A Few Months After Punting Away The Offseason In The Middle Of Their "Championship Window", The White Sox Have Punted Away The Trade Deadline
The White Sox have officially punted on the trade deadline. This is the team we're going to war with for the last 60 or so games. As it stands right now, the White Sox, a team in their "championship window" per their own words, sit 3 games back of the Twins and 2 games back Guardians:
That's pretty fucking pathetic. As I said 2 sentences ago, this was a season that was supposed to be SMACK DAB in the middle of the White Sox "championship window" and those are THE WHITE SOX WORDS, not mine. Well, I have admittedly said that a bunch of times, but it's because I was echoing the organization's words and believed them when they said they were hellbent on multiple parades.
And yes, multiple parades are their words, not mine.
We "the fans" were hoodwinked, plain and simple. We "the fans" should have known this after their first move of the 2020-21 offseason was to hire Tony LaRussa, but we also figured the pure talent was too good for his old ass to really fuck anything up. Just let him sit in the dugout and go and win against dog shit divisional teams before giving it a run in the playoffs.
That's not to say that they can't figure this shit out in the offseason or that it's fire sale time, but the future outlook is not looking good and it's because of money. The White Sox already have a ton of payroll committed to next year. If this winter is any indicator of what's to come, we shouldn't get too over our skis as fans about the owner opening up his piggy bank and allowing his fucking GM to make necessary additions that aren't lotto tickets or has beens.
But the move that really should have signaled they weren't for real was their first move of the 2021-22 offseason - the inking Leury fucking Garcia to a 3 year deal. To this day people defend him as a player, which is mind boggling considering he's statistically been one of the worst players in baseball with equal or more plate appearances over the last 10 years. They legit competed with NOBODY to give him that deal and I knew right then and there that he was going to be the main guy at 2B for the White Sox in 2022.
Still, I gave them the benefit of the doubt. I don't know that others did or didn't follow suit with me, but they were staring down the barrel at a historic free agent class and a few glaring holes. I figured that the White Sox, in the heart of their competitive window, knew they had to fill these holes to really go for it. I figured Jerry, being 86 years old, wanted to give it one last shot at a 'ship. That he would really give the middle finger to the rest of the league by shoving his chips to the middle.
That didn't happen. The rest of the offseason went as follows:
- didn't extend a QO to Carlos Rodon, who's currently the pace horse in fWAR amongst SP, because they were scared he might accept it
- they signed 2 relievers, one of which was injured, adding to their already super expensive bullpen
- they signed Josh Harrison
- they signed Vince Velasquez
- they signed Johnny Cueto
- they traded for AJ Pollock
That's it. That's how they filled their glaring hole at 2B - an incumbent dog shit player and a has been - and that's how they remedied their inability to hit even the most mediocre RHP - by trading for an old right handed hitter. Every one of those acquisitions is over 30 fucking years old, too. Every one of them. Harrison reeks of a 2006-2016 signing a la Jimmy Rollins, Velasquez a lottery ticket arm they thought they could cash in on that was inexplicably given a big league deal, AJ Pollock who's 34 and bought high on, and Johnny Cueto, god bless his heart, who is still great but they only signed him because Lynn went down with the meniscus during spring training.
Oh yeah, and they gave 31 year old Leury fucking Garcia a 3 year deal. He's the worst combination of offense, defense and base running I've ever seen play professional baseball.
Inexcusable. Absolutely pathetic, abhorrent offseason. Still though - the roster was littered with all star potential. TA, Abreu, Robert, Moncada, Vaughn, etc. etc. etc…. all ya gotta do is win the division and hope for the best in the playoffs. Seemed easy enough in March - the talent was there, so nobody on earth thought the Sox would be 3 games back of the fucking Twins and 2 back of the Guardians in August.
But here we are. The White Sox have officially reaped what the White Sox have sowed. They are getting exactly what they deserve and it's because they, once again, refused to use money to fix needs. They operated on a budget IN THE MIDDLE OF THEIR COMPETITIVE WINDOW when there were blue chip free agents available to complement their in-house core.
We were hoodwinked. Easy as that. But but but… they traded for Jake Diekman!!!
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Fine move. They were probably gonna have to DFA McGuire once Robert is back, so to get someone with a high-ish ceiling like Diekman is cool with me.
But now they're watching the rest of the league maneuver and shake things up while they're left with the same COMPLETELY flawed roster that features about 5 DH's playing out of position, the same inability to hit even mediocre RHP, and the same black holes at 2B and RF.
Great work. I blame Jerry the most, but nobody in the organization is without fault. My order of blame goes as follows:
1. Jerry Reinsdorf. Every day I think the "carrot before the horse" rumors are true. Prior to the Machado/Harper debacle, Rick Hahn said he envisions the White Sox being a destination organization for blue chip free agents. He doesn't say that unless he believes he has the go ahead to not just pursue, but to aggressively try to sign them. I believe Jerry pulled the rug from under Rick.
2. The players. Eloy, Moncada (who I'm rapidly approaching going nuclear on), Anderson, Vaughn, and just about everyone not named Jose Abreu deserves a shit load of the blame.
3. The front office/med staff/scouts/batboys - the front office has been given the ability to have a top 5-7ish payroll. If they knew they weren't going to be able to go big for A list free agents, then they shouldn't have extended multiple fucking "core" guys before they proved it. Moncada and Eloy look like BAD deals right now, in spite of Eloy looking better of late.
4. LaRussa - yes, the guy sucks. No the guy shouldn't be managing. None of that should matter if the roster were built properly and "Tony proofed". Hopefully he realizes his time has passed and he hangs em up for good this winter. He sucks at this new-aged management and can't even stay awake in the dugout:
Oh, and Grandal looks completely COOKED. The guy that is the biggest free agent signing they've ever made. A catcher in his 30s at $73MM. That guy couldn't hit water if he fell out of a goddamn boat and he's fried defensively too.
It truly is disgusting. It is 11:20am as I construct this blog. I don't know if they have any moves to be made or not, what I do know is they completely fucked up what should have been an incredible year. Hopefully the players dig deep into their pants and find a nutsack and will their way to the playoffs. If they don't make them, Hahn better figure it the fuck out this winter.
This ain't it. I'm disgusted, as is every other White Sox fan.
PS - the Twins got WAY better today. Way better. I wish they would have traded for Carlos Rodon and he would have unzipped his pants and pissed all over the White Sox.
I'm angry, White Sox fans are angry, and the organization should feel shame. This ain't it.