bmags

But, regardless of whether they can put the whole offense together, main point was 3 years at the absolute bottom of walk percentage was horrific. It's nice to see it move into the top half in one year and not just settling for being 25th or something.

After how bad they have been even signing marginal free agents that'd be released by June, I think Tauchman is a good step if only to believe that when we get better they will be able to supplement correctly.

he is a defensive whisperer that made marcus semien a good defender.

Sadly in July it looked like a beautiful combo.

We know offensively we've been better in the second half. How it has been done has been reassuring to me that we are scouting and have a better young core. Offensively, I'm sure we are aware that post ASB we have been an actual very good offense. That has helped us be a .500 team in the second half despite a very bad pitching staff. But there is one area I appreciate because even if you isolate our no-good offense of April and May showed immediate, genuine progress. Team BB%+: In 2022, our 81-81 team had a BB%+ of 80, which is 20% below league average and also last in the league. In 2023, our team BB%+ was 75, which is both 25% below league average but also last in the league. That was a 100 loss team obviously. In 2024, our team BB%+ was 83, which is 17% below average and amazingly just 29th in the league. While 2022 could be passable because we struck out less, and did so with league average power, by the time that we get to 2024 we are striking out more, walking less, and when we do hit it, it's for grounders. In 2025, our BB%+ is 102, which is 2% above average and 11th in the league. Our K% is 100, so we are just average in strikeouts (17th in league). What makes our offense still relatively tepid is the power. So this is, finally, a real reversal into a trend that was just extremely stuck. Much of that was players, but we had a lot of differentplayers during that 3 year stretch. This year, the MLB vets we got were able to provide actual bases not just generated by hits, but so was our talent from the farm coming up and not being embarrassing in their approach. What makes me genuinely even happier is if you isolate it to just April and May of 2025, when our offense was bad, we had a 107 BB%+ which was good for 11th overall in the league. They struck out MUCH more early, and had zero power. So even if you say we are buoyed by a hot stretch, this pattern has seemed genuinely durable across some different groups of players. A funny part is - hey wait Colson isn't necessarily an amazing part of this - ... Well post July 4th, with our loss of a few vet hitters and rise of Colson and younger bats, our Walk rate does go down to 96 and 20th in league, but our K rate is actually 90 - so we strike out 10% less than the rest of the MLB. We actually have the 5th lowest K%+ since Colson came up. But our power IMPROVED. pre Colson our Power ISO+ was 73, now it is 106 post Colson. So BBs went down, Ks went way down, and power went way up. But most importantly, we stopped this 3 year long trend of being bottom of the league in BB%+. In 2021, when we had good offense, we were second in league in BB%+ at 114 (thanks Grandal). We have more work to do to be the best team in baseball, but this is the kind of real progress I like to see. Shows across the board better execution in scouting, coaching, and players.

sure would be sweet if ron washington got fired and we could hire him for Sosa.

Week 1s are often fools gold or fools...coal, but sure feels like if you could choose one team that could not afford to look atrocious it was the dolphins. Tua looks broken in a way that derek carr suddenly looked broken. And that team is built around a QB that can get out the ball as fast as Tua used to - their offensive line sucks. Jets looked much better than I thought and steelers didn't look scary. So just another ho hum 10 win steelers team that somehow still wins so many games they look ass in.

One thing aside from this coming from the coaching staff is I think bears have two qb dads that are a problem. I wouldn’t be shocked if the guy giving Dunne the stuff to run down was none other than Tyson bagents dad. As much as I dislike flus, I actually think he’s been around long enough and is secure enough as a defensive coach he wouldn’t be so dumb. But Waldron probably was furious after wickersham part.

I agree on baltimore and Philly, I struggle to put cincinnati and san fran as unbeatable teams right now. Burrow is incredible but that defense looks brutal, and san fran just seems so brittle. Who knows what they are this year.

Oh man Tyler dunne s Substack just eviscerates Williams. Basically makes him out to be Jamarcus Russell or johnny manziel.

The bears schedule is not that brutal.

Shoulda stuck with basketball!!!

it is a bit unfair how cool every left hander looks hitting a home run.

It’s a bummer he could never create a stick. Still like picks like this.

I like my veteran leadership in one position and it's the wise old owl backup catcher.

Team really needs a masher, and it will get like a Josh Naylor maybe. Pitching, eh, sometimes guys show up. I'd imagine they put money in bullpen. If you get the offense they've had last 2 months, and better pitching/a Starter in offseason, and then KC and MN regress more...I could see 70.

