Robin Ventura is on his way back. The White Sox hope the Gold Glove third baseman will bring with him some fizz to a season that quietly went flat between the night in March when Ventura broke his right leg and last Sunday, when the Sox beat Boston at half-filled Comiskey Park to finish the first half 43-42.
Call it a job for Rescue 23.
“We are getting close to the time when Robin comes back,” Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said. “That is going to be an exciting time for this team.”
General Manager Ron Schueler is almost as enthused as his boss about the prospects of having Ventura back. He doesn’t say it, but he believes a Sox team featuring the 3-4-5 combination of Frank Thomas, Albert Belle and Ventura would be leading the American League Central. He’s happy the Sox have fallen no farther than 3 1/2 games behind Cleveland without Ventura.
“To get Robin back, that’s big,” Schueler said. “It could be huge for us. He not only helps our lineup, but our defense is better right away.”
The timing of Ventura’s return remains guesswork. He has amazed coaches and teammates alike by beginning to field grounders and take batting practice only 10 weeks after surgery to repair a broken leg and torn ligaments in his right ankle.
Ventura has a difficult time judging his own progress.
“I hope that I am getting better all the time,” he said. “But the gains are so slow from one day to the next that I really can’t tell. I am working hard to get back. I want to get back as quick as I can. But I want to be ready to play when I come back.”
Schueler expects Ventura to need at least one week, and maybe two weeks, of game action in the minor leagues before being ready to react to the speed of the game at the major-league level. The Sox hope Ventura can begin that rehabilitation assignment in the minor leagues at some point within the next three weeks.
That timetable would have him on target to join the team either on a 10-game trip to the West Coast July 31-Aug. 10 or during a 10-day, 12-game homestand Aug. 12-21. They hope he is firing on all cylinders by September. The Central could be decided from Sept. 5 through Sept. 14, when the Sox and Indians play seven times. Chicago won three of five without Ventura.
“It’s great to see Robin getting close to coming back,” said Thomas, who is second in the AL with a .368 batting average. “But we can’t wait on Robin to come back and carry us. We have to do what it takes to win without him. Then if he comes back and can help, that’s even better.”
Ventura apparently will have to count as the Sox’s key late-season acquisition. Both Reinsdorf and Schueler have said in recent weeks they don’t see the flexibility to add to the $53.6 million payroll because of disappointing attendance at Comiskey Park.
Aprils of 8-17 will tend to make a few telephone lines available at the ticket office. Schueler says the Sox need to draw at least 2.4 million to justify their payroll expense. It will take a run for the Central title for the club to approach even the 2 million mark.
That, it seems, brings the focus back to Ventura. The Sox view his loss as so critical because it took away from a high-powered lineup that was expected to be a strength of the team and added to its biggest weakness, the ability to make routine plays in the field.
With Belle in left field and the since-departed Tony Phillips in right field–not to mention Thomas at first and Ray Durham at second base–the Sox knew they would sacrifice fielding for run production. But Schueler didn’t anticipate his defense allowing 61 unearned runs by the All-Star break. That equals last year’s season total.
Blame spreads as easily as butter on a baked potato. Chris Snopek, Ventura’s replacement at third base, was charged with seven errors in the first 14 games. Thomas not only is tied with Snopek for the team lead with 11 errors but has managed to botch four pickoff plays by either throwing wildly (twice), throwing late or dropping the ball.
And catcher Ron Karkovice collapsed completely, prompting Schueler to ask for catcher Jorge Fabregas, instead of a backup infielder, in the Phillips trade with Anaheim.
“There’s no question we have not played as well defensively as we need to,” manager Terry Bevington said. “But we did play well in stretches. We can play a lot better than we have.”
The Sox know they can produce runs better than they did in the first half. Both Belle and Thomas started the season slowly, contributing to the Sox’s averaging only 4.2 runs in April. They have raised that average only to 5.0 per game.
Thomas said during the spring–albeit before Ventura’s injury–that the goal was to average six runs a game, which would give the Sox nearly 1,000 runs for the season.
Durham, promoted to the leadoff spot when Phillips was traded, has an on-base average of only .284 in his new role. The third-base spot has produced a .233 average with five home runs and 38 RBIs; Ventura was hitting .282 with 19 homers and 55 RBIs at the break last year.
And although Belle earned a trip to the All-Star Game by driving in 70 runs, he is hitting only .284 with men in scoring position. He has hit better than .300 with men in scoring position for three consecutive years.
“We have a lot of ways we can improve,” Schueler said. “The biggest thing, I believe, is to put our regular lineup out there every day, to get those guys playing together. That hasn’t happened.”
Barring new injuries or a setback in Ventura’s recovery, it could happen fairly soon.
For the White Sox’s sake, sooner is better.
