Chicago White Sox Anniversary: Tim Anderson changes everything

The Chicago White Sox took a big step in 2019. A big reason why was Tim Anderson who started to change the game for this team one year ago today.

April 17th, 2019 was a somewhat big day in recent Chicago White Sox history. It was the day that White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson made a name for himself and asserted himself as a leader of this team. However, it wasn’t just noticed by the White Sox world. All of Major League Baseball took note of what was happening. It was an impressive season that followed for Anderson but all of the eyeballs followed him from this day forward.

It began when Tim Anderson hit a towering home run off Brad Keller to give the White Sox a 2-0 lead over the Kansas City Royals in the fourth inning at home. Before he began to trot the bases, he executed a bat flip that took the world by storm. It also came with Tim loudly screaming back to hype up the White Sox dugout. It was clearly more of Anderson pumping up his own team rather than trying to be disrespectful to the opponent.

Well,  Brad Keller didn’t appreciate Anderson’s actions as he threw at Anderson just two innings later. The beanball insinuated a bench-clearing situation.  Tempers flared and multiple ejections ensued from the incident. Well, Brad Keller can be mad about it all he wants but it was clearly a great moment in 2019’s book.

Anderson went on from that point with a chip on his shoulder. He clearly showed that he wants to add a bit more flare to the game of baseball. There are definitely going to be some old school fans that are going to refuse to adapt to some fun being added to the game but it seems like they are just going to have to deal with it.

Anderson playing the rest of the season following that day with a chip on his shoulder did great things for him and the White Sox. He went on to lead all the entire MLB in batting average to win his first career batting title. He also calmed down anyone who was angry that the White Sox didn’t get Manny Machado. He and Yoan Moncada made up an absolutely lethal left side of the infield on their own.

So here we are one year later to the day. Baseball is on pause right now due to some difficult times but we can all think happily about how Tim Anderson is going to be a driving force on a good Chicago White Sox team for a long time. Time will tell if this team will ever be able to get over the hump but they certainly have the cast to do it. We look back on the trades as the defining moments of the rebuild but as far as on the on-field play, this game against the Royals really started to turn the tides for this organization.