Gammons Heaps Praise on Several Young Sox Hitters

In his latest blog over at ESPN.com, Senior Baseball writer Peter Gammons took time out of his usual busy schedule of fawning over the Red Sox to write about young and breakout players he watched over the past several weeks of Spring Training. Surprisingly, the White Sox (specifically Gordon Beckham, Josh Fields, and Alexei Ramirez) got some love.

Beckham got the most air-time, being named as one of Gammons' Most Impressive 20 (or so) young players he saw in action, and favorably compared him to other young and immediately effective players like Evan Longoria or Chase Utley, all of whom he describe have "the big league player walk." Fields and Ramirez were highlighted as 2 players he feels will have breakout years in 2009.

Always nice to get some national publicity, I'm still not expecting much out of Fields, but if he can be effective with the bat and adequate in the field, I'll be very happy. As for Alexei, if 2008 wasn't a breakout year for him, then I'm very excited to see what he can do in '09. And finally, while I'm happy Beckham will be in Birmingham this year to fine tune his game, it's also nice to see more and more people take notice of his intangible gifts, the gifts that help make good ballplayers great. You can't go wrong with guys that both traditional scouts and statheads simultaneously drool over.

Keeping Up with ESPN's Power Rankings

As I noted in this morning's post, the White Sox dropped 3 spots in the weekly ESPN Power Rankings, from #1 to #4. Of course, I know they're nothing more than the opinions of probably a few staffers in Bristol, but it's still interesting to watch the numbers rise and fall as the season progresses and gives you a pretty good feel for how the baseball and sports world feels about your team. Maybe you never though the Sox were in the lower 15 of MLB teams this year, but that doesn't mean a lot of people always agreed with you.

Anyways, the graph is after the jump. Thanks to the National Center for Education Statistics for their nifty little graph maker that easily helped me create the thing and turn it into a nifty, little JPEG file. If you find the image below difficult to read, you can get a larger view by clicking on the graph.



And some extra numbers...

White Sox Average Weekly Position: 7.188
Best Weekly Ranking: 1, Week 15
Worst Weekly Ranking: 18, Week 1
Best 1-Week Jump: 10 spots, Week 7-8
Worst 1-Week Fall: 8 spots, Week 5-6

Also, quick note for the future, the Minor League Report will be a weekly thing, not daily. There's no way I'm doing that everyday. Obviously, if something newsworthy happens on the farm, I'll talk about it here, but keeping daily tabs on the Sox alone consumes enough time, I'm not keeping track of 6 teams in the Carolinas and Alabama everyday.

White Sox beat Royals 9-5, JD Gets Some MVP Love, and 2nd Half Wish Lists

Last night at 12:01, I caught The Dark Knight (go, by the way... It is a tremendous film), so I was exhausted at work all day today and I basically came home at 5 and passed out for a few hours. To make a long story short, I haven't seen much of the Sox's 9-5 win over Kansas City, but it's nice to see that the Sox hitters jumped out on Greinke, who owned the White Sox last Thursday in the Royals 4-1 series salvage. 6 runs in the first inning, Buehrle with another good outing moved his record to 7-8 and the longer than usual 4-day All-Star Break was all worth it.

B-R Box Score/Play-By-Play | Chicago Tribune recap | Sun-Times recap | MLB recap | Soxmachine.com recap

Elsewhere in the Central, Minnesota shut out the Rangers at the Metrodome, 6-0, to keep pace with the Sox and stay 1½ games out. The Tigers lost to Baltimore, 7-4 to drop back to .500 and 7½ games behind the Sox. Cleveland lost to Seattle and are now 14 games back.

Harold Baines will be honored in Sunday's series finale, when the White Sox will unveil a Baines statue in the outfield concourse. Though he spent a lot of time away from the South Side in his career, the #1 pick of the 1977 Draft is still prominent on the franchise's all-time leaderboard. Some notable highlights include:

• Tied for 6th most games played with Hall of Famer Eddie Collins (1,670)
• 4th most Career At-Bats (6,149)
• 7th most Runs Scored (786)
• 5th most Hits (1,773)
• 3rd most Home Runs (221)
• 3rd most RBI's (981)

Congrats, Harold. You deserve it.

