Wrong Direction

By Mike Rifkin

In 2021 the Chicago White Sox won 93 games and a lot of people thought that was the beginning of something special on the South Side. Well, things turned the other way for the White Sox and now who knows when it will end. On Sunday the White Sox lost to the Minnesota Twins, to lose their 20th consecutive game, one shy of the American League record which was set in 1988. The White Sox are a disaster from top to bottom, but this week there’s more to shed on this because of this past Tuesday’s trade deadline. 

Most people thought the White Sox should be fairly active during the trade deadline given their place in the standings. But the White Sox made one major move. In a three team trade with the Cardinals and Dodgers, the White Sox shipped out Starting Pitcher Eric Fede and Outfielder Tommy Pham to the Cardinals, and reliever Michael Kopech to the Dodgers. The White Sox added two players (Jeral Perez and Alexander Albertus) who are 19 years old. They also got 24 year old Miguel Vargas, who had limited playing time in LA. Entering the season none of the three were in the Dodgers’ top 30 within their farm system. They were able to dump Eloy Jimenez’s contract on the Baltimore Orioles as well.  The other reason people thought the White Sox would do well at the deadline, Luis Robert Jr. and Garrett Crochet both were rumored to be on the block and neither was moved. Robert was fantastic in 2023, with 38 homers and 80 RBI’S with a slash line of .264/.315/.542. 2023 was also the only time in his career Robert has played in over 100 games. This year it’s been a different story Robert has 12 homers and 26 RBI’s with a slash line of .214/.282/.432 in 58 games. The best ability is availability and Robert hasn’t proven to be available enough. Crochet wasn’t traded for a different reason, his problem was something said by someone in his camp. They said Crochet wouldn’t pitch down the stretch without a contract extension, the thing is Crochet still has two years left on his contract. The White Sox have moved Crochet from reliever to starter, Crochet is 6-8 with a 3.19 ERA and is second in baseball with 162 strikeouts. Did the White Sox fail the trade deadline? Yes, but I don’t blame Chris Getz for the team’s failures. 

The person at fault for the White Sox issues is owner Jerry Reinsdorf. So, why is it Reinsdorf’s fault that the team is this bad? Well let’s start with the hiring of Tony La Russa. La Russa hadn’t managed a team in a decade, and he couldn’t last two full seasons as the manager in Chicago, in part to his health, but there’s been some stories about things that went down in the clubhouse. The other one that got me was when Reinsdorf fired GM Rick Hahn and President Kenny Williams, both of whom had been with the organization a long time. But instead of doing a thorough search, Reinsdorf just promoted assistant GM Chris Getz to the position. Now this is not a slight at Getz, but if you at least interview other candidates maybe you find something you like. The White Sox are 27-87, they haven’t won a game in a month and they could catch the 1962 Mets for most losses in a season (120) and the owner will have nobody to blame but himself.