Baseball

Royals Spotlight: Alex Gordon Is Undead

By Sam Fels 1302 0

Alex Gordon was dead.

That was clear. After the 2015 Royals World Series win, Gordon must’ve figured there wasn’t anything left to do, because he fell off a cliff, crashed into jagged rocks, and watched his limbs split off. Some of this was due to injury, as Gordon’s body began betraying him in that ’15 season. He only played 104 games that year, which turned him into a 2-WAR player when he had been consistently a four or five. It also affected his superb defense.

But after that? Hooo boy. The past three seasons the best average Gordon had was .245. His highest OBP was .324. His highest wOBA was .305. He didn’t have a 2-WAR season, managing 1.7 last year, and that was the highest.

Gordon was never a great power hitter, only cracking 20 homers twice in his career and never slugging higher than .455. But he used to be a doubles-machine, including putting up 51 one season. The past three seasons his totals for two-baggers was 16, 20, 24. So what happened?

It seemed like Gordon got to that magical point a lot of players do these days at age 32, when dealing with the hyped up velocity of the modern game became too much. Gordon saw a huge spike in his whiff-percentage on off-speed and breaking pitches, which kind of clues you into that he was starting to cheat a bit on fastballs. When you’re spinning like a top on curveballs, you know this could be the problem. And Gordon was doing less and less with fastballs too, which doesn’t leave you a lot of places to go.

So what’s turned around this year? Well, Gordon is dealing with the fastball again, hitting .295 against them so far after not being above .240 the past three seasons. Gordon also isn’t getting bamboozled by changes and curves, hitting .389 and .333 against them, respectively. The past three seasons those numbers were…well, unsightly.

Is there a change in approach? There seems to be only a tweak or two. Gordon is swinging at less pitches out of the zone, but he’s making contact on significantly more pitches out of the zone. High and a way seems to be the order of the day:

One wonders if Gordon’s resurgence might bring his time in Kansas City to an end. Gordon is 35, and clearly won’t be around the next time the Royals mean anything to anyone. He has a mutual option next year for $23M, but must a $4M buyout. Any contender needing another bat would probably think that’s not much of an investment. Of course, Gordon can only play left, though an AL team could slot him at DH too.

Of course, you’re also talking about one of the most popular Royals ever, someone whose name will live forever there thanks to those ’14 and ’15 teams (could you have scored in the 9th in Game 7, though?). You don’t just flog those unless you have to, especially as Gordon probably doesn’t fetch that much at 35 with still limited power. These are the decisions that rebuilding teams have to make. At least Gordon isn’t dead like he used to be.

Baseball

Weekend Series Wraps: Sox Swept By Twins, Cubs Drop Two Of Three To Reds – Get To The Meats

By Sam Fels 1319 0

You’ll have to excuse me today. It’s a holiday weekend and I’m a little under the weather, which is like the worst combination ever, so I’m just going to combine these into one so we can all go about using our bonus weekend night however we see fit. I hope there’s grilled meats and cold beer in your future. I’m gonna try the old booze and allergy med combination and see if I can’t find Lucy in the sky.

Game 1 Box Score: Twins 11, White Sox 4

Game 2 Box Score: Twins 8, White Sox 1

Game 3 Box Score: Twins 7, White Sox 0

-This is probably not how you’d design this era of Sox-Twins matchups to start, now that one has proven to be ready for primetime and the other trying to get there. 26-5 combined suggests the Sox road might be a little longer to traverse than you thought. The Twins were so ruthless this weekend, as any mistake any pitcher made in black was punished by a baseball traveling at high speeds and distances. Six homers over three games is a pretty conservative pace for them on the road, but with the weather in Minneapolis finally cooperating, they might start lining up the two.

-I can see where Max Kepler is going to be villain #1 for Sox fans pretty soon. He just looks the part, and is effective enough to take the mantle. That lithe, smarmy carriage. Besides, only assholes are named Max

-Reynaldo Lopez wasn’t that wild, but he was wild in the strike zone, which usually ends with you giving up three homers and eight runs against a team that is a fireworks factory in itself. Lopez got scared off his slider, which means it was only fastball-change, and as the change wasn’t all that effective, it’s gasoline time.

