Posts tagged ‘Offense’

The 2008 White Sox are turning into a team caught in a constant paradox. Some recent surges with the bat have propelled thier offensive numbers out of the depths, while outstanding pitching numbers have begun to level off. Both developments should not come as a huge shock considering how hitter-friendly the home ballpark is when summer time rolls around.

At 42-35 with a lead that’s been sliced down to a half-game by the blazin’-hot Minnesota Twins, the Sox have a lot to be proud of at this point while keeping in mind how much work still lies in front of them. On the plus side of the ledger:

This bullpen was supposed to be a disaster, and it isn’t. It was hard for opposing GMs to contain their laughter when they saw the high-dollar contracts awarded to Scott Linebrink and Octavio Dotel. While not perfect (and each with a pair of walk-off homers against them in the past three weeks) the two have combined to be a dramatic upgrade which has, alongside a revived Matt Thornton and an improving Nick Masset & Boone Logan, provided Bobby Jenks an actual supporting cast in the late innings. While losing 4 games via ninth-inning walk-off since May 30th isn’t exactly something to write home about, a dependable bullpen is the biggest reason the Sox haven’t faded into the pack of the AL Central.

John Danks and Gavin Floyd weren’t supposed to be ready. Danks was supposed to have already hit his ceiling, Floyd was a washed-up product of the hype machine who never got close. While still too early to start campaigning for Cy Young Awards, the alleged weaklings of the rotation have thrown some of the best starts all season for the Pale Hose. Danks in particular has been stellar in the wake of shoddy run support (2 runs or fewer scored on his behalf in 10 starts thru June 25th). The rotation was supposed to be unable to get off the ground after Mark Buehrle. Right now it leads the AL in quality starts.

Meanwhile, the elephant in the room…

The offense isn’t building any consistency…except perhaps to be consistent in their inconsistency. The same corps of hitters that raped and pillaged Kansas City and Minnesota to open June at home got muzzled by the Rockies in their home park and handcuffed by the Cubs on what was a very hitter-friendly weekend at a hitter-friendly field. They can light up a good Twins’ staff just as easily as a household name like Eric Stults can throw a complete game shutout at them.

Going into the season I was counting on three things - that the Sox would have a better offense, simply by virtue of believing the whole team can’t slump for 162 games twice - right? -, that the Sox should have a better bullpen based strictly on the numbers, and that the Sox could have a decent rotation if Danks and Floyd pitched above expectations. So far my expectations have been far surpassed on latter two. On the first, many of the exact same problems that torpedoed the team time after time in 2007 are still popping up, disguised by power-ball explosions that boost up the team offensive rankings - again, after the dismal performance of ‘07 anything looks great by comparison. But this remains a lineup filled with holes despite being third in the AL in runs scored.

Everything evens out over a long, grinding baseball season. You can’t expect dominant pitching every night, just like you shouldn’t expect having a dormant offense every night. But the great teams are the ones that strike the balance early and keep building on that through the season. Right now, even with their status as a pleasant surprise and an undeniably entertaining team to watch, the Sox continue fluxing back and forth between “good” and “mediocre” so much that it makes you very uneasy about the foundation on which they’re built.

In sport, as in life, about the only sure thing is that there is no sure thing. Just because you have an All-World lineup and then add in two more All-World players doesn’t mean you’ll score 1200 runs the following season. Conversely, just because your fourth and fifth starters entered the year with a combined career record of 14-23 doesn’t mean they can’t both be among the league leaders in ERA. It’s a crazy, mixed up world, and sometimes you just take a cue from Mike Sciocsia and instead of saying “I have no idea”, just say, “That’s baseball.”

In baseball, no two teams are alike, nor are they as different as the records might indicate. Granted there are times (plenty of them, really) when it’s quite simple to point out the disparity - the difference between a 90-win team and a 72-win team is obvious. One of them is good and the other one sucks, end of discussion. Other times it’s less clear - take the difference between say, a 94-win team and an 86-win team. It might be an overachieving group in the former or a band of underacheivers in the latter. Whatever the rationale proves out to be, once we start talking about a week’s worth of games or less in the standings, we’re talking about two teams with comparable skills. The team with 94 wins racked up that number because they closed out the games they were supposed to. The latter has a lot of talent but usually is sitting right on the outside of the playoff picture because they didn’t take care of opportunities to nail down wins they should’ve taken over the course of the season. The latter team is the type with an opportunity of a six-game stretch against the worst pitching staff in the National League and the second-worst in the American League, and goes 1-5.

How can you explain the fact the Sox looked to be rolling in late May only to thud atrociously in Tampa, then come home and hang 61 runs in 7 games, and then - facing off against two of the five worst staffs in the game - averaged just 2 runs per contest while dropping 5 of 6? The freakishly on/off nature of the bats can’t be as simple and easy to get rid of as a shrug of the shoulders and a coolly said, “That’s baseball.” Or can it?

