To the Pen, Pen, Pen

Like I said, the White Sox don’t have to run the remainder of their schedule, but when they hit five homeruns, like last night against the Reds in Cincinnati, it feels like they will. I mean, even Nomar Mazara and Yasmani Grandal went yard. Good guys, 5-0. Negative Nancy that I am, I sometimes worry that this Sox team will be a copy of 2005, with a roster not exactly built for the ages. Then I look at Matt Foster and Codi Heuer, two of the relievers used last night, and hope returns. It’s always good to develop your own pitching. Better yet when that pitching wasn’t drafted in the first round, like Garrett Crochet, who made his MLB debut Friday. You want—and moreover, expect—your #1 pick to mow down the order, striking out two and needing just thirteen pitches to get the job done. But that’s not Foster and Heuer. Foster was drafted in the 20th round in 2016. His record stands at 5-0 with a 1.88 ERA over nineteen games and twenty-four innings pitched. Heuer was picked in the sixth round two years ago. He’s managed a 3-0 mark with a 1.77 ERA over eighteen games and 20.1 innings. The Sox actually drafted a kid from Missoula, Montana, by way of Wichita State. Be still, my beating heart. This is how you build a bullpen, not by throwing money after the likes of Kelvin Herrera and Steve Cishek. Oh, and finding someone like Evan Marshall, who needed to approach the age of 30 before figuring things out.