By signing Mike Clevinger in November, well before all of the similar back-end rotation candidates found homes, the White Sox implicitly signaled their trust in him.
The timing separates it from the standard compromised-character transaction. Take the Royals, who couldn't resist the temptation to sign Aroldis Chapman for $3.75 million last week. Chapman served baseball's first suspension under a specific domestic violence policy in 2016 and still doesn't seem entirely stable, but he hasn't been in capital-T Trouble in a while, so hey, sign him for cheap, and maybe he can be traded for a better person (and talent) after four months. If it doesn't go well for any reason, the investment is negligible. It's a cynical move that requires lowering standards and holding noses, but between the lateness of the signing and the modest price, there are signals that everybody understands the deal, even if many won't endorse it.
The White Sox showed no such awareness with Clevinger. The Sox made him their second-most important addition of the winter, the guy tasked with filling Johnny Cueto's surprisingly large shoes at the back end of the rotation. Those aren't the actions of a team with reservations, and sure enough, after The Athletic reported Tuesday afternoon that Clevinger was under MLB investigation following allegations of domestic violence and child abuse, both the club and an Athletic source said the White Sox only learned of the investigation after the signing.
Still, it's surprising that the White Sox wouldn't have a sense of this, although not because anybody had an obligation to tell them. Vinnie Duber says that information is usually not disclosed ...
A source informed CHGO that player agents are not obliged to share information regarding league investigations with teams during negotiations and that neither the league nor the players’ union shares that information with teams, either. Similarly, neither the league nor the players’ union is obligated to share the information with the other party, and generally, they do not.
... and it's probably because such investigations already have a process under the collective bargaining agreement, and leaking incomplete details regardless of merit would be an easy way to put a thumb on the scale of a player's market while potentially jeopardizing other confidentiality concerns.
No, it's fair to question whether the White Sox did due diligence because Clevinger's public history was already spotty, and there weren't pressing baseball reasons to land his services. The former took a backseat in the reaction to the signing because the more immediate question was whether Clevinger was even any good.
Now there really isn't a best-case scenario here. Even if the investigation clears Clevinger -- and The Athletic's article now includes an emphatic denial of the claims from Clevinger's representation -- it's still the second time he's dealt with messy accusations from a partner, and his name also surfaced during the cross-examination of Trevor Bauer's accuser. Tuesday's news surprised, but it didn't shock.
There also isn't a wholly satisfying course of action. I'd be fine if the White Sox rid themselves of Clevinger right now, but if they feel like they've been duped, why risk owing him all of his contract when the league could suspend him and prevent millions from going his way? They'd still be branded incompetent from signing him in the first place, and it'd probably add another lawsuit to the franchise's growing pile, so they can't yet cut him cleanly. (Also, as a-t noted in the comments, the joint agreement in the CBA prevents the White Sox from taking punitive action at this point.)
With Bauer and the Dodgers as precedent, it seems like the path forward is a heaping helping of no-comments and administrative leave until the league announces its results. The best they can do under those restrictions is signing Michael Wacha or lesser sixth-starter candidates in the interim to tip their preferred course of action.
But even if that's the only real choice the White Sox have, it still sucks, because there's no way to know if closure is weeks away, months away, or impossible to attain. The White Sox barely got started trying to undo the damage from their last first-guessable personnel decision immediately made worse by serious charges, and now here comes another one to darken the first days of Pedro Grifol's managerial career. The Dodgers could win with or without Bauer, but the White Sox's most direct path to a rebound involved Clevinger enjoying modest-or-better success. Two days before the accusations and investigation were revealed to the public, Ethan Katz touted Clevinger's upside:
“Where he was in his career and where we’re hoping we can get him to, that’s a No. 1 or No. 2 in your rotation,” said Katz of free-agent signing Mike Clevinger, whom he coached in Single A in the Angels organization.
The hope is that Clevinger didn't do the things he's accused of doing, because obviously that would be awful. It's also awful if this ends up being a fabrication, because the last thing domestic violence victims need is a prominent "what about" example when they risk everything to step forward. Some outcomes are better than others, but there isn't one that's worth rooting for. If the best possible resolution is that Clevinger consistently chooses regrettable company, what does that make the White Sox?
