My dad grew up a Brooklyn Dodger fan, so he knows something about disappointment and protective amnesia.  He always says that its been a good year if your team is within five games of the playoffs in September.  Five games is manageable.  If you're within five games that late, it means you've had a competitive Summer and been entertained.  You've had hope.  That's enough pleasure to justify all the countless hours, cold night games and bad food that we invest in our team.  I agree with him and its what I try to teach my girls as the standard for identifying with a team.  My question to you all is, what constitutes a successful season by your standards?

I guess the macho Ricky Bobby answer would be that coming in second just makes you the first loser so the only successful year is one where you win the World Series.  Yankees fans have this attitude which is why its been so pleasant to be around them this decade.  I don't buy that but that's just me.  Anyway, as of right now, what do the Sox have to do in order for you to look back in November and say "that was a decent season"?

(Just to play around with the new stuff, I'll even try to attach a poll to this.)

[Update by The Cheat, 10/06/08 7:48 PM CDT ]: This was originally posted on March 27th. I've bumped it for effect. Comments reopened.

Poll

What is the minimum result you would consider a successful season for the 2008 White Sox?

5%

World Series Champoions or nothing, baby.

27 votes

2%

AL Pennant

11 votes

31%

Make the playoffs

165 votes

39%

Meaninfully contend for the playoffs (within 5 games of a spot in September).

206 votes

5%

A .500 record

31 votes

3%

Improve on last year's disaster.

16 votes

2%

Have a better record than, or win the season series against, the Cubs.

13 votes

10%

Acquire or develop players who you think will make the team appreciably better in 2009-11.

57 votes

526 votes | Poll has closed

I have a sense that there are some number of us who are afflicted with the European malady of caring about football (the real kind) and the English Premier League.  I thought it might be fun to set up a private Friends League to play fantasy football for the coming Premier League season.  The Guardian has set up pretty good looking game that is free to enter and looks a step more sophisticated than the traditional "goals and clean sheets" kind of thing.  It rewards crosses, tackles, interceptions and bunch of other stats that make roster decisions more interesting.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/fantasyfootball

The league I set up is named South Side Sox and the password is ozzie.

Anyway, if you have any interest in "soccer" at all, check it out.  I know that, for me, having a reason to pay attention to the fixtures on a weekly basis focuses my interest and has helped me get a handle on the game.

I look forward to playing with you.

One thing recent White Sox history has taught us is that you can replace scars with mediocre players and generate significant improvement.  Think Orlando Hernandez over Dan Wright, AJ Pierzynski over Sandy Alomar, etc. Right now, the Sox are fielding a surprisingly decent team with a Juan Uribe shaped scar at second.  Now one could, I suppose, cast longing eyes in the directions of Danny Richar's rehabilitation or engage in wish-casting that Alexei Ramirez is ready to be a major-league player if only he were to play every day.  Neither option looks very promising to me.  So the question for you is, are there any mediocre second basemen out there that are either being under-utilized by their teams or are about to become superfluous as their teams fade from contention?  I'm not looking for a Brian-Roberts-for-Josh-Fields-and-Aaron-Porreda type blockbuster (although I would make that deal).  Rather, I'm looking for a cheaply available, replacement or league average type middle infielder who can do the job better than what we've got.  Would there be any point in bringing back an alumni like Iguchi or Ray Durham?  Does Ronny Beliard have anything left?  For the love of God, isn't there someone who can do this better than Uribe?

Sunday's Tribune had a story (under an unusual joint Gonzalez-Rogers byline) on the Wilder firing: Wilder Story. There's a fair bit of personal stuff on who Wilder was and how hard this is for Williams to take, but there is some hard reporting as well:

Williams and other Sox staffers would not elaborate on details of the investigation because it is ongoing. Williams wouldn't say if financial improprieties were involved, but a source with knowledge of the probe said there were questions regarding the manner in which signing bonuses were distributed to Latin American prospects. Investigators were seeking to determine if Wilder and dismissed scouts Victor Mateo and Domingo Toribio were skimming from those bonus payments.

An MLB investigator confirmed to the Tribune on Saturday that the probe involved skimming and that it currently is limited to the White Sox. 

. . . .

Wilder has been keeping a low profile since rumors of a probe of the Sox's Latin American operations first surfaced. In the statement announcing his dismissal, the Sox said they conducted their own probe before asking Major League Baseball's Department of Investigations to get involved.

The findings, the statement said, have been turned over to federal authorities to see if any federal laws were violated.

When the news first broke, Cheat speculated that the causes were likely to be money, drugs or falsifying immigration documents.  Gonzalez' initial reporting suggested that it was money and now we have a second story confirming the initial speculation. 