MLB.com surveyed all of its writers and Jermaine Dye got the 2nd most 1st Half AL MVP votes, behind (of course) Josh Hamilton. Nice to see that the guys that cover the game have noticed Dye is having another tremendous year and nice to see that Dye recovered from that terrible first half he had last season that really torpedoed his entire season. Barring injury or a complete 2nd-half meltdown, Hamilton will win the AL MVP, but I'm glad that Jermaine is getting some props for what he's meant to the Sox so far this year, especially considering Carlos Quentin has probably been the most talked about member of the team for his break-out season (and rightfully so).

Kyle Long, one of the pitchers I really liked from June's draft, looks like he's headed to college. I remember reading something on Long (of the football-playing Longs... Howie Long is his dad and recent NFL 1st round draft pick Chris is his older brother), that said he would need to be blown away by an offer to reconsider dropping his scholarship to play at Florida State University next year. The Sox took a flyer on him in the 23rd round, but Mark Gonzales reported tonight that Long told Sox scouts that he's going to Tallahassee. A power throwing lefty, I would have liked to see him develop for a few years in the Sox system, but oh well. The two other players I really like, Beckham and Danks, are good bets to sign by August 15, and considering how well the Sox's 2 Rookie ball teams have started this season, hopefully this draft will go a long way to replenishing the Sox's farm system.

As it stands right now, Long would be the 5th draftee who will not ink a deal with the Sox; 16th round pick Brett Basham will return to Ole Miss for his senior season, 31st round pick James McCann will attend the University of Arkansas, 35th round pick Harold Riggins will attend North Carolina State, and 43rd round pick Cory Farris will be attending the University of Kentucky.

Thanks to their 3-3 road trip to close out the 1st half, the Sox dropped 3 spots in ESPN's Power Rankings. They are now ranked the 4th best team in the Majors, behind the Cubs, Red Sox, and Angels. Yeah, they don't mean shit, but it's nice to see the Sox get all the national attention they've deserved. I'm going to try and keep track of the Sox's progress in the power rankings over the 2nd half, just to keep a finger on the pulse of what the World Wide Leader thinks of the Beloved.

Although the White Sox haven't expressed much interest, Freddy Garcia and his agent are targeting a September comeback for the former Pale Hose. The article is from New York, so it specifically mentions the Yankees and Mets as teams that are interested and could use Garcia, but Garcia's name has been a popular hit on MLB Trade Rumors, and I think at last count at least 1/2 of the 30 teams in the Majors have been looking at or expressing some interest in the rehabbing righty.

The White Sox have owned the Royals at home. I know, that's not really news, but the Kansas City Star noted in it's post-game coverage of tonight's win that Zack Greinke personally dropped to 0-6 in his career at U.S. Cellular Field and the White Sox have only lost 18 of the last 70 times the Royals and Sox have played on the South Side. Intra-division dominance... Yes!

Both Joe Cowley and the White Sox blog each published a Top-5 Wish List for the final 70 or so games of the 2008 and season. Both are worth a read and make some pretty good points, though they do mirror one another a bit. So, in the spirit of things, here's my Top 5 Wishes for the 1/2 Half of 2008.

