Oh, That Rebuild

It’s all about the learning.  On Tuesday, Lucas Giolito of the White Sox went six innings against the Indians, giving up five runs, all earned on nine hits, including two doubles and two home runs.  But here’s the positive—Giolito didn’t walk anybody.  Go, rebuild!  As for yesterday, Reynaldo Lopez went 2-2/3 innings, more than enough time for him to yield seven earned runs on eight hits.  But this is a rebuild year, so everything’s a mulligan.  Yea, rebuild!

Tim Anderson and Yoan Moncada are the Sox double-play combination of the future.  Anderson made his tenth error at short yesterday while Moncada bobbled number five.  Mulligan.  Daniel Palka butchered another ball in right field.  Mulligan.  Adam Engel has struck out 43 times in 140 at-bats.  Mulligan.

On Tuesday, 19-year old Juan Soto collected three hits in the Nationals’ win over the Orioles.  Meanwhile, 21-year old Eloy Jimenez, the Sox #1 prospect and #3 in all of baseball according to MLB.com (Fernando Tatis is #7, but we traded him for James Shields), toils away at AA Birmingham.  Despite hitting .333 with 36 RBIs (second-best in the Southern League), Jiminez has to wait his turn.  GM Rick Hahn has a plan.

Mulligan.  

Let's Dance

Clare and Chris came over for a Memorial Day barbeque, during which we watched the White Sox cough up a four-run lead in Cleveland.  (Suggestion:  Either make Daniel Palka a dh or encourage him to open a butcher shop.  Palka wields a glove like a meat cleaver.)  During dinner, Clare mentioned that she hadn’t picked out a song for the two of us to dance to at her wedding, now a little over a month off.  “We can’t do ‘I Fought the Law,” my daughter joked.  Oh, would that we could.

In seventh and eighth grade, Clare entered a hitting contest at Stella’s, our batting cages of choice.  Both years she was an independent while virtually everyone else belonged to a travel team (ironically, one she’d belong to come high school).  The first year, Clare was one of twenty hitters and finished second.  She might have slipped to third the next year.

When you don’t know anyone outside of your father (and that’s of debatable worth), you may need help to stay calm and focused; music can definitely help.  In my daughter’s case, it was “I Fought the Law” by the Bobby Fuller Four.  My guess is Clare heard it in the car once and went nuts, more or less.  “I’m breakin’ rocks in the hot sun/I fought the law and the law won/I fought the law and the law won.”  Clare just had to have the song, and, before long, she did.

On the way to every session (the competition went on for several weeks, November through December), I played the song, and Clare did a little cowboy pantomime when Bobby Fuller sang, “I’m robbin’ people with a six-gun.”  Or just hitting a rubber-coated baseball.

But you can’t dance to a lyric like that, so Clare will have to find something more appropriate.  Lucky for me I can tell the story as part of the toast.   

Fast Cars

In a way, nothing could be more American than auto racing, or more democratic.  I mean, who doesn’t race at one time or another?  So, rather than say I’m not a fan of the sport, I prefer to think of myself as a driver in good standing, and have been since July of 1970.  Trust me,   there’ve been a lot of races.

The one I’ll mention here occurred two months after I got my license that July (and how tricky my instructor was trying to get me to run a stop sign on the course).  As I recall, it was a Friday night in early September, and I was on my way in the family Ford Galaxie to visit my girlfriend, who went to school in the faraway North Shore.  My, how I zoomed down the express lanes of the Kennedy Expressway.  Let’s just say I was in the ballpark of the speeds Chuck Berry mentioned in the lyrics to “Maybelline.” 

I couldn’t get over how fast I was going; things looked cool in a blur.  Then, just like that, I throttled back, my need for speed entirely satisfied.  In all the time since, I’ve been more interested in getting to places on time (as opposed to late or early, both of which I hate).  But I still want a car that can go zero-to-sixty in a few seconds flat.

I like dependability and style along with performance.  Of all the cars I’ve had, the PT Cruiser was my favorite.  Talk about style; it looked like a ’40s’ panel truck.  At stoplights, people were always asking me about it.  There was also the time someone I knew, a true “gearhead,” said, “You know, a hemi would look just perfect in that.”  Yes, put a V-8 in my baby.

The PT took us to all of Clare’s area travel tournaments and twice to nationals in Kansas City.  After nine years, we switched to a Ford hybrid and gave the PT to Clare, who drove it another three years.  Even now, four years after its passing, we share tales of driving the PT.  You really don’t need Indianapolis or Dattona for that.

But a hemi would be nice.

Fahters and Sons and Flags

For as long as I can recall, Memorial Day on Homan Avenue involved the flag and spring cleaning.  My father flew the flag on the front porch, and we all pitched in with the washing and whatnot.

When you’re twelve, helping to carry the mattresses outside is a job in itself, but that was only the half of it.  Next, I was handed an honest-to-goodness rug beater and instructed to beat the dust off the mattresses.  Très fun.  When I grew older, I was promoted to wall-washing.  Kitchen, dining room, living room—my father and I shared space on an extension plank between two ladders.  First we did the walls with Soilax, then rinsed them down with water.  After that, we used a special sponge for the ceilings.  Again, très fun.  This went on for years, even after Clare was born.  Where’s Daddy?  Why, he’s up on the ladder Grandpa is holding steady.

Spring cleaning was done by the Fourth of July.  My father could concentrate on making barbeque chicken on the grill—and putting the flag out.  His work uniform, of a Chicago firefighter, had a flag patch.  The front railing had a special holder for the flag pole; I wouldn’t be surprised if he fashioned it himself.  And, when the time came, I had a flag as a housewarming gift from my father.

