A Day at the Beach

Michele and I went to a North Side beach yesterday for the first and no doubt only time this summer. Why does something you like to do have to be so far away? Going to the beach means something different here than on either coast. In Chicago, a beach is measured in blocks, in California or New Jersey, by the mile. The time we went to Daytona Beach with Clare in college, I looked north and then south. The sand and ocean appeared endless in either direction. On the coasts, a beach is pretty much the same in good weather or bad. In Chicago, a beach can be overwhelmed by Lake Michigan in a bad mood, and parts of it literally turn to ice come winter. I was lying on a towel in a spot where ice could be taking hold in a few short months. Long story short, we love our beaches, if in different ways than surfers and Jersey guys. An afternoon of tanning and reading put me in a mood where I could accept whatever the White Sox had to throw at me. Apparently, Lucas Giolito was so upset with Tony La Russa’s sudden absence due to illness that he couldn’t concentrate in his start last night. Then again, Giolito’s stunk all season, so the three homeruns he gave up to the Royals were hardly anything out of the ordinary. The four-game losing streak is now five, Royals 9 White Sox 7. Did I mention Gavin Sheets? He hit two homers himself good for five RBIs. Over the last fifteen games, Sheets has been hitting at a .432 clip with three homers and fourteen RBIs. All of a sudden, he has twelve and forty-two on the season. So, he has to play for the Sox to see exactly what, and who, they have going into the offseason. It’s going to be a winter of hard decisions. If only we had a front office capable of making them.

Stink in Action

Dylan Cease gave up two hits in eight innings against the Diamnodbacks yesterday afternoon at Guaranteed Rate Whatever. Did he get a win? Of course not. But, hey, these days with these stinkin’ White Sox, a no-decision is the next best thing. Anyway, it’s all Cease’s fault. He had a 2-1 lead going into the eighth; that should’ve been enough. Only hit #2 was like hit #1 for Arizona, a homerun. After a scoreless eighth for the flop-Sox, “manger” Tony La Russa applied the stink in the form of reliever Kendall Graveman. The pride of Rick Hahn’s offseason activity, Graveman walked two of the first three batters he faced. For a little drama, he got the next batter before giving up a run-scoring double to Jake McCarthy. But the stink wasn’t over. In the bottom of the ninth, the Sox had runners on first and second, one out, when up came another of Rick Hahn’s offseason moves, the re-signed Leury Garcia. He gone, as the Hawk used to say. And Romy Gonzalez, too. So much for getting back to even. La Russa skipped his usual postgame affirmation-in-the-face-of-defeat. Instead, La Russa offered that losing didn’t make him frustrated or disappointed. Why? Because “That’s loser’s crap,” he informed reporters. “It just seeps energy out of your body. I just get angry and want to do something about it.” Like holding players and coaches accountable? I didn’t think so.

Mission Accomplished

Congratulations to owner Jerry Reinsdorf and “manager” Tony La Russa. Together, they’ve succeeded in putting a powerful stink on the White Sox that won’t go away anytime soon. The fruit of their labor was on full display last night against the Diamondbacks. White Sox jump out to a quick first-inning lead thanks to a Gavin Sheets’ three-run homerun? Not to worry. They’d be two runs down by the bottom of the second. And here’s how it happened: walk; catcher’s interference; single; walk; strikeout; single; walk; groundout. The wild pitch that preceded the inning-ending strikeout, unlike just about everything that went before, didn’t lead to a run. Want to see a team play without a hint of motivation? Right this way, as Sox hitters managed all of two hits from the second to the seventh innings against Arizona starter Merrill Kelly. They did pull to within 7-5 thanks to two runs in the eighth, but La Russa knew how to fix that. How? By bringing in Joe Kelly, of course. That’s Joe single-walk-single-Kelly, with Reynaldo single-sacfly-Lopez to follow. Final score, Diamondbacks 10 Sad Sox 5. I don’t know if anyone else saw it, but Lopez turned into a statue between pitches. He wasn’t so much shaking off rookie catcher Carlos Perez as he was telling him to drop dead. Not on the same page? More like not in the same zip code. What would a Sad Sox loss be without a La Russa bromide? Here’s the latest one after last night’s loss: “Worst thing you can do is get frustrated and depressed, discouraged. Get angry. Do something about it. That’s the message. Get some adrenaline pumping and get back to even.” [Tribune online story today] Wow, straight out of the mouth of Patton, or Napoleon. Or Bozo.

Friday Night Lights

I spent last night in the visitors’ grandstand as my son-in-law made his high school head-coaching debut against a school named for a scientist who worked on developing poison gas during WWI. Go figure. The field was alive with adolescent energy. Players played; cheerleaders cheered (and flipped and got tossed into the air and built pyramids); members of the marching band marched. Everyone else under the age of eighteen spent the night in perpetual motion. I wonder, if you transported a grandstand into the Sahara Desert, would these same kids keep walking up and down the steps, congregating in groups and showing off for people they want to show off to, until the heat felled them all? I think so. It was a study in youthful human interaction, and I had a front-row seat. And, at my age, it’s not like anyone could see me. Chris’s team won the second half, but not by enough to win the game. His athletic director, though, was pretty happy, because the team barely showed up last year against the same opponent. So, it was a moral victory, considerably more than the White Sox earned in losing to the visiting Diamondbacks, 7-2. Arizona center fielder Alek Thomas offered up yet another reason to fire general manager Rick Hahn. We took Nick Madrigal and Steele Walker before Arizona nabbed the pride of Mt. Carmel High School in the second round of the 2018 draft. Madrigal has since been shipped off to the Cubs, where he can do that Nicky Two Strike routine of his between stints on the IL, while Walker is on his third organization after being traded to the Rangers for Nomar Mazara (!). Back to Thomas—he made two first-rate catches in center field, the one against Jose Abreu probably saving two runs. Throw in a possible homerun-stealing catch by right fielder Daulton Varsho on Romy Gonzalez, and you would’ve thought it was the visitors who were charged up and in a pennant chase. After Adam Engel made the last out of the game, a crowd of just over 33,000 Sox fans took to booing. In his postgame news conference, “manager” Tony La Russa told reporters, “They have every right to be upset—at the team, management, whatever. They've got every right to do it.” [story on team website today] La Russa wasn’t done playing nice with the paying customers: “It's amazing fan support here, and I've got plenty of experience. But there ain't no free lunch. It's a two-way relationship. They support you and you've got to give back. So we've got to do more about giving back." This is equal parts sad and pathetic. Does La Russa think fans care that he respects them? Does he think this will save his job? He has no worries in that department, from what I can tell. Jerry Reinsdorf seems perfectly content to watch his friend finish out of the running this year, and let him do it again next year as well. I TIVO’d the game to watch when we came home. I saw better performance and coaching from the losing side in a high school football game than La Russa and his team could provide on a “professional” level. Mercy.

