The White Sox led their division wire-to-wire a year ago, yet most of the time Greg Walker looked like he had just chugged a glass of sour milk. It was the greatest season of Walker’s career, and also one of the most demanding.
“We didn’t have any easy games,” the hitting coach and former first baseman said.
He almost lets himself smile thinking about the season that stretches ahead. There’s excitement where the daily questioning used to be.
With the addition of Jim Thome, increased assurance in Jermaine Dye and the knowledge that players have bought into the selfless approach Ozzie Guillen preaches, there are days when Walker feels almost, well, confident. The team that won a World Series despite being outscored by Tampa Bay and seven other American League teams should be a lot more formidable.
“I hope so, for our sake,” Walker said.
Thome’s late-spring fireworks show–three two-homer games over the last four days–illustrated just how dangerous the defending champs can be with him hitting in front of Paul Konerko and Dye.
Thome is healthy after the elbow problems that opened a door to Ryan Howard and made him expendable in Philadelphia. He wasn’t sure how the elbow would hold up when he reported to Arizona in early February, ahead of almost everyone else, but he is now.
“That was just a bad year,” Thome says of 2005, when he hit .207 with seven home runs in 59 games. “I was injured, I tried to play through it and it didn’t work out. I learned a lot from it. If anything, it has made me hungrier for the game, really.”
Say Thome reverts to his 2004 level and Konerko and Dye duplicate their numbers from a year ago. That would add up to 113 home runs and 291 RBIs from the 3-4-5 hitters.
But what if a return to both the Midwest and the AL brings out a real renaissance in Thome? And what if his presence–especially his willingness to take a walk (career on-base percentage: .408)–means more production for the guys hitting behind him.
Say Thome does what he did in 2003, his first year in Philadelphia, and Konerko and Dye raise their production by 5 percent. That’s 125 home runs and 336 RBIs from the primary 3-4-5 hitters.
Alex Rodriguez, Gary Sheffield and Jason Giambi produced 114 homers and 340 RBIs a year ago. David Ortiz, Manny Ramirez and Jason Varitek combined for 114 and 362.
Imagine the 2005 White Sox with their pitching, fielding, creativity and either of those trios in the middle of the order. They wouldn’t have waited until the last week of the season to eliminate Cleveland.
They would have destroyed the club record for victories in a season and rolled into the postseason as a heavy favorite, not a team that had to prove itself every game–not that anyone is complaining with how things worked out with the combination of Carl “Yappy” Everett and Frank Thomas as the designated hitters.
“Carl Everett gave us a lot last year,” Walker said. “We got a lot out of the DH spot. But the thing Jim brings, besides the obvious power, is that he’s going to be on base all the time. We didn’t get many walks last year.”
Konerko, who had 81, was the only White Sox player who walked even 50 times. Boston had eight of those guys, the Yankees seven, Oakland six and Cleveland four.
The White Sox were 11th in the league with a .322 on-base percentage. That was the stat that kept Walker working so hard with his hitters.
Thome, conversely, makes him smile.
“I am really excited about having him in the lineup,” Walker said. “I’ve studied Jim’s swing for years. When I work with left-handed hitters, we use his videos to help us teach. He’s fun to watch. He does a lot of things that are technically correct. You take a big, strong guy with sharp fast-twitch reactions and repeatable, perfect mechanics and, wow, you get some hitter.”
Thome, never one for posing, has been content to stay in the background this spring. He has spent his time getting acclimated to his third team in five years and continuing the fitness program that began last winter in Florida under the guidance of Philadelphia trainer Jeff Cooper. He had just begun hitting like the Thome of old when he tweaked his hamstring hustling out a double on a drive high off the hitter’s background at Tucson Electric Park, which sent him back to the cages.
When the White Sox went on a three-game tour of the Phoenix area last week, he remained in Tucson, getting as many at-bats as possible in minor-league games. The results have been impressive.
“He got locked in a week ago,” Walker said. “He’s looking great. He’s feeling it. He’s locked in right now.”
Thome knows that won’t always be the case. Like Konerko, he’s a perfectionist who hates making outs. Hanging curveballs that aren’t hit hard are the bane of his existence, and any pitch chased out of the strike zone is a mini-crisis.
“It’s going to be a long year, a lot of good and bad times,” Thome said. “You know going in there are going to be good times and bad times.”
Walker just wants to relax in the late innings every once in a while. With Thome around, that’s not asking too much.
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