a story for another time.

A couple of times I tried to recreate happy times during my not-happy period and it was an absolute disaster. For example, one of my happy times was a dinner and shopping trip with my parents on December 29, 1995. I attempted to recreate the experience in 2008, with a cretin I was dating at the time. Some of the stores I had been to in 1995 were closed, as was the restaurant I ate at with my mom and dad. Everything about the 2008 trip was bad. So bad, in fact, that it almost ruined the original experience for me, which was the exact opposite of what I had been trying to accomplish. And I’m worried I’m going to do it again.

I have plans this year to do a project I did in 1995-96, as well as 2001. My project is to create myself on NCAA Football 07, NCAA March Madness 07 and MVP NCAA Baseball 07, playing my way all the way through. I’ve went in depth on my project in previous blog entries so I don’t want to belabor the issue, but I’ve been wanting to do this again for over 20 years. And I figured with better equipment (I can play the PS2 games on my backward compatible PS3 instead of the NES I had in 1995). But I’m concerned I’m going to be disappointed because it’s not a carbon copy of my original project. Even though it’s more a matter of mindset than anything else. But I’m hopeful that I can see my way clear and enjoy it.

Which brings me to the whole purpose of this entry.

My obsession with my history is a double-edged sword. While I loved my childhood, my teenage years and my early 20s, that time is gone and nothing I can do will bring it back. And I’m trying as hard as I can to let those days dissolve into the past and not base my whole life on how happy I am NOW in comparison to how happy I was THEN. The fact is, I should be happier now than I’ve been at any point in my life but I just can’t feel it. I can’t find it. I am hoping that finally getting on with my project will bring back the happy I felt in 1995 and 2001. But I can’t let that be the singular deciding factor in what I’m dealing with.

The past 18 years haven’t been so bad that I couldn’t get through them but they have been horrible. Relationships I wouldn’t wish on anyone. One with a fat piece of garbage in the late 2000s that nauseates me even to think about, and she was the one I attempted to recreate my 1995 trip with. The whore of Preston County in the 2010s who nearly ruined my life. A girl in Chicago who was 35 going on 15. These situations made the past 18 years absolutely dreadful. And I’m past all of that now. I’m in a situation that is perfect now. I should be happier than I’ve ever been. But I’m letting those miserable 18 years pull down my happy past as well as my current and my future. Even women I wasn’t romantically attached to, like a girl I knew from 1999 until 2023 just decided to make my life a little more miserable than it needed to be. And I considered her to be my closest confidant in a complete and total friendship situation. After re-assessing the situation, I realize she needed to go as much as the women I had dated in the past. And that needs to be something I never look back on.

I have to let the good and the bad go and stop thinking about how happy I was from 1982 to 2004 and how miserable I was from 2005 to 2023. Those times are both over, and while I’m not as happy as I was in my younger days, I am MUCH happier than I was at any point since 2005. And rather than focusing on either of those things, I am trying so hard to focus forward. And I just don’t know if I can pull it off. If my project doesn’t work out, I don’t know what I’m going to do from there. I’ve put all of my eggs in one basket and I’m afraid I’m going to drop it. And then I’ll know that things are far worse now than I’m willing to accept.

So, for the next 2 months I’m focused on updating baseball rosters on MLB The Show 23 and making an attempt at running franchise mode this season. And if that falls short by any length, it’s time to start on my project and I have everything leaning on that decision. We’ll see what happens but right now I don’t have the highest of hopes and I’m still obsessed with the past. And I have to get past that to move forward regardless of what I’m going to do.

I know this is all kind of a mess, I just felt like it would do me good to get all these feelings out and see how things go in the future. Thank you for taking the time to read. Peace.

Talkin’ Baseball: My Take On The Sox Machine 2023-24 Offseason Plan Project

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Every year the Sox Machine website posts a template for what is known as the “Off-season 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. Basically, playing general manager.

So, here is my Off-season Plan Project for the 2023-24 offseason. Like last year, I’m going to do list not only what I would do in terms of roster construction, but what I think the team will do as well.

PREAMBLE

This is going to be a transition year, from the “window of contention” White Sox to the “let’s try this again” White Sox. The 2024 season will be the bridge between them. I expect another 100 loss season and the firing of manager Pedro Grifol and his staff following the 2024 season.

ARBITRATION-ELIGIBLE PLAYERS

Dylan Cease: $8.8M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Andrew Vaughn: $3.7M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Michael Kopech: $3.6M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Touki Toussaint: $1.7M (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Trayce Thompson: $1.7M (non-tender, I think the Sox will non-tender)
Garrett Crochet: $900,000 (tender, I think the Sox will tender)
Clint Frazier: $900,000 (non-tender, I think the Sox will non-tender)
Matt Foster: $740,000 (tender, I think the Sox will tender)

Most of these are no-brainers. Cease is the ace of the staff, Vaughn is a former third-overall pick in the MLB Draft and Crochet was also a first-round pick. On the flip side of that, Thompson (a 37 OPS+ in 36 games with the Sox in 2023) and Frazier (a 52 OPS+ in 33 games with the Sox) should have played themselves off any MLB roster going forward and should consider going to Japan or South Korea. I think this will be Kopech’s last chance to amount to something. Toussaint showed enough in 2023 to at least be a depth piece or a spot starter. Foster is coming off injury but will only be making the league minimum and this team needs pitching in the worst way.

CLUB OPTIONS

Tim Anderson: $14M ($1M buyout) (pick up, I would trade if possible, I think the Sox will pick up)

Liam Hendriks: $15M ($15M buyout, paid over 10 years at $1.5M) (buyout, I think the Sox will buyout)

I’ll address TA later but I would definitely pick up the option to begin the offseason. Hendriks is a special case, considering his Tommy John surgery but there’s no reason to spend $15 million this year on a pitcher who won’t be pitching for a team that won’t be contending. Don’t feel bad, he’ll still be getting $1.5 million a year and that’s more than most of us are making.

