The Twins entered Thursday night’s contest twirling their way through a 13-game losing streak that will probably get frequently referred to when retracing how they lost 100 games in 2016. During said streak, the Twins had allowed 96 runs, or around 7.3 per game. If one wanted to gradually transition a major league team into […]
Author: James Fegan
Chris Sale’s plan–whatever it is–is working
Chris Sale took a funny approach to the beginning of his 26th start of the season: he spent the early part of his day looking like a bad pitcher. His slider floated through the zone, his fastball velocity hovered around 92 mph, which is fine if he’s locating and playing it off his other devastating […]
Tigers 8, White Sox 4: Reality arrives in the fifth
The White Sox started a pitcher Tuesday night who came into the game with a 9.61 ERA, with more walks than strikeouts, and who had more than a third of the hits he had allowed leave the ballpark entirely. There was good reason to expect the Sox would allow a garish run total to […]
First or second move
The first acquisition of last year’s White Sox offseason was Steve Lombardozzi. The second was selecting Jacob Turner off waivers. Since moving to the bullpen, Turner does not look great, but has resembled a major leaguer in a way he certainly did not in his disastrous spot starts, allowing two earned runs, striking out seven […]
The Good Ship Avisail
“Anyway you slice it, the last 38 games of the season may determine [Avisail] Garcia’s fate in the organization. … As the White Sox remain cautiously optimistic about his future, Garcia can stay under team control through 2020. Look for him to play a lot of right field until season’s end.” -Bruce Levine [Buys […]
White Sox 9, Mariners 3: Four-homer night backs a typically brilliant Quintana
What will be more difficult? Explaining to future generations how impossibly nasty Chris Sale was in his heyday when decades of pitching development will make his pitch mix and delivery seem ordinary, or explaining the sublime nature of Jose Quintana‘s mastery over all that he can control. 1. A leadoff double from Leonys Martin put Quintana […]
Mariners 3, White Sox 1: Brilliant finish from Sale brightens otherwise awful game
It’s the time of year to cling to positives, to look for something to track for progress, or given the absence of Jose Abreu‘s power bat and Chris Sale‘s most overwhelming strikeout stuff, and Jose Quintana striving for a career year, just some feats of strength from the core is enough to be heartwarming. In that vein, it’s […]
Phillies 5, White Sox 3: A non-humiliating Shields loss
Recently, James Shields had been sliding back to his old habits of getting completely annihilated while pitching in a White Sox uniform. Coming into Wednesday night, Shields had allowed six earned runs in each of his August starts, given up nine home runs in 14 innings of work, only lasted 14 innings in four starts, been crushed […]
Rodon’s war against the other side
The Phillies only having one good left-handed hitter on their entire roster is mostly disastrous, but it puts them in a position to do something pretty sharp. Against Carlos Rodon, who came into Tuesday night with right-handers hitting .305/.365/.484 off of him–even with his hot August beginning to factor in–the Phillies trotted out an all-righty […]
White Sox 9, Phillies 1: Total dominance
The Phillies are not a good baseball team. They’re in the middle of a genuine rebuild, their hot start to the season was mostly helium, they have a moribund offense and no parts of their promising young pitching were on display Tuesday night with Jake Thompson on the hill. A Sox blowout shouldn’t have been […]