By Ricky O’Donnell

At first glance, there seems to be nothing wrong with this picture, taken from the White Sox’s official website. The team is encouraging fans to vote their favorite players into the All-Star Game, something Sox fans do better than most. And you may as well do your voting now, because the Sox crack promotion staff will surely bombard you from every angle if a Sox player sneaks into that silly Last Man on the Ballot thing. It worked for good ol’ Scotty Pods in 2005, and no one could forget the all-too-clever “Punch AJ” campaign of 2006.

All the usual suspects are in the picture. Paulie, Thome, AJ, and Swisher, just like you’d expect. Juan Uribe is also present, which, of course, totally makes sense. Anytime a guy has twice as many strikeouts as walks and can post an on-base percentage under .270, you have to recognize that.
But someone’s missing.

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Posted on May 18, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

Like most teams, the Sox have been up and down so far this season. The first three weeks of the year gave fans optimism to think maybe this team is really better than most humans and computers expected, while during last week’s six-game losing streak, the season was (obviously) over.
Such is the case for almost every team during baseball’s eternal season. It’s important to remember that small sample sizes are nothing if not deceiving, and that most things find their way back to the mean before long. That has always been one of the first things The Sox Report points out when discussing early season baseball, but, like everyone else, we still often fall into the trap.
Remember our declaration that Nick Swisher was already the Sox best player? Well, we wrote that after he had been on the team for a week. A lot of fans now think Swish is a bum, as he’s hitting all of .200. Of course, that isn’t where he’ll end up in September; sportswriters and fans should remember that.

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Posted on May 12, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

After starting out the season strong, the White Sox have now dropped eight of their last 11 games. This weekend was the low point of the young season, as the Sox lost three consecutive games in Toronto, and can be swept by the Blue Jays tonight.
So instead of focusing on the negatives, like the abysmal team batting or the abundance of solo home runs, let’s talk about something more enjoyable: my trip to Toronto a few years ago.
I went to see the Sox take on the Blue Jays in Toronto with a few friends in the Summer of 2006. The Sox ended up losing on a walk-off homer in extra innings by Shea Hillenbrand, but the beginning of the game was far more exciting than the end.
Four of us arrived at the Rogers Centre about an hour before game time. One of our friends, we’ll call him Anthony (since that’s his name), had to go back to our hotel room, so he was arriving at the game by himself.
Anthony shows up at the stadium about 15 minutes before the first pitch. He comes dressed in an American flag shirt, carrying a huge American flag on a staff, and holding two signs.

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Posted on May 5, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

Through his first 24 games as a member of the White Sox, Orlando Cabrera has fit in perfectly in Chicago. Acquired for his gold-glove defense at shortstop and to bring speed and intelligence to the top of a powerful order, Cabrera has been as good as advertised so far. He’s struggled a tad at the plate, but boasts an OBP .100 points higher than his batting average, and his defense has been as stellar as ever.
Cabrera has also fit seamlessly into Ozzie Guillen’s heavily Latino clubhouse. But just this week, we found out that Cabrera also has a lot in common with some of Chicago’s other top athletes. Ladies and gentlemen, Orlando Cabrera likes to party.

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Posted on April 28, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

This portion of the festivities was dangerously close to being dedicated to the maturation and subsequent greatness of the young John Danks. But if there’s one thing Chicago baseball fans should know, it’s never go too crazy drawing conclusions from small sample sizes early in the season. Call it the Tuffy Rhodes rule.
Still, Danks has been lights-out so far, picking up two wins this week and pitching more like Mark Buehrle than Mark Buehrle has thus far in 2008. Success in baseball, however, often comes as easily as it goes, especially for 23-year old pitchers. To be a sure thing, it takes consistency. As of now, it’s too early to say Danks has found it.

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Posted on April 21, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

Few Sox players over the years have drawn more admiration from broadcaster Hawk Harrelson than Joe Crede. “Mike Schmidt, Brooks Robinson, those guys are great,” Hawk (probably) once said. “But I’ll tell you what, gimme Joe Crede at third base any day of the week”.
Remember, Harrelson is also the guy who, as Sox general manager, traded Sammy Sosa to the Cubs for George Bell [It was Ron Schueler, not Harrelson. Sorry.]. But Harrelson isn’t the only one who appreciates Crede work at third base. He’s also one of the Sox’s true fan favorites. Crede’s play in October 2005 might have something to do with that.

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Posted on April 14, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

During Sunday night’s 13-2 beat down of the Tigers, ESPN’s venerable Peter Gammons fawned over new White Sox masher Nick Swisher, calling him a gamer and a grinder. While the two adjectives have become dirty words for stat-crunching, Fire Joe Morgan-reading baseball fans everywhere, Gammons is spot-on in his appraisal of Swisher.
Swisher is the White Sox’s best player, a fact that seems relatively clear to everyone, even if he’s only been on the team for one week. For Sox fans who have grown tired of watching Juan Uribe swing out of his shoes at chin-high fastballs the last three years, Swisher’s approach to hitting is refreshing, to say the least. If Swisher isn’t thrown a strike, he won’t swing at it. It’s that philosophy that has helped jump start the Sox offense the first week of the year.

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Posted on April 7, 2008

By Ricky O’Donnell

If it’s Opening Day for the White Sox, that can only mean one thing: C.C. Sabathia and Cleveland Indians. For the fourth consecutive season, the Sox and Indians square off in their season openers; for the third consecutive season, Sabathia will be on the mound for the Tribe. His career record versus the Sox is 14-3.
Opening Days are just one game, but they are often revelatory. In 2005, the Sox snuck by Cleveland 1-0, with the immortal Shingo Takatsu – frisbee pitch and all – recording the final out. Few would have guessed that 1-0 would also be the score of the Sox’s final game that season, a win over Houston to secure the World Series.
In 2006, the White Sox pounded Cleveland 10-4. The rest of that season would characterized by their explosive offense, with four players hitting over 30 home runs – even though a 90-win season was only good enough to finish third in the mighty AL Central that year.
And then there was the 12-5 beat-down Cleveland handed the White Sox to open the season last year. The Sox went on to lose 90 games.
So watch the opener closely and we’ll get a good idea if Ozzie Guillen will have to make good on his promise (threat?) to run naked down Michigan Avenue if the Sox win the World Series.

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Posted on March 31, 2008