None of this is fatal to The Rebuild, of course.  Part of the plan, after all, was to stockpile a massive arsenal of prospects such that you don’t need everything to go perfectly to have a path to contention.  So, when 2018 stalled out, the natural conclusion was to shift the first year where the White Sox might want to try to contend from 2019 to 2020.  And maybe the next year the White Sox can make the playoffs actually is 2020, but that doesn’t mean the White Sox shouldn’t make major moves in free agency right now. To consider:

1.  The obvious contenders in the American League next year are the reigning World Series champion Red Sox, the Yankees, and the Houston Astros.  The A’s and Rays had a good number of positive performances which may be tough to repeat, but it’s fair to say they have a puncher’s chance as well.  The rest of the AL is either in full rebuild (Kansas City, Detroit, Texas, Baltimore,  Toronto) or in some sort of limbo after suffering a setback year (Angels, Twins).  You’ll notice I’m omitting the Cleveland Indians and Seattle Mariners from this discussion.  Over the past few days, these Win Now teams have been making a lot of noise about trimming payroll or even going into full rebuilds.

As with every rumor, particularly dramatic ones like these, it is safe to assume they are nothing more than just rumors until you see actions to match the talk.  Still, the Mariners were already an old team that has yet to actually crack the playoffs, and it’s hard to see a path to getting significantly better from here.  They wildly outperformed their run differential to post 89 wins (with a 77-win pythag) on the back of extreme good fortune in 1-run games, largely thanks to a truly herculean effort from Edwin Diaz fronting what looks like career years from a whole lot of no name relievers.  Nelson Cruz is a free agent. Robinson Cano has been gently declining as he is now closer to 40 than 30. And, while Jean Segura, James Paxton, and Mitch Haniger are very nice players still in their 20s, the latter two are brittle, and collectively aren’t enough to drag a lackluster surrounding cast to the promised land.  They have a creative front office, but this team as currently composed may very well be out of gas, and accordingly they have announced almost everyone on the roster is for sale.

Cleveland also features a stars-and-scrubs construction at the tail end of a contention window.  Unlike Seattle, their stars are a whole lot more impactful — Jose Ramirez, Francisco Lindor, Corey Kluber, and even Trevor Bauer rate at or near the absolute tops of their positions in all of baseball — and also unlike Seattle they have been rattling off division titles, albeit in a much weaker division.  But Cleveland is now mewling lamely about payroll, even apparently complaining about having to pay the absolute bargain Kluber his Cy Young Award bonuses.  There’s even some fire to go with this smoke.  They refused to make a qualifying offer to Michael Brantley, their only good outfielder in 2018.  And, even if they don’t sell guys like Kluber or Carlos Carrasco as reported they are willing to do, the team is going to take on some water next year.  Edwin Encarnacion is finally looking like age is getting the best of him, and mainstays Cody Allen and Andrew Miller are likely going elsewhere in free agency.

All that said, Cleveland underperformed their run differential last year and they’re clearly still the best team in the division by a long shot.  But, if they actually follow through and trade pieces like Kluber and Carrasco, they crash back that much closer to the AL Central pack.

Yes, you still have to bid against NL teams for free agents, but the American League, particularly in the AL Central specifically, at this moment, may be wide open.

2. This free agent class is different.  Some of the shine is off it as Clayton Kershaw and Charlie Blackmon wound up extending and other free agents — like Miller, for instance — aren’t quite as shiny as they looked even six months ago. But, Manny Machado and Bryce Harper are both still there.  It is my position the White Sox should sign both by outbidding everyone else, or, failing that, push all of their chips in on Harper specifically.

With the caveat that any super rich team can come out of nowhere and sign someone — the Diamondbacks aren’t even one of the powerhouses and they swooped in with the high bid on Zack Greinke, for instance — not only are these two free agents huge outliers in both talent and age, the market for Harper in particular is less sanguine than it might have been under normal circumstances.  Part of that is him having one of his “down” years (.249/.393/.496) in his walk year, but part of that is weird circumstances that have cropped up.  Yeah, you can always make room for Harper, but the Yankees’ corner outfielders are Aaron Judge and they unexpectedly were able to add Giancarlo Stanton thanks to Project Wolverine.  Similarly, I had long thought the Nationals were being underrated as a candidate for Harper’s services, but then Juan Soto basically turned into Bryce Harper II in front of our eyes, and if a Nationals organization who has lost most free agent wars they’ve been in as they desperately try to get everyone to take deferred salary wants to play it safe, they can lose Harper and still potentially roll out with three All-Star outfielders anyway.  The Cubs were long considered a candidate for Harper’s services but now they are murmuring about trimming payroll too!