-Yonder Alonso had three hits. So y’know, that’s something.

-Willians Astudillo is as much fun as I hoped.

-Covey wasn’t even bad today. There was some BABIP Kung Fu Treachery, but is only real mistake was a change that decided to go rogue, and then it went far thanks to Eddie Rosario. The Twins just aren’t missing right now.

-It’s a little scary that Welington Castillo was allowed to stay in to take another foul tip off the dome, when he looked a little shaky after the first one. Let’s say all of baseball has a long way to go when it comes to this sort of thing.

-After another day of watching Manny Banuelos, it’s probably worth pointing out that Dylan Cease gave up one over six in his last outing with 7 Ks but four walks. It’s the latter that’s probably keeping him in Carolina.

Game 1 Box Score: Reds 6, Cubs 5

Game 2 Box Score: Cubs 8, Reds 6

Game 3 Box Score: Reds 10, Cubs 2

-We said this Reds team was miles better than its record was saying it was, and they seem intent on proving that to the Cubs alone. Votto can’t hit anyone else, but he’s still Votto against the blue pinstripes, and they will never, ever get Eugenio Suarez out. It’s just not going to happen. Ever. Forget it.

-You can’t go any farther without talking about the pen again, and I’m going to harp on this until moves are made. There’s no point in bringing in Montgomery or Chatwood for merely one inning or just an out as it was on Friday with Monty. You barely have anyone to trust out there. Right now, I’d be using both, at least three times a week combined, to take over from the starter and see how far they can go. That limits the exposure of everyone else. Sure, Cishek is supposed to be the one you can trust right now, but he’s already overworked and well on his way to 70 appearances and an additional 174 times he warms up. Considering both Monty and Chatwood were stretched out, I don’t know why they can’t give you two to three innings three days apart each. It’s certainly time for creative solutions, unless you want more Brad Brach and Kyle Ryan in your life.

-That’s a mixed message with Darvish, who kept getting pulled early in the year to keep his confidence and yet sent out there for an eighth inning he clearly wasn’t prepared for. You know when a pitcher is emptying the tank, and that was in the 7th yesterday. Yes, the pen is a mess, but again, had they just closed out Friday with Monty and maybe on more, we aren’t here.

-It’s not going to happen for Carl Edwards.

-Daniel Descalso isn’t hitting, and then gave away a run because he can’t actually catch the ball. Solid signing here. Today he came up in his first AB and clearly wanted to go the opposite way, late on even breaking balls. His next AB he seemed determined to pull everything. He’s about as in between as you can get.

-And now maybe Bryant could have the concussion problems he has last year after getting beaned. This went well. Burn this tape.

Onwards for both…

 

Baseball

Series Preview – White Sox vs. Twins: Destined To Do This…For Awhile

By Sam Fels 1487 0

vs.

RECORDS: White Sox 23-26   Twins 33-16

GAMETIMES: Friday 7:10, Saturday and Sunday 1:10

TV: WGN Friday, NBCSN Saturday and Sunday

KIRK COUSINS’S PRISONERS: Twinkie Town

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Reynaldo Lopez vs. Jose Berrios

TBD vs. Kyle Gibson

Dylan Covey vs. Jake Odorizzi

PROBABLE WHITE SOX LINEUP

Charlie Tilson – CF

Yoan Moncada – 3B

Jose Abreu – 1B

Wellington Castillo – C

Eloy Jimenez – LF

Tim Anderson – SS

Yonder Alonso – DH

Yolmer Sanchez – 2B

Ryan Cordell – RF

PROBABLE TWINS LINEUP

Max Kepler – DH

Jorge Polanco – SS

Marwin Gonzalez – RF

Eddie Rosario – LF

C.J. Cron – 1B

Miguel Sano – 3B

Jonathan Schoop – 2B

Jason Castro – C

Byron Buxton – CF

 

After four days with the class of the AL and coming out intact, if not with heads held high, the Sox traverse the length of the country (or width? Whatever, south to north) to see the team that’s knocking on the door to join that class. The Minnesota Twins are out by themselves in the AL Central, have the best winning-percentage in all of baseball, and along with the Astros have a +90 run-differential, best in the game by a distance.

