Are the White Sox close?

 If you have been like me and needed to bury your head in the sand for just a couple of goddamned minutes, you have turned back to the Twins offseason. It's not uplifting, but it's also not life or death. One thing that hasn't changed in these miserable times in Minneapolis is that online Twins Territory is very down on their chances. A refrain I've heard is "forget trying to win the division, they need to worry about staying ahead of the White Sox".

I'm not sure how serious it was when it was said, but frankly, it's a little bit ludicrous. The White Sox aren't necessarily the bottom feeders they were two years ago, but in 2026, they still aren't very good. Importantly, they don't look anywhere near the Twins.

The White Sox do have some players to build around, certainly. Colson Montgomery and Kyle Teel stand out as the best positional carryovers, with Seth Smith likely to start the season as their top starter. I would be remiss if I didn't also note their splash signing of Japanese slugger Muneteka Murakami. 

Byron Buxton was worth more wins by himself than Montgomery and Teel combined. Neither played a full season, but even prorated, well, the numbers look worse for Buxton. And speaking of prorated, Luke Keaschall and Austin Martin were better than Teel by a WAR metric. Seth Smith would start perhaps third or 4th in the Twins rotation, and given, again, the prorated WAR, might end up as the 6th man in the rotation. The only starter he was easily better than was Bailey Ober, and Ober has a good history.

Yes, the Twins bullpen isn't very good. But if the metric we are working off is "are the White Sox any better," then you can say, sure, the White Sox have Grant Taylor, who is better than anyone the Twins have to offer, but otherwise, they are similar groups. The Twins should see fewer innings out of their pen, though, which should go a long way.

Both teams expect to see help from their prospect pool. The Twins happened to have the 2nd rated farm in baseball mid-season last year, while the White Sox sat at 17th. There is another ranking coming out soon, and the Twins will move down because Keaschall graduated off the list. Next year, top ten prospect Walker Jenkins will be off the list too, with Emmanuel Rodriguez potentially following him. 

I'm not comparing the Twins to the top of the division. I am saying they are significantly better than the White Sox. 

The rebuild that never got built.

 The season consisted of such a dog fight with the Guardians in the first half, and finally resulted in the squad coming together and pulling away late. The Tigers actually came out in 2nd by the end of the year, which just shows it's very hard to win games when you don't ever get around to scoring any runs, as Cleveland struggled with. 

Even the Royals, paced by Bobby Witt Jr. seemed to come alive a bit late in the year. If not alive, then at least they showed enough to get some fans to the stadium next year. It's clear they are near the beginning of a reset.

Vibes were less good in Chicago, where the White Sox were expected to compete, and potentially win the AL Central, thanks to a good rotation and an emergent core. It didn't hurt that the team finally decided to shake loose of Tony La Russa at the helm for those that saw success for Chicago in 2023. 

And then, the season was an unmitigated disaster. Despite the expectations for Chicago and Kansas City, they finished only 5 games apart in the standings. It was so bad that the White Sox are bringing La Russa back (to the front office). 

What is the most frustrating aspect of a team whose rebuild didn't work? Like I said, the White Sox had a bunch of prosects that seemed ready to make the jump. I was fearful, as a Twins fan, of the White Sox potential. They stocked up in their trades of Adam Eaton, Jose Quintana and Chris Sale, and really seemed poised to move into a golden era.

But after that promise, some of those prospects just weren't successful, like Yoan Moncada who had a bad season. Eloy Jimenez has never repeated his rookie season, and only seems to get worse in the field. Michael Kopech has never seemed to rein in his terrific stuff. Is it more frustrating that these guys aren't producing as expected?

Or is it more frustrating to watch Luis Robert explode for 38 home runs and realize the hitter he's always been capable of being? Or to have Dylan Cease become one of the top starters in the league, and know that having these two stars reaching their potential just isn't enough? Knowing that the rest of your cast of characters was too mediocre to allow your stars to execute in important moments?

The AL Central was derided for it's mediocrity this season. The Twins proved, at least, that they could compete in the post season, and the Tigers and Royals were about as expected, maybe a bit better. Cleveland wasn't able to maintain their fortune from last year, but the real problem with the division was a White Sox squad that just didn't have it. Now, though, we should know what to expect in 2024.

An uphill battle.