SoxFest Fodder

By George Ofman

While a wave of blue invaded a downtown hotel last weekend, a sea of black and silver is taking over another well-fabled guest house starting today. White Sox fans will jam the Palmer House for SoxFest, the South Side nine's answer to the Cubs convention. They actually do have one thing in common: The color red, as in red-faced. Fanatic fans of both teams can look back to 2009 and blush with embarrassment. Neither team was very good.

Try downright disappointing.

The Cubs were injected with a dose of Milton Bradley (a killer virus in most nations). The Sox merely suffered from lethargy and plodded along to a 79-win season. But hope springs eternal, even if freezing rain from the heavens signal that winter's grip has a ways to go.

The Cubs found an antivirus to Bradleyitis though I'm not quite sure whether doses of Carlos Silva will cure the patient.

The White Sox went much further, dialing up some aging veterans, disconnecting from others, while shifting a future star from one base to another and welcoming a former Cub. This does not account for two key additions from last season, one of whom has won a Cy Young Award while the other is trying to prove his bat wasn't confiscated by TSA when he arrived in town.

Jake Peavy must pitch like the Jake Peavy during his healthy days in San Diego. Alex Rios cannot hit like Alex Trebek or the Sox will be in jeopardy.

And so, too, will be the reputation of Trader Kenny, who is banking on both players to revive his team's chances of winning the division.

But in revamping his team from a softball aggregate to a grittier, more flexible group, Williams is taking a chance the Sox can win without having to hit the ball out of the park nearly 200 times.

The immensely popular Jim Thome and Jermaine Dye are gone, replaced by more speed and perhaps a gaggle of designated hitters.

The thinking was that Thome clogged the bases, so why not just rotate the DH to give Ozzie Guillen more flexibility?

That's fine so long as players such as Mark Kotsay, Andruw Jones, occasionally Paul Konerko and who ever else gets a shot, can make up for Thome's numbers. He hit 23 homers and drove in 74 runs in just 107 games before being dispatched to the Dodgers.

Ozzie wants more options, though I have a sneaky suspicion that Jones might not make it out of spring training. He lost his bat long before Rios did. I like the 17 homers he hit in under 300 at-bats in Texas last season. I don't like the anemic .214 batting average that went along with it.

Scott Podsednik's second tour of duty ended when he asked for more dough. Instead, the Sox opted to deal for Juan Pierre, the former Cub who better hope the grass is greener and shorter on the South Side than it was for him in Wrigley Field. He should steal more bases than the 55 swiped by Pods and the long-gone Chris Getz.

Sox fans will also welcome the ageless Omar Vizquel, the rehabbing J.J. Putz and the promising Mark Teahan so long as he promises to hit 25 homers and not commit too many throwing errors from third.

His arrival means the relocation of golden boy Gordon Beckham, who will now handle second base, making you wonder if he'll follow in the footsteps of Ryne Sandberg, a converted shortstop who started his Cubs career at third, moved to second and whose bust is now on display in Cooperstown.

Right now, Sox fans are simply hoping the 2010 season isn't a bust

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George Ofman is now with WGN radio after a 17-year run with The Score. He also blogs for ChicagoNow under the banner That's All She Wrote. Comments welcome.