I probably find more holidays to fly it than my father did.  The way I see it, you claim the flag or let someone else do it.  So, out the flag goes for Labor Day and Veterans Day and maybe even Columbus Day.  I’ve flown it so much over the years Clare has been pressed into duty as a second Betsy Ross, sewing up holes and mending tatters along the edges.  That flag will die with me, and I intend to live to a hundred.

The NFL owners would probably love to salute me at halftime, if only I’d buy season’s tickets to the Bears.  It’s just as well.  The owners have announced a new policy about protesting the national anthem—players can either stay in the locker room or stand at attention along the sidelines.  I don’t fly the flag for the likes of them to dictate conduct.  I don’t even fly the flag for all the same reasons my father did.  Oh, I’m proud and thankful to be an American, just as I’m sure Patrick Henry and Thomas Paine were proud.

It would be nice if a few football players happened to cite the likes of those two as an inspiration, but what can you expect of anyone in their twenties?  I’ll cite it for them. 

State of the Rebuild

Maybe the White Sox shouldn’t be in such a rush with their prospects, after all.  I mean, look what happens when they get here.

On Thursday afternoon, starter Lucas Giolito took it upon himself to pull a Carson Fulmer; no two innings pitched for Giolito.  Instead, the young right-hander managed just four outs, during which time he allowed six hits and three walks while hitting a batter.  Add it all together, and one of the hopes of the rebuild gave up seven runs, all earned.  Giolito (3-5) now has a 7.53 ERA.  As bad as that is, he also leads the AL in walks with 37 and the majors in hit batters with 10.  So, all the work with pitching coach Don Cooper must be paying off.

Going the distance for Baltimore was Dylan Bundy, who entered the game with a 2-6 record and 4.70 ERA.  Those numbers didn’t stop Bundy from throwing a complete-game two hitter.  Oh, and he struck out 14, 11 on breaking balls, and I swear not one of them was in the vicinity of 90 mph.  So, all the work our young hitters are putting in with hitting coach Todd Steverson must be paying off as well.   I particularly like how Bundy threw breaking balls from the start, but nobody in the home dugout seemed to take note.  Nearly all Sox hitters go up looking for the fast ball.  Sliders and curves are foreign to them.

[On the other end of the spectrum is the consistently good Reynaldo Lopez, he of the misleading 1-3 record (and 2.93 ERA).  Lopez went seven strong innings against Detroit on Friday and left with a 4-2 lead; the Sox bullpen quickly turned that into a 5-4 deficit.  How long do you think before the non-decisions—six so far and counting—trigger a dugout or clubhouse explosion?  I’m guessing sooner than later.] 

But, hey, this is a rebuild, and winning isn’t everything; this year is all about developing talent, which is why the Sox signed veteran catcher Wellington Castillo to a two-year contract, so he could help bring the young pitchers  along.  Only Castillo has just been hit with an 80-game suspension for PEDs use.  At least he took responsibility for it.  Better late than never, right?

Sox GM Rick Hahn said Castillo’s suspension won’t “have much of an impact at all” on the success of the rebuild.  Neither will the young talent, from the looks of it.

Age is Relative

On Monday, nineteen-year old Nationals’ outfielder Juan Soto became the youngest ballplayer to start a game since 2012.  When he hit a three-run home run in his second big-league at-bat, Soto became the youngest player in Nationals’ history to homer (beating Bryce Harper by three days).  Did I mention Soto won’t turn 20 until October 25?  Eloy Jimenez of the White Sox will turn 22 a month later.  So, who’s the better prospect?

Jimenez may be rated higher, but Soto is already in the bigs (albeit due to a slew of injuries to the Washington outfield).  Yet, if circumstances have forced the Nats to call up Soto sooner than they’d like, they still did it without fear of starting his free-agency clock or anything else.  The White Sox under general manager Rick Hahn operate until a different set of rules, ones I don’t pretend to understand.

Top pitching prospect Michael Kopech is already 22, as are two other top-10 Sox prospects; two others are 21 and three are 23.  Only Luis Robert at age 20 comes close to matching Soto in age.  And yet Sox fans are told to wait until the talent is ready.

Yeah, we wouldn’t want another Juan Soto on our hands, now would we?   

Say What, Say How

Perhaps the most underappreciated job in major-league baseball right now is that of the interpreter; you can’t go international without one.  The success of Japanese, Korean and Taiwanese players can depend on what their interpreter says, and how it’s said.  Latin players oftentimes rely on a bilingual teammate to translate for them, but I wonder.  Midwesterners who’ve gone to NYC or Boston at some point feel like they’re in another country with all the extra t’s and r’s and “ah’s” that come out of people’s mouths.  Spanish has to be the same way as it’s spoken in the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico and Venezuela, among other places.  And what do they speak on Curacao?

Baseball is a game of nuance both as it’s played and learned.  Pitchers have to understand grips and arm angles while batters are forever experimenting with their stances.  Clare would have coaches talk to her about her “load,” and she’d have to explain to me what they meant (a batter at the ready position as the pitch is thrown, I think).  Now, imagine a hitting coach talking “load” or hips or shoulders to a player who wants help.  It’s one thing to speak Korean, Japanese or Chinese, and quite another to apply it to the game of baseball.  I would think the best interpreters are ex-jocks rather than expats.

Players and organizations have to decide on some happy medium when it comes to language; the onus to learn English seems to fall heaviest on Latin players.  The White Sox look to be doing something a little different in that regard.  Not only do they have a team interpreter, the interpreter helps players do postgame TV interviews.  This strikes me as a smart thing, signaling to players their “take” on the game matters more than the language it’s given in.  It also shows respect in this age of Trump.

Who knows, once a player expresses himself in his own language, he may be willing to learn another.