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Chicago White Sox
Scouting Report
By the Numbers | Players To Watch | Projected Roster
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When you have to help carry a team, as the slugging Belle
will, it's important to get
loose.
(V.J.
Lovero)
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Ten minutes
before his first full-squad spring workout as the White Sox
manager, Jerry Manuel thumbed through a dog-eared paperback
copy of
The Essential
Gandhi, found a passage to share with a visitor and then placed
the book atop a stack of tomes on his desk that included
the Bible and a text about the power of Dr. Martin Luther
King's speeches. Call those books Manuel's manuals. In
those pages he says he
finds inner strength and humility, which naturally elicits a
question about Albert Belle. Not surprisingly, Manuel's
responses tend to sound a little like prophecies.
"If you institute rules without having relationships,
that equals rebellion," said Manuel, sipping from his
Isaiah 40:31 coffee mug. "I'm here to change these
players' hearts to the commitment it takes to win a world
championship, and that might be
uncomfortable for a while. I've never had to push my teams
through a wall. I want my teams to run through a wall
without being
pushed."
Talk about the irresistible force and the immovable object.
Jerry Manuel, meet the White Sox. This serene man who has
never managed a full season above Double A has been handed
the reins of baseball's most churlish team of recent years.
Despite having
the majors' second-best record in the '90s—behind only
Atlanta—Chicago has produced only one division title and
four second-place finishes in the decade. (They were also
in first place when the strike-shortened '94 season ended
prematurely.) "In recent
seasons this team just hasn't played as well as it is capable
of playing," White Sox general manager Ron Schueler
admits. "I question at times the intensity we've taken
out on the field. It's as if our club has thought it was
good enough to turn it on and
off."
Management's lack of faith in its players was never so
clear as it was on last July 31. After an off-season of
trying to purchase a pennant by signing free agents Belle
($55 million) and pitcher Jaime Navarro ($20 million), the White
Sox suddenly gave up on the American League Central race,
trading the guts of their pitching staff—closer Roberto
Hernandez, ace lefthander Wilson Alvarez and
sometime-starter Danny Darwin—to
the Giants for six undistinguished minor leaguers. Explaining
the controversial deal, owner Jerry Reinsdorf said,
"Anyone who thinks this club can catch Cleveland is
crazy." At the time Chicago was just
3 1/2
games behind the Indians with 57 games remaining, which
prompted third baseman Robin Ventura to say, "I
thought the season ended in
October."
Reinsdorf considered his club's poor attendance—eighth in
the league—and surmised correctly that the fans despised
their own team. So after the
season, Chicago also dumped veterans Ron Karkovice and Ozzie
Guillen. The '98 White Sox are rebuilding with a lineup
that will be younger than last year's by about two years
per man and will also be
$20 million cheaper. Apparently, the franchise is adopting the
philosophy that if you're going to lose, you might as well
do it economically.
"We have more unknowns on this team, but I don't think
we're underdogs," first baseman Frank Thomas says.
"I think we're still a force to be reckoned with, but
I'm happy if everybody else believes
differently."
The White Sox should have no trouble scoring runs with
Belle, Thomas and a full season out of Ventura, who missed
99 games at the start of the '97 campaign with a broken
right ankle. But the pitching is shaky at best. The top two
returning starters are
Navarro and James Baldwin, who combined for a 21-29 record
and a 5.54 ERA in '97. Unless new catcher Charlie O'Brien,
who has caught Cy Young winners in each of the past four
seasons, can work some magic on Chicago's young pitchers,
things could quickly
go south on the South Side. "I know there will be tough
times as we develop this team," Manuel says. "But
I believe it is my time to go through the fire. That's part
of the process that makes
gold."
Speaking of which, Manuel is pleased to report that just as
he pondered his initial approach to Belle, the mercurial
leftfielder showed up unannounced at the manager's office
and expressed a burning desire "to play more than 162
games." One morning
early in training camp Belle was even spotted smiling.
Twice. Belle was wearing a faded T-shirt issued after the
infamous trade last season, a garment bearing a message
that assumes even greater import in '98. On the front it
says,
CHICAGO
LEFTOVERS. And on the back it reads,
WE MIGHT JUST BE DUMB ENOUGH TO WIN
THIS.
It ain't Gandhi, but it's a
start.
—by Tim Crothers
Scouting Report | By the Numbers | Players To Watch | Projected Roster
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