Ultimate Fanbase Troll™ 2 — Service Time Boogaloo

So, at the end of last week, fans were promised a statement about the “final” decisions being made regarding additional players making the jump to the Chicago White Sox in September.

Today, we got that statement. Here’s a little piece broken off, courtesy of the unwavering hand of Daryl Van Schouwen:

And, “some reaction from around baseball”:

(Michael Kopech’s sister.)

Here’s the thing: I, for one, really, really, really, really hadn’t thought this was solely or significantly about service time. I believed, or wanted to believe, that there was some strange voodoo of earlier-season injury, evaluating current outfielders, or knowing once Eloy is up, he’s up for good that was delaying — not postponing — the promotion.

We’ve gotten ourselves worked up about Eloy not being in the majors since before the Double-A All-Star Game, when the reasoning was that the White Sox were throwing a bone to Birmingham by keeping Jiménez down for All-Star Game (the Barons hosted) attendance.

In June, we published a quickie throwaway comparing Eloy to Frank Thomas, the significant difference between the two at Birmingham (recall, Big Hurt was promoted to the White Sox directly from Birmingham at the start of August 1990) was strikeout and walk rate, which may have a lot more to say about the way the game has changed over 25 years than Eloy’s weaknesses. (In retrospect, I should have drilled deep into defensive comparisons. Such a fine line between stupid, and clever.)

Exactly one month later, larry wrote a forceful and passionate take on what was developing into an untruthful and manipulative situation regarding both Jiménez and Kopech.

And even as we kept the pressure on, both with larry’s breaking piece (handled with tweezers, from Jon Heyman) and a trademarked takedown on the absurd current state of affairs, there was still some sense that calmer and fairer heads would prevail by ... Labor Day.

They did not.

WSB 2018: Calmer and Fairer Heads Will Not Prevail