Something for Nothing

I wasn’t wild about the White Sox trading for Jeff Samardzija going into last season.  It was three young players and a prospect for a pitcher who always reminds people of what a great receiver he was in college.  Well, Samardzija’s taken his headstrong act to San Francisco while those three players acquitted themselves well against the Sox last night.

Josh Phegley—Rick Hahn and/or Kenny Williams liked Tyler Flowers more behind the plate—and Marcus Semien—we got to keep Carlos Sanchez—had two hits apiece, with Phegley scoring two runs, and Chris Bassitt went 5-1/3 innings in a non-decision.  After giving up a three-run homer to Todd Frazier in the fifth, Bassitt stood on the mound, biting his glove.  Back in the dugout after the inning was over, he took to biting on a towel.  Something about that I find endearing, as opposed to, say, the routine of our starter, Jose Quintana.

The man is the pitching equivalent of Mike Hargrove, the Human Rain Delay.  A runner gets on base, and Quintana turns into a statue.  He leads the world right now in career non-decisions.  There may not be a sabermetric measure for this, but I say the slo-mo works on his teammates’ psyches.  The only way to see if I’m right is for Quintana to quicken the pace with runners on base.

Hey, Mr. Plate Umpire, do us a solid and enforce the pitch clock, will you?