Machado will likely have more suitors, as the ability to cover shortstop and third makes him suitable for more teams than the corner-limited Harper, but some of the same payroll factors — Boston is probably tapped out although watch them sign both these guys anyway — or weird cheapness might drag his salary back into the realm of reality.

And all of this brings us back to the White Sox.

I will never bet on this team to spend until I see it. Historically, that’s just not what they do. To be fair, full teardown rebuilds, outbidding the field for guys like Luis Robert, or drafting highly touted Scott Boras clients like Carlos Rodon weren’t moves in the organization’s history either. But for all that you can talk about how stockpiling a million prospects helps you replenish your major league roster internally with depth — true! — the whole point of homegrown players is they’re cheap.  You’re paying Yoan Moncada $550,000 a year to be a league average second baseman* instead of $10 million or whatever for Asdrubal Cabrera. If you repeat that all over the roster, as the White Sox intend to do, it would seem, then that should free up a ton of money to supplement the roster elsewhere.

*Yes obviously he should be a better player than this, but for now bear with me.

To that end, the White Sox currently have an estimated $54.5 million in payroll commitments for 2019 right now and $5.75 million in commitments for 2020.  They could sign both Machado and Harper to $35 million a year deals and their opening day payroll would still have ranked 18th in the majors last year.  They could give them each $40 million a year and still be right about where their payroll was in 2011. You can non-tender Avisail Garcia and save another ~$8.5 million if you need to to get it done.  And, because of their age and skill sets, you don’t need to get good right away to get good value on their contracts.  They’re likely to still be very good in 2020, or 2022, or 2024. And yeah, their contracts will ultimately be riddled with opt outs, and injuries and underperformance can happen, and EVERYONE wants to sign these guys, but the stars are aligning and fate is reaching out its hand.

The White Sox have the ability to back up the Brinks truck to both of their homes as much as anybody, and given just how much payroll room they have, should be able to outbid anyone. Whether they have the will to do so is another question, but they have the ability to do so.

If the overwhelming majority of teams in the majors are in some version of a rebuild that means the market inefficiency is to go for it.  You’ve already acquired virtually all of prospects you’re going to acquire by selling pieces from the major league roster.  These are the guys you’re going to try to win with. The next free agent class does not offer anything near this type of opportunity.  You can sign these contracts and still have room to do more to shore up the fringes of the roster, which, by the way, should be supplemented by the future of the team you have already committed to. Ironically, for this franchise, the White Sox are currently choked to the gills with 1-2 WARP players and don’t seem to have a star anywhere on the roster (yet) and have a pipeline of potential stars but also potential spare parts. You can plop two 26-year-olds onto the roster who have posted multiple 5-7 WARP seasons and, in Harper, a guy who posted an 11.2 WARP season in 2015.

Even moderate internal improvement from potential stars like Anderson and Moncada (and throw in Jimenez etc. while we’re at it) and modest other moves on the periphery and that would immediately put the team’s win expectation in the low-to-mid 80s with room for more.  The division is already there for the taking and may be getting even more up-for-grabs, and the White Sox are uniquely positioned to exploit this unique opportunity.  If they don’t get one of these two guys, you are that much more reliant on what’s in house turning into gold or having to trade good pieces away to get something back. Why bother when you can use the freely available resources you have in surplus to just add two MVP candidates just entering their primes to your core?

I don’t claim to be some sort of savant for suggesting “pay the most money to the best free agents” but you could not draw up a better situation for the White Sox given their current situation.

Hell. Trade for James Paxton while you’re at it.

Lead Image Credit: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

Maybe that’s a bit dramatic.

The Winter Meetings are over and the rumors are swirling, which means we are getting close to Christmas time. While it’s been a rather quiet offseason, that doesn’t mean the folks in Bridgeport aren’t wishing to make some noise this holiday season. In fact, some of their wishes could be coming true very soon.