MUTUAL OPTIONS

Mike Clevinger: $12M ($4 million buyout) (I think he’ll take the buyout)

I wasn’t a fan of Clevinger, and I’m not a fan now. Yes, he was the best pitcher on this team in 2023, that says more about the state of the Sox starting staff than it does about Clevinger. His numbers were good (3.77 ERA, 9 wins, 3.3 WAR, 118 ERA+) and maybe he can get a multi-year deal with a contender to be a fifth starter, which is what he was supposed to be when he signed with the Sox.

OTHER IMPENDING FREE AGENTS

Yasmani Grandal (Made $18.25M in 2023) (let him walk, I think the Sox let him walk)
Elvis Andrus ($3M) (let him walk, I think the Sox let him walk)
Bryan Shaw ($720,000) (resign him, I think the Sox let him walk)
Jose Urena ($720,000) (let him walk, I think the Sox let him walk)

Grandal will forever be the face of the failed rebuild, a $72 million contract for an OPS+ of 99 and a cumulative WAR of 2.5 over four years. Nothing says “White Sox” more than that. Andrus and Urena were just “the best of the bad options” that were available when they signed. Shaw is a different matter entirely. He was a horse coming out of the bullpen in 2023 and while his ERA was a tad high (4.14) he finished 17 games (including four saves) and struck out 40 and walked 17 in 45.2 innings. This is the same guy who lead the league pitching in 81 games in 2021 with the Guardians. I’d absolutely bring him back, with a nice raise, say $900,000. He earned it.

FREE AGENTS

No. 1: Gary Sanchez, Catcher (two years, $16 million). This guy can do everything Grandal was supposed to do, but, you know, actually DO IT. He’s only 30 but he’s a veteran of nine years. Last season he hit 19 home runs (compared to eight for Grandal) to go along with a 2.4 WAR. All that while making $1.5 million. This team needs a catcher who has some success doing the job and he’s done it. I don’t care about the .217 batting average, 136 strikeouts. He’s still a major net-positive over what’s on the roster right now. In two years, the Sox can call up Edgar Quero and Sanchez can move on.

No. 2: Lucas Giolito and Jack Flaherty, Pitchers (each at one year, $15 million with an option for 2025). Buying on the cheap, two guys who need to rebuild their value after having lackluster 2023 seasons, reuniting with Sox pitching coach Ethan Katz (as most people know, he was their pitching coach at Harvard-Westlake High School) and that not only fills out two-fifths of the rotation for 2024 but also gives two good trade chips at the 2024 trade deadline. There’s nothing to not like about this option, considering the Sox needs in the rotation and the young pitchers they acquired at the 2023 deadline are nowhere close to ready to compete for a rotation spot.

No. 3: Whit Merrifield, 2B/RF(two years, $15 million). Clearly on the downside of his career but Merrifield hit .272 last season and stole 26 bases for the Blue Jays. He’s already being mentioned as a free agent target by the Sox and would fill a need at either second base or right field. Reuniting with Chris Getz and Pedro Grifol should also make for a nice landing for Merrifield. While he’s certainly not great (0.8 WAR in 2023) he’s better than any of the options currently on the roster at either position he plays. I see him more as a second baseman while the Sox wait to see if Oscar Colas can figure out how to play baseball because he’s not going anywhere soon. Merrifield can also bring some badly-needed leadership to this team of fools. It’s an upgrade from nothing.

Even though Chris Getz is in charge and not Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn, I have a feeling it’s going to be business as usual for the front office. Under the radar signings and hopes for bounce backs, I can see them signing players like Royals pitchers Brad Keller and Zack Greinke, a second baseman like Michael Chavis or Tony Kemp (of the Nationals and A’s, respectively; Kemp can also play the outfield), and a right fielder like Wil Myers (who hit .189 in 37 games for the Reds last season) and hoping they’ll bounce back to what they did five or six years ago. That rarely ever works. But it’s cheap!

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 Eloy Jimenez to the Milwaukee Brewers for 3B/1B Luke Adams. Yes, Adams is not the Brewers’ top prospect (he ranks in the 20’s) but Sox fans always seem to massively overvalue the players and prospects in this organization. Jimenez is nothing special. He had one good fluke season in 2019 and it’s been all downhill since then. This will also free up about $13 million in payroll. Adams isn’t a great hitter (.245 in 371 MiLB at-bats) but he stole 30 bases in 2023 at Class A and had an OPS of .801. He can play first base or third base as well. Eloy would be the first guy out the door if I was trying to fix this mess (I guess I lied, Moncada would be the first guy out the door but there is no way anyone is going to take on that $24 million salary he’ll earn next season). Jimenez is an overrated bum who just doesn’t fit here anymore.

No. 2: Trade Tim Anderson to the Atlanta Braves for P Seth Keller and OF Isaiah Drake. The White Sox make this move after exercising TA’s $14M option for 2024. Some Sox fans may think TA has to be worth at least Ronald Acuna or Spencer Strider (I can literally see Southside Showdown suggesting a trade like that) but the fact is TA was one of the worst hitters and defensive players in the Major Leagues in 2023. That batting title was a long time ago, and so was the 20/20 season. TA had a -2.0 WAR and an OPS+ of 60 in 2023. So I’m looking at a couple of middling prospects with the Braves. Keller is intriguing as he’s known more for his off-speed pitches than his fastball and Drake is a known speedster with a good glove whose bat may take some time to develop. But I think that potential is worth one season of TA and the Braves could get the best of TA (a .300 average, 20+ home runs and stolen bases) when he’s on a team where he’s not expected to lead or be the face of the franchise. And if he can turn the clock back to 2019, he’d be an upgrade over current Braves shortstop Orlando Arcia..