Torture By Any Other Name

The sad joke that is the 2022 White Sox added a new chapter in Baltimore last night, when closer Liam Hendriks gave up a game-tying homerun on an 0-2 pitch with two outs. Wait, there’s more. Kyle Stowers was hitting .130 before he connected on his first career homerun. Wait, there’s more. Two pitches earlier, Adam Engel dropped a foul fly by Stowers for what would’ve been the third out in a Sox victory. Wait, there’s more. The game went eleven innings before the Sox could find a way to lose, 4-3; bringing in Jake Diekman sure helped, though. The acquisition of Diekman ranks right up there with Jeff Smardzija and James Shields as reasons to show Rick Hahn the door. But back to the game. In the tenth and eleventh, the Sox had six chances to score the runner from second. And what did they do? Tenth inning—flyout, flyout, strikeout. Eleventh inning—strikeout, pop out, groundout. Luis Robert was responsible for that strikeout in the eleventh, part of an 0-for-5 night with two double plays and five runners left on base. Situational hitting as taught by Frank Menechino, no doubt. That, or “manager” Tony La Russa screwed up bigtime with his star center fielder, who for the past two games has taken to swinging with one hand during some of his at-bats. Rest Robert’s legs while risking injury to his left wrist? Like I said, a sad joke. The postgame went according to script, with Engel and Hendriks taking responsibility for the loss while their “manager” said in effect no one was to blame. “Not anything wrong with the way we played today,” Tony La Russa told reporters [story on team website today]. “Just got beat.” No, Tony. Your players screwed up, and you probably did, too, yet again.

Bounce

So, the White Sox beat the Orioles last night, 5-3 behind Lucas Giolito. What does it mean? Well, until they make up five games in the loss column to the Guardians, pretty much nothing. Think of it as more of a dead-cat bounce until then. Giolito went 6.1 innings and said afterwards that “I felt very much more like myself” and “[I] tried to have conviction with every pitch.” Does he feel like other people sometimes? Shouldn’t a pitcher always pitch with conviction, assuming he wants that big payday come free agency? Yoan Moncada made an exceptional play with the bases loaded in the bottom of the seventh, one out and the score 3-1, Sox. Jorge Mateo hit a shot down the third base line that Moncada snared going to his left. He then touched the bag and threw to first for an inning-ending double play. Moncada may be in the running for a Gold Glove this year. I hope he gets it. I also hope he’s playing elsewhere next year. If only his fielding affected his hitting. Last night, Moncada went 0-for-5, to bring his average down to .192. Yolmer Sanchez won a Gold Glove at second base for the Sox in 2019, only to be let go. Sanchez hit .252, by the way. It was nice to see Gavin Sheets get three hits to go with three RBIs and Romy Gonzalez two hits and a run starting at second. The young people are our future, as the cliché goes. Throw in Seby Zavala picking up three walks and a hit, and I might be tempted to revise my opinion on how this season ends. Not yet.

Fork Time

Whether or not they know it, the 2022 White Sox are history, toast, so many dead players lurching to the finish line. Stick a fork in them, they’re done. Last night in Baltimore, Eloy Jimenez gave Dylan Cease a two-run lead in the first inning with his seventh homerun of the year. Cease gave it right back, with interest, in the bottom of the first, grooving a pitch to Ryan Mountcastle, who took it over the center-field fence for a three-run homer. That’s all she wrote, folks. Orioles 5 Sox 3. I see in today’s The Athletic that hitting coach Frank Menechino crawled out from under his rock to talk about Jimenez and his sizable talent. However,nothing on the Sox stranding eleven runners in scoring position last night, or seven the day before. But let’s talk about the guy hitting .306. Why the team pays for “manager” Tony La Russa to go on the road is beyond me. It’s not like he does anything. Oh, wait, he talks, like telling reporters after the game, “To be fair, you can’t say the team quit.” [today’s story on team website] Tomato, tomahto, Tony. You say quit, I say toast.

