GLENDALE, Ariz. — Camp Grifol is into its fourth week, and the reviews have all been positive. Glowing, even.
Attention to detail rules the day. Emphasis on fundamentals, intense work on the little things and making fixes, too.
All of which is a good thing, considering the White Sox were one of the worst defensive teams in baseball, underperformers lacking in other areas as well. First-year manager Pedro Grifol has been tasked with the hefty assignment of turning an 81-81 team into a better one, even though it lost its top slugger, Jose Abreu, and one of its top pitchers in Johnny Cueto in the offseason. And closer Liam Hendriks, who is receiving treatment for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, will not break camp with the team.
The only significant additions were left fielder Andrew Benintendi and back-of-the-rotation starter Mike Clevinger.
And with that, the Sox have an American League Central division title to pursue.
Grifol, with a staff including several newcomers to the organization, is in charge. He is segmenting camp into five-day, or seven-to 10-day increments to keep the focus on immediate tasks. The World Series is everyone’s goal, but there’s no value in dwelling on October during March.
“You can’t win the World Series in spring training, but you can lose it,” Grifol said.
Grifol spoke to the team Tuesday about little things, fundamentals, opportunistic base running, hitters knowing situations and their roles.
“I know it’s March 7,” he said. “But I’ll stress this again, to address these things on March 25 is too late.”
Grifol laid out expectations for the next seven to 10 days Tuesday morning, and he’s ratcheting up the urgency and lowering tolerance for miscues. The players say they like this approach.
“I was a little more lenient on signs and missing signs and some of that stuff,” he said. “And it’s time to refocus. And understand that those little things are extremely important. And we got to focus on the little things.”
“We got to secure the baseball, we got to throw the ball to the right base, we got to have cutoff guys in the right situations,” he said.
“We’re getting closer to Opening Day. And this is how we’re going to win a lot of games, being able to be fundamentally sound to prevent the other team from being opportunistic against us. I envision this club working on this throughout the spring.”
The players like the approach and the methods.
“I love it,” veteran second baseman Elvis Andrus said. “Sometimes when you have such a talented team, you start forgetting the details of the game. And it’s something Pedro and all the coaches notice. And they know that for us, as much talent as we have, if we don’t pay attention to little details and fundamentals, it can get ugly during the season.”
This is the time during spring training when it becomes challenging, Andrus said. Everyone is excited the first week and the last. In the middle, it’s a test of “work ethic and consistency.”
Last season’s face plant serves as motivation.
“It’s been great,” veteran pitcher Lance Lynn said. “We knew a lot about Pedro. He’s helped those younger guys come along well [in Kansas City as a coach].
“Hopefully we can get guys that are here to live up to what we know we are capable of that we did two years ago [won the AL Central]. Last year was a down year, it was a lost year, in all honesty. We have a lot of guys with a lot to prove and he has the ability to push guys where he needs to.”
