NASHVILLE, Tenn. — The White Sox won’t call it a rebuild, but there’s no getting around the truth.
They are rebuilding. Retooling, reshaping, reconfiguring, re anything is preferred to rebuilding, which spells not trying to contend, even in a weak division.
New general manager Chris Getz and his boss, chairman Jerry Reinsdorf, are looking at a minimum of two years before they can begin to expect to compete, even in the soft AL Central. There’s no getting around it.
I asked Getz if he was reluctant to characterize the plan as “rebuilding.”
“To find the appropriate word at this point is premature,” Getz said at the Winter Meetings Tuesday. “But I will say, based on the upper-level talent we have on this ball club, I don’t think it’s going to be a dramatic lift to get us where we need to be.”
But is the goal to compete in 2024 after going 61-101 in 2023?
“We expect to be better than this past year,” Getz said. “I’ve said it before, we’re fortunate to be in the AL Central. Everybody has their challenges with their club and they’re looking to upgrade their team and we’re doing the same thing. It’s important for our players, everyone part of the organization to find ways to improve, start with Game 1, try to win that one and just adding to the win column.”
The Central is both a blessing and a curse for the Sox. They’re fortunate to be in a soft division, but being in the AL East or West would force them to set the bar higher for a competitive roster.
To compete next season might only require the Sox to field a .500 team. But that’s a big jump from 61 wins to 81.
“Well, that’s why we’re here and we have our group and we wake up every day trying to improve the club,” said Getz, who got hired because the Sox’ freshly recent rebuild failed.
While other teams were in pursuit of frontline starting pitchers, the Sox were linked to free agent right-hander Erick Fedde, who is coming off a nice season — in Korea.
During the season while already looking ahead to next year, manager Pedro Grifol said having players like Luis Robert Jr., Eloy Jimenez and Tim Anderson would allow the Sox to be competitive in 2024.
“Oh, it’s definitely not a rebuild,” Grifol said in late August. “When you’ve got Robert in center field and Eloy and [Andrew] Vaughn and Timmy, I don’t consider it a rebuild.”
But staff ace Dylan Cease is on the trade market at these meetings, Anderson’s option for 2024 was not picked up, and Jimenez could be traded. The Sox will also have a substantially lower payroll, and they have an abundance of question marks on a pitching staff with no proven starters after the temporarily employed Cease. And the farm system required trades of Lance Lynn, Lucas Giolito, Jake Burger, Joe Kelly, Reynaldo Lopez and Kendall Graveman for prospects to raise their minor league talent ranking to No. 20 by MLB Pipeline.
Since the outset of the offseason, Getz, assistant general manager Josh Barfield and Grifol said the moves and plans being made in the wake of the big disappointment of finishing .500 in 2022 and the wreck that was 61-101 last season —- only the fifth time in franchise history they’ve lost 100 or more games — are being made with two or more seasons down the road in mind.
The plan to change culture, improve chemistry and improve defensively and on the bases is all good.
“We took a lot of time coming in to this to prepare and get an idea of what we want our team to look like,” Barfield said at the meetings Tuesday, “not just next year but beyond, and trying to make moves that reflect that. We’ve had a lot of interest in a lot of guys, which is encouraging because there’s a lot of talent here.”
Some of which is going to get traded away. Which is what bad, rebuilding teams do.
“We’re going to have multiple options, depending on which way we go, to help improve the direction of next year’s team and beyond,” Barfield said.