Rick Hahn's front office got an awful lot of attention for the move the White Sox didn't end up making this winter. But the ones they did are expected to have plenty of impact on the 2019 team.
One of the most different aspects of this year's edition of the South Side baseball club is what's going on behind home plate. And in true rebuilding fashion, that vastly different catching situation is expected to have a long-lasting effect on the much-discussed rotation of the future.
Welington Castillo played in just 49 games during the 2018 campaign, missing 80 due to a PED suspension that wiped out much of his season. He was brought in an offseason ago to help develop the young-and-getting-younger White Sox pitching staff and to use his veteran experience to help guide Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez through their first full seasons in the major leagues. That obviously didn't happen. And while Castillo's absence might have had nothing at all to do with Giolito's league-leading ERA or Lopez's various inconsistencies over the course of 2018, having him there every day to finally help do the job he was brought in to do can only be of benefit to Giolito, Lopez, Carlos Rodon and eventually Dylan Cease, who's expected to arrive in the big leagues before time runs out on the 2019 season.
"I’m really happy to be here and work and try to help this pitching staff," Castillo said last month in Glendale, Arizona. "I know what it can do and what they are going to do. So, it’s up to them to put everything together and me helping in the pitching staff and helping the pitching staff and the pitching coach will help them too. I think we got something special here.
"I learned a lot, especially more for the attitude they have in the game when stuff don’t go right, when they don’t feel good. It’s easy to pitch when everything goes the right way. It’s not easy to pitch when the stuff goes the other side. That’s when I realize what to say to each guy and I’m here to help them. I learn a lot from them and them from me so we have to help each other."
Hopefully that consistent veteran presence as the White Sox starting catcher can help out those young pitchers, guys who do have stuff to prove in 2019, chiefly that they belong as key parts of the conversation about that rotation of the future.
There's another new face, too, in Castillo's backup, James McCann. McCann was brought in after the White Sox watched him spend the past five seasons with the division-rival Detroit Tigers. His bat left plenty to be desired in 2018 — just a .220/.267/.314 slash line to go along with eight home runs — but the White Sox value the veteran presence he can bring, too, and McCann is fully aware of what's expected of him.
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"Come in and help the young guys," McCann said last month. "I have a specific expertise in as far as I've faced all these guys for the last five years, so I know the scouting reports, I know what we see as an opposing hitter. Now I'll bring that to pitchers as well as the hitters, what I was able to see when I was facing them. At the end of the day I'm here to win and help the team improve the culture that we started here."
Sounds like a welcome addition. McCann has some unique insight that might be able to help Giolito, Lopez, Rodon, Cease and whoever else continue to find their ways in the big leagues. In Detroit, McCann worked with some of the best to ever throw a baseball, and he might be able to pass on some of that knowledge from Hall-of-Famers-to-be like Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer.
"Shoot, I was catching Verlander and Scherzer and David Price," McCann said. "So it was the opposite — I had Cy Youngs teaching me how to look at scouting reports, how to game plan and do that kind of stuff. Now I can turn around and tell the young guys: 'Hey, this is what Verlander does, this is what David Price does.' Hopefully that can help them."
That sounds great for the White Sox young pitchers. Nothing against the tandem of Omar Narvaez and Kevan Smith, who these pitchers enjoyed working with last season, but they can't offer the kind of insight McCann described or the track record of major league success Castillo boasts.
And catcher isn't the only position where the White Sox made additions that could benefit this young starting staff. Ivan Nova was brought in to be the replacement for James Shields, the veteran innings-eater who still receive positive reviews for the guidance he provided in the clubhouse. Ervin Santana, brought in during spring training on a minor league deal and looking to be a good bet to be the team's fifth starter, could serve a similar purpose. And additions to the back end of the bullpen, Alex Colome and Kelvin Herrera, could help the young relievers by taking some late-game pressure off them.
In other words, the White Sox did a bit of a revamp on the support staff for their young hurlers this offseason, and there are new resources for young arms to help with their development into what the team is hoping is a dominant staff of the future. We'll see how much those resources end up helping in 2019.
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