Here what they might be asking for on the South Side this year.

Rick Hahn

Hahn’s Christmas Wish: An open Jerry Reinsdorf checkbook in 2018

Rick Hahn has done a lot with the White Sox in last 12 months. Committing to a rebuild and moving players has put the White Sox in a position to have not only top-tier blue chip prospects, but quality depth in their farm system as well.

While the Sox rebuild is still in progress, Hahn mentioned at the Winter Meetings that the team would look to add via trades and free agency if it fits in the long-term plans of the organization and an opportunity presented itself.

Manny Machado could be that opportunity. However, not necessarily this season. While I understand the thought of bringing him in for a year and hopefully getting him to sign an extension, there’s more risk than reward.

There’s reason to be skeptical about the White Sox chances to get Machado.  His market is already heating up with the Orioles putting the 24-year-old third baseman/shortstop on the trading block, and there will no shortage of suitors on the free agent market. It’s possible for Machado’s deal in 2018 to eclipse $300 million, which doesn’t fit the White Sox DNA. For one, the largest contract in Sox history was the 6 year, $68 million contract the team signed Jose Abreu to in 2014. Would Jerry Reinsdorf almost quadruple the largest contract they’ve given to any player, ever?  It’s hard to imagine.

Hahn and co. were able to get Reinsdorf to approve this rebuild, so whose to say they can’t convince the Sox chairman to write the check? Especially if it ignites the rebuild that gets him closer to winning World Series.

Rick Renteria

Renteria’s Christmas Wish: Be a more exciting version of the 2015 Minnesota Twins

The 2015 Minnesota Twins were very similar to the upcoming Chicago White Sox team. Like the Sox, the Twins were in the middle of their rebuild.  They had young players on the horizon, most notably Miguel Sano and Byron Buxton, the latter being the consensus No. 1 prospect in baseball, and had very low expectations.

They had no position player hit more than 28 home runs and just one player had a batting average that eclipsed the .280 mark.  Their pitching staff was just as mediocre with a 4.07 team ERA and their best player by WARP was starter Kyle Gibson (11-11, 3.84 ERA, 4.1 WARP).

Yet despite all those different factors, they found a way to win games. 83 of them to be exact, and found themselves in the middle of the AL Wild Card race in late August and September.

Renteria’s squad can have a similar season in ’18 and his club is already more exciting than the team the Twins ran out there in 2018.

The White Sox will trot out one of the youngest rosters in baseball this Spring with four of its five starters and seven of its nine position players under the age of 26. That number will only continue to drop with the expected arrival of prospects such as Eloy Jimenez and Michael Kopech (we’ll talk about them later).

Because of the young players that will be playing, there is a level of variance as to how the White Sox will perform and likely have an affect on the team’s overall performance.

The White Sox will take a step forward this season. Like last year, they’ll be competitive, win some games and even surprise some people. An AL Wild Card run shouldn’t be something they expect, but if things go right and the Sox young players play well, they can definitely make August and September interesting.

Jose Abreu

Abreu’s Christmas Wish: Stay on White Sox long enough to see the turnaround

Abreu has been worth every penny of the $68 million the White Sox signed him to back in 2014. He’s been a leader both on and off the field and his presence has benefited several players including Reynaldo Lopez and his fellow countryman Yoan Moncada, who referred to Abreu as his “big brother.”

On a baseball level, Abreu has been just as great. He’s hit at least 25 homers in each of his first four seasons and slugged north of .500 in three of while four. There’s no doubt he’s become one of the most feared hitters in MLB during that time.

Can the White Sox get a nice return for the future if they shipped Abreu to a potential contender? It’s likely, even with the abundance of first base-types on the market. And for a team still in a rebuild, it would be crazy for the front office not to think about maximizing his trade value. But could Abreu’s continued presence in the White Sox’ clubhouse prove to be too valuable for a young team that will still need a leader as they start to win in the next two or three years? You bet they do. Look at what Carlos Beltran’s presence did not only the Houston Astros, but the Yankees two seasons ago. Same can be said for Chase Utley in Los Angeles. While Abreu has more baseball left in him than those two did when they were in their mentoring stages of their careers, it’s hard to put a price tag on a solid culture.

If I were a betting man, I’d put my money on Abreu getting his wish.