As for what I think the Sox will do in the trade market, I think it will look a lot like previous years where they don’t have the guts to make any moves. They still talk about all the talent on this team, yet I don’t see it. I see a team with a cumulative 83 OPS+. I see a team that had only three offensive players with a WAR over 1.0 (and one of them, Jake Burger, is gone). I see a team that can’t run or hit, or steal bases and is rebuilding the pitching staff. But for whatever reason, people inside the organization think this team is just loaded with talent. The problem is that talent is all on paper.

SUMMARY

This would be my every day lineup: Sanchez (catcher), Vaughn/Gavin Sheets (1B), Merrifield/Lenyn Sosa/Jose Rodriguez (2B), Sosa/Rodriguez (SS), Moncada (3B), Andrew Benintendi (LF), Luis Robert (CF), Colas/Sheets/Merrifield (RF) and Sheets/Vaughn (DH). Zach Remillard would be my top utility player.

The pitching rotation: Cease, Giolito, Flaherty, Toussaint and Kopech.

The bullpen: Gregory Santos (closer), Bryan Shaw, Garrett Crochet, Aaron Bummer, Declan Cronin, Lane Ramsey, Matt Foster and Tanner Banks. I would also keep Kopech as a fifth starter/long reliever and hope he finally learns how to pitch.

I think the White Sox will sign four or five pitchers who no one has ever heard of to minor league deals, they’ll invite all the pitchers they acquired at the trade deadline to Spring Training and just hope they somehow manage to turn into MLB pitchers overnight and talk about all the talent that’s on this team.

So, here is what I see the Sox running out there every day:

Everyday lineup: Korey Lee (catcher), Vaughn (1B), Romy Gonzalez (2B), Anderson (SS), Moncada (3B), Benintendi (LF), Robert (CF), Sheets/Colas (RF) and Jimenez (DH). I do think there’s a chance the Sox will attempt to trade for Salvador Perez, but I think the Royals will overvalue him much like the Sox will overvalue TA in trade talks and nothing will come of it. I also would not be at all surprised if, when he gets absolutely no offers, Yasmani Grandal signs a minor league deal with the Sox and gets an invitation to Spring Training. The fact that they refused to designate him for assignment at any point during the season says they value him more than that big contract he signed in 2019 was worth.

The pitching rotation: Cease, Kopech, Toussaint, Jake Eder, Nick Nastrini.

The bullpen: Gregory Santos (closer), Garrett Crochet, Aaron Bummer, Declan Cronin, Lane Ramsey, Tanner Banks, Deivi Garcia and a dumpster dive free agent or two.

I can see my version of the 2024 White Sox finishing 80-82 if Giolito and Flaherty bounce back and Kopech learns how to pitch. They might even be within eight or 10 games of first place at some point in August. Sanchez and Merrifield could provide some badly needed leadership. I think Cease can bounce back from a lackluster season and maybe Colas will improve.

I see the real 2024 White Sox finishing 62-100, spending the season wondering why all this talent hasn’t evolved yet. Moncada will hit .220 and be hurt most of the year, Vaughn will be the same pedestrian hitter he’s been his entire career (if he hasn’t figured it out after almost 1,500 at bats I don’t know when he will). The pitching will struggle because they felt the need to rush youngsters who weren’t ready to fill out the rotation if they don’t sign the Royals castoffs, if they do the record may be worse.

Things may eventually start to look up once Moncada 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. I don’t want to pass judgment on the new front office yet, but the one thing that remains the same is Jerry Reinsdorf is the owner and I’m expecting a cut back on the payroll this year, which went from $196M in 2022 to $180M in 2023 and I’m imagining a $150M payroll in 2024. I’m not saying it’s impossible to win with a payroll like that; payroll doesn’t mean anything. The Sox lost over 100 games in 2023 with a massive payroll. There needs to be talent and this team doesn’t have much of that. So, we’ll see where things go from here..

Thank you for taking the time to read. Peace.

How I Plan To Spend The 2023-24 Chicago White Sox Offseason

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Credit: Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports

It’s been a long and difficult journey to get to this point, and I’ve taken many side trips along the way. Back in May, I started thinking about what I would do after the baseball season ended, knowing the White Sox had no chance of making the playoffs. I took a number of options into consideration, even starting a few and then bailing out.

So, now I have decided the route I want to take.

I considered following college sports again, specifically UCLA or WVU. I was willing to completely walk away from the White Sox for a couple years while they got their ducks in a row. I figured the break would do me good and I could start attending WVU games again if I started following the Mountaineers. But I did a double take after reading about the hazing situation at Northwestern University, that has also been taking place at a number of high schools throughout the United States. I’m not sure what sodomizing teammates has to do with football, and I have a hard time believing there are that many faggots playing football just for the opportunity to fuck their teammates in the ass, but whatever the reason, I completely lost any interest in anything to do with the sport of football.

Yes, I’m throwing the baby out with the bathwater by lumping all of the football programs together, but I found I couldn’t watch a football game without feeling sick to my stomach. This is not an anti-gay statement, this is me being disgusted at football players, who present themselves as “manly,” literally sexually assaulting their teammates. When did football players go from assaulting their wives/girlfriends (which isn’t any better and I’m not saying that’s what they should be doing) to sticking their dicks, broomsticks and other items up each other’s asses? What kind of moron thought that was a good idea?

Regardless of how it started, the fact is it happened and it’s beyond pathetic.

