Thursday, May 17, 2018

Rebuilding, a Player's Perspective


Brandon McCarthy started his MLB career as a 21-year old with the 2005 White Sox.  Thirteen years later, the tall right-hander is still pitching, currently as a starter with the Braves.

McCarthy has never been one to hide his opinions; Clare does or did follow him on Twitter for his outside-the-box take on things.  McCarthy had a bigger forum yesterday in the Tribune, which he used to full effect.  To the best of my knowledge, this was one of the few, if not the first, times a ballplayer offered his thoughts on team rebuilds.

Speaking to reporter Paul Sullivan, McCarthy said, “You see teams tank and do something and fall short, and then you’ve subjected your fans to a few years of tanking.”  McCarthy did allow that there are times tanking makes sense, “But you’re also seeing too many full teardowns...it’s somewhat of an easy lie, an easy situation to pass off to [and on] fans.”  I’ll say.

Now we come to the point where the player sounded like this fan:  “We’ve seen it a ton.  Like, if five years in a row you nail your top draft pick inside the top ten picks, then you’re probably going to be better.  But it took five years in a row of your fans trudging out to games pretty much just to watch the other team play.”

Let me note here that the White Sox, who officially began their rebuild in 2017, haven’t had a winning season since 2012.  So, Sox fans have been trudging for a lot longer than five years.  Last season’s record was 67-95.  With a record right now of 10-29, we’re on track for a 40-44 win season; hello, ’62 Mets.  Trudge, fudge…

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