If this report is accurate, it may be the best case the Sox could hope for out of this shitty situation.  If the Sox organization had been involved systematically in distributing steroids to prospects (even if done without the knowledge of Williams or Reinsdorf), you have to think that MLB would come down hard and impose penalties on the team.  Similarly, if there were systematic violations of the immigration laws, the Feds would likely want to make the team serve as an example that such hijinks are no longer considered amusing.  However, if what we have here is essentially an embezzlement scam by Wilder and two of his subordinates, that looks like something where the team has been, at least in part, the victim and may not need institutional punishment.

The reports of how this broke are consistent with an embezzlement scheme.  The Sox' spin has been that this is a problem that they turned up internally and then blew the whistle on themselves.  That's usually a pretty smart way to avoid heavy discipline and its the kind of thing I'd expect a clever and experienced lawyer like Reinsdorf to do, especially given his close personal relationship with Selig. 

The timeline seems to have been:  1. Sox develop suspicions and investigate internally; 2. Sox determine they have a serious problem and ask MLB's Department of Investigations to become involved; 3. The Federales are invited to join the party to determine whether any US laws have been violated.  I'm curious to know whose idea it was to get the Feds involved.  Did Reinsdorf and the Sox always see that as a potential end-game or was it something that came as an unpleasant "suggestion" from the MLB guys?

Now, even if I'm right and the team can avoid organizational discipline, this still sucks pretty hard.  At a bare minimum, it looks like the Sox' Dominican operation has been decapitated.  Also, if Wilder really is looking at criminal charges and the Feds start to work him over, there are going to be some very pointed questions about what he knows regarding any skeletons in the Sox closet (and, I guess theoretically, the Brewers or Cubs as well.)  You never know what a guy looking at jail time will suddenly remember in order to cut a deal.  Of course, that's the blindest of speculation and I'm not really worried about it.  What's worse is that guys wearing Sox shirts stole money from a bunch of kids.  You have to think that will be widely discussed throughout the Caribbean and that it could take a long time before our replacement scouts build up any trust in the area.

Pretty much everyone here understands that it is very unlikely the Sox will make the playoffs this year.  That's a given.  But such is the natural state of White Sox fandom.  We're not like the aristocratic Yankees or Cardinals or teams that expect it to be their divine right to contend year after year.  We understand that the universe isn't fair, that the innocent suffer and that we are fundamentally alone and unloved.  Such is the natural order. 

But that doesn't mean we just take it.

Continue reading this post »

Ok, so we've got a pretty good idea of what the roster is going to look like.  We've got some intelligence on the rest of the League.  We know that Nick Swisher is Teh Awesome, that Alexi Ramirez is wildly intriguing and that Javy Vazquez is making us all think that maybe, just maybe, this is the year he cashes in on all the hopes and potential.  Likewise, we know that Jerry Owens is morphing into Scott Podsednik so fast that he's going to marry a Playmate and start wearing #22, that Crede and Uribe are problems not assets, and that left-handed pitchers are going to be like sunlight to a vampire for our black-clad heroes.  But, as Bill James pointed out so many years ago, it all comes down to runs.  Baseball players are only valuable to the extent they create or prevent runs.  Teams ultimately succeed or fail based on runs.  So, all of our speculation comes down to how many runs can we score and how many do we allow.  What's it going to take and how do we get there?

Continue reading this post »

My sense is that among the knowledgeable, statistically literate baseball pundits (exemplefied by the Rob Neyer/Baseball Prospectus crowd), the consensus is that the Sox are not a contending team.  Even if they back down a little from the forecast of a 90 loss season, most of the people I respect are picking the Sox for a non-contender in the very difficult AL Central.  The basic thesis is that the excellent 2006 run production is going to decline because it was based on exceptional performances by a few aging and/or injury prone hitters while the mediocre run prevention is unlikely to improve significantly.  

The way I see it, we are going to need something like 94 wins to make the playoffs.  Even with all the good teams in the Central, someone is going to win a bunch of games so you're not going to steal the Division with 91 wins.  By the same token, the second place team in the East is going to be pretty good, so the Wild Card isn't going to sneak in with a crappy NL-type record.  So make 94 wins the target.  I don't have resources at my fingertips to calculate this, but I'd guess that means a run differential of at least 95 and probably more like 105.  Call it 100 runs better than the enemy as a fair target for the playoffs.  (And, yes, I know that that the Pythagorean predictions aren't perfect but they serve as a pretty good baseline for this purpose.)

The question is, where are you going to get those 100 runs?  

