Who will replace Pedro Grifol as White Sox manager? (2024)

After 279 games and 190 losses, the Pedro Grifol error … era is over in Chicago.

And for the third time since firing Rick Renteria after the 2020 season, the White Sox are looking for a new manager.

In 2020, the Sox went with chairman Jerry Reinsdorf’s choice in Tony La Russa to replace Renteria and then, in 2022, general manager Rick Hahn picked Grifol to replace La Russa. Now it’s on GM Chris Getz to make the call, though you can’t count out special advisor La Russa’s influence or Reinsdorf pulling rank again.

As you might’ve heard, the White Sox are in a pretty bad place right now, which complicates the process.

The Sox are rumbling toward a record number of losses this season and are on the lower rungs of a rebuild with little hope to seriously compete in the near future. It’s not great.

So the Sox probably won’t be hiring a future Hall of Famer to take this job. And while you can’t fully discount some experienced names, this feels like a job for a first-year manager, which is another White Sox specialty.

With those caveats in mind, this is the White Sox. Who knows what they will do?

There aren’t a lot of positives to this organization at the moment, but the Sox do have a lot of young pitching, both in the minors and recently promoted to the bigs. They also have a souped-up pitching department helmed by Brian Bannister. (Current pitching coach Ethan Katz should be a candidate to stay at his job.)

And it’s still a big-league job. They only make 30 of them.

So here are some candidates for that open position on the top step of the White Sox dugout.

In the White Sox system

Does anyone remember when Justin Jirschele was the subject of a New York Times Magazine feature story?

It was back in 2017, in the early days of the previous Sox rebuild. At 27, Jirschele was the youngest manager in the minor leagues. The son of a longtime coach and manager, Jirschele was a minor-league washout who went into coaching at 24 and was getting a chance to skipper the Sox’s Low-A team in Kannapolis.

Since then, he’s moved up the ranks and at 34 is the current manager of the Triple-A Charlotte Knights. Getz, who played for Jirschele’s father, Mike Jirschele, in the minor leagues, appeared briefly in the story.

“He’s still green,” Getz told the writer, Chris Jones, “but he has the heart and desire to be just like his dad.”

In 2022, Getz put Jirschele in charge of “Project Birmingham,” an attempt to turn the Double-A team into some kind of instructional test kitchen at the end of the season.

“I feel like (Jirschele) can handle it,” Getz said at the time. Getting the promotion to Charlotte showed he was on the right track. So, with that in mind, Jirschele would make sense, at this time, to get another bump to the big leagues if Getz feels he has the potential to manage where the results really count.

On Thursday, the Sox named Jirschele as third-base coach while installing Grady Sizemore as interim manager, among other coaching staff changes. But Getz insinuated Jirschele won’t be a candidate for the top job in Chicago.

“We do plan on targeting individuals for the manager position that are in other organizations. So the expectation is to hire someone outside of the White Sox,” he said during a video conference call.

Tony La Russa tree

As the manager of the team with the third-worst record in baseball, would Skip Schumaker of the Marlins want to come manage the worst?

This is where the La Russa Factor comes in. Schumaker, 44, played for La Russa for parts of seven seasons in St. Louis.

While his second season as a manager has been a disaster, Schumaker is the reigning National League Manager of the Year. After Marlins GM Kim Ng resigned, Schumaker had his 2025 option year voided, making him a free agent after the season.

Schumaker’s experience as a player and managing a young team make him a top choice for this job. If he wants it.

Miguel Cairo, another former La Russa player, took over for him when he left the team in 2022 for health reasons. Cairo went 18-16 but didn’t get the full-time job and is now the Washington Nationals bench coach.

It’ll be interesting to see if La Russa has more recommendations.

Current MLB coaches

Why not poach some coaches from the best organization in baseball? The Dodgers’ duo of first-base coach Clayton McCullough and bench coach Danny Lehmann are intriguing options. McCullough, 44, is a former minor-league manager with a player development background who has interviewed for open jobs in recent years, while Lehmann, 38, was a former minor-league catcher turned video scout who worked his way up to Dave Roberts’ bench coach in 2023. Before that promotion, he was sort of a liaison between the coaches and front office.

Speaking of successful organizations, how about Astros hitting coach Troy Snitker, who was up for the Cleveland Guardians job last year? He also comes with good lineage, being the son of Braves manager Brian Snitker and all.

Brian Snitker 🤝 Troy Snitker

Astros Hitting Coach, Troy Snitker, met up with his dad during lineup card delivery in today's game against the @Braves pic.twitter.com/lCvRrZgTQ0

— Houston Astros (@astros) April 17, 2024

Texas offensive coordinator Donnie Ecker has been mentioned as a possible managerial candidate. Former Rangers manager Jeff Banister is a coach in Arizona, where Getz’s assistant GM Josh Barfield came from. You always have to keep your eyes out for those kinds of connections.