How did they get here? By smashing the shit out of the baseball. The Twins lead the world in runs by 17, They’re second in the AL behind the Astros in average, on-base percentage, and lead everyone in slugging. They’ve done this while playing in one of the least hitter-friendly parks as well. In fact, it’s the worst in the American League and only trails Wrigley so far this year, with both benefitting from Winter Olympics conditions. Or suffering, take your pick.

Of all the regulars, the only soft spots are Marwin Gonzalez and  Hero Of Everymen Everywhere Willian Astudillo. Jason Castro and Mitch Garver have kept Astudillo third on the depth-chart most of the season, though Garver is hurt at the moment. But they’re getting hitting from everywhere, with Polanco vaulting himself into stardom, and squeezing power out of Nelson Cruz and C.J. Cron. The former might not play this series but is about ready to come back from injury. It’s a tough lineup to traverse, if the Sox weren’t already tired from having to run the Astros gauntlet for four days.

But it’s not like the Twins don’t get pitching as well. Berrios, Odorizzi, and Martin Perez are all carrying ERAs of 3.30 or under and FIPs to back that up as not flukes. It’s not a huge strikeout staff but they don’t walk a lot of guys. They don’t get many grounders but in that park that’s not a huge problem. Gibson has had some homer problems but that’s mostly due to luck and will probably even out over the rest of the year, even as the weather warms up.

The pen is anchored by the continually grunting and sweaty Blake Parker, and no I don’t know how that works either but it does. Parker doesn’t strike that many out, walks too many, but gets out of it with a high groundball-rate and pure guts essentially. The main bridge to him is Taylor Rogers who is the strikeout dude back there. Ryne Harper and Matt Magill have also been highly effective.

Whereas Lucas Giolito got his shot at parading through a lineup of mutants and had maybe his best night in the majors last night, it’ll be Reynaldo Lopez’s turn tonight. It looks like another bullpen day on Saturday.

With the trajectories these teams are on, and the declines elsewhere, this could be the prologue to another few years of Twins-Sox arguments at the top of the Central. Which should lead to another batch of hilarious ads from Fox Sports North and an invasion of surprisingly annoying Twins fans whenever they’re on the Southside. And away we go.

Baseball

Twins Spotlight: Buxton, Polanco, And All We Need Is Just A Little Patience

By Sam Fels 1548 0

The Twins sit eight games clear at the top of the AL Central. While they have been predicted to compete for a couple years now, surging to the front with authority was not predicted many places outside the State of Hockey. Sure, it helps that Jose Ramirez and a few pitchers in Cleveland died, but the Twins look to have arrived.

Two big reasons the Twins are up there is Jorge Polanco and Byron Buxton. Polanco has a case for AL-MVP-Who’s-Not-Trout division, and Buxton is making good on the promise that most thought had gone to waste. A difference in approach with the rearing of the two is apparent.

Hard to believe, but Buxton is appearing in his fifth major-league season. He came up first when he was 20, which some do but is a big ask for just about anyone. Before being called up, Buxton only got 13 games at AAA and 59 at even AA. So he was pretty damn green. He got an additional 49 games at AAA the following year, but he was up full-time after that. Buxton has always been a positive player purely on his defense in center, but his offense has finally joined the party this year, after some thought it never would.

Polanco would also appear briefly in the majors at 20, but that was only for four games. He spent all of 2015 in the minors, where he got 95 games at AA and another 22 in AAA before another cameo in the majors. In 2016, Polanco received another 75 games in AAA, which is far more than Buxton ever got. Polanco never quite struggled at the plate in the majors the way Buxton did at times, but both have exploded this year, especially Polanco.

