Cactus League play is over, the White Sox have left Arizona to play a pair of exhibition games in San Diego. All the friendship bracelets and braided hair will have to be discarded, along with the shiny 14-13-1 record, the first Spring winning record for the Sox since 2004.
1. Rare is the team that actually needs to assure people that their clubhouse isn’t in active discord on April 1, but the White Sox are such a team, and so they have. As reported by Colleen Kane:
“We had a very strong and unified clubhouse early in camp,” Rick Hahn said. “Obviously we got sidetracked there a little bit in the middle. The way the clubhouse responded to it wasn’t really a surprise to us. You have a fair amount of veteran leaders in there. … They seem as unified and on point as they were early in camp. … It doesn’t really seem like any outside distraction is going to derail them at all.”
Hahn also praised Robin Ventura for raising spirits and the newcomers for assimilating quickly, and all talk from the clubhouse continues to typify the Drake LaRoche episode as a surreal moment in time that wasn’t even as important as the players portrayed it to be.
The White Sox are hardly some juggernaut where if they bottom-out at under 80 wins it will require a narrative about clubhouse discontent to explain it away, but they have themselves to blame for why the rest of the season will get viewed through that prism by casual observers.
2. Chris Cotillo reports that the White Sox are aggressively pursuing newly available right-hander Miguel Gonzalez. Released by the Baltimore Orioles earlier in the week after he fouled up an injury-riddled, ugly 2015 with a 9.78 Spring ERA, Gonzalez, 31, has a minor league option left, but apparently was cut so Baltimore could avoid the $5.1 million he was owed for his second year of arbitration.
The Baltimore Sun’s Eduardo Encina says groin issues hampered Gonzalez in 2015, whereas he had produced a 118 ERA+ over 435.2 innings between 2012-14, but cFIP was portending the end of his effectiveness by the end of that run. Gonzalez underwent Tommy John Surgery in 2009, and was a Mexican League reclamation project who surprised with usable innings. He’s had major league success, but he’s a low-90s right-hander with no remarkable offerings or skills, rather than a high-ceiling talent who can be refined or would benefit a lot from a new pitch.
He’s not a very exciting addition, and doesn’t read as a typical Don Cooper project, but he would be depth. The question is why they would be so aggressive in seeking depth all the sudden, unless they were deeply worried about what they have seen from Mat Latos, Jacob Turner and Erik Johnson so far. The latter two were both rushed off to Triple-A, and Latos is currently recipient of some of the harshest comments you’ll see the White Sox coaching staff extend toward pure player performance.
3. Speaking of spare parts falling off the Orioles colossus, they appear to be in a troubling dispute with left-handed first baseman/outfielder Hyun-Soo Kim, signed this offseason from the KBO on a two-year, $7 million deal. The contract prevented the Orioles from being able send Kim down to the minors, and he seems like he’s willing to have a standoff with the club over this clause.
The Orioles are understandably concerned about rostering and playing Kim after he started the Spring 0-for-23 and still hasn’t collected an extra-base hit. He slammed 28 home runs and hit .326/.438/.541 during his last season in the KBO, and in the wake of the success of Korean imports like Jung-Ho Kang in Pittsburgh, there’s a lot more optimism about his power playing in the major leagues, but he certainly doesn’t seem right at the moment.
If this blows up into a contract-killing dispute with the Orioles, though, this is certainly a more interesting flier than James Loney.
4. Inaccurate preseason predictions get blown up all the time in hindsight, but with everyone resorting to play it safe in response, I appreciate the predictions that make me think–or just the ones that address the team I cover. In that vein, old friend R.J. Anderson picking Tim Anderson to be the AL Rookie of the Year is intriguing, since it requires envisioning how it would happen.
Jimmy Rollins and Tyler Saladino are stacked on top of each other on the major league roster, with a plan to share the load to prevent overuse. The process of both flopping in individual opportunities, prompting the Sox to abandon their timeshare and trust that Anderson had nothing to learn in Triple-A could take half the season. A more plausible scenario would be a devastating Rollins injury, followed by poor hitting from Saladino and an undeniable hot start in Triple-A for Anderson. And that’s just to get to the majors.
Anderson is the type of prospect where the tools will stay out in front of the refinement and skill, possibly for his whole career, rather the type of polish prospect who can hit league average upon arrival but lacks room to grow after. Anderson grabbing Rookie of the Year honors would require a surprisingly easy learning curve like the one he enjoyed last year, but against more fearsome competition. I don’t share R.J.’s vision, but I appreciate when smart people make risky insights on possibilities we often overlook.
5. As a general rule, we here at BP South Side will take as many stories of single bullpen sessions with Don Cooper fixing White Sox pitchers as the universe has to offer, and Dan Hayes on Carlos Rodon’s crow hop is the newest/latest.
Lead Photo Credit: Joe Roth // USA Today Sports Images