Temptation

I’m F’n tempted to go filter-free in describing how Tony La Russa “managed” his White Sox against the Royals yesterday afternoon. What the F is wrong with this guy? First, starter Michael Kopech shows discomfort warming up. He tells the staff he’s ok, but that should be a head’s-up to anyone paying attention, right? Not for our “manager.” He must’ve seen a different game than I was watching. Kopech walked the leadoff batter in the bottom of the first, then hit the second batter. Given the fact that Kopech had problems warming up and was throwing in the high eighties to low nineties, well below his norm, a prudent manager would’ve pulled his starter right then and there. Not our “manager.” No, he left Kopech in to face Salvador Perez, who singled in the first run. Enough? Not for Tony, who let Kopech walk the next batter. Then, our “manager” finally made his move to the bullpen, only Jimmy Lambert didn’t bring any magic along with him, letting the next three batters reach base. The score was 4-0 before the Sox could bat again. Somehow, they managed to tie the score by the seventh inning. Given that they had ten hits and seven walks on the afternoon, you’d think they would’ve scored more than four runs, but, No. Maybe the three double plays had something to do with it, or the approach—you might say lack thereof—Sox hitters took, I don’t know. Hitting coach Frank Menechino seems to be a shrinking violet with the media these days. Now we come to the eighth inning, score 4-4, Joe Kelly in for the Sox. Kelly hits the first batter. Kelly hits the second batter. Kelly gives up a single to the third batter. Kelly miraculously gets a force at home with the fourth batter. Kelly walks the fifth batter to give the Royals the lead, which they would not relinquish. Only then did our “manager” change pitchers. In Kelly’s defense, he may have been distracted by his shadow or the echoes coming from the stands of a nearly empty Kauffman Stadium. After the game, La Russa unveiled Testy Tony, telling reporters, “You want to say we’re lousy? Say we’re lousy.” There’s so much F’n more to add to that.

Tell Us What You Think

Surprise! We have Peacock, the streaming service that was supposed to broadcast yesterday’s White Sox-Guardians’ game, only it rained. Peacock’s notion of keeping viewers informed was to show a camera feed, without comment, hour after hour. Finally, after about three hours, the game was called. That’s when Jason Benetti and Steve Stone popped up to provide a little human interaction. A few hours later, I went on MLB.com to check on the Rangers-Twins’ score, which triggered a request by MLB to take a survey. It was all about COVID and platforms, how safe I feel at the ballpark and how I watch games. When they asked what concerned me most, I answered the length of ballgames. Did I mention they wanted to know if I’d made a purchase in the past week using Venmo? Because that’s the future of the national pastime, not me and my penchant for snappy gametimes.

A Clinic, a Pulse, Dumb and Dumber

Lucas Giolito of the White Sox offered a fine whine in today’s Sun-Times. “It’s been a lot of stuff this year I’m trying to work through. Mechanically, physically.” I hope Giolito wasn’t too preoccupied with his troubles to see what teammate Johnny Cueto was doing on the mound last night in Cleveland. Cueto held the host Guardians at bay for 8.2 scoreless innings before giving way to Liam Hendriks, who recorded the final out in a 2-0 Sox victory. Cueto threw 113 pitches to come within one out of his ninth career shutout. I couldn’t find a word of complaint from Cueto anywhere on not going the distance. Instead, this was Cueto in today’s online Tribune story: “I know that every time that I pitch now it’s kind of a playoff game. We are in the race, and I know I have to do my best to help the team. It’s that mentality that I have.” Lucas, take note. And, not to pile on (too much), realize that Cueto threw 113 pitches. You’re eight years younger, yet the most pitches you’ve thrown in a start this season is 109, and that was good for all of six innings. In fact, of the six times you’ve topped a hundred pitches this year, you’ve never gone more than six innings. In fact, twice times you’ve gone five, and once 5.2 innings. Not exactly a profile in efficiency a la Cueto. So, the Sox have a pulse and a chance to pull within two games of the Guardians in the loss column with Dylan Cease going this morning. Only the Sox won’t have Yasmani Grandal, not toady and not for some time to come, from what I can tell. Call it a combination of a dumb play(er) and a dumber coach. Grandal was on second base in the top of the seventh inning when recent pickup Elvis Andrus singled up the middle. For reasons best know to himself, Grandal thought he could score, and so did third base coach Joe McEwing. Only Grandal made like Lot’s wife and turned his head not once but twice to see where the ball was. It ended up in catcher Luke Maile’s mitt, in plenty of time to tag Grandal out. Grandal slid awkwardly trying to avoid a tag that never should have happened because the baserunner never should have gone. No word yet on how long Grandal will be out, but I’m guessing two weeks to the rest of the season. So it goes with your 2022 Chicago White Sox.

For Their Next Trick…

How do you match giving up twenty-one runs in a game? Why striking out seventeen times in the next, of course. Cleveland 5, Toast 2. The team that Jerry Reinsdorf owns and Rick Hahn put together and Tony La Russa “manages” went into Cleveland last night already in the hole, given the lineup La Russa put together—Luis Robert out again with a wrist injury and Gavin Sheets out because…the manager apparently wasn’t impressed enough that Sheets treated the 21-5 game as if it counted by getting himself four hits on the afternoon. No sir, better to put Yasmani Grandal in the lineup as DH. Yes sirree. That move came back to bite the Sox on their collective butts in the first inning, two runs in, runners on the corners, Sheets not up. Grandal was, and he promptly grounded into an inning-ending double play. The Sox had four hits that inning. They’d have three more on the night, along with those seventeen strikeouts. Three came in the fifth inning after Josh Harrison led off the inning with a double and moved to third on a wild pitch by Guardians’ starter Triston McKenzie. I could be wrong, but I think it took McKenzie nine pitches to then dispose of Seby Zavala, A.J. Pollock and Andrew Vaughn. But like the man said in the movie, We don‘t need no stinkin’ runs. You know, that movie starring La Russa as the gold prospector in the Sierra Madres. That character stood out for his sense of accountability. Three Sox hitters failing to make contact goes with four two-out runs scored by Cleveland—it all reflects back on the coaching staff. And here the manager said one of the good things about that 21-5 debacle was his bullpen would be rested for the big upcoming series in Cleveland. Holy Reynaldo Lopez and Jake “Boston Got Rid of Me For a Reason” Diekman, you could’a fooled me by how the pen pitched. Bad Doug is back. If the Sox lose today, I want them to keep losing until the owner and the general manager are forced to own up to the mistake they’ve made with this team. The manager, of course, won’t admit anything outside of how good the other team’s pitching is and how hard his guys try.