Next, I really considered going all in with the Chicago Blackhawks and I started a full-on transition. I have nearly as much Blackhawks memorabilia as I do White Sox, and I was ready to start replacing my Sox decor with Blackhawks. But then I took a look at the big picture and I decided I wanted to take one final run at my White Sox franchise on MLB The Show. And that brought me to what I’m going to do this offseason.

Today I downloaded the most recent rosters on MLB The Show 23. I’m going to update them over the course of the winter to be ready for the first Spring Training game. I’m going to listen to the White Sox podcasts every week and watch a couple or three episodes of Chicago Fire/PD/Med and watching my science shows and lectures on YouTube. I still plan to catch a Blackhawks game when its on a channel I can get (I don’t get NHL Network since I traded Dish Network for YouTube TV).

Last year, I was halfway through my roster updates when they magically disappeared, even though I had them saved on my PS5 and in the cloud. Both, gone. This year, I’m saving the rosters on the PS5, the cloud and a USB Drive in hopes of that not happening again.

Some have asked why I don’t just wait for MLB The Show 24 to come out and just go from there, but (1) the game won’t release until Spring Training is almost over and (2) if The Show doesn’t feature year-to-year saves, I’m not going to buy the new edition. I’ve done that for years and haven’t gotten my rosters updated correctly since 2021. I see no reason to continue buying a game that I’m not going to play. So, if this works, I’ll either play MLB The Show 23 next season or, if next year’s edition features year-to-year saves, I will update and move my rosters and Spring Training files to MLB The Show 24.

Either way, this is the final year I’ll be updating the rosters. If it all works out, I won’t need to do a full update next season. If it doesn’t, next offseason will be completely focused on the Blackhawks. I can’t really see a situation at this point where I would ever be able to go back and watch college or NFL football, at this point I’m too disgusted with the whole thing, but I’m not going to make any definitive statements, because every time I do make a definitive statement about something, I end up having to walk it back.

So, I’ll be spending the next four months as White Sox GM on MLB The Show 23 and updating all 30 team rosters and adding free agents as they are signed and making trades as they are made in real time. I’ll post the rosters to the vault when they are finished, in mid-February.

And if anything happens this year to ruin my work, I’ll consider that a clear sign that I need to stop, and I will just walk away from it. But one way or the other, this is the last time I’ll be undertaking this project. I’ve enjoyed it over the past several years but it has to come to an end at some point. This year is the point at which it ends.

Thank you for taking the time to read. Peace.

2022 A personal Retrospective

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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.

Peace.

WHERE DO I GO FROM HERE?

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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.

Peace.

2020 A Personal Retrospective

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You don’t have to scroll too far back in my blog to see what high hopes I held for 2020. The beginning of a new decade, and putting an end to the worst decade of my life. It felt like the right time and the stars were aligning to make 2020 a real direction-changer for me. It was going to be the beginning of something special.

Well, we all know 2020 wasn’t exactly the “best year ever.”

However, I’m also going to be the first to admit it was far from being the “worst year ever.” Yes, there were challenges and things didn’t always work to plan. But 2020 was still a far cry better than, for instance, 2018. And it was perfection when compared to any year between 2010 and 2017. So I’m not here to bury 2020, just to remember it.

I will say the first six weeks of the year were as close to perfect as they could have been. I was so happy. I was working on my MLB The Show rosters because I wanted to kick off MLB Spring Training on the actual date and play a full season on the game in franchise mode, so when the offseason hit I could make the transactions as I saw fit.

And this plan worked up until COVID-19 shut down baseball for almost five months.

At some point in mid-February it felt like everything changed. Where as everything had been so perfect those first six weeks, there was a negative connotation to everything and when we went on lockdown, it felt like everything had fallen apart. My new year/new decade triumph wasn’t a loss, but it was shaping up to be far from what I had anticipated, which I am sure was the case for everyone on earth, not just me.

One of the highlights of February and March was getting Doom Eternal for my PlayStation 4, as I was a huge fan of the original Doom games dating back to the Super Nintendo in 1996. And I was so happy with Doom Eternal that I also bought the Doom Slayer’s Collection, which covered several of the games for the newer consoles I hadn’t played before.

March, April and May were enjoyable because I played Red Dead Redemption and Red Dead Redemption II all the way through to completion, back to back. But I played II before I because I wanted to play the games in chronological order in regard to the timeline of the games. I also was neck-deep in watching old western shows and movies.

Looking back, I wish I had taken that time to play my baseball season on MLB The Show and saved the Red Dead Redemption games for winter.

June and July are a complete blur. I have no idea what I was doing during that time. Clearly nothing constructive. I wasn’t even taking time to smoke cigars or watch Star Trek or do any of the other things I wanted to do even before baseball had been rescheduled. The very idea that I just threw time away like that annoys me to no end.

August brought “MLB Training Camp” and a sixty-game season. So I got a couple of months of baseball and that was enough to whet my appetite for MLB The Show, so when the season ended I downloaded the latest roster and began making all the real transactions (and a few of my own with the White Sox that weren’t made in reality but that I wanted to do) so that when Spring Training 2021 comes, I can do what I wanted last year.

I was also concerned when the season ended about what direction I was going to go in terms of entertaining myself for the winter. I used to play one of the Grand Theft Auto games to completion back in the late 2000s and early 2010s, and in 2015 began a yearly tradition of playing a Batman Arkham game as soon as baseball season ended.

This year I thought about immersing myself in Spider-Man games, shows and movies. I bought several Spider-Man video games, as well as the early 1980s cartoon series and the 1994 cartoon series, as well as the original movie trilogy on Blu-ray.