Yoan Moncada

Moncada’s Christmas Wish: Become a 3.0 or better WAR player in 2018

When I wrote about Yoan Moncada last offseason, no one really knew what to expect from him. He had the tools, he had the physique, but with all the expectation, how would he fare?

Speed? Check.

Power? Check.

Ability to hit? Check.

Strong arm? Check.

Solid glove? Check.

While it took him some time to find that rhythm once he got to the big leagues, he found a nice groove the last month of the season, slashing .276/.349/.469 with eight extra-base hits.

Unlike 2017, Moncada will begin the season as the starting second baseman in 2018 and be penciled into the top of Rick Renteria’s lineup every day. Despite it being his first full season, there’s no reason to believe he can’t take a huge step forward and become a 3.0-WAR type of catalyst for the Sox.

Andrew Benintendi was a 2.6 WAR in his first full season in the big leagues for the Boston Red Sox last year as a main focal point of their lineup. Moncada will be one of the anchors for the White Sox and while there isn’t as big of a supporting cast as Benintendi has in Boston, he’ll have that same level of expectation in his first full season in 2018.

The Cuban phenom managed to have a 1.7 WAR in his brief 54 games with the Sox so looking for him to double that in 2018 isn’t unreasonable. He could even surpass that number if his defense, which is his weakest tool, continues to improve. Moncada actually graded well defensively in 2017.

Moncada is the cornerstone of the White Sox rebuild and may be the future face of the franchise. Everyone saw flashes of the tools that made him the No. 1 overall prospect in baseball and if can tap into all five of those tools, the sky is the limit for what this guy can do in 2018 and beyond.

Eloy Jimenez and Michael Kopech 

Jimenez/Kopech’s Christmas Wish: Force the team’s hand and break camp with the big-league club

Sure, this is every minor leaguer’s dream, especially when they are on the brink of making it anyway, but when it comes to the White Sox top hitting and pitching prospects, the idea is not too far-fetched.

After being acquired in the Jose Quintana trade, Eloy Jimenez, who was already rated as the eighth best prospect in baseball by Baseball Prospectus and fourth-best by MLB Pipeline, seemed to get even better following the trade. He hit .345 with Winston-Salem before earning a promotion to Double-A Birmingham where he hit .353 in his small sample size there. Jimenez didn’t cool off when the season ended either as he tore up winter ball in the Dominican.

Michael Kopech, like Jimenez, exceeded the Sox expectation during his first season in the organization. The flamethrower had never topped 100 IP prior to 2017 and not only did he surpass that mark (134) he also remained healthy. Kopech showed that he could handle Double-A, and dominated in the process. He earned himself a promotion to Triple-A Charlotte where he more than held his own in his three starts there.

When discussing ETA of timelines for young players, Hahn always talks about how the “good ones” will force the team’s hand. There’s no reason to rush either of these guys to the majors as both are still just 21 years old. While I believe both will start the year in the minors, it won’t be long before they get the call. Jimenez and Kopech knocked on the door last season, expect them to kick it down in ’18.

Lead Photo Credit: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

–Ohtani signing;

–Giancarlo Stanton trade;

–Jeter’s ownership group;

–The Mets;

–Jack Morris & Alan Trammell;

–Manny Machado rumors;

–White Sox “buying” prospects?

As is often the case with anonymously-sourced reports, it led to more questions and a lot of potential scenarios being thrown around. Quite simply, the possibility of the White Sox acquiring Machado brought more than enough “ifs” and “buts.”

IF the White Sox acquire Machado, it would give them an established star who is still in his mid-20s. Machado has made three All-Star teams and finished in the Top 5 of AL MVP voting twice (and Top 10 three times), is a Gold Glove-caliber third baseman (and still very good defensive shortstop), has played in 156 games or more in three of his four full seasons, and won’t turn 25 until next July.

BUT Machado is a free agent after the 2018 season, meaning whatever price the White Sox would need to pay to acquire him would come with the caveat that they may only retain his services for one year.

BUT IF the White Sox can convince Machado to sign long term, they would have an already established superstar in his prime to pair with even younger up-and-coming superstars Yoan Moncada and Eloy Jimenez, giving the White Sox a lineup for the next 5-8 years that can wreak havoc on the American League.

