Chris Sale spent Wednesday doing what he’s done so often in Atlanta this season: carving through a lineup and looking every bit like a Cy Young finalist again. The 37-year-old left-hander struck out 10 Reds over 5⅔ innings of one-run ball, and that punchout total pushed him to 200 for the year in the Braves’ 3-2, 11-inning win over Cincinnati. Only Randy Johnson has posted nine seasons like that among lefties.
After the game, Sale’s thoughts turned to Don Cooper, whose death was announced earlier in the day. Cooper was Sale’s first big league pitching coach, and the connection stretched from Sale’s 21-year-old rookie season - when the White Sox rushed him to the majors just two months and 10⅓ minor league innings after taking him 13th overall in the 2010 draft - through six more full seasons in Chicago. That run included five All-Star Games and five top-six Cy Young finishes.
Sale had already been talking about Cooper on the podcast Baseball Is Dead, and he laid out exactly what the coach meant to him.
"To start my career, I had potentially the best pitching coach for me to start my career in Don Cooper. When I came out of the draft, like [podcast co-host Dallas Braden] said, it was assholes, elbows, kneecaps, I mean, I was going all over the place.
It was herky-jerky, low three-quarter slot. Nobody thought I was going to hold up.
No one thought I was going to be a big league-- you know, injury concerns, the whole thing.
And I remember him, he's like, 'I'm not changing a thing.' He's like, 'You repeat your mechanics well,' and he kind of rattled off a few things and he's like, 'I want you to be you.'
And he instilled confidence in me when I really didn't deserve to have any. I was a first round pick or whatever, but like they got me to the big leagues quick and I'm just, I felt overwhelmed.
I felt like I was out of place. And he's like, 'No, kid.
You're here for a reason and we're going to rip it.'
And I remember there were even sometimes even just random things that just instill confidence in you. I'd be throwing a bullpen midweek.
I'd get like four pitches in, and he just like put the balls down on the rail -- because you know how pitching coach have extra balls if you spike one or whatever -- he'd just put them down. He goes, "I've seen enough.
I'm out.' And I'm like, 'Well, if he's not going to stick around, I'm not sticking around.'
So, I throw like a six-pitch bullpen. He's like, "All right, we're good.
Go for it."
And again, he'd sit there and watch me fail. He'd just watch me absolutely implode on a mound and he'd make me learn from it.
He coached me down a highway. He didn't coach me down a hallway.
So he kind of let me get off a little bit and try to recorrect on my own before he would step in and say, 'OK, this is the deal.'"
Cooper’s death also brought back a wave of nostalgia, and that part makes sense. He was a major figure for the White Sox and one of the central reasons they won a World Series in the last 109 years. Even now, the image of four straight complete games in the ALCS still feels more unreal with every passing year.
But the memory of Cooper reaches beyond 2005. It also points back to a simpler era that lasted 18 seasons, when a team could hand a raw arm like Sale to a coach like Cooper after barely any minor league time and let the two sort it out together.
It was the same with pitchers like Jon Garland, José Contreras, John Danks and Gavin Floyd, who could take their lumps for a while while learning how to get through 200 innings. Matt Thornton got a career revival by lengthening his stride, and everyone else got a cutter.
"Coop'll fix 'em" became the shorthand, and if he couldn’t fix someone, maybe nobody could.
That kind of setup belongs to another time, though. Pitching development is broader now, with more voices and more methods than ever before.
There’s no reason to put all that authority in one person’s hands the way teams once did. Still, there was something clean and satisfying about a fast-talking New Yorker selling one approach across a roster and getting real results from it.
Everybody knew the same TV shows, everybody knew the same halftime act, and everybody knew who was likely to take the first six innings for the White Sox. Don Cooper and that old baseball monoculture fit together perfectly.
In Other News...
Ian Happs Wrigley Gesture Felt Bigger Than A Normal Thank You
After a recent game at Wrigley Field, Ian Happ gave the crowd one of those small but memorable gestures that tends to stick around longer than the final score. The Cubs outfielder tossed a ball into the stands with a thank-you message attached, along with $300 for the fans, a fitting touch from a player who has spent his entire big-league career in Chicago since the club drafted him in 2015.
It also landed at a moment when the backdrop around Happ feels a little heavier than usual. The Cubs have already wrapped up a postseason spot, but there is no guarantee they will get another home game, and Happ is scheduled to reach free agency after the 2026 season. So a simple note and a wad of cash to the crowd carried a little extra weight, the kind of gesture that makes you wonder whether Wrigley might be seeing one of its most familiar players in a regular-season setting for the last time. [Read more 🡒]
Cubs Clinched October But Their Biggest Wild Card Fight Remains
The Cubs have already checked the most important box, locking up a postseason berth for the second straight year with a 2-1 win over the Marlins, but the real work is still ahead. After a season in which midseason moves helped steady a pitching staff that had given them trouble, Chicago enters October with a clearer path than it had a few weeks ago and a chance to make the Wild Card round more favorable.
Chicago still finds itself in a tight battle for the top Wild Card spot, and that matters as much for positioning as for momentum. The Cubs own tiebreakers over both the Padres and Phillies, a useful edge if the race stays crowded, and it leaves them with a small but meaningful cushion as they try to turn a playoff ticket into a more manageable opening series. [Read more 🡒]
Cubs Still Have A Real Shot To Shape Their October Path
With a week left in the regular season, the Cubs are still very much in position to influence not just whether they get into October, but how the bracket may break once they do. San Diego sits atop the National League wild-card race by a game, with Chicago and Philadelphia tied just behind, and the Cubs have already done important work for themselves by owning the head-to-head tiebreakers over both clubs.
Chicagos path is not just about chasing the Padres down, it is about what happens in the standings around them, because MLBs tiebreaking rules could swing the order and the matchups that follow. Philadelphia has the edge over San Diego but not over Chicago, which adds another layer to a race that still has room to shift in ways the Cubs can use to their advantage. [Read more 🡒]