Sox Machine: Chicago White Sox blog

Johnny Damon, northern Belle

If you've somehow missed hearing that Johnny Damon has jumped from the Boston Red Sox to the New York Yankees, please let me know.  I'd like to crash at your place for a bit.

Damon has spurned the BoSox, signed with the Yankees, shorn his trademark mane and mountain-man beard, and now that's all we're going to be hearing about for the next....four years.  Terrrrrrific.

The Bronx Bombers stole a key member from their toughest divisional competition while addressing a weakness, giving many of those who follow the Yankees a burst of confidence.

But before Yankees fans start ordering their AL East Champs t-shirts, they should ask us Sox fans what happened when Jerry Reinsdorf took Albert Belle away from the Indians in free agency after the 1996 season.

Nothing. 

And Belle was a far better player.

Jerry Reinsdorf inked the malcontent slugger to the then-largest contract in baseball, and he actually had earned it.  He had three consecutive seasons with a slugging percentage over .623, and he was only one year removed from a season in which he became the first player to hit 50 homers and 50 doubles in the same season.

The Indians had rolled to their second straight divisional title in 1996, winning the AL Central by 14 1/2 games.  The Sox were overmatched in large part due to their weak outfield.  Tony Phillips, Darren Lewis and Danny Tartabull (wow -- remember them?) were no match for the Tribe's trio of Belle, Kenny Lofton and Manny Ramirez.

So the Chicago front office decided to address its weakness by robbing the Indians of their strength.  Taking Belle away from Cleveland, and adding Belle to the Sox, was supposed to make a world of difference.  It didn't.  The South Siders finished below .500, missing out on what could've been a winnable division considering Cleveland won it with only an 86-76 record.

Belle's sub-par performance was a big reason why they faltered, although Terry Bevington was arguably the worst full-time manager in Sox history -- he of the signals to a bullpen in which nobody has warmed up.  The infamous White Flag trade didn't help matters either, but a normal Belle performance probably would've ensured that such a move would have never occurred.

The surly power hitter struck out twice as much as he walked, after years of walking more than whiffing.  He lost 130something points in slugging, 80 points in on-base percentage, and played a godawful left field to boot.  That wasn't what the White Sox had in mind for $10 million a year. 

To Joey's credit, he did rebound with one of the most dominating offensive performances in White Sox history -- 48 doubles, and a team-record 49 homers and 152 RBI.  Of course, that year the Sox had no pitching to speak of.  The window of opportunity had closed, Belle escaped Chicago with a nifty clause in his contract triggered because he wasn't the highest-paid player in the game anymore, and the Pale Hose went into rebuilding mode with "The Kids Can Play."

Damon's situation will be different in New York, because he won't be expected to contribute as much as the Sox needed Belle to put forward.  The pin-up model just needs to be better than Bernie Williams was in 2005, and that can almost be assured.

But a team would like to be getting a true difference-maker for $13 million a year, and I don't see that.  Damon's OPS has never been remarkable, he has decent speed but nothing game-changing, and his range in center field is countered by an atrophic throwing arm. 

Cleveland had a much bigger void to fill with Belle's absence, and while one player couldn't make up for his production, a combination of them got the job done.  Brian Giles came up through the farm system and David Justice was signed as a free agent, and both those guys made sure that the Tribe would continue to have no problem scoring runs.

If Boston grabs former White Sox prospect Jeremy Reed away from Seattle, or perhaps Coco Crisp from the current Indians, they'll have recouped most of what they lost when Damon departed.  His image may be larger-than-life, but his shoes aren't that hard to fill.  Should the Red Sox make a couple of right moves, the coverage the Damon signing received may be much ado about nothing.