Bye, bye, JeDye

Jermaine Dye, the MVP the 2005 World Series for the White Sox, is probably done as a Southsider. The Sox, as expected, declined their option on JeDye, who now will become a free agent.

The Sox also confirmed the reports that they have traded Chris Getz and Josh Field for Mark Teahen. At first glance, it would seem the multi-position Teahen might take Dye's spot in right field, but Sox GM Kenny Williams is already saying that Gordon Beckham will move to 2nd base, while Teahen comes in to play 3rd.

That's definitely workable, though a little surprising. Why not move Beckham to his original position at shortstop, where Alexei Ramirez has had defensive troubles, and move The Missile back over to 2nd? Meanwhile, we hope the Sox are still thinking about going after Chone Figgins as a possible off-season signing. He's speedy, a great lead-off hitter and can play right field, or 3rd base or pretty much anywhere.

The loss of Getz generates mixed emotions. He hit in the .260s and never developed into the lead-off hitter the Sox might have expected (Last year at this time, Kenny was pitching Getz as a solid starter at 2nd), but he displayed nice speed base-running skills, and had his moments last season. It is good to see the Sox got something for Fields, whose time with the Sox started ticking away when Beckham became a star.

Abreu's off the table

The hot stove season isn't even warmed up yet, and one of the players who would have been a great fit with either the Cubs or the White Sox has been taken off the table. Bobby Abreu, the L.A. Angels' southpaw outfielder with power, speed, a decent batting average and plate patience, has re-upped with the Angels.

He would have made a nice replacement for Jermaine Dye on the Sox, or a much better follow-up to Milton Bradley on the Cubs. Now, both teams could end up setting sights on another Angel, Chone Figgins.

Incidentally, it had been reported earlier Thursday that the Sox had traded Chris Getz and Josh Fields to Kansas City for Mark Teahen, another potential Dye replacement, though by the end of the day, the veracity of those reports was in doubt. Well see. Teahen also plays third base, so maybe Gordon Beckham would move to second?

Only good thoughts

The Cubs won 2-1 over the Dodgers Friday, and I guess I had become so accustomed to all-or-absolutely-nothing offensive efforts, I had no idea that the Cubs had not won game while scoring less than four runs since last Sept. 11 (according to the Tribune).

The Cubs managed hits Friday, though not with runners in scoring position, as has been the problem of late. But, they did get just enough from a Koyie Hill solo homer and a bases -loaded sac fly from Kosuke Fukudome for the vcitory. Another very strong pitching performance, this time from Ted Lilly, kept the Cubs in the game.

The Cubs are now 3-1 since their 8-game losing streal ended and are winning for the month, 14-12 with two games to go. While stars and core line-up goes continue to gradually--very gradually--come back from slumps and injuries, guys like Hill, Bobby Scales (though he had a scary 9th inning error Friday), Micah Hoffpauir and Jake Fox are stepping up and doing just enough. More good news: The Gatorade machine survives another day. And, we're getting closer and closer to the return of Aramis Ramirez.

The White Sox, meanwhile, actually won in Kansas City, a feat that was starting to seem as hard as winning in Minnesota. After pounding K.C. 11-3 Friday night with a great pitching performance by Clayton Richard, the Sox also are 3-1 in their last four games, and 5-2 since the 20-1 demolishing at the hands of the Twinkies last week. Jermaine Dye, Paul Konerko, Alexei Ramirez and Josh Fields each had 2 RBIs in this one.

May has not been as good to the Sox: They have an 11-15 record for the month headed into Saturday night's game, though if you ask anyone in Chicago who is in better shape right night, almost anyone would say the Sox. Both teams are in fourth place in their divisions, and the Sox have a losing record, but it's the Cubs who have more work to do, and a taller mountain to climb comeptition-wise.

The last bit of probably good news for the Sox is that they traded Lance Broadway (who was no longer impressing anyone despite past first-rounder status) to the Mets for catcher Ramon Castro and designated catcher Corky Miller for assignment. Castro is probably an offensive step up from Miller and is an Ozzie guy, having been in Florida when Oz was coaching for the Marlins (the Cub fan side of me will acknowledge no further details about teh Marlins during that period).

Mighty K.C.

The Sox have lost two in a row in Kansas City and four in a row overall. With the struggling Jose Contreras set to take the mound Wednesday night, I'm not feeling confident about their chances to bust the losing streak.

With the exception of a 3-0 loss to 2009 Cy Young Award Winner Zack Greinke the other night (What? You say they haven't given him the Cy Young yet?), the problems have been mostly in the pitching department. Last night, gavin Floyd let another lead get away from him after the Sox put him ahead 4-1 early on. Things actually looked pretty good in the early going because the Sox managed to hit well off Kyle Davies, the K.C. pitcher who previously has mystified them.

