Grading the White Sox: Dallas Keuchel

At midseason, the SSS staff graded the 46-46 White Sox, from head of the class Dylan Cease all the way down to Dallas Keuchel. We invented a WARsss metric that could very well be just a cute way to trot out our special site grades — but really for all you know could be the product of years of research in a stats lab.

Our expanded report card will take us through everyone who saw time in uniform for the White Sox, plus some front-office types. Most of our writers will take on a couple of players, with final grades and short writeups, running through the end of November. Enjoy!

Or, in Dallas’ case, damn your eyes!

Dallas Keuchel
LHSP
Midseason: -3.3 WARsss
Final: -3.9 WARsss

Dallas Keuchel was a lot of things in 2022.

Firstly, he was bad. No getting around that.

His velocity downgraded itself from “diminishing” to diminished.

He seemed unusually wary of challenging the strike zone.

He was an easy scapegoat for a fanbase looking for something to blame.

He was paid as a front-end starter, but as has happened countless times before to pitchers older than 30, the bottom fell out.

He gave up more than five earned runs in three of his eight Sox starts, but he pitched at least five innings in just half of his Sox starts.

He recorded a ground ball rate of more than 50%, but his batting average on balls in play was .364.

He spoke out about lack of discipline and focus among his teammates, of a divided clubhouse that lacked the ability to play as a team, and a lack of leadership.

He spoke about poor defensive positioning and like All-Star closer Liam Hendriks, he pitched like he didn’t trust the defense behind him.

He was right.

He also didn’t perform up to his contract.

Dallas Keuchel was bad in 2022, but he’s not the reason the White Sox were bad. He was another easy distraction from the top-down mediocrity of a franchise that continues to prove that it doesn’t know what it’s doing.

2022 White Sox Grades

Dallas Keuchel, LHSP, -3.9