1. Long term contract extensions for Carlos Quentin and Bobby Jenks - Quentin especially has been a diamond that Kenny Williams unearthed from Arizona and not only has been the best offensive player the Sox have had all first half, he's quickly become a fan favorite and gotten a lot of media attention. Jenks, on the other hand, has proven his worth as a closer, both when he's on the field and when he's off (I think we all remember the Misadventures of the Bullpen in Bobby's absence). With the current core of this team aging, the Sox would be well advised to follow in the footsteps of many other teams in locking up their young stars. Along with Buehrle, Floyd, Danks, Alexei, and Josh Fields, I think the Sox have a great core of talent to build around in the next few years.
2. Not overpaying for another starter - In lieu of Contreras and Vazquez's struggles, the Sox have been mentioned as a buyer in this year's Trading Market. While some intriguing names out there are still possibly available such as A.J. Burnett or Justin Duchscherer, one of the pillars of the last few years of the Williams era has been making smart acquisitions, especially in terms of starting pitching. While I wouldn't mind some insurance for Contreras or Vazquez, we've seen this before out of the streaky starters. While in a perfect world, they would both get their heads screwed on straight and take the pressure off the front office, I'd rather see the Sox buy low on another project starter rather if they make a move at all by the trading deadline.
3. Some Individual Hardware - If the season ended today, the Sox would obviously be in the play-offs, but they'd also be shut out of the major awards. OK, I'd take a division title over a sweep of the MVP, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year, and Manager of the Year, but this is a wish list. Unfortunately, barring injury or unexpected collapse, it looks like Hamilton is in control of the MVP race, Evan Longoria is the prohibitive favorite to win the Rookie of the Year, and smart money is on Joe Maddon to be named Manager of the Year, and while these are all good choices, well, I'd like to see Dye/Quentin, Ramirez, and Ozzie steal one of these. I'd like to think Mark Buehrle, John Danks, and Gavin Floyd would be in the conversation for a Cy Young Award, but the fact that none of them were selected to the All-Star Game should let you know what kind of competition they're going to be dealing with.
4. Twins Collapse - Even though everyone points to the 2nd half surge by the Indians in 2005 as a critical reason the Sox were able to tear through the play-offs in 12 games, I wouldn't mind seeing the Twins fall off the pace and leave the Sox with some breathing room by September. There are simply more concerns with this team than in '05, especially in the rotation. I think Ozzie Guillen is a good enough manager and the veteran core of this team is experienced and hungry enough to be able to stay competitive even if the Sox are essentially playing meaningless games the last few weeks of the season, but I'd like them to be able to rest young starters like Floyd and Danks and possibly work with Contreras in the last few weeks of the season, so they're all fresh and ready to go come October.
5. Paul Konerko revival - Ok, I've got to mention this like the two other lists I linked to. If Konerko can find his swing in the last 2½ months of the season then the Sox will have added another big power bat in the middle of their lineup at no cost, which would do wonders in making the Sox one of the more potent offensive teams in baseball and take a lot of pressure off the Sox's already excellent pitching staff.

Finally, in keeping up with former Sox farmhand Gio Gonzalez, he is one of the top candidates to fill the hole in the A's rotation voided by the newest Philadelphia Phillie, Joe Blanton. The A's current starting staff can pitch on regular rotation until Tuesday, so the A's are in no rush to make a decision, but if Gonzalez gets the call, his first start will be sometime by then and with MLB Extra Innings available for free preview to all digital cable and satellite dish customers (I believe) until next Wednesday, the 23rd, everyone should have a chance to see his first MLB start.

In Other News, the Sun Rose in the East Today

I guess it's my fault for being tricked, but when I opened up ESPN.com, they had a teaser for one of Jerry Crasnik's Starting 9 columns. For fear they'd take it down, here's the text:

Can the Rays stand toe to toe with their rich foes? Can Chicago's two Central leaders stay above the fray? Can Josh Hamilton deliver more made-for-Hollywood magic? The second half awaits

Cool, right? I mean, I know they've got to talk about the Cubs because the N.L. Central race is very compelling right now, but I want to see what he'll say about the Pale Hose... Drumroll, please... [opens envelop]... The answer is nothing! Not one word on the A.L. Central leading Sox and our race with the Twins, which is crazy if for nothing else, it was probably the least likely division race that experts would have predicted.


Haven't seen any follow up on this yet, but Gordon Beckham who the Sox used the 8th overall pick on during this June's draft is one of five finalists for the USA Baseball Golden Spikes Award, which is awarded to the top amateur baseball player in the country. Don't know if Beckham will stay at shortstop or move to second base, but if he's as far along as some say he is, the Sox may have the foundation of their middle infield for the next few seasons with Beckham and Alexei Ramirez. Regardless, since Ozzie departed the Sox as a player before 1998, the White Sox have had 5 different Opening Day shortstops (Mike Caruso, Jose Valentin, Royce Clayton, Juan Uribe, and Orlando Cabrera).