After being decimated by injuries during the 2022 season, the White Sox are making changes to their staff ahead of the new year.
Though the team has not yet made an official announcement, it appears they have hired Geoff Head as their new Senior Director of Sports Performance. Head shared the update in a post on his personal LinkedIn just last week.
Head has been involved in professional baseball for the past 15 years, most recently serving as the Senior Director of Health and Performance for the Cincinnati Reds since December 2019. In his role, Head was active in the Reds front office and provided leadership in the specialties of medical, rehab, strength and conditioning, mental skills, nutrition, sports science, and wellness for the MLB team and its affiliates. Following the Reds’ second 100-loss season in franchise history, Head was among the five staff members let go last month.
According to his LinkedIn, Head was previously with the San Francisco Giants where he had spent his 12 other seasons in the league. During his time there, he held a number of roles including Strength and Conditioning Coordinator (2008-2015), Major League Sports Scientist (2015-2017), and Assistant Director of Player Development – Director of Sports Medicine (2017-2019). Head described his responsibilities in the latter role as the following:
“To ensure the holistic intradepartmental staff integration of physical therapy, athletic training, strength and conditioning, sports science, sports psychology, and nutrition as one collective unit in order to create the most well rounded and efficient development plan for each of our players medical and performance enhancement needs. As Assistant Director of Player Development, a priority of ensuring interdepartmental staff integration of the field staff and medical staff operating as a complete unit to serve the full spectrum of our players development.”
Before his time with the Giants and Reds, Head received his M.S. in Kinesiology with an emphasis in Sports Conditioning from A.T. Still University of Health Sciences.
Based on how the White Sox front office was structured in 2022, it appears the position that Head will take over is a new one. For reference, these are how roles were listed ahead of the season:
Major League Training Staff
- Major League Head Athletic Trainer James Kruk
- Director of Rehabilitation Brett Walker
- Director of Strength and Conditioning Goldy Simmons
- Major League Assistant Athletic Trainer Josh Fallin
- Assistant Major League Strength and Conditioning Coach Ibrahim Rivera
- Massage Therapist Jessica Labunski
Major League Medical Staff
- Lead Team Doctor Dr. Nikhil Verma
- Head Athletic Trainer Emeritus Herman Schneider
- Senior Medical Advisor Mike Reinold
- Team Physicians Dr. Jeremy Alland, Dr. Josh Blomgren, Dr. Julie Bruene, Dr. Joseph Hennessy, Dr. Scott Palmer, Dr. Kathleen Weber
- Team Orthopedics Dr. Bernard Bach, Dr. Charles Bush-Joseph, Dr. Brian Cole, Dr. Brian Forsythe, Dr. Grant Garrigues, Dr. Gregory Nicholson
- Team Ophthalmologist Dr. David Orth
- Team Optometrist Dr. R. Tracy Williams
- Team Psychologist Dr. Jeffrey Fishbein
- Team Cardiologist Dr. Kousik Krishnan
- Team Infectious Disease Specialist Dr. John Segreti
Though the organization will likely elaborate further on how both departments will be structured moving forward, the addition of Head looks to be a welcomed positive for all involved. An ESPN article from 2020 highlighted how Head helped the Reds to start tracking biometrics from Trackman and Hawk-Eye with a focus on identifying players’ physiological issues (link here). In a separate article from 2017, Head detailed the Giants’ sports science program that took a high-tech approach to assess health and fitness by looking at “the physiological biomarkers of fatigue and performance” (link here).
As more on this hiring is made available, we will provide additional coverage here and on social media @SoxOn35th.
Featured Photo: Sam Wasson/Getty Images
Doth mine eyes deceive me or are the White Sox finally entering the 21st century when it comes to little things like analytics and sports medicine? Wish they’d done this about 4-5 years ago so as to be ready when their window opened, but better late than never.
I do not know the man, but the change is one of the four areas that troubled me last season.
1). Hundred pitches by fifth inning. Strike totals are impressive but not so the balls thrown raising pitch count.
2). The lack of small ball and using the batter’s box to advantage. 1. At age 75 I can drop a bunt against most any pitcher. Beating it out is another matter. If my team cannot hit against (insert any name) ____________, I’d have the entire lineup bunting to wear out defense legs and cause hurried mistakes. 2. The Oakland A’s Bert Campaneris changed his foot placement: up close, far away, way inside and way outside from pitch to pitch. Campaneris presented a different look to the pitcher. Campaneris was not the best leadoff man average-wise, but he was crafty and smart.
3). The relief corps, unlike Houston and other playoff teams, rarely jelled En masse, and rarely preserved a starters pitched-their-heart-out game.
4). The manager – no comment since he gone.
The careers of Geoff Head and White Sox pitching coach Ethan Katz overlapped with the Giants organization in 2019. Perhaps Katz put in a good word for Head, similar to what Lucas Giolito did with his mentor and high school pitching coach when the former was being interviewed for the White Sox coaching gig in 2020.