HOWEVER (sorry that’s not an if or a but) reports that Baltimore would not grant an extension negotiating window with any trade partners increase that risk ten-fold. Regardless of the presumed price the White Sox would have to pay for Machado’s services, (reports circulated Thursday that Michael Kopech was not included in the White Sox offer, and Jimenez is a presumed non-starter) the White Sox would be acquiring a star one year away from a pay day the White Sox have never before been willing to pay, and would surely be giving up multiple Top 10 prospects from their stacked system.

BUT the White Sox have, as I just noted, a stacked farm system, and while even the least prospect-huggiest among us would wince at the idea of giving up the future potential of a Dylan Cease or Carlos Rodon or Lucas Giolito or Reynaldo Lopez, the White Sox have put themselves in a position where even acquiring a super-duperstar like Machado would not leave them a barren wasteland from a young talent perspective.

BUT what if the White Sox acquire Machado with the intention of flipping him for even more young talent? The Yankees farm system is ripe with talent, and Orioles owner Peter Angelos would likely be hesitant to deal with their divisional overlords, so maybe this all ends with the White Sox simply trading out prospects or young players for ones they like even more?

BUT as farfetched as that sounds, it’s even more so when you figure a team as ripe with cash as the Yankees would be even more likely to just wait for Machado to hit free agency, unload a dump truck of cash on top of his head, and continue on their war path toward world domination.

EVEN IF that’s not the immediate plan, the White Sox presumed fallback should they acquire Machado and fail to come to a long-term agreement would be to flip him before July 31. This would, of course, mean his value would be lower as he would be a mere ~3 months from free agency.

One of the things that makes this alleged pursuit so enticing (ya know, other than the idea of your favorite team acquiring a player of Machado’s ilk) is the presumption that it means the White Sox are prepared to do things differently than in the past.

As the White Sox completed their scorched-Earth rebuild, tearing down the core of yesteryear for new hope and promise years down the road, the fear has always been that when Moncada, Jimenez, and the rest of the White Sox young prospects reach their peak, the White Sox wouldn’t be willing to spend the money it would take to supplement that presumed core, just as they weren’t with Chris Sale, Jose Quintana, Adam Eaton, and Jose Abreu.

Hahn addressed that on Thursday after the White Sox failed to make any news in the Rule 5 draft.

“If a high percentage of the players we have internally are able to contribute to a championship club in Chicago, it should be fairly cost-effective from a payroll standpoint which would allow us some freedom to be more aggressive on spending either on higher-price players via trade or in free agency,” Hahn said. “There’s been a lot of things over the last year that I think perhaps may have surprised people or at the very least deviated what people have perceived the way we would do things.

“There was certainly a notion that the Chicago White Sox would never rebuild, there was certainly the notion that the White Sox would never incur a substantial penalty or substantial tax in order to sign a player, as we did with Luis Robert. There was repeatedly written and reported, even a year ago at this time, that the White Sox would never make a trade with the Chicago Cubs, so we’ve repeatedly shown that what you’ve assumed about our actions in the past doesn’t indicate how we’re going to act going forward. So the notion that we wouldn’t potentially be aggressive when the time is right in free agency or would not spend big on a premium ticket item, I would say probably fits in with those old narratives that we’ve already proven to be false.”

 I’ll be frank about this, I don’t expect the White Sox to acquire Machado. There’s a chance these reports are being used as leverage against other potential suitors, and there’s an even better chance Machado remains with the Orioles for at least the start of the 2018 season.

But whether or not the White Sox tipped their hand toward future plans or if this is merely white noise serving as a distraction during an otherwise moribund time for news around the organization, the Machado rumors show, if nothing else, that the White Sox are again willing to do business in a way we’re not normally accustomed to.

The risks, they are aplenty, but the reward is worth dreaming on.

Lead Photo Credit: Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

Eloy Jimenez and Zack Collins have been promoted from High-A Winston-Salem to Double-A Birmingham. While there are only a few weeks left in the minor league season, players are human beings and when you excel in superlative fashion at your job a promotion is in order.  There’s also reason to believe that they have mastered the level and are ready to be promoted.  Jimenez has hit .345/.410/.682 in 122 PAs since arriving in Winston-Salem.  As Rafael Devers and Yoan Moncada have demonstrated, elite hitting prospects can move really quickly, and Jimenez will therefore start next year in Double-A, and if these trends continue this time next year he could be a candidate for a September call up.

