"Rebuilding" is a term that gets tossed around rather lightly, but there's a dilemma to it: How do you know when a team is really on the road to getting better? The White Sox are the perfect example of a team that seems to be on the right path, but throw in enough retrograde motion that you're never quite sure; they've been up and down all season. The Sox have won eight of their last 13 games, but they have also suffered humiliations, watching great starts by Chris Sale get thrown away by the bullpen, which is, to put it politely, is a hot pile of toxic sludge. With the trade deadline looming it's fair to wonder if they are really on their way or just faking it.
White Sox balanced between rebuilding and regressing
When is a team truly making progress and when are they just teasing?
Jonathan Daniel
At this point last year, it was clear what the White Sox needed to do at the trade deadline: Sell and start over. But this season, it isn’t as simple. They are in fourth place in the AL Central with a .469 winning percentage which... isn’t good, but represents a six-game improvement over last year’s .406 through the same 96 games. They are currently on a hot streak, at least as weak teams go, with their starting pitching having clicked into place about three weeks ago. Having gone 35-42 with a 4.41 overall ERA through the season’s first 77 games, they have since gone 10-9 with a 3.19 ERA. The league-average ERA this year is 3.93.
The starters are responsible for most of the good there, having gone 9-4 with a 2.82 ERA over that span. The bullpen has gone 1-5 with a 4.11 ERA, Javy Guerra and Ronald Belisario taking two losses each.
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In some ways, being marginally better and 10.5 games out of first (and 6.5 back of the second wild card) as the non-waiver trading deadline approaches instead of the 14 of this point last season is a weirder space to occupy. The last thing that anyone wants to do is underestimate a team’s chances of competing now instead of next year. That fear, along with the odd sign of life, has led to rationalizing the team’s flaws, over-touting the prospects, and premature claims that Rick Hahn has it all figured out. To be fair he might have, but he’s also not clairvoyant -- and he’s certainly not autonomous, which means what he’s figured out will always be only part of the White Sox picture.
Given the standings and the return on players typically being better in July than December, the Sox didn't hesitate to deal last year. They traded Matt Thornton, Jesse Crain, Jake Peavy, and Alex Rios, followed by trading closer Addison Reed once the season was over. The purpose of trades weren't just to offload veterans and their salaries but also to make progress. To some extent Hahn achieved this, receiving Avisail Garcia, Adam Eaton, and Matt Davidson who could each contribute in the coming seasons to the team's repair, this despite a serious injury to the former and a slow first half for the latter.
Then there’s the draft, the big consolation prize for having such a poor season. The Sox had the third-overall pick and selected (and subsequently signed) left-handed pitcher Carlos Rodon. Though it takes some players years in the minors to mature, Rodon’s fastball and slider are good enough now that it wouldn’t be a stretch to see him in the rotation at some point in 2015.
Carlos Rodon (USA TODAY Sports)
A rebuilding roster, or really any roster in general, will have varying degrees of winning and losing gambles on it, and while Scott Downs and Frank Francisco were busts, the Sox did sign Jose Abreu to a six-year, $68 million deal in hopes that he would be the foundation for the offense, a move that has likely paid off even better than they had imagined. There is always some concern with how a hard-swinging slugger from a foreign league will fare in the transition, but Abreu leads the majors in slugging percentage (.630), and home runs (29).
The fact that Abreu has done so well is a relief, but one slugger an offense does not make. It’s something the Sox have experienced before. Going back to 1900, the Sox have had had the luxury of having the league’s best slugger (as measured by home runs) just three times. That’s just one more time than the St. Louis Browns, who went out of business 61 years ago. (There were a couple of times when the Sox had the guy who ended up leading the league, but since he was traded mid season, it doesn’t count.)
Dick Allen, 1974. (Getty Images)
Those three home-run leaders: 1971 (Bill Melton, 33), 1972 (Dick Allen, 37), and 1974 (Allen again, 32). Even with the league home-run leader in their possession, the Sox went 79-83, 87-67, 80-80 (respectively). Allen even won the MVP in 1972, but that’s cold comfort for a team that didn’t reach the postseason between 1959 and 1983.
The Sox are hoping to avoid that scenario by building around Abreu’s talents instead of relying solely on his strengths, but they still have the nagging question of what to do with the rest of their offense and the other weaknesses like the bullpen. While the goal is clear, the path to get there is not, particularly since their pace is better but by no means good and the wild card is a temptation.
It would be easier if there were a sign pointing in either direction--to buy or sell-- but at this point, the Sox have neither. Sure, we can make a guess how it ends--since Baseball Prospectus's Playoff Odds give them a 2.2 percent chance of making the playoffs it feels a little like Lloyd Christmas standing in front of Mary Swanson saying, "So you're telling me there's a chance?" but it's hard to trust any of the teams in the AL Central -- even the Tigers winning five of their last six heading into the break doesn't engender quite the confidence it should.
This uncertainty puts the Sox in the unenviable position of spending July in purgatory where the moves they do and don’t make can be second guessed and scrutinized in a way that last year’s couldn’t. The balancing act between winning and tanking is volatile for a team that has two, maybe three, championship-caliber players and is held together by underperformers and scraps. When considering moves that could be made before the trade deadline it’s hard to know what is a building block and what is a false lead. Nevertheless, there has to be at least an attempt made to sort them out.
The White Sox have identified their core, if we're to believe what Hahn told the Astros in trade talks this offseason. Pitchers Chris Sale and Jose Quintana and position players Avisail Garcia and Jose Abreu comprise the untouchables. That label makes sense for Sale and Abreu at this point, but it seems largely generous to Garcia and Quintana, both of whom are good players and in Quintana's case perhaps even a little better than that, but not players who wouldn't be the third- or fourth-best players on a contending team. Almost everyone else is, to a greater or lesser extent, still in the fungible category.
Jose Quintana (Jim Rogash)
That's not to say some aspects of the team aren't improved. Even if the offense is still below average, they've left behind last season's 84 OPS+ attack, one of the softest in history. Nevertheless, Alejandro De Aza, Dayan Viciedo, Tyler Flowers, and Gordon Beckham are still struggling despite the very long leashes they've had over the years.
If there's one benefit to marginal improvement versus last season's freefall, it's that it's more reasonable to be on the fence about trading players like Beckham, Alexei Ramirez, and John Danks. The Sox also aren't desperate to dump salary; entering next season, the payroll will be around $55 million, depending where they settle with arbitration-eligible players, which leaves them room to add more free agents if they decide to go that route. Maybe teams that are in tight races get a little more desperate for options like Viciedo or even Adam Dunn, but the return for such would likely be so underwhelming that it's not a stepping stone towards the future.
At some point though, the Sox have to break this cycle of dross instead of depth. It’s promising to think about a rotation that includes lefties like Sale, Quintana, Rodon, and Danks (if they keep him), and an offense with Abreu batting cleanup, but the rest is just filler until the Sox can figure out their next move. This good news is that this trade deadline and the start of the offseason could be the end of the worst of it for the Sox. They’ve made strides with what they have and will continue to build and have the flexibility to spend that they didn’t have before and could realistically keep the rebuild on a two-year plan instead of one that lasts decades.
Given that, it’s fair to say that while the Sox haven’t been rebuilt, the term “rebuilding” does indeed apply.
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