My Bad

I thought Lucas Giolito might rise to the occasion and pitch the White Sox to a series-clinching win over the Astros yesterday. My bad. What Giolito did instead was give up seven runs on eight hits and a walk in three-plus innings of a 21-5 rout. Manager Tony La Russa thought that Vince Velasquez and Jose Ruiz are major-league pitchers. His bad. Velasquez and Ruiz each allowed five runs. Giolito now sports a 5.34 ERA to 5.68 for Velasquez and 4.72 for Ruiz. There’s no reason for the latter two to be on this roster a day longer, and the same holds for Giolito next year. This was a must-win game, and Giolito laid an egg. In comparison, Michael Kopech pitched brilliantly the night before. At least Kopech was able to go six innings while giving up just three runs, one of them stupid. Giolito can give up three runs in the blink of an eye. The 28-year old will be a free agent after next year. His best season was 2019, when he went 14-9 with a 3.41 ERA. He went 4-3 with a 3.48 ERA in the COVID-shortened season of 2020, with a no-hitter and a win over Oakland in the wildcard series. Last year, he was 11-9 with a 3.53 ERA, plus one crummy start (4.1 innings, four runs) against Houston in the ALDS. Where in any of these numbers does it suggest Giolito rates Max Scherzer dollars? My father was a strong man. He must have thought I could be that way, too, to let me be a White Sox fan.

Revert to Mean

Last night, for the third straight game against the Astros, the White Sox mounted an eighth-inning rally with two runners on, one out, Yoan Moncada and Yasmani Grandal up in a one-run game. Not this time, folks. Moncada made like a statue on a 2-2 count to get rung up while Grandal swung at ball four, popping up to the catcher. Sox lose, 3-2. How I wish they’d stop playing dumb baseball. See above, and below. Starter Michael Kopech couldn’t be bothered to focus on Jose Altuve, the first batter of the game. No, Kopech walked Altuve on four pitches. Then, he couldn’t deliver a clean throw to second base, where Altuve would’ve been out by a couple of feet trying to steal. Then, Kopech let Altuve steal third. Then, Kopech gave up a sacrifice fly. Houston’s first run provided the margin of difference between a chance at victory and defeat. And, as ever, there’s Tony La Russa, aka the liability in the dugout. Josh Harrison batted in the bottom of the fourth with the bases loaded, one run in and nobody out in what was now a 3-1 game. Harrison has looked good the past two nights, either in the field or at bat. On top of that, he tends to be overaggressive swinging, which is not a good thing against a groundball pitcher like Framber Valdez. Back in the day, Casey Stengel would’ve pinch hit, fourth inning be damned. Me, I’d think long and hard about a squeeze. La Russa let Harrison swing away into a double play. Maybe our HOF manager was distracted, what with his claiming credit for a recent team meeting and all. Seems like several players got together last week to talk about the state of affairs on the South Side. Not only did La Russa say it was his idea, he said he got it before Johnny Cueto went public with his show-some-fire challenge. Right, and I am the walrus.

Good Enough

Dylan Cease blinked first, then Dusty Baker, then Justin Verlander, giving the White Sox an eyes-wide-shut 4-3 win over the Astros last night at Guaranteed Rate Whatever. In case he was wondering, Cease found out what happens when batters don’t chase his pitches; they can get on base, as in six hits and three walks in five innings of work. Here’s the thing, though. If Andrew Vaughn makes a nice play in right field—not to be confused with left, per my daughter’s ninth-inning phone call last, a whole different animal, the one the converted first baseman is more accustomed to—Cease gives up one run, tops. As it was, he exited with the score 3-1, bad guys. It stayed that way until one out in the bottom of the seventh, two runners on. Me, I’d give serious thought to lifting my starter after Seby Zavala battles back from a 1-2 count to walk. Baker thought otherwise and let his veteran righthander face pinch hitter Gavin Sheets, who in turn lined a 1-2 pitch for a game-tying double into the right field corner. An inning later, we were back to that rising-to-the-occasion vs. broken-clock debate with Yasmani Grandal and Yoan Moncada. This time the Sox had two runners on and nobody out with Grandal up. Running with not one but two pianos perched on his back, Grandal hit a slow-enough roller to first baseman Yuli Gurriel, who turned the double play. Anyone else woud’ve beaten the relay to the pitcher covering first. Two outs, Moncada up. Lo and behold, the enigmatic one got his second eighth-inning, run-scoring single in two nights, and the Sox win. Again, rising or broken clock? I’d like to think the former. We’ll see. That Liam Hendriks even got the chance for a save is fairly miraculous given his manager’s penchant for playing with fire. First, Tony La Russa goes with Jose Ruiz in the sixth inning. Not only did Ruiz yield a two-out double, he threw the ball away on an attempted pickoff at second base. Somehow, the Sox got out of the inning without a run scoring. In the seventh, La Russa doubled down with Vince Velasquez, who last pitched on July 5th. Velasquez did pretty much what I expected, giving up a one-out single and walk. Then, just for fun, he went to a full count on the next two batters, Alex Bregman and Kyle Tucker, who have 143 RBIs between them, by the way. Talk about miracles. Bregman flied out, and Tucker grounded out, no runs scoring. The scoreless outing lowers Velasquez’s ERA to 5.10. No doubt, Matt Foster is wondering why he was sent down to make room for Velasquez off the IL. Foster has a 4.50 ERA, and 1.29 over his last seven appearances. Oh, well. Ours is not to reason why, only to cheer our Sox on the fly.