Then, by a complete fluke, I happened onto the show Chicago Fire. And I realized I had my winter all sewn up. So I bought eight seasons of Chicago Fire, seven seasons of Chicago P.D., five seasons of Chicago Med and one season of Chicago Justice on DVD. I started watching them in chronological order, along with the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit crossover episodes. As of today (December 18), I am 111 episodes into a 448 episode marathon, with new episodes set to begin in January 2021.

Enjoying these new shows has definitely been the highlight of the year for me, because I haven’t watched a “current” show since Family Guy debuted in 1999.

So, as 2020 comes to a close, I can’t say I’m altogether thrilled its over, like a lot of people can, but all the same I’m ready for a new year. I’m also ready to do the things I neglected to do in 2020, like working on my White Sox franchise on MLB The Show, smoking cigars and just enjoying life. And working myself back into good physical shape.

In closing, on a scale of one to ten, I’d give 2020 a six. I can’t really complain but I did miss out on a lot of opportunities I’d hoped to take advantage of. The major positives (finishing both Red Dead Redemption games and beginning my fandom with the Chicago shows) definitely outweighed the negatives this year. And I guarantee no one on earth is looking at 2020 ending the way they had anticipated or wanted. Hopefully 2021 will remedy that situation and everyone can move forward with their hopes and dreams.

Peace.

2020 Update: Random Thoughts

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I realize it’s been a long time since I’ve blogged and that was by design, as I wanted to let the new decade fully begin before I gave my thoughts on it. I wanted to do a little random “blurb” to give my thoughts on the lay of the land in the 2020s.

First, let me say that this month has been everything I had hoped the 2020s would be. I haven’t been this happy in probably 15 years, maybe more. Admittedly, I take to the single life like a fish to water (yes, I know it’s correct to say “like a duck to water” but a fish takes to water because it’s life depends on it, I think that’s more appropriate for me). So that was a great first step and really helped me to focus on myself.

More so, that allowed me to sit back and watch people who spend all their time on social media complaining and whining about how they were treated by an ex, and how uncouth it all is. We’ve all been mistreated by exes. I’ve been kicked to the curb, ghosted, mislead, lied to, stolen from, cheated on, used for leverage and had fake charges filed against me with the county sheriff’s office, and that’s only the past two years!

Everyone has had bad experiences (in my case I’ve had 100% bad experiences) but that doesn’t mean it needs to be beaten to death on social media. Yes, I have a very anti-relationship stance, and I do occasionally post memes in that vein, but I also love women and I celebrate them on social media as well. I found a middle ground between being ridiculous in any direction. And I feel good about myself for it.

This is why 2020 is being spent focusing on me, because no one else is going to. I have learned the hard way that everyone is out for themselves, and now it is my turn. I am putting myself and my happiness ahead of anything or anyone else. There’s an old saying about the fact that you can’t love someone else if you don’t love yourself first, and that’s very true. You need to be at peace with yourself and your situation before you should get involved with anyone else. I have my own problems, I don’t need yours. Get your problems taken care of and then we can see where things go.

On a happier note, I am continuing to update my MLB 19 The Show rosters and have done the best job I have done to date on offseason updates, dating back as far as 2014. Usually I try to do as much of the major transactions as I can and let the minor league stuff sit, especially the Class A rosters. But this year I have spent hours every day making sure everything is as it should be. I hope to start playing my franchise on February 22, which coincides with the first Spring Training game the White Sox play.

This will be the 16th consecutive year I have bought Sony’s MLB offering for a PlayStation console, dating back to MLB 2005 for the original PlayStation. I also bought MVP Baseball 2005 that year and have bought a new game every year since. Prior to 2005, I made due with MLB 2000 on the PlayStation and MVP Baseball 2005 on the PS2.

One of the biggest negatives of 2019 was the six stints I spent in Facebook jail. But the silver lining in that cloud was that it allowed me to diversify my social media presence and I have been much more active on Twitter and Instagram, for better or worse, I suppose. While Facebook remains my base of operations, Instagram has become a repository for my daily meme posts and Twitter is a great haven for Chicago White Sox news.

I have worked myself into a very good daily and weekly schedule but that’s all due to change as soon as baseball season begins, and then I’ll have to do a life reboot and change a lot of the things I do to make time for baseball games five or six days a week. That’s definitely not a complaint, it’s just a fact that things will be changing soon.

I continue to feel positive about everything. My decision making has taken a major step in the right direction, I’m not making bad decisions on a daily basis like I used to, in fact, I haven’t made a poor decision yet in 2020. I’m also learning to be less off the cuff and ill-prepared for things, I have a habit of running into burning buildings (metaphorically speaking) without thinking about the consequences and that has been a lifelong issue for me, my attitude has always been “let’s do it and worry about the consequences later” and that has a 0% success rate with me. Now I am learning to do my research and think things over before I act, and not just act on impulse and screw everything up.

I’m the luckiest man in the world. I am financially secure, I have everything I want (that money can buy, that is), I have great friends and their support means the world to me because without them, I would no doubt be in a bad situation somewhere, and the only thing I lack in life is a partner to share it with, and if that’s as bad as its going to get, I’ll take it. I can get by on my own with ease, I’ve done it before (proudly single for nine years between 1996 and 2005) so if a second go-around of that is in the works, I’ll take it and make the best of it. That era was the happiest time of my life, by far.

Which brings me to the fact that I should be living my best life right now, but I am still having to work my mind into accepting the fact that it’s OK to be happy.

So, in closing, I put a lot of pressure on the 2020s, and so far it’s has been everything I had hoped it would be. I came in well-prepared and so far, so good. I just hope it continues to chug along nicely, and that spring and summer offer me the opportunity to catch up on my cigar smoking that has been neglected all winter, and of course I am looking forward to the first winning White Sox season since 2012.

Thank you for taking the time to read. Peace.

