Chicago White Sox Lose Playoff Hopes With Cleveland Sweep, Time To Look To 2023

The White Sox were hoping for a sweep this week, and they got one. Just not the kind they needed. Entering their Tuesday-Thursday series against the Guardians, the Sox trailed Cleveland by four games with a perfect chance to narrow the gap. Instead, they go into the last 12 games of the season with a seven game deficit in the division.

The Sox are not yet mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, that magic number is five, but their chances of getting in are effectively nil.

“I’m not giving up,” interim manager Miguel Cairo told reporters after Wednesday’s game. “(White Sox players) are not giving up. We are going to come back and play again. “The season is not over. We still have to come and play hard. The way it’s supposed to be played.”

But the tune in the Sox clubhouse shifted after Thursday night’s loss that completed the three-game sweep.

“It’s tough,” Gavin Sheets told reporters. “Obviously 162 doesn’t come down to three games, but we knew what we had to do this series and we weren’t able to do it. It’s frustrating, it’s disappointing, but it’s not just this series.

“We had to play better all season. Obviously this was a huge series and we weren’t able to pull through.”

There is a scenario where the Guardians suddenly lose most of their remaining games and the Sox somehow win theirs, and in that scenario, Chicago could still find its way into the playoffs. But that’s very unlikely. According to FanGraphs, the Sox have a 0.8% chance of getting into the postseason.

And diagnosing just what went wrong for a team with such high promise going into the season isn’t simple. Cairo offered a few thoughts to reporters on Thursday.

“I’m going to tell you this. In spring training we lost Crochet. During the season, the beginning of the season we lost Moncada for a month with his oblique. We lost Eloy, we lost Bummer, we lost Hendriks for like three weeks,” he said. “It’s been a challenging season, no matter how you see it and us and the staff trying to keep the level of the passion so they can keep going out there and play in the game.”

Every team deals with injury, and it’s not necessarily the case that the White Sox did any more so than anyone else. The data below would suggest that, at least based on total time lost to injury, they are on par with league average.

This does not account for the names involved — losing a utility infielder is not the same as a key member of the rotation like Lance Lynn — but a closer look here would at least suggest that Cairo isn’t wrong. The Sox have performed respectably despite the amount of injuries, and presumably a more healthy team wins enough games to win the division. They are loaded with talent, but it’s no use when that talent is on the injured list.

If there’s good news going forward, it’s that the front office can take the reigns on changes. There’s the question of whether Tony La Russa returns in 2023, the last year of his contract. Given his health status and age, it would be an easy out for owner Jerry Reinsdorf to give the job to Cairo or someone else. Not all of the Sox shortcomings of the last two seasons can be attributed to La Russa, but if he is not healthy enough to manage another full season, then they have to move on.

Along with someone new at the helm, another way the Sox can improve their playoff chances in 2023 is more depth. They played most of this season without a full time second baseman and used young players like Gavin Sheets and Andrew Vaughn in the outfield — thanks to injuries to other guys — despite the fact that Sheets and Vaughn are better suited somewhere like first base.

This year, the Sox have an estimated payroll just south of $200 million. The front office has invested in talent. They may need to invest more. José Abreu will be a free agent at season’s end. The Sox paid him close to $20 million this year. Abreu has been immensely important to the franchise, but the time might be right to move in a new direction. There are club options next year for Tim Anderson ($12.5 million) and Josh Harrison ($5.5 million). AJ Pollock has a $10 million player option for 2023. It might be tempting to just let this money slide off of the books and see how the remaining group performs next season, but the Sox would be better off to redirect any freed-up dollars.

The rotation and infield both need depth. The outfield might too. Both Eloy Jiménez and Luis Robert have shown that staying on the field is a challenge. They’re talented players who can’t be relied on yet to play a full season. The Sox’ competitive window has been open for the past three seasons, but so far they have one playoff victory to show for it. Before that window closes, they will need to reexamine both who runs the day-to-day of the team and who is donning their uniform.