It’s a little difficult being a Chicago White Sox fan nowadays. This is especially true considering the success that the other franchises in the Windy City have seen, especially the Chicago Blackhawks and Cubs, respectively. To put it into perspective, every other Chicago franchise has been to the playoffs or won a championship since 2008, the last time the White Sox were in the postseason.
Both the Chicago Bears and Bulls were one series away from appearing in each league’s respective championship event. The Blackhawks and Cubs have WON the Stanley Cup and World Series trophy, respectively. But where are the White Sox? The team has had some shots to go to the postseason, most notably in 2012, but then they faltered towards the end of the season.
Ever since then, the team has been nothing more than average, and now they are hard to watch sometimes, despite having some phenomenal players, like Chris Sale, Jose Abreu, Jose Quintana and Paul Konerko, who retired from baseball in 2014. Have no fear though, because the rebuild of the team is well under way.
Most fans either are unaware or forget that this drastic rebuild happened in the offseason before the 2017 season. It got started in a dramatic way, with the trades of Chris Sale and Adam Eaton. The return on those players have been well documented, with Yoan Moncada, Lucas Giolito, and Reynaldo Lopez being integral pieces of the youth movement. Making things better is the fact that more talent is on the way, with Michael Kopech leading the charge.
Yes, it’s incredibly difficult to see all of this losing occurring, especially in some of the ways that the team has done so. But it’s going to be well worth the wait. Look at the winners of the past two World Series. The Houston Astros and the Cubs were absolutely DREADFUL before they were on top of the baseball world.
From 2011-13, the Astros won an AVERAGE of 54 games a season, before improving to 70 wins in 2014, 86 wins in 2015, 84 wins in 2016 and then a whopping 101 wins in 2017. While the Cubs weren’t as drastic, they were still difficult to watch.
In the same time span, the Cubs averaged 66 wins a season. That improved quickly as 2014 saw the team improve to 73 wins, a disgusting 97 win season in 2015, improving even MORE in 2016 with a 103 win season and a World Series championship.
The White Sox organization knows that the current times are going to be rough. However, they are more concerned about the development of all the talent acquired in these blockbuster trades. Right now, most of the players with superstar potential are still sitting in High A or AA, so it’s going to be a couple years before they are ready for the major leagues.
In the meantime, the players that are currently on the White Sox roster, whom will hopefully be a part of the happier times, are gaining invaluable experience. Players like Moncada, Giolito, Lopez, Tim Anderson and Carson Fulmer are still relatively young, but with tremendous talent. The players have an understanding of what’s happening, but that isn’t going to stop them from going out and proving what they can do.
Right now, the season is hard to watch. The White Sox only have 10 wins as a team, struggling in most areas and failing to compete with the Cubs. Hope is on the way though. As they say in Philadelphia, “trust the process.”