Quick Thoughts by Jason J. Connor

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Quick-Thoughts

“QUICK THOUGHTS”

– I have said on multiple occasions that as bad as the past 10 years have been, 2019 was one of the better years of the decade. That was just a straight up, boldfaced lie. The fact is, 2019 has been as bad as most and worse than many. Five stints in Facebook Jail (including one instance in which I was cleared of any wrongdoing but just left in Facebook Jail for a week anyway) after zero the previous 12 years… Another losing season by the Chicago White Sox (seventh in a row and ten out of 11 overall)… All this promise for a big offseason that just melted away last night with Rick Hahn’s “no urgency to do anything” white flag speech… The only thing that has separated 2019 from any other year is it’s the first time since 2010 that I haven’t wanted to die at some point during the year, so I guess I have that going for me, or something.

– I don’t know what changed with Facebook in 2019 but the Gestapo would fear Facebook had it been around in the 1930s and 1940s. In the old days, you could start an account with an email address, verify the address and you’re good to go. If you violated the ridiculous “too many likes, too fast” rule, you got multiple warnings before they shut down your ability to “like” for 24 hours. And I imagine you would have to go pretty far afield to get put in Facebook jail. In 2019, starting a new account (or attempting to, in my case, because I’m not allowed, for some reason) included email verification, cell phone number verification, head shot photo and, amazingly, driver’s license verification. To start a page on a free social networking site. If you somehow manage to get an account, and you “like” too much, too fast? Instant 30 day block. No warning, no word on how many “likes” are too many, just an instantaneous block for 30 days. And if someone just doesn’t like you? They can report a post and you can go to Facebook jail for offending someone over literally anything.

– For the first time in my life, “I’m not going to date next year” has gotten a 100% positive reaction from everyone I know. That tells you just how bad things have actually gotten. No longer do I get “you just haven’t met the right woman yet” or “things will improve.” Now everyone agrees it’s best if I just remove myself from the situation at large and stop pretending that, at age 42, I’m gonna walk into the forest and find Sleeping Beauty laying there just waiting for me. It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but I think in the long run it’s going to be a lot better for me, mentally and emotionally.

– It’s hard being a White Sox fan. Listening to Kenny Williams walk into the GM meetings last month talking about how it’s “business as usual, but much more.” Then a month later hearing that there is no urgency to do anything, straight from the mouth of Rick Hahn. Seven straight losing seasons? There clearly has never been any urgency. We’re just happy to show up, take our ass-whooping and go home. For those who aren’t Sox savvy, the White Sox have won three World Series titles in the past 119 years, the first in 1906, the second in 1917 and the third in 2005. They also played in the 1959 World Series and lost. Now if anything says “no urgency,” I think that speaks volumes.

– I have really high hopes for 2020 and the decade of the 2020s. But every day things just seem a little less optimistic and a little more “here we go again.” My personal failings are generally self-induced, like my awful taste in women and my stubbornness when it comes to walking away from a situation that is not ideal. But other issues, like Facebook, I can’t take much personal responsibility for. A week in Facebook jail over a meme about a plate of bacon? Find one person on earth that would be offended by that. Besides some towelhead, I mean. The beheading videos are fine, just don’t show a plate of bacon or someone will be offended. Yeah, that’s me being singled out. That’s someone with an ax to grind or Facebook itself deciding to make an example of someone. And it’s me.

– I’m dedicating 2020 to good cigars, good liquor, good food, good friends and White Sox baseball. It’s going to be the year I turn my life around and focus on me. And if 2020 turns out as badly as the previous 15 years, I don’t know what to do.

Thank you for taking the time to read. Peace.

2020: A New Beginning And A New Era

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As I have hopefully made clear in previous posts, I am really ready for the decade of the 2010s to end. This has been the worst decade of my life by a wide margin. In fact, this has been the first decade of my life I would give a failing grade to. I am a generally positive person who can see the good in a bad situation but the good from the 2010s are few and far between.

This blog will not be beating a dead horse and looking back at all that toxic negativity. This blog is about hope, positivity and the future. I think the 2020s have a chance to be great.

I also want to lay out what I want to accomplish as we reach the dawn of a new era.

What has me most excited for the 2020s is the ascension of the Chicago White Sox from laughingstock of Major League Baseball to a viable contender for a World Series title. The decade of the 2010s was just as bad for my favorite baseball team as it was for me. From 2010 through 2019, the White Sox had one (1) winning season out of 10, in 2012, when they finished 85-77 and in second place in the American League Central. Other than that, nothing but negatives.

That is changing, however, as the rebuild that began in late 2016 is starting to bear fruit. It will be fun to follow the team as they continue their improvement for the next several years.

On a personal level, there are a lot of things I want to see change from the 2010s into the 2020s. Physically, mentally and emotionally. I have figured out my mistakes and I am ready to not only stop making them but to move on from them and forget them. Leave the past in the past.

Physically, while I made some strides in 2019, I am far from a finished product. Probably 60 pounds, at least, need to be removed from me when I step on the scale. I want to start making a workout program part of every day, much like I did back in my younger days. In my early 20s, I participated in a weight training program seven days a week and was very happy with myself. I was at my physical peak then. Right now I’m not. I’m still showing the effects of the past ten years and I want to put that in full reversal, with losing weight being the most important. I lost a lot of hair, especially in the latter part of the decade from stress, and am considering just shaving my head. This has been frowned upon by some female acquaintances, but more on that later.

I plan on working out my exercise program in the next week or so, I want to do some combination of weight training and aerobic, while adding endurance exercises later on in 2020.

I debate daily on keeping my beard or trimming it down to a notch above a five-o’clock shadow look. I’ll never go clean-shaven again, but the mountain man look may be a little too much.

