Black Sox Blog

Frank Thomas made his return to Chicago this week, and in the series opener, he definitely made an impact.  The good news is, he didn’t make THAT much of an impact that we lost the game.

For most of the game, the White Sox were down 4-1.  Then just like last year, they stormed back and scored three in the eighth to tie the game up.  Jermaine Dye and Brian Anderson both homered to account for the three runs.  Then in the bottom of the tenth, A.J. Pierzynski scored on Pablo Ozuna’s squeeze attempt.  Jon Garland had a decent enough start to keep us in the game and Bobby Jenks improved to 2-0 with two shutout innings to close the game out.

On Tuesday, we jumped all over Kirk Saarlos and by the end of two innings, we had a 5-0 lead.  The White Sox kept running up the score from there, and by the end of the game, it was 9-3.  Javier Vazquez improved to 5-3 and he gave up three runs on six hits and four walks with three strikeouts.  Paul Konerko and Jermaine Dye hit their twelth homerun of the season and Jim Thome hit his 18th.  Thome finished the game with three runs.

Yesterday was another close one, but Mark Buehrle got the job done.  He gave up one unearned run on six hits and three walks with three strikeouts in seven innings, and he’s now 6-2 on the season.  Jenks picked up his thirteenth save of the season.  On the hitting side, nobody was brilliant because the Sox were held to six hits but Rob Mackowiak’s RBI single in the sixth ended up being the difference.

The Tigers are finishing up their series in Kansas City while we travel to Toronto to take on the Blue Jays in a three game series.  It’s looking more and more like the Tigers are for real so we need as many wins as we can get.

The White Sox are now 3-9 this spring, near the bottom of the Cactus League.  They dropped their game against the Angels this afternoon and once again they had a hard time getting hits, much less putting runs on the board.  It’s the fifth time this spring they’ve scored two runs or less and today it was against rookie Jared weaver.

Mark Buehrle had a great game.  He went five innings and gave up only four hits.  He was replaced with Dustin Hermanson, who proceeded to give up three runs in the sixth.  Tim Redding was also hit hard and gave up three runs in his one inning.  The Sox take on Oakland tomorrow, although Frank Thomas isn’t scheduled to play.

Ryan Sweeney and non-roster invitee Josh Fields lead the team with three home runs. Fields is having a particularly good spring and five of his six hits (in 13 at bats) have been for extra bases.  He also leads the team with six RBIs.  Sweeney’s hitting .421 with an .895 slugging (in 19 at bats) and he’s tied with Jerry Owens with five runs.

Black Sox Blog favorite Joe Crede is having a pretty rough spring.  In seventeen at bats, he has two hits and he’s driven in only one run.

This doesn’t seem to want to go away.  Frank Thomas was annoyed at how he was let go this season.  Can’t say that I blame him because he’s only the best White Sox hitter ever.  Anyway, he feels he was just sort of lost in the shuffle when he should at least had a sit down with someone prior to be cut.  On the other hand, he was paid $3.5 million as part of his buyout, which is a pretty good parting package no matter how you look at it.

Now White Sox GM Kenny Williams raised the bar by calling Frank Thomas an idiot.  Thomas hasn’t seemed to want to let it go, and Williams almost to appears to have snapped.  You’d expect more from a GM, but I’m not really familiary with Williams temperment.

It’ll be interesting to see how Thomas fires back.

I’m not surprised that Frank Thomas ended up in Oakland.  Billy Beane appreciates the kind of player Thomas is, so that’s where he’ll a chance to make one last push towards the Hall of Fame.  The deal has a base salary of $500,000, but Thomas can make as much as $2.6 million more if he gets enough plate appearances and his injured foot is fine.

 I was really sad to see Thomas go.  He’s one of the greatest White Sox hitters of all time, which is why I’m going back and taking a look at his stellar career.  I wish the Big Hurt the best of luck, except when he’s facing off against us.

If there was any question that Frank Thomas was a star in the making, his first full season ibn 1991 put any of those to rest. Frank Thomas got off to a rough start (.200 batting average in his first ten games) but he then hit homeruns in back to back games and never looked back. By the end of the season, he’d rack up numbers that would garner him a third place finish for the Most Valuable Player behind the eventual winner, Cal Ripken, Jr. and slugging first basemen (and first player to hit 50 homeruns in fourteen years) Cecil Fielder.

Frank Thomas finished first in the league in walks (138), OBP (.453) and OPS (1.006). He finished ninth in hitting (.318) and fourth in slugging (.553). His 32 homeruns put him fifth in the league.

Thomas also had some monster games. He had his first multi-homerun game on July 15. On May 23, he went two for five with five RBIs and on June 14 he went four for five with two doubles, a homerun, two runs and five RBIs. His third “five RBI” game of the season came on June 24 in which he went two for four with a double a homerun and five RBIs.

Here’s a look at the numbers…

Games 158
AB 559
Runs 104
Hits 178
Doubles 31
Triples 2
Homeruns 32
Walks 138
Strikeouts 112
Stolen Bases 1
Caught Stealing 2
BA .318
OBA .453
SLG% .553
OPS 1.006
RC 142
RCAA 75
RCAP 64
RC/G 9.47
ISO .234

It didn’t take Frank Thomas long to make his mark on major league baseball. After being picked seventh overall in the 1989 draft after starring at Auburn University, Thomas made his major league debut on August 2, 1990. On that day, Thomas ended the game zero for four, but on his final at bat he hit into a fielders choice that scored Ivan Calderon. While he’d get his first RBI in that game, he’d have to wait until the next day to get his first major league hit, a two run triple to centerfield. It wasn’t until the end of August that Thomas hit his first career homerun. It was August 28 at the Metrodome.

For most of the season, Thomas was hitting well above .300 and had an OBP above .400. His OPS of .983 put him at a very impressive OPS+ of 177. He only hit seven homeruns, but as we know, those would eventually come. The oddest thing about his season was a negative. He finished with 44 walks and 54 strikeouts. While that’s a pretty impressive ratio, it wouldn’t be until 2001, over a decade later, that Frank Thomas ended a season with more strikeouts then walks.

It’s hard to nail down Thomas’ best game in 1990. He went three for five with two runs and an RBI on September 22 (his only three hit game of the season), and he drove in three runs on August 31. He had 17 multihit games and he had a thirteen game hitting streak in September.

Here’s a look at Frank Thomas’ numbers in 1990, courtesy of Lee Sinin’s Sabermetric Baseball Encyclopedia..

Games 60
AB 191
Runs 39
Hits 63
Doubles 11
Triples 3
Homeruns 7
Walks 44
Strikeouts 54
Stolen Bases 0
Caught Stealing 1
BA .330
OBA .454
SLG% .529
OPS .983
RC 48
RCAA 26
RCAP 21
RC/G 9.46
ISO .199

The Chicago White Sox bought out Frank Thomas for $3.5 million, making one of the greatest hitters to ever lace up his cleats on the South Side a free agent.

We all know Thomas has been less then durable the last few years, so the decision doesn’t come as a surpise. In three of the last five seasons, Frank Thomas wasn’t even able to make it to the 80 game mark, although one of those seasons (2003) was also an MVP caliber season. However, I think some team is going to pick him up and use him as a DH. You don’t find too many players with a career OPS of .995 who also has more walks then he does strikeouts.

Best case scenario is the Sox get him back. You figure to make it worth it, they’d have to sign him for less then $6.5 million. They had an option for $10 million, and they’ve already spent $3.5 on the buy out.

Chris Widger, the Sox backup catcher, agreed to terms with the Sox. He’ll be making $650,000 next year.