Sox Machine: Chicago White Sox blog

Joe Crede: For real, or a Ta-tease?

One of the greatest days of the year is when Sean Forman updates Baseball-Reference.com with the stats of the recently completed season, and 2006 is no different.

Granted, it wasn't as fun as clicking on the Sox's page last year and seeing the red, white and blue bunting with the banner "World Series Champs," but this year's page has plenty of interesting stuff.

Most interesting to me is Joe Crede's stat line.  It was by far his best season of the year, in which he set career highs in all three averages, home runs, runs, RBI, hits, and he tied his career high in doubles.  Yet his OPS+ for the year is only 108.  Through all the turmoil, Alex Rodriguez posted a 140 OPS+.  On one good foot last year and boasting a .212 batting average, Frank Thomas posted a 131 OPS+.

Crede already has plenty of question marks with regards to his back, which The Cheat at South Side Sox examines well enough so I don't have to.  But there are some issues with his performance as well, and they're not all bad.

Crede's on-base percentage is what saps his OPS+, and along with his career highs, he set a career high in his AB : BB ratio at 19.43.  That's not a good thing.  Even at his career high, it's 20 points below the league average.  On the other hand, he drastically reduced his strikeouts.  In 2005, he went 7.14 plate appearances per strikeout; in 2006, he reached double-digits with 10.10. 

With the increased amount of balls in play, he did set a career-high in double plays with 18, but that was mainly due to the last month of the season.  His back flared up, and he stopped going the opposite way because he couldn't generate any power. 

But speaking of injuries, check out who his most comparable player is on his bb-ref page -- Fernando Tatis. 

Tatis had his breakout season in 1999 for the the St. Louis Cardinals when he hit .298/.404/.553 with 34 homers and 107 RBI.  That season he played 149 games, but he played only 96 the next year.  The Cardinals never offered him a big contract, but the Montreal Expos did.

And guess what?  He kept getting hurt, averaging only 69 games a year during his three-year deal.  Even when he was healthy, he never approached that old level of productivity, and given the shrinking finances of the Expos, the contract turned out to be an albatross.

Crede's already played over 130 games four times (Tatis only has two), and the only time he was completely shelved was due to a broken finger on a hit-by-pitch, not because of his back.  On the other hand, Dustin Hermanson's back issues were the 800-pound gorilla for the second half of 2005 and into the offseason.  The Sox found out the hard way that he wouldn't be able to continue ignoring his health issues during Spring Training, and the bullpen never quite fell together throughout the year.

That's what scares me about striking any deal with Crede.  At any time, something could pop or swell and there's a 60-day DL stay, and he's not gearing up for microsurgery he admits sounds like no big deal.  I don't like doctors either, but I also don't have millions of dollars riding on any one procedure.

If Crede gets the surgery, I think the Sox should talk a long-term deal, for it would give incentive.  If he doesn't, I imagine another one-year deal's in the works.  Despite his back, the Sox still don't seem to have much leverage, as Josh Fields is still half a season of seasoning away based on how he looked during his call-up.  There's no way he can start.  If Brian Anderson frustrated people, Fields could cause aneurysms.

Home for an 'Exile'

Staff and wire reports

ALBANY, N.Y. -- Nobody's quicker than Kenny Williams when it comes to making a move in the offseason.

But this year, somebody beat the White Sox general manager to the punch.

Sox Machine today announced the first free-agent signing of the year, luring Exile in Wrigleyville away from the Most Valuable Network to join its team.  Terms of the contract were undisclosed, but reports have confirmed that it is the most lucrative deal in the history of the franchise.  The reports also confirmed that the deal is the cheapest in franchise history.

"I don't think he pays," one source stated.

Exile in Wrigleyville, which broke into the blog leagues in 2004 and is written by a North Sider who roots for the South Siders, is expected to bolster the Sox Machine lineup and provide a Chicagoan perspective to the largely upstate New York-based brand of White Sox commentary.  The White Sox have played in Chicago since their inception in 1901.

The blog will bring veteran presence to a team that had one of the most inexperienced lineups in the league last season.  Fittingly, it'll be sporting the colors of the Sox uniforms of the 1960s and '70s.

"It reminds me of what Orlando Hernandez brought to the Sox in 2005," Chicago Tribune baseball writer Phil Rogers said about Exile in Wrigleyville.  "Like El Duque, it's seen just about everything and can present a bunch of different angles to the hitter.  The only difference is El Duque is from Cuba, and Exile is a blog." 

Rogers then said the Sox had a growing interest in Lance Johnson as a possible replacement to Brian Anderson.

A cloud of controversy enveloped Exile in Wrigleyville recently when its author, Vince Galloro, was accused of using amphetamines, which were banned before the 2006 season.  An independent investigation discovered Galloro merely had a high-speed Internet connection.