I’m thinking maybe a basic buzz cut, not a razor-shaven bald head, with a light beard.

I look young for my age in spite of what stress has done to me in the 2010s and I don’t want to lose that. I have watched my mom age 30 years in the past five and I don’t want to do that at 42 years old. My mom didn’t start to really age until she was 80. I want that kind of longevity.

I also have to start getting more sleep, which means going to bed earlier and actually going to sleep, rather than surfing the web on my phone and being in bed for eight hours but only sleeping for four. I have to make myself understand that the internet will still be there in the morning.

So, if I can drop about 60 pounds, get the “look” that I want and get some sleep, I’ll consider that a victory and a good beginning for the decade. There is no reason I can’t accomplish those goals.

From a mental standpoint, there is a lot I want to do on many fronts. I want to learn. I want to put my mind to work more than I have in the past 15 years. That means exchanging girls for academics, on whatever level of academics I happen to land. I enjoyed scratching the surface on my scientific learning in 2019 and certainly hope to continue that, just on an expanded basis.

Other subjects I would like to study more in-depth include the American Civil War, of which I have been a knowledge sponge for decades. I love American history but haven’t done enough about it. I have a lot of information at my disposal and intend on packing my brain with that info.

Also on the mental side of things, I want to put more time into my MLB The Show franchise on the PlayStation 4. This has been a desire of mine dating back to the mid-1990s, when I was playing Ken Griffey, Jr.’s Winning Run on the Super Nintendo. I want to play the part of general manager and build the White Sox like I was running the team. I have been through a number of video games in an attempt to do this, including every MLB offering from Sony since MLB 98 over 20 years ago. If I fail in this endeavor again, I have a secondary option I would like to give a try to again.

Back in the 1990s, I enjoyed playing NCAA Football games and “creating” myself at UCLA, playing my career there, and then getting drafted into the NFL. The earliest version of this started in 1995, my senior year in high school. I haven’t given it a real try since 2001, but if MLB The Show fails, 2020 may be the time to do it, 25 years after the original run. I have to use outdated games (NCAA Football 14 is the newest to be released due to licensing issues, but it will have to do).

More importantly, from a standpoint of my mental health, is to nurture my friendships with the people who actually care about me and to eliminate the toxic people. This may seem like a no-brainer, but I have a really bad habit of being involved with toxic people. And this is not a new phenomenon, this has followed me for most of my life, for at least 30 years now. I need to stop dealing with people who either don’t have my best interests at heart or who only want me around for what I can do for them, or who just get a kick out of seeing me miserable.

Emotionally, a lot of these changes will help me eliminate the stress and anxiety I feel most days that I just try to suppress. The problem is, suppressing stress and anxiety is what got me into the physical wreck I am today. From 2010 to 2017 I put on almost 100 pounds, lost a lot of hair, suffered from stomach ulcers, lack of sleep, twitching eyes, a wrecked immune system and migraine headaches. As I eliminated the stress and anxiety, a lot of these things began to clear up. If I can eliminate all of them, I can begin to rebuild the wreckage that was once my body.

I have also been trying to “clean up my act” a bit on social networking. I am in the midst of a 30-day suspension on Facebook that could lead to a lifetime ban from what I have read and having my account permanently closed, due to memes I have posted that were considered “offensive.” This is borderline hilarious, due to the fact that one of the times I was sent to Facebook jail I reposted a meme I had posted one year previously and nothing was said about it. In fact, I have spent five hitches in Facebook jail in my life and all five were in 2019. In the previous 12 years, I had never been in Facebook jail. Once, I was accused of “posting spam,” which was actually White Sox news stories. I fought the law and I won, as my stories were returned to my wall and no action was taken. I can say 2019 was the worst year I ever spent on Facebook and I hope that will improve going forward, assuming I have a Facebook account to go back to in two weeks time.

I have cleaned up all the sexual posts, bad language posts and the kinds of things that make one look less intelligent or socially unacceptable. I also plan to ravage my friends list and remove people that shouldn’t be there, and I will be very discriminating going forward in terms of who is allowed into my circle. There will be a solid vetting process with who gets into my life.

So, if I can work myself back into shape, get the look I want, eliminate the stress and negativity and toxicity from my life, start learning again, accomplish what I want on MLB The Show (preferably) or NCAA Football and make my social networking pages a reflection of the guy I actually am rather than the off-color comedian I had always wanted to be, I will consider 2020 to be a success. And I think if I accomplish even 10% of my goals, 2020 will be a major improvement over 2019 and a massive improvement over the rest of the 2010s.

I’m staking a claim on the 2020s as “my decade,” the one where I bring out the best in myself and allow God to put me where I should be rather than fighting tooth and nail to make bad decisions and put myself into problem areas that I should never have been involved with in the first place. I have the tools and the ability to make the best of this decade and I’ll do everything I can to accomplish that goal. I want to forget the 2010s ever happened and look strictly forward.

There is no reason I can’t be living my best life in 2020 and every year after that. Its just a matter of actually applying myself to the task at hand and doing it. There is nothing holding me back. If I were to fail, I have no one to blame but myself. But I’m going to do all I can to succeed.

Thank you for taking the time to read. Peace.

Chicago White Sox: Offseason Update (November 12, 2019)

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An important week in baseball, the general manager’s meetings in Scottsdale, Arizona began yesterday (Monday) and last through Thursday. While not nearly as important in the big picture as the Winter Meetings, which take place in San Diego, December 8 through 12, the general manager’s meetings help set the foundation for the Winter Meetings.

The White Sox are in the news quite a bit as Bob Nightengale of USA Today has tried to again fan the flames of importance around the Chicago White Sox, as he did last offseason by announcing, at one point, that the White Sox were not only the front runners for shortstop Manny Machado, but that they were also the favorites to sign outfielder Bryce Harper!