Polanco’s 27% line-drive rate is top-20 in MLB, and his 41% hard-contact rate will get it done as well. Polanco’s been especially dangerous on off-speed pitches this year, crushing curves and change-ups like never before. That’s probably a product of a new alley-to-alley approach, as a jump of nearly 10% more of his contact going up the middle.

Buxton seems to be the latest member of the Launch Angle Cabal, raising his fly ball rate nearly 20% over last year and 10% over his career norm. He’s on the other side of the spectrum, pretty much selling out to turn around fastballs and susceptible to breaking or slower offerings. And as you can see from the zone profile from what he’s doing with fastballs in his career vs. this year, he’s dead-set on lifting lower ones:

Either way, the Twins appear set up the middle for a long time to come. Good thing Hawk isn’t around anymore to have the Twins continually break his heart, even if it takes place outside now instead of in a garage.

Baseball

Series Preview – Reds vs. Cubs: Tell Your Statistics To Shut Up

By Sam Fels 1256 0

vs.

RECORDS: Reds 22-27   Cubs 29-19

GAMETIMES: Friday-Sunday 1:20

TV: NBCSN Friday, ABC Saturday, WGN Sunday

WHO DEY: Blog Red Machine

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Anthony DeSclafani vs. Kyle Hendricks

Tyler Mahle vs. Yu Darvish

Tanner Roark vs. Jose Quintana

PROBABLE REDS LINEUP

Nick Senzel – CF

Joey Votto – 1B

Eugenio Suarez – 3B

Jesse Winker – LF

Yasiel Puig – RF

Derek Dietrich

Jose Iglesias – SS

Tucker Barnhart – C

PROBABLE CUBS LINEUP

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Kris Bryant – 3B

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Javier Baez – SS

Jason Heyward – RF

Victor Caratini – C

Daniel Descalso – 2B

Albert Almora Jr. – CF

 

The NL Central is weird. Weird things can happen in baseball over two months. Hell, it can happen over six. The Reds show up today, and they’re last in the division. Yet they have a +25 run-differential, which is fourth-best in the entire NL, behind the three first-placed teams. Hell, the Cardinals have a +21 run-differential, and they’re a game behind the Pirates, who are -42. This probably evens out, and relatively soon, but for now it’s certainly odd viewing.

The way you get to that, or at least one way, is having great pitching and a woeful offense. The Reds have those. So they’re always holding opponents to few runs, but their offense rarely catches up, and when they do it’s a binge. It’s like your rare trips to Stan’s Donuts (don’t even try to play that you don’t get like three things at Stan’s. I know you. I see you).

Since we last saw the Reds, they lost two of three to the Dodgers at home and then split with the Brewers in Milwaukee, including an abstract performance art piece on Wednesday afternoon that they dropped 11-9. Not much has changed with the Reds in just eight days. One difference for the Cubs is that they’ll see Anthony Desclafani and not Luis Castillo, which is definitely a trade up if you’re the Cubs.

DeSclafani’s career has been kind of all over the map, and he’s had his injury problems. His strikeouts are up this year, but his grounders are way down and when summer finally hits in Cincy that’s generally not a recipe for success as balls tend to ride the humidity and methane from Skyline out into the right-field bleachers a ton. DeSclafani has changed this year by choking off his slider into a curveball, throwing that pitch more more than he ever has and five times as much as he did last year. He still uses the slider a quarter of the time, and it’s still his most effective pitch as far as what hitters do against it.

The Cubs also didn’t see Tyler Mahle, who’s been great and isn’t walking anyone essentially. Mahle features a fastball, change, and curve, and the change and curve get a ton of grounders for him, which will be a real boon in his home park.

Other than that, you know the drill. Eugenio Suarez will kill the Cubs at some point this weekend, Senzel is heating up, Dietrich is the only other one hitting, and the pen has multiple weapons before you even get to Raisel Iglesias at the end.