Ex-White Sox players

Cubs third-base coach Willie Harris, 46, was the only other known interview in 2020 before La Russa was handed the job. The former White Sox player is now in his fourth year with the Cubs and could be the energetic, positive manager the Sox need at this juncture.

When I asked about his frenetic presence at third base in 2021, he told me, “It’s not something that I try to do. I wake up like that every day, man.”

Harris’ 2005 World Series teammate A.J. Pierzynski was recently mentioned as a strong candidate for the job. It’s no secret Pierzynski, like most ex-MLB catchers, sees himself as a future manager and he said he’d love to interview for the job. But considering how often he’s criticized the team, including his old teammate Getz, on his “Foul Territory” show, he’s probably not getting the nod … unless it’s a Reinsdorf decision. Which is very possible.

.@ajpierzynski12 denies reports that he's in talks to become the @whitesox Manager pic.twitter.com/TMutF3u3Cw

— Foul Territory (@FoulTerritoryTV) July 29, 2024

Gordon Beckham does some games on TV for the White Sox and he told me he’s intrigued by the idea of managing. Bobby Jenks is skippering an independent league team near Chicago. I always thought Paul Konerko had manager written all over him, but he’s too smart to leave his good life in Arizona.

And that takes us to …

Ozzie Guillen

After the team’s 20th consecutive loss, Ozzie Guillen went public with a hilarious take on the team hiring Grifol over him.

“I don’t think I was that bad a manager, but they picked Pedro in front of me,” Guillen said to laughter on the team’s TV postgame show.

Guillen, who managed the White Sox to a World Series title in 2005, has wanted back his old job for years, but his fractured relationship with the previous front office made that impossible. Would Reinsdorf push Getz to rehire Guillen now?

Guillen should’ve been managing somewhere since losing the Marlins job in 2012 after one ill-fated season, but I don’t know if he makes much sense with the state of the current roster, though he obviously would’ve been a better choice than Grifol. Selfishly, I like having Guillen on the postgame show.

Another former White Sox manager

Hey, has anyone heard from Rick Renteria since he was unceremoniously fired after taking the Sox to the playoffs in the 2020 pandemic season?

Renteria was looked at as a placeholder manager in his two jobs in Chicago, but his tenure on the South Side doesn’t look so bad after the Grifol experience. I doubt he would answer Getz’s call unless the money was large. (It won’t be.)

Next Rick Renteria

Hey, the Sox hired one ex-Cubs manager. Why not David Ross? Just like how Renteria was canned by the Cubs so they could hire Joe Maddon, Ross was jettisoned for Craig Counsell. I actually think he would get along well with Getz and would get a letter of recommendation from Getz’s buddy, Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer.

Above-average Joes

For years, over different hiring cycles, there were rumors about Joe Girardi returning to manage the Cubs. They never came to fruition. So what about the White Sox?

“I do want to manage again,” he told me in 2022. “We’ll see if I get an opportunity if it comes about. If not, I mean, I was fortunate I got to manage what, 14 years? I feel really blessed with that. If I broadcast for the rest of my life, that’s what happens. I like broadcasting too.”

Girardi is currently a broadcaster for both the Yankees and the Cubs’ RSNs.

Given his, uh, intensity, I don’t think he’s a good fit for a rebuilding team, but he’d be worth an interview.

Speaking of Joes with World Series rings, can we get an APB on Joe Maddon’s RV? Maddon would probably prefer to manage a good baseball team, but he has familiarity in Chicago and could give his restaurant another go here.

Why would he take this job?

Terry Francona is a former White Sox minor-league manager and if his health is willing, he’ll probably stage a comeback. But if that’s the case, why would he come to the South Side? I’ve heard some Chicago people mention it, but it doesn’t seem realistic. Especially since he won’t get big money or control here.

Current Kansas City Royals bench coach

Second time’s a charm? The Royals-White Sox connection was the punchline of last offseason but no joke, the little-known Paul Hoover, 48, would be one of my candidates. He’s from the Rays organization — he came to Kansas City with Matt Quatraro — and I also went to high school with him.

Hoover’s Baseball Reference page is wild. He appeared in 40 MLB games spread over seven seasons from 2001-10. In 2007, he had a brief moment of infamy when he broke up Mets starter John Maine’s no-hit bid in the eighth inning with a swinging bunt down the third base line. The Mets hadn’t had a no-hitter to that point.

“I tell it now like, back in the day, when our parents would tell us they walked to school in 10 feet of snow and it was only an inch, I tell them it was a line drive into left field,” Hoover told me. “It was really a swing and a bunt.”

Hey, if he can make it in New York (and Kansas City), he can make it in Chicago.

(Top photo of Skip Schumaker: Brett Davis / USA Today)