Those two combined for $630 million over the length of their respective deals, which last 10 years (Machado) and 13 years (Harper), a bit above the White Sox pay scale.

Now Bob is pushing the concept of the White Sox being all in on every available free agent on the market this offseason, though he was quick to pull back on the top player available, pitcher Gerrit Cole. But continued to push the assertion that third baseman Anthony Rendon is a viable possibility, and maybe even to go so far as to say a legit target.

I don’t want any misunderstandings here, I have nothing negative to say about Rendon whatsoever, he is a legit MVP candidate (.319/.412/.598 with 34 home runs and an MLB-leading 126 RBI in 2019 as well as winning a Silver Slugger and making the All Star team) but he isn’t a fit with this White Sox team. I HATE this idea (which is bandied about regularly on the Sox Talk Podcast) that you just sign the best available players you can get and worry about where to play them later. That concept is totally insane in my opinion.

You build a team and fill in your needs. If you don’t need a third baseman, you don’t sign a third baseman. You find the best player available, either by free agency or trade, at the position you have a need. So as great as Rendon is, you just say “I don’t need a third baseman” and you move on to where you do have a need. It’s simple.

The Sox have three major needs: Starting pitching, right field and designated hitter.

In my perfect world, the names you fill in are Zack Wheeler, Yasiel Puig and Edwin Encarnacion. You’re getting a good strikeout pitcher with outstanding control (195 K’s versus 50 walks in 2019) who will be a perfect fit in the ballpark and the rotation, a right fielder who you can pretty much pencil in for 20+ home runs (maybe 30 playing 81 games a year at Sox Park) and 15 steals per season and a DH who has hit 32+ home runs 8 years in a row.

Yes, each has their negatives, Wheeler has had Tommy John Surgery twice (but worked 195 innings last year and has less than 900 innings on his arm), Puig can be an attitude problem (which I think would be remedied by the strong Cuban culture within the organization) and Encarnacion will turn 37 in January, so he’s not a long term solution, but I think he can help a guy like Jose Abreu adjust to being an everyday DH and that’s a win/win situation.

As starting pitching goes, I just don’t see the White Sox going $250 million (or more) for Gerrit Cole or $150 million (or more) for Stephen Strasburg. Not only is that not something they have done in the past, but I don’t see the Sox spending that kind of money (more on that later). The next group of starters includes Madison Bumgarner, Dallas Keuchel and Wheeler, guys who you could get for under $100 million. While I am a big fan of Bumgarner, I see him staying in the National League and the 1,800+ innings on his arm is a concern. Keuchel is a guy who probably slots as a #4 within the White Sox rotation and I don’t see what’s to be accomplished paying $60 million over three years for a number four who pitches to contact in a hitter’s park and who has never been much of a strikeout guy.

Right field is a conundrum because the Sox have been linked since the offseason began to Nicholas Castellanos. While I am a big fan of his bat (.289/.337/.525 with 27 home runs and 58 doubles in 2019) his defense is well below-average and he’s only been slotted at DH 40 times in 839 career games. So you’re giving up something with him either way, you’re guaranteeing yourself two below-average gloves in the outfield (along with left fielder Eloy Jimenez) or you are giving yourself the unknown of what he can produce at DH.

The DH position is a bit of a monkey in it’s own right, due to the lack of productive ones (Kendrys Morales, Justin Smoak and Mark Trumbo look to be the only full-time DH options outside of Encarnacion. Morales hit .194 with two home runs in 53 games, Smoak hit .208 with 22 home runs and Trumbo hit .172 with no home runs in 31 plate appearances.

I’ll pass on all three. And that leaves Encarnacion and guys like Avi Garcia.

There is also the possibility of rotating the DH (which has been about as productive as the past few full time DH options the White Sox have signed) and letting Zack Collins, Jose Abreu and the right fielder (Castellanos or Kole Calhoun or Corey Dickerson) to split time at the position. Not something I am a big fan of, but I like to have a set lineup every day.

As I have been writing this and doing my research prior to, one guy who keeps catching my attention is the aforementioned Corey Dickerson. While he is a left fielder, not a right fielder which the Sox need (and he has only six games of experience in his career in right field) I realized he has 128 games of experience at DH, mostly during his two-year stint with the Tampa Bay Rays. In addition to his left-handed bat, he also carries a .286 career batting average. He’ll turn 31 in May and maybe could be a good option as an everyday DH.

I hate feeling negative about the team, especially this offseason because the position player that is considered the #1 free agent plays a position they don’t need and if they don’t pursue him fans will take that negatively and I don’t think that’s fair. I wasn’t big on last year’s pursuit of Manny Machado (and was active about pushing that fact in my blog) because he didn’t fill a need; I knew they planned to play him at third base but that wasn’t his preferred position. I don’t want to see the Sox spend money just for the sake of saying “look, we signed Anthony Rendon, now we have to change our infield around to fit him in because we signed a guy at a position we didn’t need to fill, let’s hope Moncada is OK with another position switch.”

That doesn’t work. Spend the money, but spend it responsibly. Spend it on need. But don’t sign the cheapest player available and hope he’s a bounce-back candidate. Don’t sign an outfielder because he had a good season six years ago. Don’t sign a pitcher because he won a Cy Young award five years ago and he’s been awful since then. That doesn’t work.

I am 100% convinced this team can, with the right additions, contend for a Wild Card spot in 2020 and then for a division title in 2021. But there are holes that need to be filled and they need to be filled properly, with players who play the position and have been successful, recently. Winning teams have winning players. Let’s go out and find some.

Thank you for reading. Peace.