As Smiling Jack Ross said in A Few Good Men, "These are the facts and they are undisputed:"

2005 741 scored (9th), 645 allowed (3rd), (96 diff.) 99-63 (91-71 Pyth.)
2006 868 scored (3rd), 794 allowed (10th), (74 diff.) 90-72 (88-74 Pyth.)

I don't see us scoring 868 runs again.  It would be a pleasant shock to me if Dye/Thome/Konerko/Crede were as collectively healthy and awesome as they were in 2006.  Could it happen?  Sure, but that's not the safe way to bet.  Plus, I don't see anyplace in the lineup where the slack is going to be made up.  Is Toby Hall going to make up the difference between Dye 2006 and Dye 2007?  No.  Do even the most optimistic of us seen Anderson and Uribe being alot better than they were in '06?  I'm afraid I don't.  

So, we're scoring less and every run we don't score, we're going to have to get back on the prevention side, plus 26 more runs prevented on top of that.  Can we do that?  Well, we did in 2005, but we were much, much worse in 2006 (an increase of 149 runs allowed!).  I can see the bullpen, rotation and defense each getting a little better, if things go right, but I don't see any single factor that is going to dramatically improve our run prevention.  We didn't acquire Johan Santana.  Our bullpen is going to have good and bad patches.  Iguchi is not going to turn into Homer Bush.  But if we get incremental improvement in all phases of run prevention, we can shave the runs down by more than we lose in runs scored.  

And that's what it is going to take, in my view.  So, for example, Buehrle has to pitch more like Buehrle.  Masset and Haeger have to be better than Cotts and Politte.  Anderson and Erstad/Podsednik have to catch the ball better and/or hit enough to stay in the lineup.  If we win on enough of those kinds of bets, we can offset the likely offensive decline and contend.  But that is alot of things that have to go right and anytime you're betting on a series of contingencies, you are betting against the odds.

So, what do you think?  Are my assumptions flawed?  Am I missing a source of likely improvement?  Or do you agree with me that it is unlikely that the Sox will make the playoffs?

Prompted by Cheat-class boredom over all the inactivity and speculation, as well as Bonds' showing up at the Winter Meetings to beg for a job, I pose the following question: Would you support the Sox' signing of Barry Bonds assuming the contract was not an issue (say, 1 year, $5 mm plus incentives with protection for us if he is indicted)?  Note that I'm not saying there is any chance of this happening.  I'm just curious what the community would think of the idea.

On the positive side, he's far and away the best hitter available.  Even in last season's haze of injuries and controversy, he hit .270/.454/.545 in 130 games.  Although he looks slow and fat, he's still a tolerable left-fielder; not good, of course, but he won't kill you.  Plus, since the Giants didn't offer him arbitration, we could acquire him without giving up and draft-picks.  I think signing him would make the Sox the instant favorites to win the Central.

On the negative side, he's Barry Bonds.  He's a flaming jerk who is likely to be unpopular with his teammates and the media.  He would be the number one story about the Sox, everyday, all season.  As he caught and surpassed Aaron, the pontificating and attention would be stiffling.  Plus, he's a rule-breaking cheat.

So, what do you think?  For myself, I'm torn between my contrarian desire to stick a finger in the eye of conventional wisdom (plus, I really like winning) versus my severe distaste for the man and the idea that it just wouldn't be as much fun to be White Sox fan next Summer if we have to deal with the Barry Bonds Show all the time.  

Poll

Should the White Sox sign Barry Bonds?

40%

Yes.

11 votes

59%

No.

16 votes

27 votes | Poll has closed

Here's an interesting quote from ESPN knuckleball afficianado Rob Neyer:

Speaking of the American League Central, it's been said more than a few times that White Sox GM Kenny Williams, flush with starting pitchers, might have more leverage this week than any other general manager. I would agree with that particularly if Williams and his colleagues have some realistic notion of Charlie Haeger's value. I've been promoting this guy since last spring, and I'm going to keep promoting him until he gets the chance he obviously deserves. Nutshell: Haeger looks to me like the best young knuckleball pitcher any of us have seen. He's 23 years old. Over the last two seasons, his ERAs ranging from Class A to MLB: 3.20, 3.78, 3.07 and 3.44. If he threw 90 miles an hour rather than 70, he would be considered one of the dozen or so best pitching prospects in the game. Did I mention that he's 23? And that most knuckleballers don't gain control of their key pitch until their middle or late 20s? If I were Kenny Williams, I would trade one of the guys who throws 90 -- because they have more trade value than the guy who throws 70 -- and give Haeger a slot in the rotation next spring. If I were not Kenny Williams, I would sidle up to him in Florida and try to find out exactly what he thinks about Charlie Haeger.

