Chicago White Sox
Overview
World Champion Chicago White Sox. That has quite a nice ring to it. We've certainly never heard those words in that order before. Not only did the White Sox sneak past the New York Yankees in one of the great pennant races in baseball history, they capped it off by dispatching the vaunted New York Giants in five games. All season long the White Sox had been underrated by the critics. Even going into the 4th game of the World Series, most critics still saw the Giants pulling this out.
Those critics had not noticed or purposefully ignored the flight of these White Sox in recent years. Yes, this was their first ever pennant and also their first ever Series victory. That being said, they finished in 2nd place in the 3 years preceding this one and have *averaged* 95 victories a year since 1931. The primary difference between 1933 and previous years isn't the greatness of the team so much as it's the fact that this time around they were just able to bring home the brass ring.
Salvador Lopez has been the manager since their push into contention. In 4 seasons he has a record of 366 victories and 250 losses. It's a little early to call him the best manager of all time, of course, but this percentage gives him the 2nd best winning percentage of all time behind Jared Morris, that Red Sox manager from the mid-20s whose leftist politics resulted in his exile from major league baseball the second his team faltered in 1927.
Pitching
With all the talk of
Bob Hinman's incredible 32 victory season, one thing that's been lost in the talks of Sox pitching is the adversity they had to overcome. This team played half the season without
Jose "Moo" Castillo, who won 23 games in 1931 and went 18-6 in his rookie campaign of 1930. Had he been out there, that second half might not have been close at all. They also had to deal with the loss of
Ronald Tinter, not regarded as a great pitcher but certainly someone the team could have used to eat innings instead of guys like
Ted Carson, and the decline of
Bob Gordon, the 179-game winner and 8-time winner of at least 15 games in a year.
Bullpen members don't always deserve mention here, but
Mark Jacobs was exemplary. He was maybe the hero of the World Series but even before then he struck out 19 batters in 21 1/3 innings with the Sox and was otherwise absolutely unstoppable. In a world where starting pitchers are expected to finish their games, Jacobs provides Sal Lopez with the means to pull games out if they cannot.
Code:
Player Age W L Pct G GS SV IP H ER HR BB SO ERA
Bob Hinman 26 32 8 0.800 41 41 0 359 261 68 14 48 187 1.70
Bob Gordon 34 10 14 0.417 27 27 0 191.1 225 87 10 52 28 4.09
Ronald Tinter 36 11 9 0.550 23 23 0 176 189 62 5 46 29 3.17
*José Castillo 24 11 8 0.579 20 20 0 168.1 158 52 6 54 79 2.78
Brian East 28 8 6 0.571 15 15 0 117.2 94 30 3 29 37 2.29
Ted Carson 25 8 6 0.571 18 16 1 102.2 113 59 4 56 11 5.17
Todd Rigsby 37 5 0 1.000 23 0 1 48.1 33 10 1 12 30 1.86
Ben Gravel 34 2 0 1.000 25 2 0 42.2 47 14 0 16 16 2.95
Mark Bulter 22 2 2 0.500 22 0 2 39.2 30 6 2 10 17 1.36
*Spencer Mayer 34 1 2 0.333 27 0 7 39 40 19 6 11 22 4.38
Aaron LeBron 23 3 2 0.600 6 4 0 35.2 27 6 1 19 13 1.51
Dan Osborne 23 2 1 0.667 4 4 0 25 24 9 2 16 5 3.24
Mark Jacobs 29 0 1 0.000 13 0 5 21.1 23 5 0 8 19 2.11
Kent DeLong 27 0 0 0.000 2 2 0 11.1 9 2 1 5 6 1.59
Max Maurice 25 0 0 0.000 1 0 0 1.2 2 0 0 2 0 0.00
Team Totals 28.5 95 59 0.617 267 154 16 1379.2 1275 429 55 384 499 2.80
Catchers
Al Thiele was picked up by the White Sox prior to the season in a blockbuster deal with the Phillies. While things didn't really work out on their end of things either, Thiele ended up being the goat of the trade. His offense completely left him last year and the best news of the year was when Chicago was able to trade him across town for closer Mark Jacobs. Enter
Ashley Wetherell. The career 2nd stringer proved worthy of the task of starting, finishing 6th among all backstops in RBI with 56 and #1 in three-base hits. He also had the 3rd best fielding average among qualifying catchers and threw out 43.9% of runners who tried to steal on him.
Code:
Pos Player Age G GS AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO AVG OBP SLG
C Ashley Wetherell 27 120 111 412 41 108 23 7 3 56 0 0 33 38 0.262 0.322 0.374
C #Al Thiele 33 53 49 188 21 37 6 2 0 17 1 0 22 16 0.197 0.284 0.250
C Bob Weaver 31 23 6 35 4 7 1 1 2 8 1 0 2 2 0.200 0.243 0.457
Infield
As great as
Bob Wolf is in normal circumstances, he really raises the stakes in the clutch. Last season he hit .342 with 6 homeruns and 33 RBIs from the 7th inning on, and .351 with runners in scoring position. With runners in scoring position *in* close and late situations, his on-base percentage ratchets up to .500, and in close/late situations with 2 outs, he hit .410 and had 15 RBIs in 39 at-bats.
