Dylan Cease is in a much better place now after joining the San Diego Padres at the start of the 2024 MLB season.
He currently has a record of 4-2 in seven starts with his current team, posting a 2.55 ERA with 48 strikeouts in 42 1/3 innings.
Chicago White Sox traded the 28-year-old to the Padres in exchange for Steven Wilson, Drew Thorpe, Jairo Iriarte, and Samuel Zavala.
He spent five seasons with the White Sox, and the last one, as he described it, was among the worst years of his professional career.
A series of Dylan Cease trade rumors swirled around shortly after the White Sox's season ended.
He was the subject of speculation, and the result of the 2024 season made it easy for him to look for new scenery.
"I still think that in the minds of a lot of people we had a really good chance to compete," Cease said ahead of his return to Chicago for a series with the Cubs.
"I think we feel like we took a chance to compete and we just didn't put it together. We had a really bad year and it obviously kind of led to the need to kind of redo everything."
The White Sox were indeed in it in the middle of the season. They also put up a good roster, with many hoping to prove themselves.
However, the organization never found stability, and they had a horrible finish to the season, settling for the third-worst record in the American League at 61-101.
All-Star pitcher Liam Hendriks attributed their season's failure to off-the-field issues, including locker room leadership.
"We had too many guys pulling in different directions, too many cooks in the kitchen trying to fix what they thought was [wrong]," Hendriks told the Chicago Sun-Times in February this year.
"There's a lot of Type-A people in a clubhouse. You've got certain people thinking, 'This is the way it's got to go.' Certain people want to fix something, so they just scream and yell until someone fixes it. There wasn't, honestly, enough positivity and eagerness to go out there and play on a day-to-day basis."
Dylan Cease hopes the White Sox will figure it out
Although Cease has already entered a new chapter of his MLB career, he still hopes for the best for the White Sox.
The 2022 All-MLB Second Team member is surprised by his former team's struggles this season but believes they will eventually recover.
He thinks a baseball game can be stupefying at times; then the White Sox will suddenly be good again.
As for the San Diego Padres, they have work to do, too.
Right now, they look like a mid-club with an 18-19 record, eighth place in the National League, and second to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the NL West.
Cease's time to reunite with his former club and fans will be on September 20, when the White Sox play a three-game series at Petco Park.
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