Ethan Katz made an appearance at Saberseminar at IIT, in a conversation conducted by Len Kasper. Saberseminar is a conference that features presentations from independent researchers, front office employees and technology companies, and a lot of what Katz and Kasper talked had been discussed over the last few years in previous coverage, at least if you read every James Fegan article.
That said, there were a couple of things he brought up that I hadn't heard or seen, at least in the way that he presented the information.
Regarding the pitch clock, Katz said that he typically doesn't worry about the pitch clock's specific impact on pitchers until he hits 20 to 22 pitches in an inning. At that point, he pays closer attention to mechanics and body language.
He also mentioned that the Sox had confidence in reshaping Gregory Santos' arsenal because while he had unwanted cut on his four-seam fastball -- and Katz eventually just called it "a bad fastball" -- he said bad four-seamers can be turned into sinkers if there's buy-in from the pitcher. And if a pitcher doesn't want to give up on the four-seamer, maybe it can be paired with a sinker to give two kinds of run from the same arm slot and release point.
So there's something for your $2. Here's more.
Hahn appears to believe the White Sox can compete next year. I think that's a delusion. The team has too many holes to fill thru free agency, and most prospects of interest aren't close to the big leagues. The Tigers, Twins and the Guardians have interesting prospects. Soon, the Central might not be as dreadful as it is nowadays. Do you agree with Hahn - we can compete next year? If not, considering the Tigers, Twins and the Guardians young talent, when do you think the White Sox can compete? Thank you.
-- As Cirensica
I don't think the White Sox should expect to compete, but I understand if the White Sox don't want to think of themselves as non-competitive. Double-A prospects are close enough to contribute at some point during the 2024 season, the White Sox still have a fair amount of talent on the payroll (even if it doesn't fit together that well), and no team in the AL Central demands fear at this point. Cleveland looked scary based on how they finished 2023, but the four young infielders and outfielders who looked like real solutions last year all took a step back. Kansas City's another example: It looked like they'd built an intriguing young core with real progress in the minors, and now they have the record they have and no top-100 prospects, although Bobby Witt Jr. has unlocked something scary.
So the White Sox should have an open mind toward 2024, and create a chance for themselves if things break their way. That's how they enter most years, but at least this time they wouldn't be selling it their best effort, and they wouldn't need it to click, because 2025 makes more sense for the internal calendar. I think the shape of the rotation will tell us how serious they are.
Who would you like to call up from the minors to give a run this year? Sosa sucked at each level for a month then turned it on. He is an example. Second part, who should they cut to make room?
-- Doug W.
It probably makes sense to call up Lenyn Sosa at some point, because even if he hasn't been the same player since returning from the oblique strain, his individual window might be closing, with José Rodríguez, Colson Montgomery, Jacob Gonzalez and Bryan Ramos all lining up for infield reps in the near future.
Other than that? There isn't much. Maybe Korey Lee, once he's officially playing regularly enough with the Knights to make me think he's fully past his own oblique injury, but if the White Sox wanted to devote the catcher reps to Carlos Pérez instead, I'd understand it. Jordan Leasure's gotten off to a rocky start in Charlotte, so he doesn't need to be thrown into the fire when there are already enough fringe arms to go around.
As for who can go, Yasmani Grandal is an obvious choice because the Sox would have three catchers without him, but everybody else is on the 40-man and the Sox get three other spots on the active roster on Sept. 1, so there you go.
The Sox appear capable of finding at least adequate pitching from other orgs if we are looking at strengths of the franchise. Could this FO redeem itself by bringing in an outside scout/advisor to fill a similar role to aid in the position player scouting department?
-- Matt
I think pitching is an entirely different animal from position players, because all it takes is One Weird Trick for a pitcher to be useful for an inning at a time every three days, and a lot of teams are good at finding those guys. The White Sox have made some strides, but they're catching up to the league in this regard. Hell, the Rays, Mariners and Orioles seem to shed the bulk of their bullpens every two years.