For the Cubs, they’re apparently still trying to exhume Descalso today, and Hendricks returns home where he’s given up no runs in his last two starts in white over 17 innings. Pedro Strop won’t return this weekend but is very close. Yu’s revival started against this Reds team, and they’re an offense you can get healthy against. There’s a nasty looking road trip after this, so another series win would certainly be the right prep for it.

Baseball

Reds Spotlight: Then Back To My Place Where I Will Get You Votto

By Sam Fels 1045 0

We’re going to try to add these to our baseball previews. At least as long as our sanity allows.

There are many signs of the apocalypse these days. Look around daily, and you’ll probably find one. Maybe it’s the imminent heat death of the planet. Or the fracturing of the political scene. Or increasing feudalist society across the world. Perhaps nuclear winter in the Middle East.

Joey Votto with a 74 wRC+ feels like it’s not too far down the list either.

To be fair to Votto, he did start like this once, just once, before. In April of 2016, he hit .226 with a wOBA of .276. He struck out nearly a quarter of the time, just as he did this season. That time he was hitting a ton of grounders, which he isn’t that time, and we’ll circle back to in a sec. And when all was said and done in 2016, Votto ended up slashing .326/.434/.550 with a 158 wRC+. And really, that’s what we should expect from Votto until he doesn’t do that, even if we get to September 20th and he’s still doing this. I’ll still believe he’ll end up with superior numbers. It’s one of those things where even seeing the body won’t prove to me he’s dead.

That doesn’t mean there doesn’t feel like something’s off with Votto. One, he’s swinging at way more pitches out of the zone, and the real jump is he’s not getting to any of it. The past three seasons, Votto has made contact at between 75%-78% of the pitches he swung outside of the zone. This year it’s 63.1%. He’s making less contact than he has in a long time, and his swinging strikes are as hight as they’ve been in a decade. What’s the deal here?

You heard Jim DeShaies mention when the Cubs were in Ohio that Votto’s fly balls are way up, and that’s true. 42.5% of his contact is in the air, up from 30% last year and a career rate of 33.3%. It’s come at the cost of his line-drives, which is what you think of when you think of Votto. Those are down to 20.8%, from last year’s 31.4%, and his usual rate of around 25%. His hard-contact is down a touch, but not to these kinds of margins.

Is Votto trying to go for a little more power? Well, one of the signs of age is a problem with the fastball, and Votto is certainly having that. For his career, Votto hit .324 on fastballs and slugged .593. This year those numbers are .191 and .338, which leaves your jaw shattered on the floor. And Votto can’t seem to get to it anywhere. Check out the location of his whiffs on fastballs for his career and then this year:

Votto’s struggles on off-speed pitches also suggests he’s leaning to get to the fastballs and is getting caught. He’s in-between. Votto simply doesn’t miss this much, so something seems to be up.

He is 35, which is when you’d think players would start to fade. But off a cliff like this? There is a comparison, and that’s Albert Pujols who is something of a contemporary of Votto’s. Pujols fell off the face of the Earth in his age 37 season, which may surprise you. At 36, while hardly the country-side wandering monster he was in St. Louis, Pujols had a 113 OPS+ in Anahiem. The next year it was 80, and he’s been a sinkhole ever since.

That can’t be happening to Votto, can it? The guy who looked like he could line a single to center whenever he wanted? This has happened once before, and then Votto tore a hole in the Earth. That turnaround in 2016 started in May. They’re still waiting on Votto this year.

Baseball

Series Wrap – Sox Split With Astros: The Arrival?

By Sam Fels 1322 0

Game 1Box Score: Astros 3, White Sox 0

Game 2 Box Score: Astros 5, White Sox 1

Game 3 Box Score: White Sox 9, Astors 4

Game 4 Box Score: White Sox 4, Astros 0

There are moments during a rebuild that at the very moment you take immense joy in. There aren’t many, and the future very well may bring a different context to them. Perhaps even a farcical one. Hell, Cade McNown had a three touchdown game once. But you save that for later. Because on the night, or at the time, it portends to a real future. To knowing that the patience was worth it. A glimpse of what could be. Tonight, Lucas Giolito gave White Sox fans that. Yeah, Jose Altuve and George Springer have been out, but that’s still one of the AL’s best lineups without them against him. With them it’s the league’s best. And Giolito put them down and wouldn’t let them up. Made them say uncle.