Leslie McGrude could never stay healthy last season and what was an otherwise pretty decent season was ruined. His chronic injuries led to the team acquiring defensive specialist
Mark Melton from the Pittsburgh Pirates. Melton, who was hitting just .230 with an OBP of less than .300 at the tme of the trade, increased his average by 56 points with the Sox and played his way into the lineup. Now the team has 3 starting-quality players for 2 positions.
At third, [b]Dale Van Tassel hit okay but a series of injuries suffered in 1932 seems to have robbed the man of his power stroke. In fairness, he was never a truly great home run hitter. However, before last year he was a guy who could hit in the .320s for you (provided "you" were the Phillies), draw 50 or so walks, hit 15 or so doubles or so... when you become a player who hits .274 with those peripherals, you become a liability. The Sox ended up trading away a solid OF prospect in Justin Boykins for
Gustavo Pena, who has many of the same issues as van Tassel, just not as pronounced.
Jeff "The Rebel" Davis started at short most of the time that he played for continuity reasons. The fact is, Mark Melton is a far better fielder at short even though the man is 8 years older. Wherever Davis, McGruder, and Melton play in 1934, you can bet that The Rebel won't be at the 6 position.
Code:
Pos Player Age G GS AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO AVG OBP SLG
1B Bob Wolf 32 141 141 548 109 179 36 7 14 95 0 1 93 26 0.327 0.423 0.495
2B *Leslie McGruder 27 85 82 347 54 110 21 8 3 41 3 1 29 17 0.317 0.370 0.450
2B Ron Brewer 28 62 33 137 15 38 4 2 1 21 1 1 14 6 0.277 0.340 0.358
3B #Dale van Tassel 31 85 76 296 33 81 5 3 1 41 3 5 34 20 0.274 0.349 0.321
3B #Gustavo Peña 36 48 48 193 20 54 6 3 1 29 1 3 14 8 0.280 0.327 0.358
3B John Gray 35 57 47 164 15 45 7 1 1 22 0 2 12 14 0.274 0.320 0.348
3B Rick Gartman 32 11 11 41 5 6 0 0 0 1 1 0 4 3 0.146 0.222 0.146
SS Mark Melton 30 80 77 280 36 80 14 6 3 35 0 3 27 31 0.286 0.350 0.411
SS Jeff Davis 22 77 69 263 32 83 14 4 4 35 4 5 31 7 0.316 0.387 0.445
SS Hugh Thompson 23 26 22 76 6 18 2 1 0 10 0 3 9 4 0.237 0.314 0.289
Outfield
George Echols started the year as half of a killer two-headed pinch-hitting partnership with
Tommy Mills but when
Roland Hardy went down, he moved into the lineup and never moved out. Despite the turmoil, Echols hit about as well last year as he had in '32, losing a little bit of gap power on the one hand but also cutting down on his strikeouts. Mills has built up a living with the Sox as a man to rely on in the clutch. Last year marked his second highest games played total in his career (he played in 94 games - and had 271 at bats - back in 1927).
Monte LaPointe keeps getting better every season he's in the league. Last year, he was good enough to make the All-Star Game and probably deserved a Gold Glove award for his play in center. The Sox expect him at or near the top of the lineup for the next decade.
Hunter Sunday is another man whose batting exploits sometimes overshadow his work in the field. Last year, splitting time between right and center, he recorded 10 baserunner kills, a fair way off the mark (Brooklyn's Ken Lefebvre had 21) but that was primarily because runners have learned not to try to advance on him. At the plate, he took home two-thirds of the Triple Crown categories, leading the AL in both runs batted in and home runs, and that despite playing half his games in cavernous Comiskey Park.
Code:
Pos Player Age G GS AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO AVG OBP SLG
LF #George Echols 24 126 96 431 75 130 28 5 7 47 8 7 51 45 0.302 0.376 0.439
LF #Tommy Mills 30 74 16 115 11 34 7 2 1 7 1 2 7 15 0.296 0.336 0.417
LF Justin Boykins 24 5 1 5 3 2 2 0 0 2 0 0 3 0 0.400 0.625 0.800
CF *Monte LaPointe 26 118 118 485 71 157 20 8 10 64 3 2 31 58 0.324 0.371 0.460
CF Trevor Haas 20 20 12 57 6 17 2 0 1 6 2 2 1 2 0.298 0.310 0.386
RF *Hunter Sunday 33 149 148 579 93 155 14 5 24 110 4 5 67 46 0.268 0.339 0.434
RF Roland Hardy 25 71 69 284 41 83 13 8 1 30 6 9 18 22 0.292 0.338 0.405
Team Totals 28.6 1720 1386 5421 741 1513 245 77 78 719 39 51 513 446 0.279 0.342 0.396