White Sox: Is This Team Good or Awful?

If you’re a White Sox fan, you will have a strong opinion one way or another about whether this team is good or awful. I’ll give you my opinion as we explore that topic

Personally, I don’t think the White Sox are either. While they played phenomenal baseball for the first five weeks of the 2016 season, I don’t believe that the last two and a half weeks resemble who they are.

Just by looking at some of the good teams they played in the first month-plus, it doesn’t make sense to assume that just because they had a tough stretch recently (in record and competition level), that the White Sox are a 75 win team.

Looking at how many games the team played in a row, not to mention the fact that many of those games were on the road, it doesn’t make sense to think that they will lose as much as they have been of late.

Given, they haven’t been getting as many clutch hits in recent games, but keep in mind they are not getting blown out.

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Since the games have been as close as they have been, I wouldn’t be shocked to see a turnaround sometime soon.

Now, here is the question, when will the turnaround come? Well, this road trip is going to be a tough place to find it. Since they are away from U.S. Cellular Field for 12 days (10 games), it might be a bit of a stretch to think there is an 8-2 run in the near future.

However, with Kansas City, New York (N), and Detroit, I would gladly take a 5-5 mark at the end of the trip. Keep in mind that two of those teams expect to play in October (Royals and Mets), so I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Sox at 3-4 after the first seven games of the swing.

Here is the issue, how good are the White Sox? Since it is evident that they are not a 95-win team, it makes sense to figure out how good they are. I thought, going into the season, that they were going to have ups and downs offensively, and would be frustrating to watch at times.

So relax Sox fans, there is a long way to go.

That has occurred, with the team not being able to drive in men from 3^rd base and less than two outs. I still stand by my statement at the beginning of the year that this team is capable of winning 88-90 games, however, is going to need some additions for that to happen.

Overall, the White Sox could be in much worse shape than they are now. Just flashing back to a year ago, the team was off to a terrible start, and could do nothing right. Now, the pitching is excellent, defense much improved, and the lineup is hitting better (overall, not recently). Keep in mind that in 2015 the White Sox won 76 games.

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While that number is low, with improvements across the board, they could win 10+ games more this year. The reason I say that is because the team lost some close games last season, not to mention would have been in more with a better defense. So relax Sox fans, there is a long way to go.

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