Before the season, the mudslide claimed the contemporary, LEED-certified marvel that is Michael Kopech. Last week, it swallowed Reynaldo López. On Monday, it moved in on Carlos Rodón, and he's tilting on the brink of collapse while city engineers cross their fingers.
Ross Detwiler's modest inland cottage suddenly has ocean views, and it's a pleasing development in a terrifying larger picture.
Rodón left his start after two innings due to shoulder soreness, although Rick Renteria said after the game that the problem seemed to stem from Rodón's neck.
“Once he came in, he just said he was feeling a little something in his neck and the ball wasn’t coming out of his hand right, which is what we could see,” Sox manager Rick Renteria said.
Rodón's had neck issues before -- June 2016, to be specific -- and that was the year only year he's managed to qualify for the ERA title. Then again, that problem wasn't tied to a major in-game drop in velocity, after a pair of surgeries on his shoulder and elbow. Rodón's health is going to be an active concern regardless of whether he makes a start the next turn through.
The White Sox still managed to win the game because of Detwiler, and one of the goats of the 2019 season now looks like the White Sox's best hope for emergency depth from here on out. Detwiler has 8⅓ innings of shutout ball to his credit, scattering two singles and zero walks while striking out seven. One of those singles was a palpable hit, while the other scooted under the glove of Nick Madrigal.
In most seasons, the emergence of Old Hoss Detwiler would be a neat little luxury. But with the White Sox down four starting pitchers a little more than a week into the season, Detwiler becomes the natural candidate for Rodón's rotation spot.
Part of it's a lack of options. Jimmy Lambert's forearm strain could be a cautionary tale for elevating Dane Dunning after his own Tommy John surgery, and Jonathan Stiever hasn't pitched above Winston-Salem. Beyond them, it's a bunch of non-roster invitees, with Drew Anderson being the headliner.
Or maybe Clayton Richard's the headliner? The White Sox added him to the mix in Schaumburg on a minor-league deal, and it's not 100 percent desperation. Back in April, FanGraphs documented in detail Richard's attempt to reinvent himself from a sinker-slider guy to somebody who could compete better higher in the zone (he shared videos and photos in the comments). If he's not able to adjust his arm angle at the age of 36, it won't be for a lack of trying or thought.
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Either way, we're back to Detwiler. There are a few ways he's different beyond the results. He mentioned surgery on his landing hip after the season, which he says is a reason why his sinker sinks again.
That's understating it, though. His 68.4% ground ball rate leads the American League, and that's a number that doesn't fit anywhere in the context of Detwiler's history. His 51.9% rate last year was the second-highest of his career, so I wouldn't count on him continuing to keep two-thirds of batted balls on the ground.
That said, that improved sinker might be playing up in confluence with other factors. While his fastball velocity isn't markedly different, he's getting a higher spin rate on it, it's having more success in the top half of the zone, and so far, last year's line drives have turned into lazy flyouts in 2020.
And perhaps with a more useful sinker, he's freed from using his best breaking ball like a fastball. He's gone from throwing an 88-89 mph cutter to an 83-84 mph slider, and the league hasn't successfully put it into play yet.
The emergence of a slider seems like it could be correlated to his relief role, where he faces a higher percentage of lefties than he would a full lineup designed to face him. That's been true, but then again, he had to face the right-handed heart of Milwaukee's lineup to throw a scoreless seventh, and although the White Sox defense made him record the equivalent of five outs, Detwiler prevailed because three of them were K's.
Both of those non-sinkers helped. Here's the four-seamer putting away Keston Hiura:
And Detwiler got Avisaíl García to swing over the same slider twice, although James McCann only caught one of them.
It's been fun watching the fan reaction -- mine included -- morph over Detwiler's five appearances in 2020, with resignation giving way to ironic appreciation, which has given way to genuine curiosity.
Knowing full well that we're vulnerable to recency bias, and three weeks from now we'll be making fun of ourselves for believing Detwiler had staying power, I'm comfortable saying these three things are true:
- This is an improved Ross Detwiler.
- An improved Ross Detwiler still doesn't seem like a great bet to succeed facing an order more than once.
- The White Sox may have no choice.
On an ideal depth chart, mystery might continue being an option for Detwiler. I'm thinking about the position-player side, where Adam Engel has as much fan support as he's ever had, partially because Nicky Delmonico was so rough, and partially because he's getting deployed in favorable situations. My sense with Engel is that if fans want him playing more, he's actually playing the right amount.
Detwiler could be in the same situation, where his improved stuff excels further in the limited situations Renteria uses him. Assuming Rodón has to miss time, I wouldn't mind seeing the White Sox dip into their Schaumburg ranks to buy an unlikely success while seeing if Detwiler's dominance continues in the bridge innings of close games. Detwiler says he's comfortable in relief, maybe because the White Sox aren't asking too much of him.
However, if the NRI types are who we think they are, and if the risk-reward ratio isn't right for a guy like Dunning, Detwiler may have to take those starts, with Richard or Adalberto Mejía or some other Schaumburg arm replacing him in long, hopefully useful relief. It feels like a trap, the Peter Principle in action, but throwing away a game every five days takes its own toll on the staff, and the erosion of depth has eliminated the time and resources for further consideration. Sometimes you have no choice but to make an unwise decision. Sometimes you have to look a gift Hoss in the mouth.
(Photo by Keith Gillett/Icon Sportswire)
