3 reasons it is a bad idea the Chicago White Sox promoted Chris Getz
By Todd Welter
The Chicago White Sox have officially hired Chris Getz to run the baseball operations.
Owner Jerry Reinsdorf promoted Getz from assistant general manager/director of player development to senior vice president/general manager.
It is more like an over-promotion.
Getz has never run a front office. Also, the Chicago White farm system has struggled to produce major-league-level talent the last couple of seasons, but we will get to that in a little bit.
Like or it not, these are the types of decisions that can happen when you love something that someone else owns.
The response from the fanbase to Reinsdorf’s decision has varied from disappointment to lackluster.
Hopeful for the best case, fearful of the worst case. https://t.co/SASP51Jrwr
— Eric Willuweit (@eswillow72) August 31, 2023
Hoping Getz succeeds where Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn failed the last couple of seasons seems to be the one agreed-upon response from the Southside faithful. It is not like everyone is rooting for him to fail. Getz rebuilding the Chicago White Sox into a championship-contending organization will be greeted with glee.
Despite the poor White Sox farm system, Getz is viewed as an up-and-coming baseball executive.
Chris Getz is the 4th current @MLB GM who has played in the majors, joining Sam Fuld, Brandon Gomes, and Chris Young.
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) August 31, 2023
One exec with another MLB team told me today that Getz is a "tremendous leader, clear thinker, sound evaluator," and perfect hire for the Sox.@MLBNetwork
There are still three reasons it is a bad idea to name Chris Getz as the front office leader.
Jerry Reinsdorf conducted possibly the worst general manager search.
When Jerry announced he fired Williams and Hahn, he said he would have a replacement in place before the end of this season.
That was a bad idea from the start as a lot of the best candidates are on contending teams with seasons that still have meaning going on. It would have been better to wait until the offseason.
Also, it was reported a day later that Reinsdorf was going to promote Getz. If he had that planned all along, why put up this farce of trying to do a general manager search? Just promote the guy right away as we all know Jerry does not care what the fans and outsiders think. See Tony La Russa being hired as manager as evidence.
A decision like this did not need a hard deadline.
Plus, interviewing as many candidates costs nothing. It would have been a great idea to take the time to interview James Click, David Stearns, or Theo Epstein to get their thoughts.
If he did not want to spend the money or give the power to those three, there were still plenty of good front-office lieutenants he could have talked with.
His logic for Getz being able to hit the ground running is flawed.
“You lose a year. And here I had somebody on the inside who was very very competitive.
— Chuck Garfien (@ChuckGarfien) August 31, 2023
I then came to the conclusion that if I had someone on the inside who can do the job, why not do it inside and save a year. That’s basically how I got to Chris.”
The Chicago White Sox need fresh ideas if they want to excel in the modern game. The organization needs a long evaluation to get turned around to have long-term success. If he wanted an executive to turn the team around in hire, maybe he should not have fired Kenny Williams as he always went for it when he was the sole final decision maker.
Instead, Jerry decided to go with another decision-maker from inside the Sox family. Which brings us to the second reason.