Carlos Rodon was pretty solid again Wednesday night. That's probably the most important thing to focus on. In his fifth-straight smooth and efficient start under Tyler Flowers, he floated through six innings with the only mark against him being Miguel Sano obliterating a get-ahead fastball, which for the most part have served him well since he dedicate himself to throwing them
Read MoreThe success or failure of teams in the MLB Draft is difficult to determine. The main reason for this is because it takes so long for most draftees to reach the majors, and players shuffle from team to team so often (whether it's by trade or otherwise) that looking at a particular team's draft class for a particular year will often only yield one or two players who actually made an impact on that team's major league roster.
Read MoreJeff Samardzija had Torii Hunter struck out in the first inning, he had fooled him with a tumbling sinker that looked like it had slid under his desperate lunge, only to have it dribble out between Geovany Soto's legs and was called a foul tip. Two batters, and maybe five minutes later it was 2-0, after Samardzija had blown his two-strike count to Hunter, allowed him to score when he blew an 0-2 count to Joe Mauer for an RBI double, completely fell asleep as Mauer got a running lead and stole third, which allowed him to score on sacrifice fly.
Read MoreWhat's the worst game you've ever seen an MLB team play?
Read MoreThe White Sox, fresh off an 8-10 start against andadmittedly brutal early-season schedule, began a four-game series Thursday night against lowly Minnesota with their unquestioned ace--Chris Sale--raring and ready to go.
And they promptly got annihilated 12-2.
Read MoreOne of the most common refrains whenever we start to get worked up over something that happens this time of year is "it's only April."
While that, as well as everything you can say about the small sample size these results are a product of remain true, the wins and losses, as you very well know, count just as much as the wins and losses in August and September.
I bring this up because the White Sox are in the midst of a season-opening stretch that sees them play 25 of their first 28 games against AL Central opponents.
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 MoreJesse Crain is no different from any other scrap heap reliever at this point in the Spring. There are some distant reasons to be interested in him, but his red flags are such that there's likely no performance that can put him on the Opening Day roster. He's around because everyone needs to call up a bunch of relievers during the season so you might as well collect as many interesting ones as you can, and really, with his injury history, his recovery is optimistic and hopeful until there's a setback and he's not anymore.
Read MoreLet’s try to get caught up on current events. In another great opportunity to rag on other AL Central, the rumors of the Twins nearing an extension with Brian Dozier is drawing the TCS’ staff’s ire.
Read MoreHeading into the 2015 regular season, it seems that most every American League team fancies themselves as a contender. As I’ve talked about earlier, this center-heavy distribution of talent should have interesting implications on the playoff race. This post is not about that. This post is me being a mean person who sees the flaws in everything. This post is about how every team in the American League will finish below .500, mathematical impossibilities be damned*.
Read MoreWhat was important about Sunday's game? Probably extremely little, since 15 of the astounding 16 runs the Sox allowed were coughed up by a bullpen filled with guys who don't figure to play a major role, if any role at all, next season. Hell, after walking three batters and allowing three runs in a single inning of work, Taylor Thompson didn't even make it through the day.
Read MoreThat was a fun game. Full of offense, multiple comebacks, offensive virtuosity, doinked singles and odd hijinks looming large, a decent and loud crowd, and Moises Sierra. The combination of a Chris Sale off-night, the Sox bad bullpen and Twins pitching made for the kind of fun-bad scoring fest that the April of this season promised for the Sox. No one even noticed that Gordon Beckham and Dayan Viciedo are still around.
Read MoreThe White Sox took the lead while Frank Thomas was reciting his love poem to baseball, so they got the thematic punch down in an otherwise miserable day where they were again mystified by Yohan Pinto and left the tying run at third despite having three cracks to make contact compelling enough to bring Leury Garcia home in the ninth. An entire weekend without getting Twain'd is just too much to ask. This day gave us the Frank Thomas speech, already. Don't be selfish. They lost 4-3, in case you wondered.
Read MoreWhen the Twins announced they were giving left-hander Logan Darnell on Saturday against the White Sox's Chris Sale, one could reasonably assume they were essentially doing the real-life equivalent of pressing the "sim game" button on this one.
But the games are played for a reason, and Saturday night's showdown went, well, about as one would've expected as Sale and the Sox cruised to a 7-0 victory, their third straight in the Twin Cities.
Read MorePoor Kevin Correia. He's carved out what's now a 12-year MLB career of soft-tossing, throwing strikes, being below-average but reliably present. And yet, whenever he's off his game, anyone watching wonders how he's still in the league. Correia and all observers knew he was up a creek when he hung a curve that Jose Abreu blasted to Duluth for three runs, and since that happened in the first inning, Correia spent his whole night making unsuccessful attempts at damage control, unaided by his defense. In Correia's defense, he only accounted for 10 of the Sox 17 hits on the night, two of their three home runs--and not the one to Tyler Flowers!--and if the bullpen had just shut out the Sox after his four innings, they would have needed to use Jake Petricka,
Read MoreWhat can I say about tonight's Hector Noesi start in Minnesota that's more telling than this: it prompted a discussion about Zach Stewart's near-perfect game against the Twins in 2011. Noesi retired the first 11 batters he faced, and took a one-hit shutout into the eighth. He did this mostly via flyouts. Long flyouts, medium-length flyouts, not so many short flyouts, and one swinging strikeout, which came against Danny Salazar, who later blasted an enormous two-run homer off Noesi in the eighth, his only runs allowed. You have to throw strikes to do this kind of work, and Noesi did that, which beats the pants off the time he walked seven people in under five innings.
Read MoreI will almost certainly write several more articles on this topic before next season starts. But, with the All Star Game come and gone, the Amateur Draft Deadline in our rearview mirror, and teams having played between 95-100 games this season, it seems as good a time as any to take stock of the White Sox' competition for the near future.
Read MoreAs much as the White Sox look like a real damn team when Jose Abreu is making the field look 200-feet long and Conor Gillaspie's dinked singles are making the outfield look like an ocean, they play a real convincing last-place team when they're sleepwalking through an entire series against the Minnesota pitching staff and trying to prop up an overwhelmed starter who mysteriously spins apart in multiple trips through the order.
Read MoreThe monumental sea change that the Sox ninth inning comeback offered proved to be just a passing wave. After Adam Eaton's RBI double against the platoon advantage in the ninth tied an otherwise dispiriting game at 4, two Daniel Webb walks proved one too many, and a walk-off Brian Dozier single off Ronald Belisario sent the Minnesotans home happy in the bottom half with a 5-4 win in a game the Twinkies mostly dominated.
Read MoreIt seemed like a good time to face the Twins. They opened their rainy ballpark to the White Sox as owners of a 5-game losing streak and were kind enough to run some middle-aged rookie out to the mound. The Sox just don’t know a good thing when they see it. With the opening game dropped they have 3 more games to make good on their trip, which is very much advised because a series loss means they’ll find themselves sitting in last place just in time for a trip through the AL East where heavier competition awaits.
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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