It’s impossible to pinpoint the exact moment White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf decided to fire Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn, but Reinsdorf indicated to Sox beat writers that it was very shortly before Aug. 22, when he lowered the boom on the longtime front-office executives.
Was it four days before then, as the Sox were being pummeled 14-1 in Colorado, or the day after that, when they were losing 11-5? Or was it one day before he kicked Hahn and Williams — a ‘‘son,’’ Reinsdorf calls him — to the curb, as the Sox were back home and humiliating themselves 14-2 against the Mariners at Guaranteed Rate Field?
Does it even matter? Not really. Any of those games, like so many before them, would have made a Sox lover retch.
The Sox were 49-77 when the firings happened and, if it’s possible, have been even more pathetic since. They lost 12-4 to the amateur-hour A’s. They lost 9-0 and 9-3 back-to-back in Baltimore. They lost 10-0 to the Tigers as part of an unconscionable three-game sweep on the South Side. And then, on Monday in Kansas City, came a 12-1 defeat that was so egregiously foul, it made Reinsdorf’s earlier harsh words to describe his own team — ‘‘embarrassing,’’ ‘‘disgusting,’’ a ‘‘nightmare’’ — seem almost soft.
Reinsdorf was right about this team, of course, and absolutely was overdue to part ways with Williams and Hahn. The Sox don’t play hard or smart — or even pretend to. They don’t fit together, which has been evident for an uncomfortably long time. And they aren’t good at — how to put this? — any damn thing at all. Yeah, that about covers it.
But then Reinsdorf went and threw all the Sox’ eggs into the Chris Getz basket, and that might have been the worst move of all. Hey, look, maybe not. Perhaps Getz, who was promoted from assistant general manager — underling to the damned — possesses the necessary tools Williams and Hahn, his superiors, between them did not. But right now something stinks, and I’m pretty sure it’s that basket. I’m detecting a miasmic blend of desperation, disingenuousness and death warmed over.
That probably sounds like a terrible insult of Getz, but it’s not. It’s a reaction to a stubborn, self-satisfied owner promoting from within at a time when everything about the organization — scouting, player development, clubhouse culture, attendance, fan relations, manager Pedro Grifol, you name it — screams for all-out change.
Yet the big guy says the Sox don’t need a rebuild.
‘‘We’ve got a foundation here,’’ Reinsdorf said.
A foundation? The Sox had a farm system that was ranked No. 1 in baseball in 2017 and pumped Luis Robert Jr., Yoan Moncada, Eloy Jimenez, Dylan Cease and Michael Kopech, among others, into the big leagues. Who’s betting on that core to win big next season or ever? Any takers?
MLB Pipeline had the Sox’ farm system at 20th in its 2023 midseason rankings.
‘‘The quality of players that have come in in the last few years [is] pretty darn good,’’ Reinsdorf said, ‘‘so I think the future looks good.’’
If Reinsdorf’s professed belief in Getz is to be trusted, the future is in the hands of a GM who is literally one of a kind in Reinsdorf’s time with the Sox, which dates to 1981. Of everything Reinsdorf has said since firing Williams and Hahn, what’s most dubious might be that Getz is the first person who has taught the game to Sox prospects in the manner Reinsdorf wanted it to be taught.
‘‘Going all the way back to Roland [Hemond] and then Al Goldis, I wanted baseball taught in the minor leagues a certain way where people understood what they were doing, they understood what’s the right thing to do in certain situations,’’ Reinsdorf said, ‘‘and nobody ever did it right until Chris came along.’’
Hemond, the GM Reinsdorf inherited in 1981, and Goldis, the Angels scout hired by brand-new Sox GM Larry Himes as farm director in 1986, aren’t the only ones Reinsdorf threw under the bus. Add everyone else who ran the baseball show, in the majors or on the farm, right up until Williams and Hahn because, again, no one else — only Getz, inventor of the wheel — had a clue.
But, wait, hasn’t Getz been molding Sox prospects for seven years? Including many of the same prospects who have reached the big leagues and embodied the same negative attributes that make the Sox maddening?
‘‘He had no responsibility in acquiring the players that he had to work with,’’ Reinsdorf said.
Oh, OK.
Reinsdorf threw everyone but Getz under the bus, including Sox players. For instance, Reinsdorf implied that Sox players have a recent history of blowing off prescribed offseason plans.
‘‘What we’re going to add this year is we’re going to police those plans,’’ Reinsdorf said. ‘‘We’re going to make sure the players are following their plans, so that when they come to spring training, they’re ready. We’re not going to take their word that they’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing.’’
What a healthy, high-functioning organization, right?
And now back to our regularly scheduled retching.
