As someone who has been very high on Nate Jones since at least his breakout in 2013, was elated at his return in 2015, and even endorsed him as the centerpiece of that truly disastrous 2014 bullpen experiment, the announcement of his extension still put me through a sliding scale of reactions as the torrent details and additional years of control and clauses were revealed.
Read MoreA hanging curveball left up to Mike Moustakas in the sixth kept Jose Quintana from setting a new career-best mark for season ERA Wednesday night. Instead, he wound up allowing three earned runs over nine relatively smooth frames to the Royals and will have to settle for a career-high in single-season innings, and his third-straight 200-inning, 3.51 ERA or under (weird cutoff, I know) campaign.
Read MoreI'm wondering how much time I should give to this 14-inning marathon when interest seems like it's...waning.
Read MoreIn the soon-to-be seven year drought between White Sox playoff berths, and in the nine years out of the last 10 where they have missed the playoffs, the Sox have finished within five games of first place in their division just once. That year, 2012, is probably more remembered as a gut-wrenching collapse than a spirited playoff bid that finished just short. Their next-most impressive season, 2010, saw 88 victories, but was dead on its feet after Jim Thome walked-off the Sox with a 450-foot blast of irony out of Target Field in mid-August. In gunning for the playoffs with annual thirst, the Sox have not only failed to deliver anything to hang a banner about, but they failed to deliver us from the doldrums of expanded roster September goof-off sessions.
Read MoreI had become concerned that some sort of moratorium on throwing Avisail Garcia hanging breaking balls, it was simply a matter of waiting until the 13th inning where he could loop a curve into a preposterously wide open left-center gap and score Jose Abreu from first. Abreu's sprint was the sort where you wouldn't be surprised if he took the day off Thursday if the Sox didn't already have it off anyway.
Read MoreWith all his early struggles, it's hard to conceive of Jeff Samardzija being the model of relative stability in the White Sox rotation, since he comes off as someone just kinda crossfire flinging the ball in the general direction of the plate on his best days, but seven innings of one-run ball in Toronto Wednesday was his fourth start of the month where he went at least that deep into the game, and all of those outings were quality.
Read MoreThis is something I'm going to start doing every weekday morning (and weekends when I can) to compile my White Sox thoughts, factoids and fascinations into one digestible morning dose.
Read MoreThe fun thing about being a good team--and this is theory from me, since I've been blogging Sox stuff since 2010 and never covered a playoff game--is that you have enough potential for impactful play up and down the roster that you can survive a disappointing performance from a reliable contributor. As bad as White Sox starting pitching has been, with shaky starts from presumed headliners Jeff Samardzija, Jose Quintana, and once more again Wednesday night, Chris Sale, is that the offense has provided no hope of picking them up.
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 MoreLast night's game was really, really ugly until the bottom of the 9th. But the fact that the Indians couldn't come out in victory formation and kneel out the clock is one of the many reasons why baseball is the best.
Read MoreThat's more like it.
A day after breaking their season opening four-game skid, the White Sox welcomed Chris Sale back with open arms and he pitched them to a 6-2 win over the Minnesota Twins, the Sox's second in a row against the presumptive AL Central bottom feeders.
Read MoreThe White Sox have won a game!
A 5-4 victory that frequently looked like it might send the White Sox into a Worst Season Ever 0-5 certainly puts things in perspective. At the beginning of the day, Chicago was a Brewers win and a loss away from being the only 0-5 team in the majors. Instead, they sit at 1-4 alongside several other teams, many of which fancy themselves contenders. Right now the Braves and Phillies are a combined 8-2 while the Nationals, Marlins, and Pirates are all 1-4 alongside the White Sox. We heard repeatedly that anything can happen over the course of a few games, but seriously: anything can happen over the course of a few games.
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Baseball 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 MoreThe new-look White Sox will be without ace Chris Sale for the first week, so they'll need new arms Jeff Samardzija and David Robertson to come out with sharp command after getting bombed all Spring (28 IP, 26 ER, 11 HR combined)
Read MoreWELL, WELL, WELL.
So a full-month of goofy-time exhibition ball has not proven Micah Johnson to be verifiable whole wins better than Carlos Sanchez, and 40-man roster space has become a concern. Wonder if a self-aggrandizing blogger predicted such chaos. He'd be a billionaire about now...
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 MoreWhen the San Diego Padres agreed to terms with James Shields earlier this week, the 2015 MLB Draft order was finalized — finally.
Read MoreRick Hahn is an ever-present character in all White Sox dealings. He's looming not far from the foreground in every offseason story; it feels unnecessary to dedicate our entire focus to him above the actual players coming in. To do so, would be a furthering of the ever-present cult of the executive, where our fascination and praise has diverted from world-class athletes and their craft. Instead of admiring the works of art, or even the artists, we ogle the work of the curator and then take some bizarre fascination in the operating budget they had to secure the priceless. No thoughts of watching Melky Cabrera popping singles all over the yard, just contemplation of 2 WAR for three years for $42 million. Is it worth the investment for a famous tycoon?
Read MoreThe White Sox are holding a press conference this afternoon to announce the acquisitions of Jeff Samardizja, Melky Cabrera, and David Robertson. That is good news; three good players, filling holes at three important positions.
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.
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