But, Floyd eventually let 6 runs go to waste before departing, and Matt Thornton and Octavio Dotel helped the Royals to a 7th run as this one went into extras 7-7. The Royals won 8-7 in 11 innings. No, K.C. is not the whimpering mess it once was, and the Sox are now 1-4 this season against the Royals. The worst stat from Wednesday night's game was a woeful 11 walks issued by Sox pitchers.

The Sox actually out-hit K.C. 16-11, so maybe they should have come up with a few more runs. Jermain Dye and Josh Field both homered, A.J. Pierzynski was 4-5, Carlos Quentin was 3-5, and Scott Podsednik had 2 RBIs, but as a team, the Sox left 13 men on base.

Still, I find pitching more troubling right now, as the bullpen has begun to weaken, and Contreras, Floyd and even John Danks have strung together a series of poor outings. Who thought at the start of the season that Bartolo Colon would be the second-most effective pitcher on the Sox after Mark Buehrle. Giving Contreras a breather might not be a bad idea, especially with Aaron Poreda picthing well in the minors, but Ozzie Guillen seems resolved to let Contreras find his old self while hacking his way through meaningful games.

Yes, it is still early, but K.C. is in 1st place, and we don't want them to get used to it.

Trading places

The Cubs looked great Tuesday night, while the Sox looked flat, but our teams traded places Wednesday night, as the Cubs could not muster a single run against the Reds' Johnny Cueto in a 3-0 loss, while the Sox pummeled the Orioles 8-2 behind lock-down pitching from John Danks.

Danks was one of our favorites of 2008, and while he was not as over-powering against the Orioles as he was in his first two starts this year, he kept the Orioles off balance, walking none, limiting them to 4 hits in 7 IP and picking off a runner.

The Sox batters gave him everything he needed early, staking him to a 4-0 lead in the first 3 innings. Jim Thome and Josh Fields had homers. Fields and Chris Getz, working out of the top two spots in the line-up, both had three hits. Fields had 3 RBI and Getz drove in 2 runs.

Scott Linebrink and Matt Thornton were not all that impressive, each getting an inning of work late and letting multiple runners on, but the Sox had plenty of breathing room.

The Cubs, meanwhile, did not get much going against Cueto after stringing together a pair of hits by Kosuke Fukudome and Derrek Lee in the 1st inning. There were a couple other situations in which they had 2 on base without 2 outs, but couldn't find a clutch hit. Milton Bradley, having trouble getting back in the swing of things after injury, struck out 3 times. Lee and Alfonso Soriano both had 2 hits.

Ted Lilly looked pretty good, with his only run in 7 IP coming shortly after he made a throwing error on what would have been a bunt hit anyway. Neither Angel Guzman nor Kevin Gregg could escape their own one-inning assignments without giving up a run each.

The word during last night's Cubs telecast was that Jeff Samardzija was being called up after a scorching run at AAA--I guess I'll start spellking his name correctly. Though Neal Cotts is the most obvious pitcher to be demoted or worse, the Cubs need his left arm, shaky as it is, in the bullpen. The Trib suggested Luis Vizcaino may be the one walking the plank.

The Cubs are about to begin an afternoon game, so get the to a TV or GameDay.

It's still early, he says

Rockies 5 Cubs 2
Cardinals 7 Cubs 4

Tigers 9 White Sox 0
White Sox 3 Rays 2

Again had a few problems with BlogSpot earlier today and so I'm catching up:

Rockies 5 Cubs 2--My first trip to Wrigley this year. Not much has changed, thankfully, except for the Captain Morgan's Club monstrosity along Addison which further clogs of the sidewalks. Why doesn't someone close Clark and Addison already on game day?

I'm just grumpy because the Cubs never got it going against an old mate. Jason Marquis had his ups and downs as a Cub, and as he pitched against his former teamates as a member of the Rockies, he looked a lot like his Cub self: A very hittable pitcher who gets into plenty of jams, but sometimes finds his way out via a timely ground-out, strikeout or--in one case--a strike-him out/thrown-him-out double play.


Colorado beat the Cubs 5-2 Wednesday as SBW watched from the cheap seats, in a game where you kept anticipating a Cubs comeback that never quite happened, right down to the fizzled bottom-9th attempt at a rally. That inning started with a Derrek Lee solo homer (The crowd was on D-Lee at the start of this one for his slow start this season, but he went 3-4 in this game.) The Cubs added 2 baserunner and had Geovany Soto (the tying run) at the plate with no outs.


