Bernstein: Dead-End White Sox On Clock At Trade Deadline
By Dan Bernstein--
CBSChicago.com senior columnist
(CBS) 2016 is now shot for the White Sox, who sit a distant third in the AL Central at 51-54 and are seven games out of the second wild-card spot, behind four other teams. No more rose-colored pretense can stand between right now and today's MLB non-waiver trade deadline at 3 p.m.
The minor deal Sunday that sent reliever Zach Duke to St. Louis for slap-hitting speedy outfielder Charlie Tilson could signal the start of a long-needed teardown, or it could be the last move general manager Rick Hahn does before the offseason. As always, he will see what deals are available, then present options to team chairman Jerry Reinsdorf.
That's how this works, with the owner ultimately deciding if he wants to keep competing right now.
BaseballProspectus.com's playoff odds calculation gives the White Sox a 4.2 percent chance of making it, and the projections at Fangraphs.com have them at merely 1.7 percent. In other words, not enough -- even for the 80-year-old Reinsdorf, who has habitually wanted to go for it in the short term.
The Dodgers, Red Sox, Rangers, Blue Jays, Nationals and Astros are all reported to be in pursuit of starting pitching, and all have deep enough farm systems to put together a reasonable package in exchange for either Jose Quintana or Chris Sale, who rank a respective seventh and 15th in pitching fWAR in baseball.
As analyst Joe Sheehan noted in his subscription newsletter Friday:
"It's fine for an owner, a team president, a GM to get his back up and say he's not going to trade a star. It's even OK for him to mean it, as many certainly do. If that's the line, though, then you have to ask the key question: How will the players you're not trading ever be part of a contender?"
It was amusing to read comments from the White Sox in the wake of the Duke trade, almost adorable to hear them reacting like this is some kind of normal, healthy team. Manager Robin Ventura called Sunday "a tough day" due to the departure of a journeyman relief pitcher who he called "a big presence inside our clubhouse," as if those other days when the ace pitcher is cursing out the executive vice president over a teammate's kid or throwing a scissors-wielding tantrum are the easy days or that this freak-show clubhouse could somehow be affected negatively.
The tough days have been the losses due mainly to a sputtering offense that ranks 13th of 15 AL teams in home runs, total bases and OPS. The latest plan to piecemeal something around Sale and Quintana has failed, and now comes the first opportunity to declare that it's time for some new strategy.
As Sheehan wrote:
"Chris Sale has never pitched in a postseason game. The White Sox have proven, pretty clearly, that they can't take advantage of having Chris Sale around to build a contender. If you're going to keep Sale (and Jose Quintana, as the two are essentially a unit for the purposes of this discussion) then how are you putting a winning team around the top of the rotation, when you haven't done so in six years?"
Dan Bernstein is a co-host of 670 The Score's "Boers and Bernstein Show" in afternoon drive. You can follow him on Twitter @dan_bernstein and read more of his columns here.