It speaks to the expectations for Collins’ bat that as a 22-year-old catcher in his first full pro season his .808 OPS is viewed as a disappointment.  If you are of the opinion that he will not remain as a catcher, then it is a troubling offensive output for an advanced college bat in the low minors.  However, he has devoted a lot of his time and energy to developing on the defensive side of the ball and catchers tend to take a long time to figure things out, if they ever do at all.  It’s an arbitrary endpoint, but dating back to a doubleheader on July 30, Collins has hit .342/.490/.658 and walked more than he has struck out.  There’s no specific reason to believe he’d be overmatched at Birmingham or that he’s being moved too quickly, although per James Fegan over at The Athletic, there are still mechanical changes he wants to make to shorten his swing this offseason.

The promotion to Double-A also means that we will finally have some pitch framing data for Collins, although it isn’t quite as precise as at the major league level.  The general sense is that Collins has made a lot of defensive improvements since becoming a pro, but with something like catcher defense the more information we have, the better.

The White Sox also announced that Dylan Covey would be promoted from Charlotte having completed his rehab to take Tyler Clippard‘s spot on the 25-man roster.  It looks like the White Sox will be able to keep the Rule V pick on the roster all season, which means he’s theirs permanently if they want.  I am curious to see what he can do in relief, as I’m not sure there is starter’s durability there, regardless of stuff.

On Free Agency…

There is something of the magical when thinking about free agents. As opposed to draft picks, where you have to wait years and years for likely disappointment, or a trade where you have to give up something to get something. Free agents can just be shoved into the roster.  Instant gratification.

A byproduct of the White Sox rebuild, where you are theoretically building as much of a contender as you can from within, is that the roster should be cheap, composed of a higher percentage of players being paid the league minimum, or suppressed salaries through the arbitration process.  Therefore, such a team should have a surplus of money to allocate to free agency.  The Cubs, for example, were able to sign Jon Lester (nice!) and Jason Heyward (whoops!) to huge contracts to supplement their homegrown core, and have made deep playoff runs including a World Series win, as you may have heard.

And, given that Rick Hahn has floated 2019 as the first year he foresees the White Sox potentially contending again if everything breaks right, some have noticed that syncs up with the 2018-2019 free agent class.  For reference, that class projects to contain Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Josh Donaldson, A.J. Pollock, Charlie Blackmon, Clayton Kershaw, Dallas Keuchel, Andrew Miller, and more.

A lot of teams with bigger budgets than the White Sox have been obviously targeting this free agent class for a long time.  The Red Sox and Yankees have made conspicuous efforts to remain below the luxury tax threshold of late, and the Dodgers have to be on the short list of favorites for basically any player they would want to sign, just to name a few.

In addition, the White Sox have never signed a free agent to a contract of more than $100 million.  Jose Abreu’s deal remains the biggest in franchise history, and not since Albert Belle has the organization really gone out and grabbed a splashy, top of the class free agent.  So, until they do, I will assume that that trend will continue.

But, for all that I would bet all kinds of money against Harper or Kershaw playing for the White Sox until maybe their early 40s, some of those names further down the list could fit really nicely to help push a young White Sox core over the hump and into the postseason.  And, speaking of Lester, the Cubs signed him slightly earlier than when people believed the Cubs would be ready to compete.  That type of move makes sense, given that it is difficult to assemble a whole roster all at once, and that free agency doesn’t always provide the player you want when you want him.  To that end, although this winter’s free agent class pales in comparison to the subsequent one, it may be worth monitoring to see what pieces–if any–the White Sox add this offseason to see if they too make “early” moves in advance of their contention window opening.

Lead Image Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

While waiting for a garishly large chicken parmesan sandwich, I spied James Shields on the monitor striking out Adam Jones with a 2-2 curve, and thought he might have some of his sharper stuff Sunday. This was a misleading observation.