Now, Neyer is a knuckleball guy and Haeger is one of his pet causes, but I happen to agree with him on this one.  The fact is, Heager's performance has been pretty darn good (http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/H/Charles-Haeger.shtml).  Yes, his walk totals are higher than you'd like, but his ERA is quite nice, his K rate is solid and the HR totals are Jolie-class gorgeous.  By the numbers, he deserves a shot.  

Moreover, don't underestimate his youth.  I think Neyer is correct that knuckleballers develop late.  By way of comparison, Tim Wakefield, didn't even make it to A ball until he was 23 and didn't scratch the majors until he was 26.  He's now 41 and about to throw another year of useful innings for Boston.  Granted, Wakefield's perfomance was a little different than Haeger's.  Wakefield didn't walk as many guys as Charlie has but he gave up alot more homeruns.  Personally, I'd take the guy who can consistently get groundballs, especially in the Cell, but the point is that Haeger has proven himself an effective pitcher years ahead of Wakefield (or Phil Neikro or Charlie Hough, for that matter).

Depsite all this, there seems to be limited enthusiasm for Haeger in the organization, in the media and among the cognoscenti like ourselves.  Is this because of some persuasive scouting evaluation that down-grades him?  Is there something I'm missing?  Maybe it's because of the poor first impression he made during that spot-start at the Cell last Spring (even though he pitched quite well in limited innings out of the bullpen for us in September)?  Or perhaps this comes down to the prejudice against soft-tossers?  If its the later, that's a shame.  I don't want Haeger to go the way of Chad Bradford as a guy whose unorthodox style led to us getting fleeced of a quality pitcher by some sharp organization that can look past convention.  (If Haeger's name turns up as a throw-in with some trade to Oakland or Boston, be concerned.)

Personally, I'm looking forward to seeing if Haeger can contribute out of the pen next year.  Most people tend to throw him into the 6th-man in the pen type of conversations and suggest that we need someone else.  I disagree.  Let's give Charlie a fair shot to contribute as a reliever and, if he pitches the way I think he can, let's ticket him for the rotation in 2008.

Thoughts?

This is a diary entirely untethered to any source or substantiation, but how about Williams making one of his patented under-the-radar quick-strike moves and signing J.D. Drew?  Our friend, Criminal Appeal, at the Ron Karkovice Fan Club (http://ronkarkovicefanclub.blogspot.com/) floated this last week and the more I thought about it, the more I liked it.  In an inflated market like this, you will get killed bidding for the medium range guys.  Guys like Speier and DeRosa are not sufficiently better than the (almost) freely available replacements to justify the extra cash.  But stars are still scarce and J.D. Drew is a star.  He'd fit in beautifully in left and be able to slide over to right if Dye leaves in 2008.  He's a fine outfielder and gets on base a ton.  His most comparable players are Jim Edmonds and Larry Doby, which is fine company to keep.  Drew just opted out of 3 years and $33 million so we'll have to pay notably more.  Maybe 4 years and $60 million gets it done?

Reasons this won't or shouldn't happen:

Drew is represented by Boras.  I'm sure Boras would be happy to take our money but the Sox hate him and will be reluctant to deal with him at all.

4 years and $60 million may not be enough to get it done.  The Red Sox with their Jamesian management know how good Drew is and are in the bidding.  After dropping $51.1 million for the PSL to Matsuzaka, they may figure why not give Drew a $75 million deal?

Injuries, injuries, injuries.  Drew has a pattern of alternating decently durable seasons (135-145 games played) with clunkers where he puts up 75-100 games.  You could spend a lot of money for a lot of DL time.

No stolen bases.  Drew was a crafty but not prolific base stealer when he was younger but now he doesn't run at all.  Ozzie wants a stolen base guy to "put pressure on the defense" (tm) and Drew isn't that.  Kenny does what he wants to do, but he'll pay attention to what Ozzie thinks and Ozzie will want someone like Pierre.

Attitude.  Drew has had a bad reputation since he held-out after being drafted by the Phillies and he hasn't done much to correct it.  He's an even keeled kind of guy who doesn't display much emotion so hyper-fans get on him.  He's a classic lightning-rod for fan blame.  For a recent examply, check out Bill Simmons latest column where he begs the Red Sox not to sign Drew. (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/061117)  

Despite all these issues, I'd still like to see the Sox take a stab at it.  I think Drew will be a better investment than Soriano or Drew for the life of his contract, assuming he stays healthy.  I'm willing to bet on Herm and luck that Drew has the Edmonds career path, not the Bobby Higginson one.  I don't care about Boras, stolen bases or attitude.  Drew is very good ball-player, he fits a serious hole in our line-up and, compared to the other contracts being handed out, he may be reasonably valued.  He's the place I'd put my chips.

Comments?