As I Was Saying

Tony La Russa was at his ever-loving La Russa best last night speaking to reporters following the White Sox-Astros’ game. Sox starter Johnny Cueto was magnificent over eight innings of two-run ball. It should’ve been eight shutout innings but a Josh Harrison error in the top of the first set up both Houston runs. Do you know why Harrison made an error? All that spin on the ball. But he didn’t give up, no sir. Funny thing is, I thought I saw Cueto shoot a look at Harrison that pretty much said, “Don’t do that again.” I said Jose Abreu is the smartest hitter on the team. Last night, he had two hits. With the score tied in the eighth inning and a runner on second, the Astros wanted no part of Abreu (see, two hits, above) and walked him. I also said Andrew Vaughn is the second-smartest hitter on the Sox. Last night, during a four-run eighth inning, Vaughn doubled down the right field line on a 2-2 pitch to put the tying runs in scoring position. I also said something about Eloy Jimenez’s considerable natural talents. Last night, Eloy showed smarts as well, following Vaughn’s double with one of his own, a groundball smash down the third base line on an 0-2 pitch, low and way inside. Nice. I always talk about Yasmani Grandal and Yoan Moncada, and it’s hardly ever nice. Well, Grandal followed Abreu’s walk with one of his own to load the bases and bring up Moncada, who promptly singled in two runs. Grandal and Moncada either both rose to the moment or both made like a broken clock that gets it right twice a day. You decide. Cueto gets the win, and the Sox go four games over .500; they have yet to reach five over this season. Tonight, Dylan Cease will see if he can change that. The only thing standing in his way? Justin Verlander. This should be good.

Tigers No More

Well, the good news is the White Sox swept the Tigers over the weekend, winning yesterday behind Lance Lynn, 5-3. The bad news is Detroit has left the building known as Guaranteed Rate Whatever, and the Houston Astros will be taking their place for the next four games. And what does it say that two of those wins against Detroit were of the come-from-behind variety and the other was a scoreless tie going into the bottom of the seventh? We’ll just chalk it up to found-fire and leave it at that. The one impressive thing about the sweep is that Andrew Vaughn drove in the go-ahead/winning run(s) in each game. Jose Abreu is the smartest hitter on the Sox; Vaughn, a second-year player, is a not too-distant second. Abreu always knows what he wants to do in each at-bat, and he’s exceptional at foregoing the homerun to hit a ball up the middle; to the right side; or in the air just far enough, whatever the situation demands. And Vaughn? He’s tied for second with Jose Ramirez of the Guardians for most RBIs in the AL from the seventh inning on; those two have both knocked in twenty-seven runs. Vaughn is also hitting .301 on the season with fifty-eight RBIs. Compare that to .235 and forty-eight last year. That makes two guys who are serious about their craft, three if you count Tim Anderson on the IL. Eloy Jimenez and Luis Robert? Right now, they look to be content to get by on their considerable natural talent. Against a team like the Astros, that won’t be nearly enough.

If Looks Could Kill…

Lucas Giolito put on his big-boy pants last night, eventually. With two out and nobody on in the second inning, Giolito struck out Tigers’ rookie Kerry Carpenter on a full-count, only home plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt thought otherwise. Trust me when I say the pitch was clearly in the strike zone. That’s when bad Lucas took over, giving up two singles to load the bases. Then, good Lucas induced leadoff man Riley Green to lift a fly ball to deep left field that should’ve gotten Giolito and the White Sox out of the inning with a 1-0 lead intact. But, No. Left fielder Eloy Jimenez did his best imitation of a master butcher at work, having no idea where the ball was or what is glove is used for. Result, three runs score. The look on Giolito’s face was priceless, and a message to Eloy regarding his level of play. Did Eloy rfeceive said message all the way out there in left field? If not, here’s hoping Giolito repeated it in the dugout. Michael Kopech only goes six no-hit innings in his start while Giolito is allowed to pitch seven full innings in his. If there’s a rhyme or reason here, manager Tony La Russa didn’t provide it after the game. No matter. The Sox came back to get Giolito the win, 6-4, keyed in part by Javy Baez trying to be too cute with a tag on Jose Abreu, who advanced from first to second on a deep fly ball to center by Yasmani Grandal. Andrew Vaughn followed with what proved to be the game-winning single, and the Sox go on to win, 6-4. Now, it’s Lance Lynn for the sweep or nothing. Advice to Lance: You know those homeruns you say you shouldn’t be throwing? Well, don’t. .

Trash Talk

Before yesterday’s game against the Tigers, White Sox manager Tony La Russa addressed the question of hustle, and the perceived lack thereof, from his players. Talk about an admission of guilt and probable cause for firing. “I thought last year we were not very good” about that, in which case, good thing everything was kept behind closed clubhouse doors; that explains how an always Bears-intoxicated media missed what should’ve been a major story. As for this season, “I don’t think we’re perfect, but I think we’re doing well enough.” News flash—No, you’re not. La Russa proceeded to carry his head-scratching performance into the game against Detroit. On Thursday, Dylan Cease pitched six innings of one-run ball against Kansas City to get the loss. Last night, Michael Kopech pitched six innings of no-hit ball to pick up the no-decision. You see, Sox hitters can’t be motivated to go out and attack a starter like Daniel Norris, who entered the game with a 6.90 ERA; they get to him when they will, or they won’t, no biggie either way. Last night, Norris held the Sox scoreless through 4.2 innings. Somehow, my team scored two two-out runs in the seventh inning for a 2-0 win. But the story of the night was the 26-year old Kopech, who needed all of eighty-five pitches to get through six innings of work. Keep in mind that number reflects eleven strikeouts and three walks. In other words, Kopech was dealing and wanted to go out for the seventh inning. But Captain Gibber felt otherwise. Six innings was “as far as he should have gone for the game, the rest of the year, the rest of his career,” La Russa said after the game [today’s Sun-Times]. So, with about fifty games left in the season, our manager is still intent on resting his players. Hire a clown, expect a circus, I guess.

