White Sox Chairman Jerry Reindorf made the trip to Cleveland for an early-season game in 1995 when everyone in Chicago was wondering about the fate of his manager.
Coming off the players strike, the Sox started 11-20, the third-worst record in baseball after being a World Series contender when the strike began in August 1994. Manager Gene Lamont was on the hot seat, and Reinsdorf’s presence indicated the ax was about to fall.
“He’s my manager until he’s not,” then-general manager Ron Schueler cryptically said when I asked him about Lamont’s future.
The Sox returned to Chicago after being swept in a four-game series in Cleveland, and Lamont’s firing was announced the next day. Schueler said the team’s lack of “fire” made it an easy decision.
“I gave them the benefit of the doubt,” Schueler said. “But if the team can’t get up for a series like the Cleveland series, obviously I thought I’d have to do something to change the atmosphere.”
Pedro Grifol probably doesn’t have to worry about suffering a similar fate, even as his White Sox are off to a 2-10 start, second-worst in the majors entering Thursday.
Unlike the 1995 Sox, led by Frank Thomas, Robin Ventura, Ozzie Guillen and Tim Raines, this team had no expectations to start the season. Serious, long-term injuries to Luis Robert Jr. and Yoan Moncada, along with what is hoped to be a short-term injury to Eloy Jimenez, have taken the heart of Grifol’s lineup.
If he needs any built-in excuses for losing, Grifol can just point to the IL.
General manager Chris Getz knows there’s nothing Grifol can do but ask his players to play hard and limit the mental mistakes. Even then it’s going to be a monumental task to get to .500, which was considered the best-case scenario heading into 2024.
But as the Sox begin a six-game homestand Friday against the Cincinnati Reds with a dark cloud hovering, Grifol’s ability to lead them will be a recurring question.
“When you go through struggles it’s a character reveal for players and staff,” Getz told reporters in Cleveland. “You’ve got to dig deep sometimes and stay positive, and this staff is professionals and have been in this game a while whether it be on the player or coaching front.”
Lamont’s ability to manage was not in question in 1995. He already had won the American League Manager of the Year Award in 1993 and had his team in first place at the time of the 1994 strike. For reasons unknown, Reinsdorf didn’t like Lamont and had no problem getting rid of him only a month into the season. Schueler replaced Lamont with the inept and bullying Terry Bevington, who turned out to be one of the worst managers in franchise history.
Reinsdorf seemingly has a soft spot for Grifol, who readily has accepted having former manager Tony La Russa around an adviser, bowing to the owner’s wishes. When Grifol was asked in September about the possibility of turning the team around quickly, he said he expected Reinsdorf to make the effort in the offseason to try to win immediately.
“Nobody wants to hear the talk anymore,” Grifol said. “Everybody just wants to see us win. I’m not going to sit here and promise anything because nobody wants to hear it.
“They’ve heard it for a long, long time. It’s about us winning baseball games. Until April, a couple weeks into April, a couple of weeks into the season, that’s when everybody should have an opinion and make a decision whether they like what we put on the field or not.”
Here we are, a couple of weeks into April, and yes, everyone seemingly has an opinion about if they like what the Sox have put on the field. Most of those opinions, however, are unprintable. Even for rebuilds, the talent level is sparse.
Making matters worse, fans have grown increasingly tired of Grifol’s platitudes, such as the remark he made in Cleveland on Tuesday that “the ball hasn’t bounced our way.” He seems to think Sox fans are going to buy into this line of thinking when anyone can see the team was not constructed to win in 2024.
Perhaps Grifol has spent too much time listening to new team broadcaster John Schriffen, who said last week that every team needs a Bryan Shaw, a 36-year-old reliever currently sporting a 9.00 ERA. Sox fans beg to differ.
At least Getz admitted in Cleveland that the lack of “quality at-bats” from Sox hitters meant “there wasn’t a lot of room for error” in close games.
“Unfortunately it’s shown some weaknesses here,” he added.
The new Sox GM focused on defense over hitting when constructing the roster. This is what Getz gets: The Sox entered Thursday ranked 26th in hitting (.212), 28th in on-base percentage (.283) and 29th in hitting with runners in scoring position (.159).
Sox fans who last season said things couldn’t get any lower obviously were sadly mistaken. It not only is unwatchable, this could go down as the worst team in franchise history. But hey, can you spare a couple of billion dollars to build Reinsdorf a new ballpark?
Fortunately for Grifol, he probably won’t have Reinsdorf following the Sox on the road to gauge whether he’s doing enough to keep his job.
So he’ll continue to be the Sox manager … until he’s not.
