A recurrence of Luis Robert Jr.'s left hamstring issues is a blow for the same reasons all his other injury scares have merited scrutiny. His health impacts his performance, and his performance dictates his trade value, or just how spicy the decision to pick up his $20 million option would be.
But a surprisingly pervasive element of Robert's second half so far, and a potentially noticeable absence with him out of the lineup is that for as much as the last two seasons have been spent waiting for him to be whisked out the door ... his teammates seem to actively enjoy playing with him.
"He's a really good player and star, and they can kind of go off and do their own thing, but he's not like that -- he's there for us," said Colson Montgomery. "I thought there was a language barrier too, but no, he understands everything pretty fluently. He can understand everything I'm saying. We just joke around all the time. He always calls me the 'Monty Monster' nickname. I call him 'Panther.'"
"I think he's truly being himself, which is fun to see," said Davis Martin. "You can genuinely see the enjoyment coming out in the game right now when he's making great catches, he's stealing bases, when he's hitting home runs and he's looking at [Mike] Vasil flapping his arms and cackling and laughing. From a non-verbal leader standpoint, to see him have fun, that's what it's about."
Robert's locker is still ensconced in the same back corner of the White Sox clubhouse that José Abreu once occupied. Like its former tenant, he's far more likely to be carrying out some part of his routine in another part of the stadium during pregame media access to the clubhouse than chopping it up with teammates and reporters. If he ever is spotted dabbling in the burgeoning chess scene Sox players have been building for the last couple of months, it'll be an event.
"He’s always on the go," Will Venable said. "He does an amazing job running all the time and just always has a lot of energy, even though sometimes it seems like it’s more reserved. It's in there."
Venable hasn't wasted a moment in the past few weeks to highlight Robert's effort level on the basepaths, which comes along with enough speed to make an impact. And if the highest profile player on the team is making energy and effort what he projects out to his teammates, it can find just as warm of a reception as words, if delivered the right way.
"If that's your superstar, that's the All-Star, that's the guy that makes the ship go a little bit, then everybody else has to follow suit," Martin said. "If he's running the bases hard, now all the young guys know 'This is what we've got to do, we've got to run the bases hard. We've got to play good defense, we've got to do this.'"
For Robert himself, he can't really bank on the dissipation of trade talks as anything more than a temporary reprieve, but that's all the more reason to try to appreciate this home stretch.
"It’s important for us to finish strong and being able to carry that moment on for the next season too, and really show we can do something," Robert said via interpreter. "I’m just enjoying the moment. I don’t know for how long I’m going to be here. What matters is today. Today I’m enjoying the moment, and enjoying being with these guys."
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In recent weeks, both Montgomery and Billy Carlson have talked to Sox Machine about how staying taller in their setup in the batter's box has helped to reduce their head movement in their swings, giving them a more consistent view of the baseball, driving better swing decisions.
You can call Brooks Baldwin a lot of things -- left fielder, third baseman, Riley -- but he's not a conformist. He's returned from Triple-A Charlotte committed to sit deeper in his crouch, and is finishing off the best offensive month of his big league career (.305/.359/.542 in 20 games). Moreover, he opened the season trying a taller setup as he worked to stave off last year's issues with pulling off the ball, and found it didn't fit for him.
"I went back to something very similar to what I had always done; very similar to what I did in high school and basically what I did in college, something I'm more comfortable with," Baldwin said of his deeper crouch. "For me, it keeps my head a little bit more still. I'm still able to use my length on the upper half, but still stay connected to the ground and use my legs a little bit more."
Baldwin says it feels like the new setup makes him better suited to resist efforts to get him to expand on pitches above the strike zone, but the data makes it more of a feeling. Due to his essential nature, Baldwin being comfortable at the plate usually involves more swinging. His chase rate since being recalled at the start of July would be a top-10 mark in the sport (and it's only been higher in August), but his contact rate is up too.
Absent traditional indicators of better swing decisions, Baldwin argues that simply seeing the ball more clearly is making him better positioned to make things happen. His exit velocity (91.1 mph, up from 89.8), barrel rate (13.9 percent, up from 6.3), hard-hit rate (44.4 percent, up from 38.5) and even average launch angle (20.4 degrees, up from 10) all speak to someone driving the ball in the air with authority more frequently.
"I'm a little wider than I was to start the year, a lot lower, but I'm still getting basically to the same position I was at contact," Baldwin said. "It's individualized per person but that's just how my body works. Kind of spread out and stable with everything rather than trying to use more movement. I feel like when I cut down on movement, I'm able to use my hands more and the power just comes by itself."
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Every notion of Aaron Civale finding a foothold with the White Sox is interrupted by a blowup that erases most signs of it.
He was an out away from six scoreless innings against his old teammates with the Guardians in his last start before the All-Star break, before his own missed defensive assignment led to a grand slam. And after ripping off three straight starts without an earned run allowed, nine runs allowed to Cleveland again earlier this month spiked his numbers.
Civale's FIP is a run and a half better with Chicago (4.25) than it was in Milwaukee (5.58), but his ERA is still 5.05. That he's gotten here with a home run rate that's been cut in half from what he did with the Brewers, and with ground-ball rate that went from nonexistent (22.2 percent) to merely below-average (37.5), all came via work that hopefully pays off over the final month.
"We showed him when we acquired him the differences of where he was at [mechanically]," said pitching Ethan Katz. "He was like 'It's interesting you bring that up, I've been battling my knee a little bit, pretty much the whole year.' Medical jumped on helping him with that. Talking with him, we emphasized trying to get back [to his old mechanics] when the time is right, it'll be best. When he started having that great stretch, his mechanics really started getting into his back leg, getting his posture more upright and his stuff took a tick up."
The worst stretches of Civale in a White Sox uniform have spotted him missing above the zone, driving a walk rate near 10 percent. The more he's been able to sit deeply in his back leg and keep his torso upright, the more he's been able to locate pitches at the bottom of the strike zone to generate the occasional ground ball.
Perhaps more helpfully, Civale feels it's led to rediscovering a feel for the re-emergence of the overhand curveball and spurts of 94 mph velocity he's been able to find in his best moments.
"Just getting to some older movement patterns and working through some physical stuff," Civale said. "I feel like I'm able to get on top of the ball better, get better angle on some stuff, specifically the curveball. Sometimes you add pitches and it affects other pitches that you don't pick up on until a little too late. So, just trying to get that curveball feel back for honestly the last few years. But I feel like I'm in a good spot right now."