Clueless, and Not in a Good Way

Short of swearing to the point of a stroke, I can’t put it any other way: White Sox manager Tony La Russa is clueless, and he proves it on a daily basis, as he did yesterday in Kansas City. Your ace Dylan Cease gives up one run in six innings and gets pinned with the loss, you should not be talking about the winning pitcher, Zack Greinke, least of all to “tip your cap to him” because your team was clueless how to score. You should be praising Cease and pinning the loss on his teammates. Period. If La Russa knew how to manage, he would’ve known what to do in the second inning, with two runners on and nobody out. You bunt. But not La Russa. He let Josh Harrison fly out, runners holding, after which rookie Lenyn Sosa grounded into a double play. If La Russa knew how to manage, he would’ve held people accountable for the debacle(s) in the third inning. Debacle #1: runners on first and second, Andrew Vaughn singles to right, but Seby Zavala fails to pick up the flight of the ball and fails to score. All La Russa can do is defend Zavala for not falling victim to a hypothetical double play and add, “I’d rather him get to third base with one out [assuming the] right fielder caught the ball.” BUT HE DIDN”T! Debacles #2-4: Bases now loaded, nobody out, heart of the order up. And what do they do? Eloy Jimenez, strike out. Jose Abreu, strikeout. Yasmani Grandal, groundout. Tony La Russa, tipping his cap to the opposition. If La Russa knew how to manage, he would’ve pulled Luis Robert from the game for failing to run out a ground ball in the seventh inning of a 1-0 game. Royals’ second baseman Michael Massey booted the ball, only Robert took his time getting out of the box. No hustle, no base hit. Steve Stone, and I never thought I’d be singing his praises, called out Robert then as he had Zavala earlier. Not a harsh word from La Russa, though. If La Russa knew how to manage, he wouldn’t have called Johnny Cueto’s questioning his team’s fire “curious.” No, a real manager would realize a veteran player knew what the problem was and demanded accountability from his teammates. Tony La Russa, accountability? The man’s clueless, on that and so much else.

Ouch

Johnny Cueto could’ve won his start for the White Sox in Kansas City last night. Instead, he got a no-decision as the Sox bullpen imploded as the Royals overcame a two-run deficit in the sixth inning to win going away by a score of 8-3. And then there was Yoan Moncada. The White Sox enigma at third base has stopped hitting, if he ever was hitting this season. Last night, he went 0-for-3 with a walk. On the season, Moncada is batting .194 with a .258 OBP and thirty-two RBIs in 242 at-bats. Over the last seven games, he’s hitting .120 and .132 over his last fifteen. He has a twenty-eight percent strikeout rate based on plate appearances, thirty-one percent on at-bats. And now his fielding looks to be following suit. In the bottom of the sixth, Moncada failed to throw out Bobby Witt Jr. leading off. The scorer was in a generous mood and gave Witt a hit. Whatever, he could have and should have been thrown out. Sal Perez, the next batter, doubled to score Witt. After a flyout, Moncada made an error on a groundball from Hunter Dozier. Then came a strikeout followed by a game-tying single. KC scores at most one run in the frame if Moncada is fielding his position. After the game, Cueto told reporters, “We need to fight. We need to show the fire that we have, if we have any.” Ouch. Do you think he was aiming that barb at his third baseman? I hope so.

And Children Shall Lead Them

Lance Lynn got a little testy talking to reporters after losing the first game of a double header yesterday in Kansas City. Giving up two two-run homers will do that, I guess. Lynn probably knew his teammates weren’t in the mood to bail him out. Instead, the Sox bowed, 4-2. Game two went better, in large part due to rookies Davis Martin (talk about yo-yos, Martin has bounced between Chicago and Charlotte seven times so far this season) and Lenyn Sosa. Martin pitched, Sosa hit, and the Sox won 3-2. Naturally, Martin was sent down after the game, getting the win for 5.1 innings of one-run ball his lovely parting gift. Sosa, though, will be staying around because Tim Anderson is having surgery on a torn finger tendon on his left hand and is expected to miss six weeks. Good thing Sosa homered in his first at-bat, then singled, then got robbed of a third hit by the right fielder. Definitely taking advantage of the chance offered. Martin now has a 2-3 record and 4.23 ERA. I can live with him being sent down if it means he pitches regularly as opposed to sitting at the back of the bullpen for the Sox. But starting next spring, he deserves a good, long look. You never know.

The Cost of Doing Business

The Cubs did something yesterday I’d never thought an MLB team would consider—the North Siders decided to eat the last year of Jason Heyward’s eight-year, $184 million contract. Heyward hasn’t played since June 24th and wasn’t expected to come back from a knee injury this season, so you can basically add $11 million to the $22 million Heyward is owed next year. Back in 2016, I thought this was a bad deal for a player who’d never managed more than eighty-two RBIs in a season (and would never tally more than sixty-two for the Cubs). But, hey, not my money, not my team, and Heyward is credited with rallying his teammates during a rain delay during Game Seven of the 2016 World Series. By all accounts, Heyward is generous with his earnings in a socially-conscious way, so his contract has a benefit beyond baseball. To me, the Cubs had enough talent to win without Heyward or Ben Zobrist, his fellow free-agent signee by the Cubs that year (four years, $56 million). Theo Epstein overpaid for those two players because he wanted to win, now, and he did. Then, he couldn’t win anymore because his employers didn’t want to turn into the National League version of the Steinbrenners, full speed ahead damn’ the bad deals. So, Epstein’s gone, Zobrist’s gone, and now Heyward, too. Rather than emulating the Yankees or Dodgers, the Ricketts seem more inclined to act like Jerry Reinsdorf and pretend they own a small-market team. They don’t; he doesn’t; and why don’t Chicago front offices make smarter deals? Cutting Heyward is making the best of a bad situation. Why give playing time away to a veteran with declining skills and a year left on his contract? This is what the White Sox should’ve done back in 2014 with Adam Dunn. For all but one month of a four-year deal from hell, Reinsdorf and Kenny Williams pretended they were getting full value for the $56 million they were paying Dunn. Finally, with one month left on the contract, they moved Dunn to Oakland. What a waste. Long story short, be smart in handing out free-agent deals. If you can’t do that, then be willing to cut your losses like the Cubs did yesterday.

