Sox Populi Podcast 156 — Another Cubs loss, and then a trade surprise!

Little did we know when we began our latest “livestream” (to @SouthSideSox on Twitter, Sox Populi on YouTube and South Side Sox on Facebook) that we’d be mourning more than just another lost White Sox season. Midway through, Dante Jones broke the news to Brett Ballantini, Sam Sherman, Chrystal O’Keefe, Malachi Hayes, Kristina Airdo and Ryiin that Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo López had been traded to the Angels. That changed the temperature of the room, quite a bit.

• With the loss, the White Sox dipped back to worse than .400 as a team, and again cracked the 10 worst winning percentages in club history
• Sam found the Crosstown losses so bad, so embarrassing, it shook him back out of indifference and into rage, particularly at an executive class that seems to hold fans in disdain
• To that point, you can flip fans the bird with a rebuild, or by throwing a tantrum at Reggie’s, or hiring Tony La Russa, because the team is planning or in ascendance; today’s bird-flipping (we’re still rooting for the rebuild to fail, Rick?) doesn’t fly, because we know the outcome of the rebuild — and it wasn’t success
• Similarly, per Sam, being inscrutable with every move (management, personnel, spending, the daggone injured list, for crying out loud) works if you WIN; when you lose, you’re coming across as at best obstinate, at worst, aggressively dumb
• Debate over whether this White Sox team is predestined to be worse in 2024 — Malachi, for one, doesn’t think that’s a foregone conclusion
• Tears will be shed over the loss of Lucas, even though we all knew it was coming sometime this year, during or after the season; hang in there, Chrystal and Kristina!
• Surprisingly, the return for two rental pitchers, catcher Edgar Quero and lefty arm Ky Bush — is FAR richer than any of us was expecting
• Imagining what the final, painful, two months of the season will be like

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