While White Sox fans can generally agree that trading Sale was the correct move, he was arguably the most dominant pitcher in franchise history. Let’s take a look back at his White Sox career with five statsistics:
Since they moved the mound to 60’6” in 1893, Sale has the best career strikeout-to-walk ratio of any pitcher with at least 1,000 innings pitched:
1. Chris Sale: 4.78
2. Curt Schilling: 4.38
3. Madison Bumgarner: 4.29
4. Pedro Martinez: 4.15
5. Mariano Rivera: 4.10
MLB
Despite having made only 148 starts, he has more than twice as many double-digit strikeout games as anyone in franchise history:
1. Chris Sale: 35
2. Ed Walsh: 17
3. Juan Pizarro: 15
In the time he was a starter with the South Siders (2012-2016), he has more than twice as many 10-strikeout games as everyone else combined:
1. Chris Sale 35 (in 148 starts)
2. Everyone else: 15 (in 662 starts)
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And consider the fact that he has had to do the vast majority of his work against American League teams, without the luxury of facing a pitcher every 9th time in the order:
Chris Sale: 1244 career strikeouts (9 vs. opposing pitchers)
Clayton Kershaw: 1918 career strikeouts (217 vs opposing pitchers)
Sale leaves the White Sox with a franchise season record 274 strikeouts in 2015. He had five more strikeouts than the next highest total… in 45 percent of the innings …and Sale didn’t even have the luxury of being able to use a spitball:
2015 Chris Sale: 274 strikeouts in 208.2 innings (11.82 K/9 IP)
1908 Ed Walsh: 269 strikeouts in 464.0 innings (5.22 K/9 IP)