Black Sox Blog

I like these kind of low impact moves.  Junior Spivey hasn’t done much the past few years and his “decent” season was way back in 2003.  Still though, Spivey is a guy who can take a walk and probably knows his role by now and he’s solid insurance especially considering Juan Uribe’s status is still in question.  He’s the kind of guy who can get called up in a pinch if something weird happens to our infield and a minor league deal isn’t going to cost us much.

It looks like top White Sox prospect Josh Fields is ready.  He had a fantastic season at Triple A and he even spent some time down in Venezuela playing winter ball.  Now with spring training on the horizon, Fields has his eyes set on a spot on the big league team.  From the sounds of it, the only that might keep Fields off of the White Sox roster is consistent playing time.  Having him wasting away on the bench might not be as good of an altervative as having him get consistent playing time at Triple A.

At this point, according to the story, it looks more likely that he’ll make the team as an outfielder.  Joe Crede has a hammer lock on third until he’s traded (I think it could be a forgone conclusion as much as I’d hate to see it happen) and with Scott Podsednik hurt and Darin Erstad injury prone, left field might be the best shot for Fields.

I have to say, I was pretty pessimistic about the Darin Erstad signing.  I’ve never been a huge fan of Scott Podsednik either and I think having both of these guys on the team (which eventually they will) means we have two low production bats on the 25 man roster. 

That is, until I saw Peter Gammons likes the pickup.  I do agree that the fact that Erstad can play elsewhere gives Ozzie Guillen some flexibility.  This is also a great read on Ken Williams and the White Sox front office.  Good stuff.

In 2007, not only do the White Sox have another run at the playoffs to look forward to, but they also look forward to Jim Thome hitting his 500th career homerun.  Thome is sitting at 472 and he needs just 28 more, which is almost a lock if he remains healthy.  This MLB.com story does a great job of showing Thome’s frame of mind as he enters a pretty exclusive club.

The White Sox signed one soft hitting outfielder to replace an injured soft hitting outfielder.  Scott Podsednik is going to miss a good piece of spring training (6-8 weeks) after he had surgery to fix a sports hernia.  Since his status isn’t too solid, the White Sox signed Darin Erstad to a one year deal to fill in that spot.  Erstad hasn’t had a good year with the bat since 2000 but he is one of the best fielding outfielders in the game.  He’ll probably be batting leadoff despite having only a .341 career on base percentage.

Former White Sox starter Nick Altrock was recently in the spotlight at the Hardball Times.  In the Friday Annotated Week in Baseball History, Richard Barbieri focus was on Nick Altrock, who you all might recognize from my 1906 White Sox diary.  Good stuff.

With Brandon McCarthy gone, Joe Crede now moves back into my number one slot as far as favorite White Sox goes.  I had been predicting a breakout season for Crede the past couple of years and I finally got some redemption last year when Crede belted 30 homeruns and drove in 94 all while playing gold glove caliber defense.

Now the White Sox have come to an agreement with the third basemen and now both sides are able to avoid arbitration.  Crede will make a touch under $5 million.  He’ll have one more year where he’s arbitration eligible before he can test the market.  I’m biased, but I think the White Sox should lock up Crede and deal Josh Fields but odds are, it’s going to be the other way around so once again I’ll see one of my personal favorites dealt away.  Sigh.

Maybe I should start picking my “next personal favorite” sooner rather then later.

According to ESPN.com’s Rumor Central, White Sox GM Kenny Williams has had discussions with Jermaine Dye’s agent about a contract extension.  Dye is coming off of a career and MVP caliber year and in a lot of ways, he can be compared to Gary Sheffield.  Dye carried the injury prone tag for a while and while he’d put together a good year, they were usually seperated by season where he spent a lot of time on the disabled list.

He has had three straight seasons in which he had 500 at bats though so you wonder whether he’s over his past.  If you sign him now, you’ll probably get a little bit of a bargain over what you’d have to sign him for if he has another great season.  Then again, you wonder how much Dye has been dodging fate and when the breakdown is going to come.

I’d be pretty open to say a three year extension.  Anything more then that and I think they’re hoping a little too much. 

The White Sox traded catcher Chris Stewart to the Ranger yesterday for a minor league pitcher.  Stewart spent his season at Triple A last year before he made his debut in a September call up.

Johnny Lujan was knocked around at High A last year as a 22 year old.  His walk rate was awful (43 in 69 innings) and he had a 5.74 ERA as a long reliever.  It’ll be interesting to see if he gets a repeat at High A or if the White Sox push him along to Double A, where he might be out of his league.  Regardless, Stewart wasn’t anything special and he probably wouldn’t be making the big league club so it’s no big loss even if Lujan never works out.

Kevin Goldstein recently listed his top ten White Sox prospects in his latest Future Shock.  While none of them fell into the excellent category, the White Sox did get three in the “very good” section.

Coming in at the top is John Danks, who the White Sox trade Brandon McCarthy for.  Danks had solid seasons at Double A and Triple A despite playing over his head at the age of 21.  He’s a solid left hander who finished last year on a solid note.  He’ll probably compete for that fifth spot in the rotation but I see the youngster starting the season at Triple A.

Ryan Sweeney came in second, and we should be seeing more of Sweeney in 2007.  The only thing that might keep him out of the big leagues is a good start by Brian Anderson although Goldstein speculates that the centerfield job is Sweeney’s to lose. 

Josh Fields is number three and like Sweeney, he has a roadblock to any sort of extended playing time.  He’s a third baseman and while Goldstein looks like he has a good bat, it doesn’t look like he’s nearly as good of a fielder as Crede.

Number four is a familiar face in Gio Gonzalez.  It should be interesting to see where Gonzalez falls this year.  His strikeout rate was where you want it to be and Goldstein thinks a repeat in Double A would do him some good.  We might see Gonzalez by the end of 2007.

The overall prognosis of the farm system isn’t good though.  The White Sox have some good players, but they have little depth.  Not good and something that hopefully will be fixed in the next couple of years.

Well, it looks like now the status of Juan Uribe is up in the air, which is what you could have said before.  After a back forth “I’ll be there” or “I won’t be there” now it looks like there will be a formal investigation in the case where Uribe is being accused of shooting someone.  Now Uribe has gone from “being at spring training” to “hoping his legal troubles won’t affect him attending spring training.”

Sigh.  So we should plan on life without Uribe, which as I pointed out a couple of posts ago, isn’t a huge deal.

This is turning into a mess.  Just a day after reports began surfacing that Juan Uribe might sit out 2007 because of legal difficulties, the shortstop has come and said he’s now expecting to play in 2007 and the whole situation should be resolved this coming week.  Not sure where the disconnect happened here but someone got some misinformation, or Uribe is wildly optimistic about his court date.

The White Sox could be without their starting shortstop in 2007 as Juan Uribe has to report to a judge every two weeks in the Dominican Republic and he’s said he might sit out the 2007 season.

As good as people think Uribe is with the glove, he’s just as bad with the bat.  Uribe hit 21 homeruns but he did it while posting a .257 OBP and a .225 equivalent average.  On top of that, his fielding is a bit overrated.  His “fielding bible” +/- didn’t even fall into the top ten and he had only four fielding runs above average last year.  Adam Everett, who many feel is the best starting shortstop in the league, had 19 fielding runs above average in 2006 and having a guy on the field like Alex Cintron may not cost the White Sox much when compared to what Uribe does on a daily basis.

So while I hope Uribe sorts out his legal difficulties, I won’t really be missing him on the field too much.