But within a couple of minutes, the game was over: Mike Fontenot made an ill-advised attempt to advance from second to third on a pass ball. From my lofty perch, it looked like he left late and that the ball didn't get all that far away from Rockies catcher Chris Ianneta. Why he was in such a rush to advance is anyone's guess--if he get's to third and scores on a sac fly, the Cubs would still be down 5-3. Lou could not have been happy.


Next, Geo, who was in his first game back from a shoulder injury and looked pretty rusty the whole game, grounded into an easy double play. The Cubs blew some earlier chances with runners on, but tying run at the plate with no outs will be the hardest to forget. Micah Hoffpauir had an RBI double for the first run, by the way, and Fukie still has his mojo.

The other story of this one was that Rich Harden had a very strange outing, only 3.2 IP, but 8 Ks and 4 BBs. Lights out in the 1st inning, and then increasingly hittable and wild after that. Marquis drove in 2 runs. Soriano let a run score on an error. What else? Neal Cotts was brought in to face lefties, but could get them out--remember that one for later.

Cardinals 7 Cubs 4--Today was just as frustrating, if not more so, as the Cubs squandered some early BBs courtesy of Cards pitcher Adam Wainwright. Milton Bradley made a surprise appearance as a pinch hitter with the bases juiced and was called out on strikes and then thrown out of the game for arguing--get used to that. Bradley started off with the count 3-0 and then looked like he didn't want to swing. I'm sure he would have gotten a pinch-runner if he got on, but he looked extremely tentative, and while Bradley and the crowd got on the home plate ump, it looked to me like he let 3 straight strikes blow right by him.

Other than that, Fukie again showed up when few others did, stroking a 3-run homer. he was caught stealing for the second game in a row--needs to work on that. D-Lee had a sac fly for the other Cubs run.

On the mound, Sean Marshall was definitely at least adequate, with 5 IP, 3 ER and 4 Ks, but was pulled after 93 pitches. Piniella and his staff are keeping him on a short leash to start the season, but I sure would have liked to see him go another inning in this one. He was pulled after an inning-opening single, and handed a 4-3 lead to Aaron Heilman, who gave it up the same inning. Later, Neal Cotts was handed the game with a lefty up and a runner on third, and guess what happened? Single to right field. I loved Cotts as a very effective member of the 2005 World Champion Chicago White Sox, but the last few games he is not doing the one thing he is required to do: Get lefties out.

Anyway, it's a good thing its only April 16.

Tigers 9 Sox 0--Almost nothing worth mentioning from the Sox' blow-out loss on Wednesday. Jose Contreras started well, but got knocked around his second trip through the Tigers' batting order, almost the same thing that happened in his first start. Also, Contreras is just about one of the easiest pitchers around to steal on, and he proved it in this game by letting big, slow Miguel Cabrera steal second base off of him. Cabrera is an amazing player, but if he steals another base all year it will have to be because Contreras is on the mound.

Still, while Contreras was most definitely not dealing in this one, it was Mike MacDougal who really put the game out of reach, giving up 4 ER on 4 hits and 3 BBs in 2 IP. Ozzie seemed determined at the opening of the season to give Mac yet another chance, but we'll see how long that lasts. I'd mention the Sox hitting highlights, but there were none.

White Sox 3 Rays 2--Speaking of stealing bases, the Rays are absolutely relentless in that department. But, they could not do much with lefty John Danks pitching tonight. Danks was pretty tough with 6 IPs, 1 ER and 8 Ks, and left with a 2-1 lead. The runs came on a 2-run homer by Jermaine Dye.

The Rays found it much easier to steal on the Sox bullpen, getting a stolen base off Octavio Dotel and stealing 3 bases off Bobby Jenks as he tried to close out the 9th. Jenks gave up a run, but the Sox fortunately had purchased insurance in the top of the 9th on an RBI infield hit by Josh Fields.

The Sox actually left the bases loaded in the 9th, and didn't make the most of their chances tonight. That usually spells misfortune against the Rays, but this time they escaped.

Thome-time

Chicago is unbeaten so far this baseball season, with the record standing at 2-0 after the White Sox pulled off a thrilling (at least the 8th inning was thrilling) 4-2 victory over the K.C. Royals today. Both Chicago teams have won their openers. 161 games left.

I didn't catch as much of the game as I hoped, but saw some great defense and hitting from Josh Fields, and of course, Jim Thome blasted a three-run homer in the bottom of the 8th for the winner. Mark Buerhle wasn't his usual efficient self--cause for concern after a lousy spring. It seemen like Buehrle had someone on in every single inning, though I haven't looked that closely at my TiVo or the box score yet.

Meanwhile, it appeared like Gil Meche, always tough, was mowing through Sox hitters in a fairly quick game. But, you can always count on The Farns to give up a big homer at just the right time.

I'll follow up a little later with further observations...