My point is you are holding other teams to a higher standard than you hold the white sox to. But, of that group, Mattingly and Fenstermaker and Minasian aren't key baseball decisionmakers so they don't count. I don't real Over 2.5 years, aside from being unable to scout waiver wire and vet min free agent talent to avoid the worst record of all time, there are 2 points where you can look at now and say "did Getz set us up for success more than these GMs?" - The 2024 draft, especially the 1st round, where Getz drafted Hagen Smith at 6th overall, who now is struggling mightily with command, instead of multiple top hitters including #1 overall prospect. - Farm System: 18th - Major League Team record - Jeremy Zoll Twins: - 2024 First Round Draft Pick (#21) took Kaelen Culpepper who has a .900 OPS in AA - Has the 4th best farm according to BA - 82-80 record last year Would I take Jeremy Zoll over Getz? Yes. Peter Bendix Marlins - 2024 First Round Draft PIck (#16) PJ Morlando - least impressive of stats, but holding head above water in A ball with a .750 ops - Farm System: 13th - MLB Record Last Year: 62-100 (21 games above white sox) - MLB Record This Year: 61-69 (14 games above white sox) Would I take Peter Bendix over Chris Getz? Yes Craig Breslow Obviously yes. David Stearns First - in David Stearns first rebuild with the Marlins he created a near playoff team with waiver wire pickups and scrubs, they didn't lose 120 games, so just with that resume I'd say yes. Farm System: #9 Record in 2024: Made Playoffs with 89 wins Record in 2025: 69-61 (2nd place) 2024 Draft: Drafted Carson Benge (19th overall), hitting .900 OPS in AA Would I take David Stearns? Yes Brad Meador Farm System: 10th Record in 2024: 77-85 Record in 2025: 68-63 2024 Draft: Drafted Chase Burns, a top pitcher that actually dominated minors and is pitching in majors this year. Would I take Brad Meador? Yes The weird Giants set-up, is one you could argue could struggle. Yet with a worse draft position, took a player they parlayed into Rafael Devers. Their farm system, still better than the sox and surging at lower levels. Getz has done some good things, but tearing things down to the studs and then having some young players in year 2 playing like potential starters is not really out of the ordinary for baseball. Getz has been here for 2.5 years. This draft looks solid. Last looks like it was a huge miss for no reason. The Cease trade was a huge miss. As a result, we have the 18th ranked farm despite the worst record in the AL. 2.5 years in. And if it's because all of these guys that have graduated, you'd still want better on field results than we have, there's a LOT more team to build yet we have the 18th best farm. It's just not good enough yet, and Getz showing an inability to find passable talent to avoid catastrophe last year is a warning even for a 'built up' team.

If you put on your sports media psychoanalysis hat, I could see a case where Robert was relieved post trade deadline. He has had to live in this concept of constant "auditioning" and trying to be somewhere else, and finally he's able to just accept that he's on this team, it's his only career, and he's playing the kind of baseball he wants to play. No more worrying about injuring his soft tissue, he's playing pretty free out there. His hitting was there pre-break, but the running out close plays at first, the defense, it all looks a little different. And a player playing so hard for the team and fans that had such a bad run with that, it really warms my heart a bit. Go Robert. Hope he can see a winner on the southside or get us a bunch of pieces, that'd be fine too.

Can you imagine writing this post to any other fan base, and holding up a team that has a .300 win percentage since Getz took over and being like "Sheesh wouldn't you rather have Getz than these schlubs?"

Anyway my point isn’t “all progress tweets are bad”. The ones about our scoring since the ASB, compared against all mlb teams and showing us top 5 or whatever? Awesome, because that’s what we need to be a good team. Showing us better than the worst team of all time? Cool I guess.

How would you feel if your boss told you “hey, it’s ok that you are making 40% less than your peers doing the same work, you are up 20% from your low!”

This post never asked you why you were positive, you just made it about yourself anyway. In any other context aside from the white sox it would be clear that saying "hey, you are the second worst team in baseball, but guess what, you now have more runs than the worst team in major league history" would not be like...an incredible accomplishment.

One thing about the Sox , and their media that’s left, is they will only even point to their successes in relation to their previous failures. Their only benchmark is to themselves. In that respect, going 41-121 was one of their greatest accomplishments. Because now, in the middle of a 3rd straight 100 loss season, they can point to last year and say “haha oh my gosh we’ve already scored as many runs as last year!” Meanwhile they’re 7 games back from the third worst record in the league. At some point, the Sox will need to say “I’m trying to compete with the best in mlb” not “I’m trying to marginally improve over myself each year”

see a lot of these, and I think they are supposed to create this feeling of “wow we are so much better than last year!” But it hits different when last year we were one of the worst offenses in the 150 year history of baseball and has 41 wins. We could have rolled the exact same team back and struggled to hit marks that bad. This team is 100% more enjoyable, and I’m happy for our young hitters, but we’ll be clawing to hit 61 wins. 61 wins for any other franchise is horrific, and for us it’s being repackaged as incredible just because of our record setting ineptitude.

This is better. AL East: Yankees, Red Sox, Toronto, Phillies North: White Sox, Brewers, Twins, Tigers South: Rangers, Rays, Nashville, Royals West: Mariners, Angels, As, Rockies NL East: Mets, Nationals, Orioles, Charlotte North: Cubs, Pirates, Guardians, Reds West: Dodgers, Giants, Diamondbacks, Padres South: Cardinals, Braves, Miami, Houston This does SEC definitions of 'south' If you want to do east/west, I'd do EAST North Atlantic: Red Sox Yankees Mets Phillies Mid Atlantic Orioles Nationals Pittsburgh Nashville South East Braves Marlins Rays Charlotte NorthWest Toronto Detroit Reds Guardians Nearly all of those teams save nashville are Eastern Time Zone WEST Great Lakes Milwaukee Chicago Cubs Chicago White Sox Minnesota Twins South St Louis Kansas City Houston Dallas Pacific Seattle San Francisco Los Angeles A Los Angeles D Southwest Padres Rockies Diamondbacks As