Shane Smith dominates Nats as White Sox take hope from 102-loss season into 2026

WASHINGTON — The mood in the White Sox’ clubhouse was loose before they played the final game of another dismal season Sunday in the nation’s capital.

But it wasn’t just a last-day-of-school atmosphere in a room full of youngsters who’ve relished their first taste of big-league action without carrying much baggage from the Sox’ previous seasons of triple-digit losses in 2023 and 2024.

It was also an excitement to come back next year to prevent a fourth consecutive season of 100-loss futility.

The Sox’ season-ending 8-0 victory against the lowly Nationals locked in a 60-102 record for first-year manager Will Venable, who said his team still isn’t putting a number on its 2026 victory goal but is determined to turn the corner toward contention.

Venable said the Sox’ 2025 record — a 19-game improvement over that of the historically bad 2024 squad — only serves as motivation because ‘‘we don’t want that to happen ever again here, we don’t anticipate that happening here anytime soon and we feel like we’re going to separate ourselves from that.’’

‘‘To undermine our progress just because we’ve lost 100 games just doesn’t make sense to me because there’s a lot of good stuff happening,’’ Venable told the Sun-Times as he reflected on his first season at the helm. ‘‘We didn’t come into this year talking about, ‘We want to win X amount of games or not lose X amount of games.’ It was, ‘We need to accomplish these actual tangible things that we want to do on the field, that we want to do in the clubhouse.’ So that will be the focus. And if you do those things and focus well, then your win total is going to be where it should be.’’

That might not be of much comfort to fans who want to see the front office make significant free-agent additions to jump-start a slow-moving rebuild, but they can take comfort in the rookies who established themselves as components of a competitive future.

The season finale Sunday showcased plenty of the ingredients that general manager Chris Getz & Co. say will cook up the contending feast fans have been mostly starved for this century.

There was Rule 5 Draft pick Shane Smith taking a perfect game into the sixth inning against the moribund Nats. The early favorite to be the Sox’ Opening Day starter next season allowed one hit and struck out eight in six dominant innings to put an exclamation mark on his All-Star season.

There was rookie shortstop Colson Montgomery working a walk and scoring on a two-run home run by Miguel Vargas.

And there was rookie catcher Kyle Teel getting on base for the 29th time in his last 31 starts.

It was a far cry from the first two months of the season, when the Sox scarcely were outpacing their 2024 results. Montgomery’s call-up July 4 helped the Sox go a more competitive 28-37 after the All-Star break.

In the end, however, it was only good enough for a tie for third-most losses in a season for the Sox, continuing the worst three-year stretch in franchise history.

Are the excruciating growing pains worth it? Recent history suggests they might be.

The Astros hit the century mark in losses each season in 2011-13 and had 92 losses in 2014 before embarking on a decadelong contention window that only this season showed signs of closing. They have two World Series titles to show for it.

But the Astros’ front office has shown aggressiveness with signings and trades that feel foreign to fans of a team that has made only three brief playoff appearances since winning a title 20 years ago.

For now, establishing an identity is more important than fantasizing about additions, if you take the Sox’ word for it. Venable said they’re getting there.

‘‘We’re going to continue to run hard,’’ he said. ‘‘We’re going to continue to cover and back up bases. We’re going to do these tangible things that we’re committed to . . . because we know they’re important, regardless of past results.’’