Andrew Vaughn would be four days into a 10-day stint on the injured list if the White Sox actually shelved him for his bruised foot. He injured it on a foul ball late in Tuesday's 11-10 loss to the Mets, and while x-rays were negative, he missed the last two games of that series. He also sat for Friday's opener against the Twins.
At the same time, Eloy Jiménez has been limited to DH for just about the entire month of July, because his one start in right field ended after two innings due to a strained groin. He missed two games, but returned for the finale of the Mets series.
At the same time, the White Sox are carrying three catchers because Grifol hates watching Yasmani Grandal run and hates watching Seby Zavala hit, although he didn't say it in so many words.
At the same time, Pedro Grifol sat Oscar Colás on Friday in hopes of getting him to slow the game down. Colás is 6-for-34 with zero walks and 13 strikeouts since returning to the White Sox, and Grifol is trying to get him to show some of the patience he developed in Charlotte.
When Daryl Van Schouwen relayed Grifol's decision before the game, he also included a fact that proved more of a Chekov's gun than a red herring (emphasis mine):
“We have to dial down on the intensity level,” said Grifol, who started the right-handed-hitting Zach Remillard in right field against righty starter Joe Ryan to allow Colas to sit back, gather and observe for a night. “This might sound a little weird, but he plays the game at a 10 volume; we need to play him at an 8. A 10 makes him a little reckless, especially at the plate.’’
Against the right-handed Ryan, Remillard struck out thrice en route to an 0-for-4 night. In his unnatural position of right field, Remillard badly misread a fly ball to prop open the seventh inning for Minnesota, leading to two runs that effectively put the game away.
Imagine, if you will, a half-filled balloon. You can squeeze it in one place, and the air will comfortably shift. Take your other hand and squeeze the concentrated area, and it'll still probably find room to safely displace. But if you get a friend to offer a third or fourth hand, eventually the pressure will overwhelm the remaining material.
You can render a dinged-up player temporarily unavailable, maybe even two of them. You can carry a third catcher. You can sit a rookie to let him see the game from a different perspective. You just can't do all these things on the same day without courting disaster. Sure enough, Friday's game popped on Remillard because all the aforementioned forces directed the pressure his way.
It'd be one thing if the White Sox were caught cutting a corner for a day, because every team presses its luck here and there over the course of a season. Unfortunately, this is another t-boning at an intersection of two White Sox blind spots ...
- The unwillingness to put injured players on the injured list
- The belief that any infielder is an outfielder if they simply try their best
... and it doesn't seem as though Rick Hahn or Kenny Williams will ever care enough to post a stop sign, or even a flashing yellow.
It's especially concerning/irritating here because a Vaughn IL stint wouldn't be interrupting anything. This isn't the typical Jiménez injury situation where a mild strain catches him just as he's heating up, even if Jiménez has somehow spent most of his career perpetually heating up. Vaughn is hitting .188/.204/.208 with one double, zero walks and 15 strikeouts over 49 plate appearances in July. He's a guy with a history of back and leg issues and late-season fades, and he's on pace to cruise past his career highs in games and plate appearances. A midseason break probably wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, unless you're the White Sox, and you see Vaughn as some kind of structural necessity.
There's some comfort in this not really mattering, what with the White Sox 17 games below .500 and finally, mercifully, 10 games out of first place in the AL Central. Except, this kind of roster mismanagement is a contributing factor to that record, and why the contention window closed like a guillotine. If shifting from Tony La Russa to Grifol didn't solve the problem, then it stands to reason that the problems are above them. Grifol can't fix the culture when he's a product of that culture.
By the way, Friday marked the seven-year anniversary of the "Mired in Mediocrity" address, and there's something poignant about watching the Williams-Hahn front office obsess over the value of 10 days while ignoring the lack of progress over 10 years. Then again, time is money, and the White Sox are penny wise and pound foolish in both regards. They're nothing if not consistent.
