The Chicago White Sox have had Leury Garcia on the team longer than anybody else. Being the longest-tenured player on the team has to be pretty cool but the wrong player has that distinction right now. His status with the team shows many of the flaws within this organization.
Of course, none of this is Leury Garcia's fault. He has carved out a really nice career where he has made a lot of money while having some big moments on the diamond. It is unfortunate that he is now in a situation where he is a clear scapegoat.
Tony La Russa loved him. He played him far more than he should including a leadoff spot against the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2022. Garcia hit a big home run in the 2021 postseason and that one big moment tuned into a three-year deal that he didn't deserve.
In 2022, he was pretty awful. It wasn't until Tony left for his medical attention that Garcia got less playing time. In 97 games played, he had a WAR of -1.0. A player like that should not be in the lineup for one game let alone 97 (at least on a playoff contender).
In those 97 games, he had a slash of .210/.233/.267 for an OPS of .500. He had three home runs, 20 RBIs, and 38 runs scored. Those are some pretty brutal numbers for a guy who played as often as he did. If Tony never left the team, he would have played even more.
You'd never see a team like the New York Yankees, Los Angeles Dodgers, or Boston Red Sox play a guy with numbers like that as often as the White Sox did in 2022. Until they stop with this stuff, nobody is ever going to take them seriously, and rightfully so.
Final Grade: F
Leury Garcia had a really bad season for the Chicago White Sox in 2022.
Leury Garcia has to be given an F for this season. He was a negative WAR player that contributed to almost nothing good. At this point, it might even be bad to call him the 26th man on the roster as there are 10 guys in AAA who would have more of an impact.
This doesn't mean that Garcia shouldn't play pro baseball anymore. It doesn't even mean that he shouldn't even be given another MLB chance. However, it does mean that he shouldn't be getting 97 games on a team trying to win a pennant. It is no wonder why the White Sox failed so hard this year.
His future is unclear as he still has a couple of more years left on his contract which he didn't deserve in the first place. It will be interesting to see if the White Sox actually DFA him or let him continue to hurt their chances to win. It would be nice to see them act like a serious organization now that TLR is gone.