According to several reports, Scott Podsednik
may have played his last game with the White Sox Wednesday night, the one from which he departed early with another rib injury. It seems like Ozzie Guillen wants him to go out with dignity, but
that might not be an option:
"I'm real short in the bench and we're going to give him [Wednesday]
and [Thursday] to see how he feels," said Guillen of Podsednik, who has
made two previous trips to the disabled list and has only 152 at-bats
during the 2007 campaign. "If it takes more than two days, then we have
to move to Plan B. We have to DL him and bring somebody up."
I italicized
may because if you take a look at all the stories reported this month on the whole, his fate is already sealed.
Mark Gonzalez's story today sums up the current mindset:
Guillen acknowledged the price and dearth of effective leadoff batters
means it's possible Jerry Owens will bat first again next spring. Owens
has played better than Guillen expected in center field. Owens could
shift over to left if the Sox land a marquee free-agent center fielder
such as Minnesota's Torii Hunter.
The White Sox also haven't decided whether they'll keep third baseman
Joe Crede if he makes a healthy recovery from back surgery; if they do,
power hitting rookie Josh Fields could be in left.
This is how far Podsednik's stock has fallen: Nobody mentions his name, even in a scenario where his replacement are a guy who hasn't cracked a .300 OBP and a guy who has never played the outfield in a real game.
I suppose it's fitting -- and just a little bit funny -- that Pods spends his final days on the South Side on the DL, but it's another one of those scenarios where a World Series hero drops off the map without any sort of sendoff. That doesn't quite seem right, either.
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Here's one of those times where Ozzie
says something completely lucid, but the situation renders it meaningless. On the idea of Jim Thome batting first:
"Why does it do any good if you're a leadoff guy who can run but can't
hit or get on the bases? A lot of people are wrong about the leadoff
man. A leadoff hitter should have a higher on-base percentage than
anyone else."
Perfect! So why, in the American League, are the Sox
are dead last in OBP from their leadoff hitters? And you can't blame it on the disaster called this particular season, because when they were scoring runs by the boatload in 2006, they still ranked
second-to-last in OBP from the No. 1 spot.
Ozzie probably believes in what he says in the above quote, but that's because nobody would disagree with it. I do think that on a day-to-day basis, Ozzie takes a look at the lineup card and figures that a guy with wheels has a better chance of starting something in front of his big boppers -- especially since he likes the bunt so much.
I'm guessing Ozzie iterates that basic sabermetric principle because he needs to justify to himself batting a guy who clearly can't run ahead of everybody else. The idea of a leadoff man with extra-base power has to be out of his comfort zone. Otherwise,
Rob Mackowiak and his .429 OBP from the No. 1 spot would have seen a lot more time at the top of the order in 2006.
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Well, ESPN.com published my part of
Face of the White Sox poll.
They did a nice job editing it, all things considered. The advertised word limit was 200, which I maxxed out as you might expect. Then I saw that Rob Neyer and Mark Gonzalez clocked in around the 130 range, and I figured mine might be hacked apart.
I can't complain about the end result of 164 words. It's nicely preserved, and if my math is correct, that means my answer is roughly 26 percent better.
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Minor league round-up:- Norfolk 7, Charlotte 2
- Andrew Sisco saw his string of seven encouraging starts end by giving up six runs (five earned) over 3 2/3 innings. He gave up seven hits and three walks, and struck out four.
- Dewon Day had an interesting line: 2 1/3 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 0 K; David Aardsma gave up a solo homer in his inning, and his ERA cracked 5.00.
- Perezes Kenny and Tomas each went 2-for-4, with Tomas scoring both RBI; Ryan Sweeney went 1-for-3.
- Montgomery 8, Birmingham 3
- Ryan Wing had a rough start, but Oneli Perez struck out five over two scoreless innings.
- Shaun Garrett and Cole Armstrong had three hits apiece, with Armstrong hitting a solo homer.
- Cory Aldridge collected the other two RBI.
- Winston-Salem 10, Lynchburg 2
- Daron Roberts went 3-for-5 with a double and four RBI.
- Paulo Orlando went 4-for-6 with two doubles out of the leadoff spot; Maurice Gartrell fell a homer short of the cycle.
- Derek Rodriguez, fresh off a shutout, allowed one run (a solo homer) over seven innings. John Lujan allowed the other run, and it was unearned.
- Kannapolis 9, Asheville 7
- Anderson Gomes went 5-for-5 with a solo homer, three runs scored and a stolen base.
- John Shelby's only hit of the game was a grand slam, and Brandon Allen hit a three-run shot. Shelby also had an outfield assist for the second straight game.
- Jacob Rasner gave up all seven runs (all earned) over five innings, and his ERA climbed to 6.61. Noe Rodriguez and Ryan Rote shut it down the rest of the way.