Yo-Yo-ing

The White Sox beat the Rangers Sunday, 8-2, earning a split in the four-game series. That’s good for two cheers, or a cheer-and-a-half with a blah thrown in. Lucas Giolito went five innings, again (third straight start), to get his second straight win. Nothing says “stud” like an 8-6 record and 4.91 ERA. Not. Not when you need 103 innings to record fifteen outs. But you take the fifteen hits and hope it carries into Kansas City, where the Sox play a twin bill on Tuesday. Jose Abreu, Luis Robert and Andrew Vaughn are all flirting with a .300 BA, and Eloy Jimenez isn’t far behind. If Tim Anderson can straighten himself out… Hope springs eternal, into the second week of August.

By a Thousand Cuts

Again, thank God for TIVO. That little device allows me to zoom through the mediocrity of the 2022 White Sox, who lost last night to ex-teammate Dane Dunning by a score of 8-0. The game wasn’t as close as the score might indicate, folks. What can you say when a team goes up against a pitcher it should know and one who hasn’t won since the end of April? The less the better? I’d definitely go with something other than the gibber that spouts from the mouth of manager Tony La Russa, who credited both Dunning and his own hitting coach Frank Menechino, who kept telling his charges to elevate their swings. Sox hitters responded with something like twelve groundouts. As for starter Michael Kopech, nothing says stink like four consecutive baserunners after two out and nobody on in the third inning. Did Kopech get mad after giving up three total runs that inning? If he did, he had a weird way of showing it, putting two of the first three batters on in the fourth. Kopech was followed by Jose Ruiz out of the bullpen. And, wouldn’t you know it, Boink, wild pitch, run number four charged to Kopech. Tim Anderson is one for his last seventeen while Yoan Moncada is hitting .160 over his last seven games and .179 over his last fifteen (if pointing this out makes me a hater, so be it). Lucky for La Russa and the man who hired him that the Chicago media is too busy reporting on a second-year offensive tackle for the Bears. Will Teven Jenkins play for the Munsters, or won’t he? On that question, I care about as much as the White Sox do about competing.

F This

Jim Bowden of The Athletic gave the White Sox an F in their efforts to improve the team roster before Tuesday’s trade deadline. As a general manager, Bowden makes a good sportswriter. Or not. Funny that he didn’t mention how the Cubs went out and improved themselves back in 2017, acquiring lefthander Jose Quintana from the Sox in a deal that brought Dylan Cease and Eloy Jimenez to the South Side. Quintana went 33-23 in parts of four seasons for the Cubs. That was four teams ago, by the way. And Cease? He’s 34-22 since 2019, this year being his best at 12-4 and a 1.98 ERA. Eloy is Eloy, which is to say he’s a superbly gifted hitter, when healthy. Last night in Texas, he hit a solo shot that provided the margin of victory for Cease in a 2-1 win over the Rangers. Cease is 26, Eloy 25. I wonder if the Cubs would make that same deal knowing what they do? That’s obviously a question Jim Bowden wouldn’t ask.

Stop Me if You’ve Heard This One Before

Johnny Cueto on the mound and the White Sox facing a lefty making his major-league debut—sounds promising, yes? No, and that’s with Cueto going eight full innings in Texas against the Rangers. Only Tim Anderson and company couldn’t touch Cole Ragans for more than a run in the five innings he pitched. They managed another run against the Rangers’ bullpen, as if this were an Al Lopez or Eddie Stanky team. In other words, two runs of offense were not enough in a 3-2 loss. Texas scored the deciding runs in the seventh inning. Cueto threw high to first to put a runner on; that would’ve been an out. Josh Harrison was slow covering first base on a dribbler to Cueto; that would’ve been an out. And the score would’ve remained tied at one apiece. Yasmani Grandal was dropped down to eight in the batting order, which is where he belongs, there or on the bench; he responded to his demotion by going 0-for-3. Not to pick on Grandal (seriously). Tim Anderson batted leadoff and went 0-for-5. Something is definitely off with the team igniter. Anderson has hit all of one homerun since May 24th and looks distracted at the plate. Maybe he caught something from Yoan Moncada, batting .204 after picking up a hit in four at-bats last night. Oh, well. Things will turn any day now, right? Right?