It was not until a later portion of the game, upon checking my phone, that I became aware that Manny Machado had three home runs. The bleachers are mostly appealing for their inexpensiveness, and it’s fun to see the outfielders move and respond to contact, but the distance from the plate makes it very easy for the game to become a faceless wave of Orioles hitters effortlessly swatting home runs into the seats; which it became by, oh, the second inning. One of them was clearly Chris Davis, what with his exaggerated uppercut, which produced a ball that seemingly went as high as it did far, one of them was clearly Machado, who was to say that two of the others were Machado? It had shifted from “let us watch a baseball game and hope for good things” to “let’s drink beers in the sun and chill” before Shields left the game, and he threw 1.2 innings.

I didn’t actually miss a historical baseball moment at a game I attended due to complete ennui, I just almost did. I have made peace with it.

“JUST YOU AND SPANKY, TRADE EVERYONE ELSE,” hollered one importing/exporting enthusiast a couple rows behind me to Tim Anderson, after he slapped his one hit of the day. Given the events of this day alone, it could be seen as a reasonable proposal if one of the principals was switched. Jose Abreu collected three of the Sox four hits and finished a triple short of the cycle. His opposite field home run in the sixth, and the hope it provided that his power stroke has returned is probably the only events of the day I would recommended making a semi-permanent memory. Adam Eaton, on the other hand, struck out three times, but did make a leaping catch at the wall to stop the Orioles from getting six home runs.

Dylan Bundy struck out the side in the first, threw ridiculous stuff all afternoon long, and briefly provided dreams that I would see a perfect game, or 25 strikeouts, or 37 strikeouts, or some sort of memorable moment of ascent of a great young pitcher that I would retell later with exaggerated details due to both hubris and sunstroke. But no, he just pitched well.

Whatever, it is over now and we are still alive.

Team Record: 53-58

Next game is Tuesday at Kansas City at 7:15pm CT on CSN

Lead Image Credit: Dennis Wierzbicki // USA Today Sports Images

1. It was an odd strike zone on the night, but not odd enough to justify Danks working frequently behind hitters while using maximum effort just to fling the ball in the high-80s with no life. A sharp relay from Austin Jackson and Jimmy Rollins off a booming Adam Jones double to center field saved Danks from more than a single run in the first, but the smoke-and-mirrors act fell apart in the fourth. Chris Davis took Danks deep for a two-run shot on one of the gentlest home run swings ever seen, then Mark Trumbo followed it up with one of the most violent, as all of Danks’ ability to miss bats evaporated and the Sox fell down 5-2.

In true Danks fashion, he managed to nearly take it through the sixth without another run on him, but a leadoff double by J.J. Hardy ended his evening.

2. Danks wound up getting charged with six runs on the night, because a series of unfortunate events befell reliever Jake Petricka — an error on a hard-hit grounder to Brett Lawrie and a tapped infield single in front of home plate — before Manny Machado blasted a grand slam to left-center to cap a five-run inning that put the game out of reach.

Dan Jennings and Daniel Webb both pitched in mop-up work, and the latter somehow pulled out a scoreless inning.

3. The stat line for Danks, (5 IP, 9 H, 6 ER, 4 BB, 2 K, 2 HR) will not tell the story or accurately reflect what was troubling about his outing Thursday night. The stuff just wasn’t there at all. He was using an incredibly high-effort and off-balanced delivery to pipe in flat 87 mph fastballs with no real sense of location. The marvel here, and what has been the incredible thing about Danks’ past few years, is that he’s worked his way through so many games with so little in his arsenal. But he has lost another 2-3 mph on his fastball even from last year’s version of Danks and asking him to continue like this is just asking too much.

4. The White Sox took an early first inning lead Thursday night with Todd Frazier‘s sixth home run of the season; a long fly ball that just carried out to left off Orioles starter Tyler Wilson.

That was the only mark the Sox offense scratched all night, but they showed their fighting spirit in the fifth. A couple of grinding PAs from Jackson and Adam Eaton drove Wilson out of the game early after 25 pitches in the fifth, and Jose Abreu working a full count walk gave the Sox a chance to bring the go-ahead run to the plate in the presence of Frazier while they were still down just 5-2. Frazier whiffed and the rally sputtered, but it does not appear that it would have mattered anyway.

5. Abreu and Avisail Garcia both collected two hits and each drew a walk, a positive note from the two struggling behemoths in the lineup.

Team Record: 16-7

Next game is Friday at 6:07 p.m. CT at Baltimore on CSN

Lead Image Credit: Tommy Gilligan // USA Today Sports Images