The New Prospect Rankings Are Here!
/We take a break from your regularly scheduled free agent outfield rumors, because the new phone books are here! Tim Anderson is somebody!
Read MoreWhite Sox fill another black hole with acquisition of Frazier
/Another glaring hole in the White Sox lineup has been filled.
Read MoreTCS Morning 5: OHH MY GOD IS THE WHOLE OFFSEASON THIS BORING?!?
/Just to add to the sense that the White Sox could struggle to rope high-level candidates into this bench coach gig, Doug Padilla confirmed that Sandy Alomar Jr. did not even agree to interview for the position. This was kind of the indication already, since it would have been poor form to speak publicly about misgivings about the opening after interviewing for it.
Read MoreFilling the voids in the White Sox lineup
/Going into the season, one thing many pundits noted about the White Sox was the holes in the roster.
Through 31 games, it seems those fears were quite warranted. Between catcher, third base, and second base, White Sox players have combined for a grand total of 0.0 WAR, ranking in the bottom seven teams in baseball for production at each position.
As a team teetering on the brink of contention with a 5.5 game deficit, such holes are too big to not work to fill them. Micah Johnson being replaced by Carlos Sanchez won’t do that; neither will any potential in-house replacement for Conor Gillaspie at third.
Though Tyler Flowers is likely the White Sox’ man at catcher, Gillaspie and Sanchez can probably be replaced in a trade. Though the trade market has yet to develop this season, the White Sox may have a few options soon, which I assessed and sorted into relatively arbitrary categories.
Read MoreImportant stuff from a 4-2 Chris Sale Day victory over the Brewers
/Normally Chris Sale domination is an assumed element of Chris Sale Day, but after a curiously delayed start to the season, two-straight clunkers, and another suspension-caused extra break, there has been plenty of time to create anxiety that he would look like himself again.
And then he came out and razed the Brewers lineup and all was fine.
Read MoreStruggling Sox hitters--what to do?
/The White Sox won two series this past week, but are still dead-last in the American League in runs scored thanks to several black holes (I just watched INTERSTELLAR on a plane and just one seems like a kick in the pants) in their lineups. The people--might--demand solutions! Are there any?
Read MoreAnd a Happy Chris Sale Day was had by all — Important stuff from a series win
/That'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 Twins, too? Notes from 0-4
/Short of injuries, this has been about as frustrating a start to the season as you can get. Losing to the Royals brings its own frustration, but coming off the World Series appearance you can at least understand how they beat you. The Twins were coming off of a humiliating opening set against Detroit wherein they didn't score a run until late in the third game. Tommy Milone was on the mound, and the Royals' terrifying bullpen wasn't lying in wait. And the White Sox got shut out anyway.
Read MoreThese Damn Royals - Important stuff from Wednesday's 7-5 loss
/The 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 MoreToday will be better than Monday
/This 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 MoreImportant stuff from a 10-1 kathunkering to the Royals
/The White Sox had a requisite number of clunkers in their supply for this year, so kudos to them for finding a foreign lawn to go drop this on. Very little went right! Until further notice, you have six innings to jump the Royals' starter in an alley, pick them up by the legs and shake all the runs out of their pockets, or you're screwed. Instead, Yordano Ventura kept the ball down, the Royals defense didn't spare any borderline basehits, and a shaky, slider-less Jeff Samardzija couldn't pitch over the Royals typical array of soft singles and Mike Moustakas' inevitable ascent to the MVP award. That the defense imploded and Kyle Drabek was awful was the icing on a cake that was already full of ricin.
Read MoreYour 2015 Chicago White Sox in a perfect world (or the apocalypse)
/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 MoreThe Catbird Speaks 4.6.15 - It's Opening Day
/It's Opening Day. Today is Opening Day. The White Sox will play their Opening Day game today.
In that vein, Matt Adams, Collin Whitchurch and James Fegan got together to exercise their existential dread, cast aspersions on the Royals, discuss the final bits of roster housekeeping, and deride the many mistakes of the Atlanta Braves.
Read MoreWhat is the White Sox roster doing?
/WELL, 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 MoreThe Catbird Speaks 3.26.15 - It'd be cool if Chase Utley played for the White Sox
/Still buzzing after chatting with Jonah Keri, the trio of James Fegan, Ethan Spalding and Nick Schaefer stuck around and chatted a bit about:
--Courtney Hawkins' success for real?
--Avisail improved?
--Micah Johnson's ascent to the Opening Day roster
-How about just trading for Chase Utley instead?
Read MoreInterview With Rick Hahn & Buddy Bell - Recap & Analysis - Part 1
/I was privileged enough to be included on a conference call interview of Rick Hahn and Buddy Bell with a number of White Sox blogs on Tuesday. While I didn't record the conversation verbatim, I took notes as best I could and I believe there was a lot to be learned from what each White Sox executive had to say. Here's the first part of what Rick Hahn said and what I took away from it - the conclusion and Buddy Bell's interview to follow in another article*.
Read MoreLet's play another round of 'Who gets kicked off the 40-man?'
/Reporter/mensch Dan Hayes broke the tiny rumor this weekend that the Sox are shopping Eric Surkamp as a means to clear space on the 40-man roster. The Sox originally acquired Surkamp off waivers, then lowered his stock--not that they should have done anything else--by using him as a LOOGY rather than a spot starter, and even in that role he was cannon fodder for four-fifths of the season. He probably is going to have to wind up leaving the way he came.
Read MoreSo, Micah Johnson's hot right now
/In Spring Training, no one is doing anything, so someone doing anything of note is worthy of a blog post. Someone doing something with actual stakes involved, well, why have we not already novelized Micah Johnson's first 28 plate appearances?
Read MoreEveryone's working on fastball command
/I've titled a Spring Training post this way before, it was after Jake Peavy giddily recapped a March shelling by revealing that he had just been grooving 89 mph fastballs to different quadrants of the strike zone all afternoon, while a few thousands diehards who paid for tickets and airfare under the guise that they would be seeing baseball, eagerly watched. "Is Jake Peavy broken/dead/in permanent decline/masking a grievous injury" thinkpieces evidentally had a lot of merit at any given time, but Spring was always a weird place to start.
Read MoreSamardzija's "debut" with the White Sox
/Jeff Samardzija is scheduled to pitch for the White Sox Tuesday, against the White Sox, after Monday's White Sox vs. White Sox competition got rained out in the middle of the desert. Since the proper Cactus League Opener is on Wednesday with Jose Quintana, a preview of freaking out about actual, fake baseball could have waited a day, but I'm out of ideas now.
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