The 2025 White Sox were a work in progress, and Will Venable managed them accordingly

It's not all that instructive to compare Will Venable to his predecessor, if only because Venable had the advantage of knowing what he was getting into when the White Sox hired him.

Pedro Grifol assumed the job of White Sox manager figuring they were only a tighter ship and better communication from the front office from returning to the postseason. Then they started 7-21 as the bill for several tabs came due at once, and he showed no ability to pay, or even to charm his way into a reduced settlement. Once the general manager who hired him was fired, the only thing that sustained him was Jerry Reinsdorf's reluctance to pay two managers.

Venable inherited a 41-121 team, which meant that when his hiring was announced, the question was less "Does this guy deserve this job?" and more "Does this guy deserve this job?" Beyond the rock-bottom expectations, he also inherited less baggage with the previous core, which was reduced to Luis Robert Jr. and Andrew Vaughn, and neither was a good bet to last the entire season. Then you get to the part where Getz was invested in Venable's success -- something that wasn't the case with Grifol -- and he had the cleanest of slates.

Without a visible bar to clear, I don't think there was any way for Venable to distinguish himself as a strategist. His primary task at hand was not drowning, and his laid-back mien survived everything a 102-loss team threw at it. Everything else -- putting together lineups, navigating leverage opportunities -- was compromised by limited and/or inexperienced players.

Over the course of a very losing season, it struck my ear funny whenever Getz lauded Venable for mapping "pathways to victory," because everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. But when revisiting Venable's first year on the job, it's probably true enough to dodge mockery. The White Sox's 15-36 record in one-run games and nearly equal number of saves (25) and blown saves (24) might deserve more scrutiny if it becomes a habit, but based on what we know about the talent that took the field, an optimist might say that Venable charted as much pathway as he could, and the rest of the road is left for better rosters to complete.

What follows is a collection of tendencies from Venable's first year managing the White Sox, with the expectation that they'll change when the front office makes his life easier.

Venable used the whole roster

Back on June 14, Tyler Alexander had to hit for himself with two outs in the top of the 10th inning because the White Sox lost the DH over the course of a slew of substitutions. Alexander grounded out, and although he was able to pitch a scoreless 10th, he wasn't able to do so in the 11th.

Venable had no regrets.

"We went toe-to-toe with a really good ball club for 11 innings because we were able to use all our players, so absolutely," said Venable, when asked if he would make all the same moves again.

That basically summed up his approach to the whole season. He was above-average in terms of pinch-hitting and pinch-running, and used 153 different lineups over the course of the season. While that sounds like a lot -- there can only be nine more -- it was one fewer than Grifol and Grady Sizemore wrote out in 2024.

The good news is that Venable's shape-shifting lineups had a purpose. For the second time in the 2020s and the first time since their division title, the White Sox had the platoon advantage in more than half of their plate appearances (league rank in parentheses).

• 2020: 26.9 (27)
• 2021: 57.9 (7)
• 2022: 43.8 (26)
• 2023: 46.9 (26)
• 2024: 48.4 (26)
• 2025: 57.7 (10)

This isn't necessarily a skill thing on Venable's part, as the promotions of Edgar Quero, Kyle Teel and Colson Montgomery provided the sort of left-handed options previous rosters lacked. But even before their arrivals, when Venable just had a lineup short on guys who were worthy of everyday playing time, he did what he could to justify their appearance in a given game.

Venable didn't run for running's sake

While the White Sox forced the action when baserunning -- they finished eighth in extra base taken percentage and 10th in outs on the basepaths -- this action didn't extend to stolen bases. The White Sox finished tied for 25th with 85 stolen bases, but at a respectable 80 percent clip, as only two teams had fewer unsuccessful attempts.

Luis Robert Jr. had the green light, stealing 33 bases in 41 tries, but Chase Meiroth (14-for-18) and Michael A. Taylor (8-for-11) were the only other Sox with a double-digit total of attempts. When Robert was lost for the year with a hamstring strain, the White Sox attempted just nine steals over their last 31 games. Only the Tigers (3-for-5) were less active.

Venable improvised with the pitching staff, within limts

Baseball-Reference.com doesn't seem to track opener usage across the league by that specific label, but there is a column that tracks the number of starts on short rest, and that overlap is probably pretty significant. The White Sox led this column with 16 such starts, and the Dodgers and Tigers were a distant second with 10 apiece.

Sometimes they were true openers intended to buy an inning for the guy in the rotation to take as far as he could, but the majority were closer to bullpen games. Either way, Venable was by far less rigid about starting pitcher demands than his predecessors, and while that's partially by necessity, previous White Sox seasons might've seen far more attempts to fashion a sixth starter out of a guy who wasn't cut out for it.

The unorthodox usage at the front of games led to extreme tendencies elsewhere. The White Sox were fourth in multiple-inning relief appearances, and 24th in appearances for relievers on consecutive days. Without a standard arrangement of setup man/men before an established closer, Venable didn't have a standard recipe to use at the end of games, which made it easier to avoid running the most trustworthy arms for three straight games. At some point, I'd imagine he'd like to have more risk-reward calculations be determined by push-and-pull, rather than bad-or-worse.

Venable was great on challenges

When Grifol was fired in August 2024, I opened the post by citing Grifol's awful record with successful replay reviews. It was far more of a narrative device than a significant shortcoming, or another way he failed, but some of the discussion was spent on whether a manager's success rate actually meant something when their role in the process is following the replay room’s recommendation. My sense is that it's probably pretty random, but struggling teams might find themselves in the position to challenge calls that are less likely to be overturned.

Well, one year in, Venable succeeded on as many challenges as Grifol did in his only full season, but on 14 fewer attempts.

Again, I'd chalk this up to randomness, with maybe an assist to Venable being more discerning with his opportunities. We'll have a better sense when Venable's performance can be compared to his own, rather than the the doomed one that came before.