Exile in Wrigleyville

A modest trade

The acquisition of David Aardsma and Carlos Vásquez from the Cubs for lefty reliever Neal Cotts is a small plus for the White Sox. Mostly, it's a financial plus, as Cotts is eligible for arbitration while Aardsma has less than two years of major-league service time.

Aardsma is a lot like Cotts was a couple of years ago. Aardsma can strike out a fair amount of batters (8.3 per 9 innings in the minors and 7.6 per 9 in the majors) but he walks a lot of batters, too (4.2 per 9 in the minors and 5.4 per 9 in the majors). Sox pitching coach Don Cooper has had some success working with pitchers with this profile: Cotts, Bobby Jenks, Matt Thornton and José Contreras are the best examples.

Sox GM Ken Williams said that Vásquez was just as important to him as Aardsma. I don't see it looking at Vásquez's numbers. He is left-handed and appears to have the good stuff/bad control profile. I have to imagine that the Sox think they can work with him the same way they have with the other pitchers that I have mentioned. According to his page on the Baseball Cube, Vásquez did not play during the 2001 season, so I'm assuming that he was injured. He served a steroids suspension during 2005. If he provides any decent, cheap relief for the Sox in the next year or two, he'll exceed my expectations. Vásquez was among five players added to the 40-man roster on Monday, bringing the Sox roster to a full 40 men.

While he said he would be happy to return to the bullpen, Cotts also said he hopes to get an opportunity to be a starting pitcher with the Cubs, something he knew he wasn't going to get with the White Sox. I wish him well if he gets the chance, but I doubt he would have much success, unless he's been secretly working on a change-up that he's never thrown (to my knowledge, anyway) at the major-league level. A fastball and a slider, neither of them devastating, isn't enough for a starting pitcher.

Rumor patrol

I'm always wary to start chasing down every Hot Stove rumor because, well, I'm kinda lazy. It seems like a lot of wasted effort to me, because most of the rumors don't turn out to be true. This one, however, seems worth mentioning: The Sox are supposedly close to trading Jon Garland and the Texas Rangers are the rumored trading partner. This report (which I saw at Baseball Think Factory) also suggests that the Orioles are interested. The Rangers may also be interested in Brian Anderson. Minor league lefty John Danks is the Rangers' prize that the Sox are interested in, according to the report.

The Sox are known to be shopping a starting pitcher in order to clear a spot for Brandon McCarthy in the rotation and get some young pitching in return, so the Garland-to-the-Rangers-for-Danks rumor is at least plausible. I'd prefer not to trade Anderson. I think he'll give the Sox more on offense next year (his minor league numbers suggest that he can do better than 2006). I participated in a roundtable discussion at South Side Sox last week, and my prediction there for a big trade by the Sox was to go for Vernon Wells of the Blue Jays. I would still want to keep Anderson in such a trade if possible. At worst, Anderson and Ryan Sweeney can be the options for left field in 2007. Anderson may end up as a fourth outfielder at some point, but I think he's worth keeping to find out if he can be an every day player.

These better not be true

I was glad to read Saturday that Sox GM Ken Williams was denying a report in Friday's Boston Globe (which I can't seem to find online) that the Sox were close to signing free-agent shortstop Alex González to a three-year, $15 million contract. The Reds have reportedly signed González to a three-year, $14 million contract. I wouldn't be interested in González at almost any price. I was also glad to read that Williams said there was no truth to a report in Friday's Sun-Times that said that the Angels were offering a package starting with pitcher Ervin Santana in return for Freddy García. I'm glad that that's not true, because if it were and the deal wasn't being announced Friday, I would be worried that Williams was losing it. I would be ecstatic if the Angels offered Santana for García straight up. But that's not going to happen.

That same Sun-Times article, written by Chris De Luca, suggests that the Sox may be interested in reacquiring Aaron Rowand to add some offensive punch to the outfield. The Sox may be interested in hearing what the Phillies want for Rowand, but I doubt he's their solution to improving the offense that the Sox will get out of the outfield. Despite Brian Anderson's struggles with the bat in 2006, he and Rowand really profile very similarly at this point offensively. It would be silly to get an older, more expensive version of that.