It’s been some kind of season for the White Sox clubhouse.
It’s been some kind of two weeks.
There are seven left to go.
A staggering 7-21 start was followed by more losing and a sell-off at the trade deadline. A traded teammate ripped the clubhouse culture on his way out the door Sunday.
The night before, Tim Anderson dropped the gloves and got decked by Jose Ramirez, sparking a nasty benches-clearing brawl.
And what has happened since? The Sox, owning the fourth-worst record in baseball at 47-69, took two of three against both the Guardians and Yankees.
Baseball, go figure.
The Sox’ big picture and future are as muddled as ever, but left standing in the wreckage are 26 players having 46 games to play, starting with a three-game series against the NL Central leading Brewers on Friday, followed by two games against the charging Cubs at Wrigley Field next week.
After a 9-2 win against the Yankees on Wednesday, “fun” was the operative word from Sox players who haven’t had much of it in 2023.
“It’s easy to lay down and chase personal things but that makes coming to the field every day not fun,” said left fielder Andrew Benintendi, who signed a five-year contract last offseason believing postseason baseball, not meaningless games in August and September, were in his future. “If we’re not in a position to win this year, maybe we can spoil it for some teams. Just showing up and competing every day.”
There’s more to do than play spoiler. Changing culture is all the talk lately. While they’re at trying to win games, perhaps things will begin to change in that regard.
There are many layers to it.
“It’s something you’re always working on,” said Benintendi, who played on postseason teams with the Red Sox from 2016-18. “And the more we talk about culture — obviously it’s something important — but I feel like if you talk about it all the time it’s kind of jammed down your throat, and it just has to happen organically. And these next two months it’s something we can work on. It’s just getting better every day, getting closer to each other. The last week or so it’s been better, it’s trending.”
How so?
“Realizing where we’re at. Let’s enjoy it and have fun, the cards will fall where they may,” Benintendi said. “We have [47] games left, might as well go out and enjoy it.”
On the joyless day Keynan Middleton’s explosive comments were addressed by general manager Rick Hahn and manager Pedro Grifol, Grifol said “I realized the leaders I thought we had in there weren’t leaders,” then watched his team play one of its best complete games of the season, beating perennial Cy Young candidate Gerrit Cole and the Yankees 5-1.
Coincidence? The Sox may have just caught the Yankees at the right time. But there was a certain energy about the place. Winning will do that.
Mike Clevinger, who of all people has been the Sox’ best starter behind the traded Lucas Giolito, beat the Yankees with a strong start Wednesday and talked about how it’s been “fun to show up” at the ballpark lately.
“That’s something I feel like was missing in the early part of the year,” he said.
Left-hander Aaron Bummer said the game on fight night was fun, a must win, and the “best one I’ve been a part of.”
“There has been a lot of adversity over the past week and we’ve taken two out of three and stayed focused on common goals of winning ballgames,” Bummer said Wednesday.
“It’s been a whirlwind. We’ve been focused on building for the future and build for the next two weeks. The past week, getting out of Cleveland and this series [with series wins]. ... We are playing a little bit better ball.
“We all knew changes were going to be made. The guys we got here, we are happy to go to war together.”
Brewers at Sox
Friday: Corbin Burnes (9-6, 3.42 ERA) vs. Michael Kopech (5-10, 4.43), 7:10 p.m., NBCSCH, 1000-AM
Saturday: Brandon Woodruff (1-1, 1.65) vs. Jesse Scholtens (1-4, 3.06), 6:15 p.m., NBCSCH, 1000-AM
Sunday: Freddy Peralta (8-8, 4.28) vs. Dylan Cease (5-5, 4.42), 1:10 p.m., NBCSCH, 1000-AM