Giolito got 11 whiffs in total, and five on his slider, of which he only threw 17. The change has been the main weapon of the year, but there’s nothing wrong with having a couple in your arsenal. Giolito only threw 25 balls all night. That lowers his ERA to 2.77 on the year. That’s two runs over his last 28 innings.

Those kinds of numbers are the mark of an ace. If you watched Giolito tonight and saw a pitcher becoming everything he promised, I won’t stop you. And that’s the kind of thing that portends to better days. If you feel like basking, go right ahead. These things don’t happen every day in the phase the Sox find themselves.

We can clean the rest up.

-I suppose the opposite side of the spectrum is when your team is just outclassed, as it appeared on Tuesday with Justin Verlander. Verlander will do that a lot of teams, but this one felt especially like the bigger kid keeping his hand on the littler kid’s forehead.

-Back on the good side of the spectrum, Eloy Jimenez introduced himself to the Crawford Boxes, with three homers in two games. Jimenez bombs, Giolito silence. It’s a pretty nice formula.

-You know if it wasn’t for that Toronto start, Nova has three good starts in a row. But ifs don’t get you anywhere. Nova was purely sinker on Wednesday, throwing it 55% of the time. Other than that it was just change and curve, and he cut out his four-seamer totally. See if he continues with that.

-Josh Osich has put together three straight scoreless outings, two of them multiple innings.

Move on to the next 1st place team, the Twins.

 

 

 

Baseball

Series Wrap – Cubs Split With Phillies: Could Have Been More, Could Have Been Less, So It’s This

By Sam Fels 1192 0

Game 1 Box Score: Phillies 5, Cubs 4

Game 2 Box Score: Cubs 3, Phillies 2

Game 3 Box Score: Cubs 8, Phillies 4

Game 4 Box Score: Phillies 9, Cubs 7

The Cubs should have won on Monday, but didn’t. The Phillies should have won on Tuesday, but didn’t. And each scored over eight runs in their other wins, so a split is just about right. In the words of Gennaro Gattuso, “Sometimes maybe good, sometimes maybe shit.” And considering these are two of the three first-place teams in the NL, splitting seems about right that way as well. And because everyone else in the NL East is intent on doing a damn fine Mets impression, or is the Mets, you get the feeling the Cubs and Phils might do this more than a few times more before the boxes are packed. Let’s clean it all up.

The Two Obs

-The big story of the series is the bullpen, and I suppose that’s only right. Darvish was a touch unlucky to give up three runs over six, and I thought Brad Brach was a touch unlucky to give up a run in the ninth. Segura fists one over the head of Rizzo, and that seemed to be the theme for the rest of the series. The Cubs seemed to get their fair share of BABIP Kung Fu treachery all series. Kintzler got a grounder from McCutchen in the second game, it just happened to find a hole. Happened again today too.

Still, the pen gave up runs in all four games, though the last two it was asked to go for five full innings. Chatwood took all of them yesterday, so two runs over five innings is fine for one pitcher. For some reason it’s not fine for multiple, and I thought Not John Wick was Kung Fu Treachery’d as well today for one of the runs.

We all know that the return of Pedro Strop isn’t going to fix anything, especially because he won’t be used anywhere but the 9th. Moves will have to be made. So let’s not harp on it.

-While we’re on the pen, Carl Edwards needs to drop the slide-step. He’s not Pedro Strop, who can control it. He struck out the side today, so it seems odd to nitpick. But his velocity drops when he uses it, which he was with no one on base today for some reason. He also loses most of his pitches high to arm-side because his arm can’t catch up. For someone who has such trouble repeating his delivery, just have him worry about one.

