Is Dayan Viciedo the long term solution at third?

Dayan Viciedo showed an awful lot of promise at times last year. He hit .308 with 7 doubles and 5 home runs in only his second year in America playing baseball. But is he the long term answer at third base? He is not particularly skilled defensively at this point. It is a definite possibility that he could turn into at least an average defensive third baseman. Another thing to consider is the play of Brent Morel. While his offensive numbers are not exactly gaudy he is only hitting .222 with exactly 0 home runs. He is however a very good situational hitter, he’s willing to hit behind a runner to second base with less than two outs to move him to third and he is a serviceable bunter. He already has 6 errors and has a fielding percentage of.900 meaning he only makes 9 out of 10 plays, which is unacceptable at the major league level. If Morel continues to give them this lack of production at third base, why not give Viciedo a shot to win the job when he returns from his injury? He won’t play any worse defensively than Morel, and he is capable of being a force offensively. Especially, with this team searching for a spark Viciedo, could be the spark they need.

Is Mark Beuhrle over paid?

I feel like it’s almost sacrilegious to bring this up, but it might be time to look at Mark Beuhrle’s latest contract. After the 2007 season he signed a 5 year 71 million dollar contract. At the time this looked like a fair enough contract and Beuhrle was only two seasons removed from a terrific playoffs in which he anchored the White Sox rotation to a world series. He’s won 31 games so far in this contract, while making 42 million dollars through three complete seasons. I know there is a premium on starting pitching in the free agent market, (see Lackey, John). Still Beuhrle is at this stage in his career no more than a number three starter. Pair that with the fact that they’re paying Jake Peavy 48 million over three years that’s a large chunk of cash to give to one middle of the rotation guy and another guy that just underwent major arm surgery. Fortunately, they Gavin Floyd, John Danks and Edwin Jackson are on relatively inexpensive contracts. Still when you have over 100 million dollars committed to two starting pitchers you have to be able to count on them for at least 30 wins per season over the life of the contracts.  Furthermore, 14 million dollars is just too much for a starting pitcher that will only go for 12 to 13 wins with an era right around 4.

Peavy's Back!

Tonight signals the return of Jake Peavy from about a year long lay-off. He is returning from unprecedented shoulder surgery in which they had to reattach his shoulder muscle to the bone. The original injury occured from him rushing back from an injury. He's made two rehab starts and done reasonably well. Ironically he is returning against the same team, the Angels, that he got injured against. To this point in Peavy’s White Sox career he has been a disappointment, making only twenty starts, and getting ten wins for roughly 23 million dollars. He earns 17 million dollars next year and there is a 22 million dollar team option in 2013, which at this point you’d have to believe the White Sox will be declining. Also, you have to take into consideration that they gave up Clayton Richard, who won 14 games and had a 3.75 era last year for a fraction of the cost of Peavy. All in all, there is a lot of pressure on Peavy the remainder of this year to live up to the massive contract he has.

Can the White Sox get it together?

Well, the White Sox are not off to the start anybody me included anticipated. As of today they are 8 games under .500 and 9.5 games out of first place in the central. The batting averages are tough to look at, (besides Konerko’s). Watching this team hit so far has been like watching the school for the blinds rec softball team. The good news is it’s still only May and the Indians are in first place. Seeing as baseball is really a game of averages there it seems impossible that Rios and Dunn can continue to hit this horribly when looking at the numbers they have put up for their careers. The positive is that the starters have pitched reasonably well. You have to feel bad for Danks who has a 3.83 era and an 0-5 record. If you told me Phil Humber would pitch this well and they’d be 9.5 games out I would have called you crazy pre-season. The short answer is, yes the White Sox can still turn this around seeing as it is the Indians and Royals in first and second. As long as they close out May no more than 7 games out of first place and the Tigers do not make a big push they should be in decent shape going forward.