Baffoe: Pick A Direction, White Sox, But Do It Now
By Tim Baffoe--
(CBS) Some might find a certain charm to the Chicago White Sox refusing to be sellers in a market they seem outmatched in. It jams with that the various shades of grittiness that the organization's PR campaign has pumped out this century as South Side reputation.
Any argument about them selling has seemed moot as general manager Rick Hahn refuses to publicly acquiesce to his team's status as average to maybe slightly above average.
"We're certainly out there continuing our conversations daily with other clubs and looking for the right opportunities to improve ourselves for 2016 and beyond," Hahn told CSNChicago.com last week. "We knew it was going to be a difficult market so to speak, and certainly at this point in time, it's a strong seller's market.
"Already this year, you've seen us change 40 percent of the rotation, change the shortstop, add various players to the bullpen and we're going to continue to operate in that manner. We're going to try to put ourselves in the best position to win now, and over the next couple of weeks leading up to the deadline look for opportunities to get better now and for the future."
Hahn has been pretty consistent all year that he thinks this team has postseason credentials, but it sounds as if in that quote he left the door ajar just a crack for the possibility of conceding.
So which is it? Going for it this year is bold and gives us the selfish viewer a carrot to remain interested. Focusing instead on building for next season would be more responsible for a lot of teams in fourth place and nine games out in their division and behind six teams in the wild-card race, but the White Sox aren't a lot of teams.
They seems set on riding out the rest of 2016 with manager Robin Ventura at the helm despite his obvious shortcomings. They traded for the resurgent-of-late James Shields and signed the recently activated Justin Morneau after an offseason of netting Todd Frazier and Brett Lawrie. None of this really speaks of an organization that's allowed to cash in its chips.
Assuming you're not going to sell, you need to buy now, because acquiring win-now talent is getting more futile by the day as the White Sox drift away game by game from postseason possibilities with an anemic offense. And you then don't get to be frugal.
Carson Fulmer, the 2015 first-round pick who debuted out of the bullpen over the weekend, is the asking price for a splash trade? Fine.
Tim Anderson and his two walks in 140 plate appearances at the top of the lineup to the tune of a .290 on-base percentage that isn't helping the runs drought? Tough but maybe fair. If one of them helps get you Carlos Gonzalez through next season and maybe beyond, I can live with that.
Because the White Sox scored in the third inning of Sunday's 8-1 loss and sweep to the Los Angeles Angels after going 34 straight innings without a run. They became the 132nd team in more than 100 years to be shut out in three straight games prior to that lone run and have just that one run in their last 41 innings.
"You wear it if it's just one game, let alone three," Ventura said in typical inspirational fashion. "We've got to figure it out. We'll get there."
How as presently constructed, though? This is not just recency bias. The White Sox are 24th in baseball in runs scored and 13th in the American League in OPS this year. This is a team that's supposed to hit and hasn't. It has been shut out eight times this season, which without going through 29 other team schedules I'll guess is near worst in the game.
"Yeah, it's frustrating. It's kind of the same story I told you guys yesterday," Adam Eaton told MLB.com after Saturday's offenseless loss. "It's unacceptable, to be honest with you ... We need to get things right quicker than later right now, and get things going in the right direction.
"We need to start making a push and put ourselves in a good position in the standings. This is crunch time, and it's kind of gut-check time. We need to be better in all facets. It starts with our offense."
It's an offense that needs another bat. Outfielder Austin Jackson's knee surgery recovery hasn't gone as planned, and J.B. Shuck seems like a nice enough fella, but he's more a small-town lawyer in a Depression era novel than a center fielder on a contender. The White Sox are reportedly making calls on upgrading there. Cool, but what's the hold up?
I appreciate attempting to drive the sellers' prices down as much as possible as the trade deadline approaches, but in two weeks the White Sox could go from barely in the race to completely out of contention, and sitting on hands until then could be the worst of all possible choices. You don't get a Jay Bruce or a catcher with better than your present ones' negative offensive WAR and bad framing skills if that wild-card gap has widened between now and the end of the month. Those reduced prices equally affect your potential selling capabilities, too. And you aren't much better for 2017 and beyond then either if the roster is basically the same in September as it is today with a perfectly capable bench coach not auditioning as your manager of the future.
Do something. Pick a lane. Quickly.
It would be nice not to have this same conversation with more or less the same group of guys a year from now. The season going to hell is one thing, but there's nothing admirable or gritty about the 2016 White Sox dying of atrophy.
Tim Baffoe is a columnist for CBSChicago.com. Follow Tim on Twitter @TimBaffoe. The views expressed on this page are those of the author, not CBS Local Chicago or our affiliated television and radio stations.