-Lester’s last two starts comprise 8.1 innings and nine runs, 17 hits. There’s going to be market corrections like this, because Lester is giving up an obscene amount of hard contact. 41% to be exact. He’s been able to raise his Ks and lower his walks, and up his grounders, but he’s going to have to find a way to limit the loud noises he’s surrendering. It was thunderous today. A quarter of the contact today was line-drives, half in the air, and with the wind blowing out that’s a problem.

-The Cubs have been through a dicey turn of the rotation, and they went 3-3. Hendricks was iffy on Sunday, with Lester iffy the day before that. Darvish and Quintana were good, but Hamels and Lester were not. You’ll take breaking even when you didn’t break even on good starts.

-The War Bear has four hits in his last two games, eight in his last seven, and has been on base 11 times in that stretch. Nothing definitive yet, but the start of something?

-Almora took the plaudits last night, as he should, but when he came up with the bases loaded today you kind of knew it had to be a soft grounder. Even in this upturn in May, he’s still nearly at 60% grounders. You can’t find success that way.

-Javy sure made it look easy, didn’t he? If he’d got backspin instead of topspin on that ball in the 8th today, the Cubs probably tie it.

Onwards…

 

Baseball

The 2016 White Sox Come Back For Their Nostalgia Tour

By Sam Fels 1284 0

Deep down, you kind of love this, right Sox fans?

I’ll admit to being a bit distracted in 2016 with my side of town, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t aware of all that went on with the White Sox in 2016. And frankly, I’m happy for the reminder of just how ridiculous it was. I didn’t appreciate it enough. And how important it might be, because that team ended up smashing the previous model for the White Sox and giving fans this one, which is pretty much what they wanted for years. Except for that botched Machado thing.

When Todd Frazier and Adam Eaton were doing handbags at ten paces on Monday, all the details came flying back. Because you really have to take a step back and marvel at the pure farce that the mere suggestion Drake LaRoche should haul his hilljack ass out of the clubhouse half the time caused his dad to retire! No one asked that Drake probably couldn’t read was something that was amiss, just that he belonged out there taking grounders. I mean, if you think about it for too long your brain bubbles. An adult male, or at least a facsimile of one, was told to stop bringing his child to the office, a place of business, and he reacted by packing up his stuff and going home.

This seemed such a normal request, and no one ever bothered to ask Jose Abreu what he thought about it, being separated from his entire family for years. I don’t have to wonder too hard why Adam Laroche probably didn’t care all that much about that. But you add the layers to it and it gets so much better. Jimmy Rollins, an actual grown-up even if he was completely busted as a player by that point, needed all of eight minutes in spring training to make it clear to Kenny Williams this shit had to stop. And then he saw the reaction, took 40 games, and decided he’d had enough of this shit. And this is a guy who built a career in Philadelphia!

And it just kept getting better. If anyone was really paying attention, Adam Eaton would have been the subject of talkshows nationwide after claiming Drake LaRoche–again, a child whose marketable skill is probably chewing cud–was a team leader. Where else could this have taken place? If he had said that in New York the Post and Daily News would have euthanized him for his own good. And yet it merely passed by here.

Adam Eaton was just the torch-carrier from Nick Swisher and his Dirty Cat Salon ploy, which had everyone in the clubhouse ready to go Brutus on his ass. That doesn’t mean anyone should have sided with Frazier either. Any player Hawk Harrelson likes that much should be heavily side-eyed.

Oh, did we forget Hawk Harrelson leaving the booth to check on Frazier after like, a bruise? Where else could this happen? What did Frazier and Herm Schneider do when Hawk breathlessly and covered in sweat burst into the trainer’s room? The correct answer would have been stabbing him with a tranquilizer and going about their business. I’d really give anything to go back in time and see that scene.

I’m trying to picture Michael Kay sprinting down the Yankee Stadium tunnels to see if Gleyber Torres’s allergies were acting up, and no vision of it doesn’t have Brian Cashman catapulting him into the East River. There wasn’t one functioning element to the whole operation, and I’m really greatly saddened it basically took place in the dark.

