This story was excerpted from Scott Merkin’s White Sox Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

I’ve covered the White Sox for 21 seasons with MLB.com and 22 overall, and I labeled 2022 as the most difficult and underachieving group of my run. It certainly wasn’t record-wise, but in regard to expectations at the center of the competitive window for this much ballyhooed rebuild and how they played on the field, it fit that description.

Then came 2023, and it took over that top spot. The White Sox started 7-21 and have never put together any sort of sustained run of success. Maybe that run is still to come, but it’s easy to understand the fanbase’s angst over what has transpired and the desire for a new hand guiding the next rebuild/reshape. It’s a sentiment White Sox general manager Rick Hahn understands, as he expressed during his extended pregame media session on Monday.

“I would say I absolutely get that. That’s the nature of pro sports,” Hahn said. “The fact of the matter is, I probably wasn’t as smart as everyone thought I was when I was winning Executive of the Year a couple years ago, and the odds are I’m probably not as stupid as people think I am now.

“But this is the nature of the beast. Look, at the end of the day, whether I’m here or not is going to come down to any of [chairman] Jerry Reinsdorf or [executive vice president] Kenny Williams or myself feeling I’m not the right guy going forward.”

Hahn is an exceedingly bright individual -- he’s a Michigan man, so how could he not be? He possesses a good sense of humor, which is a necessity for the struggles and inherent failure built into his job, and he had a detailed vision with Reinsdorf and Williams as to how this plan would play out. It never hit close to that pinnacle.

So, is there a chance Hahn would give way to someone else’s vision? He was non-committal on Monday.

"We’ll see,” Hahn said. “Again, we’re trying to beat the Yankees. Let’s see what happens over the next few weeks.”

Manager Pedro Grifol and Hahn have talked a great deal about building a winning culture for the White Sox, something Grifol actually spoke about dating back to a one-on-one interview I did with him in February. It was a topic discussed again on Monday, as the White Sox responded to an ESPN article in which Keynan Middleton, who pitched 39 games for Chicago this season before being traded to the Yankees, said the team was lacking in rules and accountability.

It's a culture concept both parties view as a work in progress, and something they believe is essential for a championship team. It’s a concept they will keep developing if they continue to run the show.

“Listen, I’ve been talking about culture here since Day 1,” Grifol said. “I said how important it was to the success of this organization, not just this year, but next year and beyond. Culture drives success. I didn't like the direction our culture was headed. So, we had to make some adjustments.”

“If we were where we wanted to be, I’d be much happier about the whole situation. We’re not, so I take responsibility for that,” Hahn said. “We've had numerous conversations over the last few months. Numerous meetings, one-on-ones with various players, coaches, larger conversations with larger groups about what we’re going to do moving forward. It’s been an important priority.”