It was fitting that Pedro Grifol’s last real decision as Chicago White Sox manager was lifting a starter who threw six shutout innings and watching the bullpen blow the lead in Wednesday’s 3-2 loss to the Oakland A’s.
When we look back on Grifol’s memorable 279-game tenure on the South Side, a period so awful it could eventually lead to the franchise leaving Chicago, we’ll remember the player revolt and 101 losses in 2023, the American League record-tying 21 straight losses this summer, the ongoing march toward the 1962 New York Mets’ modern-day record of 120 losses, and the regression of players from Tim Anderson and Eloy Jiménez to Andrew Vaughn and Luis Robert Jr.
I’ll always remember the repetitive, late-inning decision-making that resulted in dozens of winnable games being frittered away, and the postgame press conferences where Grifol assured everyone that Sox players were showing up and playing hard, as if that was all that mattered.
The Sox mercifully ended his managerial career Thursday morning, two days after the historic losing streak made them national news. General manager Chris Getz said all the things you’d expect him to say after firing a manager he never hired in the first place. Now he’ll get his chance to find someone who can not only lead a rebuild that’s gone backward but inspire Sox fans to support the team that’s let them down year after year.
We know it won’t be Ozzie Guillén or A.J. Pierzynski, two longtime fan favorites whose names always come up when the Sox make a managerial change. Guillén has been the team’s biggest critic for the last three years, while Pierzynski’s blunt commentary on the Sox’s woes cost him a job as a team ambassador.
They never had a chance. Honesty doesn’t pay when it comes to this particular job.
Getz said Thursday the new manager would be someone currently in a major league uniform, which immediately stopped speculation on Guillén, Pierzynski or any former manager currently out of work, like Terry Francona, David Ross or Joe Maddon.
The best bet appears to be Miami Marlins manager Skip Schumaker, who is certain to be fired by the end of the season and was mentored by Tony La Russa, the 79-year-old man behind the Sox curtain.
La Russa still has the ear of Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf and works better than a hearing aid. I wrote back in early June that Schumaker was the one to keep an eye on, and since then he’s been touted by USA Today as a possible successor to Grifol. Who knew?
“Everything that I know I’ve learned from somebody, and the majority of that would be Tony La Russa,” Schumaker said after being named Marlins manager, adding: “I got to learn what a winning sustainable culture looks like.”
The Marlins could not sustain a winning culture after earning a wild-card spot in Schumaker’s first season on the job, but most observers blame that on the failure of Miami’s dysfunctional front office — not the manager.
With the La Russa stamp of approval, he’ll likely be the odds-on favorite assuming he wants the job and if Reinsdorf signs off on a long-term deal.
Why anyone besides Schumaker would even want the Sox job is another matter. It comes with a built-in “consultant” who has forgotten more about baseball than you’ll ever know. Just ask him.
How many teams would allow a former manager who presided over the bitter end of a once-promising rebuild to return and hang around the clubhouse as a consultant, going on road trips and hovering over the manager at the batting cage to offer free “advice” while in street clothes?
The Sox pretend this is just a normal business practice. One friend of Reinsdorf said the Chairman was only helping an elderly friend stay occupied in his golden years after a health scare that forced La Russa from the dugout in 2022. Swell guy!
Fire the manager? Check. Trade the stars? Check. Rebuild the farm system? Check.
But nothing will change for Sox fans until Reinsdorf and his old boys’ system are gone. If a La Russa-Schumaker tandem is in place next spring training, it’s going to be business as usual. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
So what else is there to attract top candidates?
Getz spoke Thursday about the optimism generated by the farm system, which does include several promising pitchers but a decided lack of offensive prospects that can help in 2025 or 2026. The Sox are not a franchise that is willing to spend whatever it takes to get better, so forget about a quick turnaround similar to the wild-card contending Kansas City Royals, who lost 106 games last year.
How long will it take to start spending on free agents?
“I wouldn’t say we’re too far,” Getz said. “It isn’t going to be right now.”
Define “too far.” Any new manager should understand going in that this will be a lengthy rebuilding process with no guarantee of success. He should be someone who knows about developing prospects, handling pitching and dealing with the media to send the right message.
Grifol was 0-for-3 in those categories.
Rick Renteria, aka “Ricky Sunshine,” turned out to be the right man for the job in 2017 and took the team to the postseason in 2020. Remember “Ricky’s Boys Don’t Quit?”
But after his poor performance in the playoff loss to the A’s, Reinsdorf didn’t think Renteria was the guy to take the Sox from Point B to Point C, so he insisted on firing him and then replaced him with his old buddy La Russa, over the objections of his own executives Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn.
So here we are back at Point A, a familiar place for hard-bitten Sox fans. The road to Point C is going to be long and arduous, especially if Reinsdorf and Getz allow La Russa to continue to give his two cents to whoever is in charge. Grady Sizemore’s first act as interim manager should be to bar La Russa from the field and clubhouse.
Some fans have told me they feel sorry for Grifol, who had next to nothing to work with in his two seasons on the job.
That’s true, but he was his own worst enemy, pretending things weren’t as bad as they appeared when everyone could see they were worse. He might have a future as a Sox play-by-play man, where gaslighting fans has become Job No. 1.
