Two months to go: Hoping to avoid infamy, White Sox take to road with 3-22 July in rearview mirror
The best thing that can be said about July is it’s done.
Hello, August. Goodbye 3-22 record last month. The 1916 Philadelphia A's were 2-28 in July, so there's been worse.
But it's hello, again, 17-game losing streak. After a much needed off day Thursday, the White Sox will get reacquainted with their franchise-record skid Friday when they open a six-game road trip against the Twins and Athletics. The Twins (59-48) are 9-1 against the Sox, the loss on July 10 more than three weeks ago.
That’s the last time the Sox won a game.
And the A’s (45-65), who have the second-worst record in the American League, have gone 11-6 while the Sox were going 0-17, an unfathomable, gloomy shuffle toward depths never seen by the franchise and perhaps baseball history.
The 1962 New York Mets, a lovable expansion team with no expectations, are the worst team of all time with 120 losses in 160 games. A year before them, the 1961 Phillies lost 23 games in a row, the modern day record. If the Sox get swept for the 18th and 19th times in Minneapolis and Oakland, they will tie the Phillies’ infamous streak.
The Sox are trying to stop it with a thin roster made even thinner by trade deadline deals that sent away starting pitcher Erick Fedde, relievers Michael Kopech and Tanner Banks, outfielders Tommy Pham and Eloy Jimenez and shortstop Paul DeJong.
What’s a manager to do, Pedro Grifol? Besides worry about losing a job?
“That’s part of a rebuilding process,” Grifol said after Wednesday’s 10-3 loss that dropped the Sox to 1-12 against the Royals this season. “You’re going to lose guys, get guys up. I mention it here and in there. The best thing that happens in adversity is opportunity. And you want these guys to know, and they understand that we’re going through it and we’re 0-17 in the last 17 and they have an opportunity to take advantage. Get to the ballpark, bust your ass and give us your very best and what happens, happens. No excuses. That’s just part of a rebuild.”
Grifol is enduring the most difficult of all things for a manager, the kind of losing streak that gets managers fired, even with time on the their contracts as Grifol does through next season.
After his first season, a 61-101 campaign in which the Sox were supposed to be competitive, chairman Jerry Reinsdorf fired executive vice president Ken Williams and general manager Rick Hahn and named Chris Getz, the director of player development and assistant GM, as GM on Aug. 31.
Reinsdorf talked to reporters that day for the first time in a long while.
“The 2023 season was my 43rd season in baseball. It was absolutely the worst season I’ve ever been through,” Reinsdorf said. “It was a nightmare. It’s still a nightmare. It’s embarrassing. It’s disgusting.”
And it's still happening. Expectations going into this season were not as high as the Sox embarked on a rebuilding and payroll-cutting phase, but one wonders how Reinsdorf would characterize this one, and if he and Getz are considering a change in the dugout.
His manager is working with an offense that ranks last in runs, average, on-base and slugging percentage and a bullpen that lost its best high-leverage arm in Kopech and a reliable left-hander in Banks. Left-hander Fraser Ellard, a Triple-A callup this week with a 4.53 ERA in four minor league seasons (and a 33.5% strikeout rate this season) and the organization’s No. 30-ranked prospect, was needed in high leverage against the Royals Tuesday and took the loss.
The bullpen has blown 28 saves. Relief pitchers are 0-11 with a 6.48 ERA in the last 25 games. And now Kopech and Banks are gone.
The clubhouse seems to get quieter by the day. Grifol has been more reserved around coaches and players in recent days, sources say, and more dejected with media after games.
How could he not be?
"One thing we don't want to do as an organization is to go down in history as the worst record in baseball," Grifol said Tuesday. "It's important to approach this second half with some urgency."