Things are just a little too back to normal for the White Sox. They struggled to make contact against a marginal starter, they biffed away a lead with defensive miscues, they will not win the series for the first time out of the last five, and they're a losing ballclub again. It's familiar, in a way that the end of a sunny day reminds you that the electricity in your apartment is out.
Read MoreThe Royals have dealt the Sox four losses, two suspensions and just a world of insult and embarrassment so far this season, and the Sox need to start getting their revenge in large chunks. They got things started early when Avisail Garcia fisted a walkoff to end the game that was suspended for rain Friday night at a 2-2 tie. David Robertson pitched a clean ninth for a win, then followed it up a few hours later with a save to seal a 5-3 comeback triumph.
Read MoreGordon Beckham has the ideal qualifications for a utility infielder, in that he was a below-average starting infielder for several years. More specifically, he was good glove, bad bat guy who was drafted as a shortstop, and spent his MLB career getting reps at second and third base. The concern was that he would be misused. Then there was some mild Spring Training concern that he was completely washed up, but mostly it was concern that he would be misused.
Read MoreThe Royals are a pain in the White Sox's ass. If it weren't official before, I'm making it official after Wednesday's 7-5 defeat that saw beanballs, gopherballs, and a myriad of other weird stuff.
Read MoreThis is an assumption, but an assumption I'm pretty confident in making after Monday's less-than-inspiring 10-1 loss in the season opener.
Read MoreBaseball season is finally here.
After months of speculating, the White Sox's 25-man roster is set and the starting nine will take the field this afternoon against the defending American League champion Kansas City Royals.
Now that all the roster-building questions have been answered, what can we expect out of these guys?
Let's take our best guess.
Read MoreAs you probably know, you can gamble on just about everything under the sun nowadays. Who will be the President in 2016? Which movie will win Best Picture at the Academy Awards? How many home runs will Jose Abreu hit?
You probably have an opinion on that last one (maybe the other two, we don't know). Either way, the staff at The Catbird Seat decided to make some over/under predictions for the 2015 White Sox.
We came up with a starting point, compiled by Collin Whitchurch through a combination of looking at last year's numbers, this year's projections, and some just plain out of thin air, and each staff member predicted whether the final 2015 tally would be over or under that number. Some are fun. Some are sad. Some are ridiculous.
Enjoy, and let us know your predictions in the comments section.
Read MoreYu Darvish is going to get Tommy John surgery on Tuesday. As Michael Baumann noted, this is a tragedy on multiple levels and the Rangers look like they may be just as snakebitten by injuries this year as they were last. Despite the fact that almost every team in the AL has reason to hope this year, with the loss of Darvish and Profar, the Rangers are probably looking at another year in last place. Meanwhile, Adrian Beltre is out there at 3B, in the midst of a mid-to-late 30s second peak that is nudging him closer and closer to legitimate Hall of Fame candidacy. And the White Sox need a third baseman...
Read MoreThe trip begins...
Read MoreSpring Training is finally here. What this means is we can all get excited about the sight of actual major league baseball players on an actual baseball field, and then cry over the realization that we're still six weeks away from meaningful games being played.
Still, the season of optimism is upon us, so let's take a look at some of the important things to monitor during the White Sox's time in Arizona.
Read MoreWith SoxFest in the books, the only third baseman currently on the MLB Trade Rumors free agency list being Donnie Murphy and Jayson Nix, and Gordon Beckham filling out the last bit of the roster in some sort of utility/mascot role, it looks like Conor Gillaspie has survived the offseason after his breakout season without completely losing his job.
Read MoreSo, this happened Wednesday:
Read MoreThe White Sox are planning to compete for a playoff spot in 2015; this much is clear. There is intense optimism around the team, culminating in a SoxFest that seemed, aside from being a celebration of the 2005 team, a love fest for the moves Rick Hahn & Co. have made this offseason.
This is cool. It’s been a while since the Sox were a contending team, and even longer since they made the playoffs.
Read MoreOn Monday, while you still cared about baseball, three guys who...should be playing third base, made a lot of money.
Read MoreAccording to Bob Nightengale of the USA Today, the White Sox just signed former Nationals first baseman Adam LaRoche. Like, just signed. In an ideal world, Nightengale is in the room, watching LaRoche sign the deal, hiding behind a large fern and tweeting.
Read MoreI've seen them.
I've seen your off-season plans, filled with free agent third baseman acquisitions.
Have no doubt I have tabulated these blasphemies against CONOR and taken them into account. Dreams of Chase Headley's defense, fantasies of Pablo Escobar panda hats with increased lining for 40-degree temperatures in June. Crackpots schemes of moving Hanley Ramirez to third.
Read MoreSome narratives turn like the Titanic.
Conor Gillaspie, who we mostly hoped could play well enough to be traded for someone playable by mid-June, is garnering articles of praise. Not effusive praise, but more acknowledgement that he's earned his keep and should probably enter the next season as a presumed starter.
Read MoreThere's an identity that we want to understand the 2014 White Sox under, in which Sunday's 7-5 triumph in the rubber match against a desperate and hungry Blue Jays team fits perfectly. The White Sox flashed dizzying, game-changing offensive potential, had their lack of pitching depth exposed by both starter and reliever performance, and did just enough to keep the watching fun and not sort of tragic. Six games under .500, obviously the prototypical 2014 White Sox game would seem to be a loss, and their offense's season performance does not live up to the ideals their juggernaut April inspired, but the Sox have had less than 10 games where their young offensive core of Adam Eaton, Jose Abreu, Avisail Garcia, and yeah, Conor Gillaspie have been operating at once. They didn't build on that total Sunday, but a seven-run outburst stoked its legend all the same.
Read MoreBoy, this is getting fun, isn't it?
Friday's 13-3 loss at the hands of the Seattle Mariners was yet another showing — the third in recent memory — in which the White Sox's pitching woes somehow managed to overshadow the offensive dry spell that is getting more and more pathetic by day.
Read MoreWell, that was a fun seventh inning. The best part might have been when Rajai Davis and the Tigers defense botched their way into a big inning, or when Jose Abreu and Adam Dunn went back-to-back, or when Jose Quintana just got pulled afterward before he could find his way to turn it into a no-decision. Another frustrating game in Detroit became one of the most fun nights of the season in an awful hurry as the Sox sent Anibal Sanchez poorly and greeted newly-acquired Joakim Soria with extreme malice in an 11-4 romp.
Read MoreThe Catbird Seat is a White Sox blog by White Sox fans that focuses on intelligent and humorous baseball commentary. Brought to you by ESPN's SweetSpot Network.
An ESPN SweetSpot blog | Design by ofvoid