I think position players more closely resemble starting pitchers, where the shortcomings are a lot harder to negotiate due to prolonged exposure. That's a problem that requires more than one person to fix. The Rays and Dodgers and other teams invest so much in front office personnel -- scouts, R&D, skill-specific coaches -- in order to find what an unremarkable player could do right in the future from everything they're doing wrong in the present. It's still a crap shoot, but those teams have a lot more data to work with to increase their chances.
Does the lack of collapse from the pitching staff after the trade deadline do anything for your opinion of the work of Ethan Katz?
-- Rob L.
Not definitively, although it's off to a nice start.
What's unfortunate about the way the White Sox soiled themselves over the first four months is that the remaining schedule isn't that scary. The Guardians and Yankees are both struggling, and tn terms of OPS, the White Sox are only facing two top-10 offenses the rest of the way -- the Cubs next week, and the Red Sox in September. The majority of the schedule features bottom-half lineups, if not bottom-10. There's an opportunity for a relatively anonymous White Sox pitching staff to provide a lot of surprisingly watchable innings.
If that happens, it'll be a triumph for Katz, because you couldn't necessarily expect the guys he's working with to rise to even that challenge, but the Sox do have to worry about overprojecting based on the strength of schedule. If it doesn't happen, the Sox will have their work cut out for them coming up with 13 pitchers on whom they can hang even the most modest of dreams.
I have to be honest, is there a more embarrassing baseball team in MLB at this moment? This organization is rotten from the core, and it has been for a long time. From Kenny Williams getting into it with Frank Thomas, to the disastrous end of Ozzie Guillen’s tenure, to multiple instances of conducting no real search for a manager (Ventura and LaRussa), to the Adam LaRoche debacle, to Chris Sale cutting up jerseys and arguing with Kenny; and now to these latest rock bottom instances. This is as apathetic as I have ever been as a fan, can you tell me why or how I should continue to watch or support this team, especially in light of the fact that it seems almost 100% assured nothing will truly change.
-- David R.
The White Sox aren't worse than the Oakland Athletics as an enterprise and I think we've started taken John Fisher's putridity for granted, but if we're not counting the A's as an MLB team, then no. The Rockies are permanently adrift, but they're much quieter about it. The same can be said for the Royals, because Dayton Moore had a certain dignity about him. The Reds were more embarrassing than the White Sox due to the Castellinis' public comments, but the surprising highs from the on-field product has allowed everybody to forget about them, at least for the time being. There's an element of decay to the White Sox, and that makes them unstable. That makes them dangerous.
We complain about there being no accountability when it comes to the front office for the White Sox. Do you think it could force Jerry's hand if season ticket holders and fans next season boycotted by not buying tickets until changes were made?
-- Greg S.
We've seen the White Sox draw well, we've seen the White Sox toward the bottom of attendance, and we've seen them in the middle, and it doesn't seem to resonate in one way or another with how the team operates.
I'd leave the fans out of it. They're damned if they show up (what a waste of money! they're enabling Reinsdorf!) and damned if they don't (they won't support the team! Reinsdorf isn't going to run the Sox at a deficit! the next owner is going to move them!). I feel like pocket-watching turns fandom into a surveillance state, and how other citizens spend their disposable income is none of my business.
I think the only catalyst for significant change is humiliation, and attendance alone doesn't accomplish that. It takes something extra, like Ozzie Guillen trying to get Kenny Williams fired, or the Adam LaRoche/Chris Sale flare-ups, or a Keynan Middleton-type airing of laundry, to get the White Sox to think about what they've done. It's unfortunate that they lack any kind of proactive or introspective bone in their body to prevent it from coming to that, but that's how they choose to live. The White Sox have riches of embarrassment, a supply as abundant as the water in the Village of Bedford Park. If they're barreling into another disaster of their own making, it's most helpful to just get out of their way.