The hard truth right now is, despite that brilliant outburst to open the month of June, the Sox remain in search of an identity right now on offense, which only seems to reinforce how much they depend on a) the home run and b) favorable home park conditions in order to achieve any type of consistency. As we move forward into the summer months, the White Sox staff (great as it’s been) is going to have to pitch in the band box known as US Cellular a whole bunch too, so it would be nice if they could get back that comfort zone the hitters provided a week ago. Otherwise, the Sox will have a nice pile of games like the ones they just played to reflect on at the end of the season while saying, “That was the difference.”

We are a little over a third of the way through the season and while the White Sox may be in first place with a record of 30-26, something is clearly missing. That would be an offense. Despite phenomenal pitching, rivaling any staff in the majors, the Sox struggled through a four game set in Tampa. After another quality start fell by the way side, Ozzie blew up about the offense. Guillen is not happy about the veterans’ bats continuing to slump and urged Kenny to “fix it” by Tuesday or he will make drastic changes to the lineup.

It is hard to argue with Ozzie here as the Sox have scored less than 3 runs a game since the eight game winning streak. One of the unique things about the game of the baseball is the ups and downs from series to series. The Sox went on the winning streak and fans were ready to print playoff tickets and a week later some are on the ledge. Obviously any Sox fan in March would gladly have taken our position in the standings heading into June, but the homerun or nothing offense is raising cause for concern. This has been going on for a year and a half and at some point the offensive struggles are more than just a slump. Sluggers Jim Thome, Paul Konerko and Nick Swisher are all hitting under .215 and the team has yet to show the ability to manufacture runs.

In fact, Ozzie’s club is now 3-15 in games where they fail to hit the long ball. A far cry from the team that went wire to wire in 2005 who relied on the homerun, but could score by running, bunting men over and timely hitting. The Sox left twenty six men on base in the three consecutive losses to the Rays and could not get a sacrifice bunt down or the two out hit when they needed it. What has become increasingly frustrating is when the Sox put the first two men on base and promptly strand them. The sox are dead last in the AL with runners in scoring position and two outs, hitting an anemic .177. You cannot continue to squander great pitching performances from Javy Vazquez and company and hope to remain in the race in September.

It is not all doom and gloom for the offense, however, the Rays rotation has been best home era in the AL and some credit should be given to the emerging young team in first place in the East. Orlando Cabrera is showing signs of the player Jon Garland was traded for, hitting .291 the last 13 games and raised his batting average to .241 after starting off ice cold to begin the season. Then of course, there is Thee Carlos Quentin who is quickly becoming a superstar and is looking like a Kenny Williams heist. Quentin has carried the Sox offense, trailing only Josh Hamilton in homeruns and runs batted in.

The question is will the middle of the order around Quentin and Dye start to produce? We don’t know the answer to that, but if they do, this team is going to do some serious damage. Maybe some much needed home cooking is in order as the Sox play 17 games at US Cellular in June, including the next seven starting with Kansas City Tuesday. It is time for the Sox bats to start producing and give these starters some much needed help.

Seeing as it’s now April 29th and the season is officially one month old, let’s take a look at where the White Sox stand:

Offensive Categories:
Team Average: .242 (14th in the AL)
On-Base Percentage: .338 (7th)
OPS (OB+SLG): .755 (5th)
Runs: 130 (5th)

Pitching Categories:
Runs Allowed: 101 (2nd)
ERA: 3.77 (3rd)
BAA: .248 (4th)
Quality Starts: 17 (1st)

The people who tell you the numbers never lie are only half right. Numbers lie all the time. For example, when a team is hitting collectively as bad as the Sox are, the numbers tell you they should stink at scoring runs and winning games. And lately, the Sox have stunk at putting points on the board - and yet they’re sitting in first place heading to May while ranking in the top half of the league in every other significant offensive measuring stick. How’s this possible?

Meanwhile, what was expected to be the most combustible element of this Sox team - the starting rotation - has been outstanding. Gavin Floyd has pitched well enough to win every start. John Danks is 4 for 5 in quality outings, as is Jose Contreras. Javy Vazquez picked up where he left off - the most suspect member of the rotation is Mark Buehrle!

So you’d think things would be looking all the way up, right? Not exactly. The Sox have to start hitting if they’re going to stay a factor. To take a glass-half-full look at it, the poor average is with Nick Swisher, Orlando Cabrera, Jim Thome & Paul Konerko hitting way below where they’re expected to be. On the down side? The poor average reflects the fact that Nick Swisher, Orlando Cabrera, Jim Thome & Paul Konerko are hitting way below where they’re expected to be. Does anybody else feel comfortable just saying, “Don’t worry, they’re bound to turn it on and break loose sooner or later?” Hawk can say it. No way I’m saying it.