Sox fans may think I’m mocking them, but I’m really not. If you’re going to be a dysfunctional mess, why not just go for it? Don’t half-ass it. Go big or go home. When the Sox become contenders again, the 2016 team will be talked about in bars and living rooms across town as a sign of where they’d come from. It’s their Lee Elia tirade. It’s Dave Manson chasing Mike Keenan down a hallway during an intermission.

It all went so wrong that Kenny Williams’s policy of collecting whatever veterans he could find, sometimes multiple times, and rolling the dice again and again was consigned to a dumpster out back and never to be spoke of again. Maybe the Sox won’t get there but at least you know they’re run by something resembling adults.

The Goodman or Steppenwolf needs a show about the ’16 White Sox. They need to be burnt into the memory of every baseball fan. And they’ll be a turning point for an entire organization. 20 years from now the Sox will still vow to never be that again. It’s so wonderful. You basically have the Bulls being a cover band for them now. What a gift.

Baseball

The Disconnect And The Solution

By Sam Fels 1518 0

As I watched the Cubs bullpen fritter away another lead last night, the second game in a row they’ve done so even if it came on a collection of bleeders and excuse-me’s, I have to admit I get the fans’ angst. I might not be there with them, but I can’t tell them they’re wrong. And you know how I love telling people they’re wrong, especially when I’m from the same side. The bullpen this year is perhaps the biggest spot of neglect the Theo Epstein regime has infected the team with since they slammed back into relevance in 2015.

And it of course comes back to this winter. They kept telling us they didn’t have the money for Harper or Machado, and you didn’t have to squint all that hard to see the arguments about why signings like that didn’t make sense for the Cubs. I may not agree with that assessment, but I can understand the argument. However, fixing a bullpen is far cheaper, and for the Cubs to turn their pockets out at the thought of adding the cheapest part of a baseball team was as bewildering as it was infuriating.

And yet, as the winter dragged along and the Cubs made nary a move outside Brad Brach and casting a net to find whatever various flotsam would fall into it, there wasn’t a peep out of the Cubs front office. For a team as savvy with the media (at least on baseball matters) as the Cubs are, surely there would be a leak somewhere or a nudge that Theo and Jed were as surprised with the budget closing as we were. They talked of major changes in the wreckage of a two-day slump last October, and then nothing. Surely if things had changed between then and when the markets opened up, someone somewhere would know. And yet nothing. No whispers of fidgeting anywhere.

That doesn’t mean to cast the front office as perfect. Far from it. No matter their plans, they were counting on Brandon Morrow, which was a poor choice. Perhaps they couldn’t have predicted that Carl Edwards would run farther from competence than toward it, given his age, but he wasn’t in a position to be counted on either. You can’t account for Pedro Strop getting hurt…except he has the last three seasons. While this front office has had its problems identifying and collecting pitching, this seemed an egregious error. It is not like them to stock a complete component of a team with hunches and wildcards. And yet, here we are.

Which I guess perhaps lends credence to this story from Patrick Mooney about the Cubs and Marquee. Now, no one is going to buy this hook, line, and sinker, and nor should they. There are still more than enough variables to fuck it all up, like if no one actually picks up Marquee which Crane Kenney seems so sure of. And anything Crane is sure of you best bet you should take with a whole shaker of salt.

Still, perhaps the lack of any itching or antsy-ness from the front office over the limitations this winter stems from knowing it was a one-year deal? That they would simply have to grit their teeth through this winter knowing with the money coming off the books in the form of Hamels and Zobrist, combined with greater income would turn next winter around? Perhaps they knew with the room they’ve left for midseason acquisitions they’ll be fine? We’re essentially talking about two arms here. And if Kimbrel is going to wait until after the draft to drop the compensation, a prorated salary for half a season is probably only $5 or $6M, no? Half of a Ken Giles will cost $2M. Alex Colome a little over that. I guess I shouldn’t worry.

I don’t want to be that guy who blindly trusts what he’s being told, especially by the uber rich. Still, the complete lack of agitation in the front office, apparently, makes me think something is afoot. And the Cubs being on top of the division only buys them more time. But the answers need to be relatively soon.