new article.....baker takes back some of the things he said about robbie
Thomas leads resurgent Sox into town
By Jim Baker
ESPN Insider
It is often said of the baseball season that it is a marathon, not a sprint. In reality, it is more like an obstacle course strewn with injuries, underperforming stars and upstart competitors impeding a team's progress. The 2003 Chicago White Sox are living proof of that.
Excluding the crowded National League Wildcard picture, there is only one series this week that features a head-to-head meeting of teams in contention for a title. That series starts tonight in Kansas City where the White Sox are dropping in to take on the Royals, whom they trail by four games in the American League Central division.
Picked by more than a few people to win the division, the White Sox got out of the gate poorly and appeared to be heading for oblivion while the surprising Royals and other-favorite-Twins zoomed ahead. Now, however, the White Sox are back in the picture, playing the way it was assumed they would from the outset.
John Mullin of the Chicago Tribune writes the Royals should not expect to see the same White Sox team they did the last time Chicago visited town. That was in early April when the Sox were stumbling and the Royals were flying, setting the tone for the first half of the year and bringing manager Jerry Manuel to the brink of unemployment. Let us not forget that it wasn't so very long ago his firing was a foregone conclusion. With the team's ascension into the race, the firing talk has abated.
The rock for the White Sox all year has been a resurgent Frank Thomas, a man once thought by many to be the best hitter in the game but who had played himself off the baseball radar over the course of the last five years. While other Sox have blown hot and cold, Thomas has been producing at a high level all season. Thomas sees his function in a different light these days: "My role has changed," he told Mullin. "I'm more that middle-of-the-lineup buffer guy who's going to make the guy in front of him better and the guy behind him better. I see guys every day getting pitches in the sweet spot that you need and they know what they can do with those pitches. And that's a good thing."
There is a perception that Thomas is not being as picky as he used to be at the plate, swinging away and not waiting for that perfect pitch. One way to gauge plate discipline is how many pitches per plate appearance a player is seeing. Rather than becoming more of a free swinger, Thomas is actually looking at more pitches than ever. In fact, since his rookie year in 1990 when he saw 4.47 pitches per PA, he has never seen as many as he has in 2003. Here are his stats for the last four years along with his rank in the league in this department:
2003: 4.33 (2nd)
2002: 4.26 (1st)
2001: 3.68 (not qualified)
2000: 3.97 (18th)
Is Thomas walking less? No, he's actually walking more than he has in a few years. While he's not quite up to his 1995 standard in that department, Thomas still gets his share of freebies. This next list shows the percentage of plate appearances in which Thomas drew a walk. (Intentional walks are not counted.)
2003: .160
2002: .137
2001: .103
2000: .135
As you can see, he's still pretty selective.
Speaking of players changing, yesterday I wrote: "&neither newcomer Carl Everett or Roberto Alomar have played up to their potential since coming to the White Sox via trades. That is, unless what we are seeing Alomar these days is his potential. He is doing about as well with the Sox as he did with the Mets, which is to say, far below the standards he set for himself as recently as two years ago."
Many White Sox fans wrote in to disagree with me regarding what I said about Alomar. Here is a representative letter:
Jim: How can you say that Robby Alomar has been disappointing with the White Sox? He has been a tremendous upgrade defensively at second base and in the leadoff spot. It is hard to say that a guy is underachieving when he is batting .304 with a .395 OBP, and he strikes out less than once every 11 plate appearances, something that is very big for the Sox out of the leadoff spot. There are a lot of other things that are not in the stat column. His range at second has knocked down would be singles and helped him turn numerous double plays. His prowess defensively has made Jose Valentin a better defensive player. But the biggest thing he has brought to the Sox, along with Carl Everett, is his hustle. He has beaten out several double play balls and his hustle alone produced at least one win for the Sox.
Dominic J. Nicolini
I made two statements, one of which is definitely true and the other of which is more debatable. When I wrote that he is "far below the standards he set for himself as recently as two years ago," I was right. The 2001 Roberto Alomar is still nowhere in sight. That version of Alomar had an Isolated Power (slugging average minus batting average) figure of over 200 points. The White Sox version of Alomar has hit two doubles in 69 at bats. The other statement I made is: "He is doing about as well with the Sox as he did with the Mets&" I based this on the fact that his OPS with the Mets was .693 and with the White Sox is .728 -- not a significant improvement. What is debatable about my statement is that a larger portion of his OPS with the White Sox is attributable to On Base Percentage, the more important component of OPS. He has done a better job of getting on base in his brief time with Chicago than he did in New York.
I will fall back to another thing I said: "&unless what we are seeing Alomar these days is his potential." If this is the case -- and more and more it is looking as though it is -- then Alomar is not underachieving and I will concede that he has been somewhat better with the White Sox than he was with the Mets. If that is good enough for White Sox fans, then so be it.
Meanwhile, on the Kansas City end, they are naturally playing down the importance of the series. "Just another series," manager Tony Pena told Dick Kaegel of the Kansas City Star. "We're going to approach this series the way we approach everybody else. We go out, play hardball, don't do anything different than we've been doing.&Execution, fundamentals -- if we do it every day, we'll be fine."
If only life were that simple.