Now and Then

When my father took me to a White Sox game, he’d sometimes park at the firehouse on Lowe Avenue, down the street from Mayor Daley’s bungalow. It was a perk of belonging to the Chicago Fire Department. Yesterday, I paid $27 to park for the Sox-Royals’ game at Guaranteed Rate Whatever. Clare treated me to the game for Father’s Day. My father wouldn’t buy hotdogs at Comiskey Park, and that was when they cost in the neighborhood of fifty cents. I can’t imagine what he’d say about the $7 vendors were asking for now. On second thought, I know exactly what he’d say, and a good thing his great-grandson couldn’t hear it. I doubt his take on beer prices would be any different: $10.75, $11.75, $12.75, pick your poison. I had a Coke, but Clare paid, so I don’t know how much that set her back, exactly. What, a father can’t accept a refreshment his daughter wants to buy him? The scorecards used to be the one bargain I could count on, but they’re gone now; I print my own scoresheets off the internet. My sheets say the Sox won, 4-1, behind Lance Lynn (!), to take two out of three. Jose Abreu hit a nice three-run homerun to right center. My daughter is now thirty years old, but she still acts like a kid on occasion. She was able to get seats nineteen rows up from the right-side batter’s box; lots of foul balls, and she was stretching, not ducking, when they headed in our general direction. We both agreed Leo is way too young to take to a game. Why some people take babies to a ballgame is beyond me, and Clare. The Royals started rookie Michael Massey at second base, and he responded with two hits. Massey grew up a Sox fan in the southwest suburbs and had a big cheering section not far from us. Good for him and them. Interesting and odd that the Royals had an all-area double play combination, with Nicky Lopez of Naperville at shortstop. That’s Brother Rice and Naperville Central, by the way. Funny how the Sox and Cubs passed up two local players, again. Or, it would be funny, if funny depended on numbing-regularity. We drove down the side streets of Bridgeport to get onto the Stevenson. Bridgeport is where my father spent the first thirteen years of his life and where we went to visit his mother and other relatives. There were all sorts of ghosts and echoes. You could hear the exploding scoreboard from where my grandmother lived on May Street.

Minority Report

I was never a fan of Vin Sculley, the longtime Dodgers’ broadcaster who died yesterday at the age of 94. For me, the stories Sculley was so fond of telling tended to get in the way of the game he was supposed to be calling. And the one story I wanted him to tell, how and why the Dodgers abandoned Brooklyn for Los Angeles, he never seemed to get around to. I also seem to be in the minority over the relative lack of action on the part of White Sox general manager Rick Hahn, who did nothing more before yesterday’s trade deadline than pick up lefty reliever Jake Diekman. What, he should’ve made another big deal a la Craig Kimbrel? No thanks. So, the Padres stripped their minor-league system to get outfielder Juan Soto from the Nationals. That’s nice. How will he transform a team 11-1/2 games back of Los Angeles? Soto is one player of nine in the starting lineup. Unlike basketball or hockey, baseball doesn’t allow for a superstar to carry his team. Ernie Banks won back-to-back MVP awards with the Cubs, totaling 92 homeruns and 272 RBIs in 1958-1959; the Cubs went 72-82 in ’58, 74-80 in ’59. It’s a cautionary tale only for those who know who Banks was, and I wouldn’t put members of the Padres’ front office in that category. But, hey, if making the postseason via the wildcard is so important, more power to them. And even if Hahn had managed to acquire a talent like Soto without paying a king’s ransom, then what? Tony La Russa would be his manager; Soto would see the dysfunction; and he’d be headed out the door, sans World Series’ rings, as a free agent after 2024. For Hahn, it would be (James) Shields, 2.0. Better to hope this team can take baby steps, like last night’s 9-2 win over the Royals. Jose Abreu and Gavin Sheets both homered; Eloy Jimenez had three hits to go with three RBIs; and Lucas Giolito survived a forty-one pitch third inning. That’s all I can ask for, other than Lance Lynn actually showing up to pitch today.

I Said “Pathetic” Already, Right?

Last night, Michael Kopech pitched as well as I’ve ever seen him as a starter, seven innings of two-run ball against the visiting Royals. Guess what? Kopech and the White Sox lost, 2-1, with the game ending on Tim Anderson hitting into an around-the-horn double play. The win gives Kansas City a .398 winning percentage, by the way. Yasmani Grandal actually makes me yearn for the days of Adam Dunn, that’s how bad he is. What’s worse than Grandal’s .196 BA? The fact that he can’t run, is what. With runners on, anything on the ground is good for two, even three, outs. You’d think a HOF manager would know to look for alternatives to such a player or at least bat him in the nine-spot. Not our Tony La Russa. Grandal batted sixth last night, going for 0-for-4 while stranding three baserunners. The difference between Grandal and Yoan Moncada? Nine points in batting average, advantage Moncada, and Moncada’s ability to field his position. Well enough to merit chance after chance without producing at the plate? Holy Brooks Robinson, No, Batman! Meanwhile, Jake Burger toils away in the minors on what I’d call a bogus rehab assignment. How bad/sad are the White Sox right now? Everyone on the South Side turns their eyes to tonight’s starter, Lucas Giolito. That’s how bad/sad.

OK

OK, so the White Sox took two out of three from the worst team in the American League. Now what? They can’t pitch Dylan Cease every game. Too bad, that. Cease went six innings yesterday, picking up his eleventh win of the season, 4-1, against the A’s. Cease yielded one run on four hits and a walk; he also had seven strikeouts. The 26-year old righthander has gone twelve straight starts giving up no more than a run an appearance. That’s the good news. And the bad? The ever-engaging Cease (if I heard right, he’s making his own honey) doesn’t have much in the way of coattails. I started the season thinking Lucas Giolito would be the horse whisperer to Cease and Michael Kopech, but I was wrong. Giolito mostly talks gibber after the latest in a string of frustrating starts while Kopech seems detached, on a good night. Oh, Cease talks, alright. I’m just not sure either of his fellow starters is listening. Someday, the Sox may feature a lineup with both Eloy Jimenez and Luis Robert in it. I hope so, because Eloy, peculiar pigeon-toed stance and all, is heating up. With Robert, the power virtually drips from his swing. With Eloy, he just seems to make contact, and the ball takes flight, like it did yesterday with a homerun to right-center field. One game over .500. Do I dare dream two games with the Royals coming to town?