Back in the flow

The White Sox don't suck! At 15-21 I had written off the season. Other than Buerhle, the starting pitching was horrible. No one was hitting much save Dye and Konerko. The bullpen was decent. Ozzie Guillen hadn't called anyone a *&*&ing *&*&hole in a while.

Over the past week and a half, the team has become quite adept at winning series. While their overall 22-25 record is nothing special, they are on an 8-4 run. Clayton Richard shut down the very shutdownable Royals last night. The stats say that the Sox should be worse than their record. The Sox are 11th or below in the American league in batting average, runs, on base percentage, and slugging. The good news is that they're 10th in stolen bases. The pitching is mainly in the middle of the statistical curve.

Carlos Quentin is on the DL. That's a "duh" scenario since he's on my fantasy baseball team and I must have three players on the DL at once. If I don't have three players on the DL, I acquire more. After getting minor leaguers David Price and Matt Wieters in my lineup, I needed more holes. I picked up Joakim Soria, who should be a top closer when he returns from injury next week. Then I'd have two solid closers and one fill-in (LaTroy Hawkins).

When the White Sox drafted Lance Broadway in the first round of the 2005 draft, it was hoped that he would be come a middle-of-the-rotation starter. He became a backup catcher. The Sox traded Broadway for backup Mets catcher Ramon Castro. In fact a Chicago Tribune article on the deal didn't even mention Broadway by name. Heck, the Mets even agreed to pay part of Castro's salary.

Now, onto the endless dynasty rookie draft. I just realized that no other fantasy sport has a rookie draft. It makes sense since the NFL draft is unique in that their draftees always go directly into the big leagues. The NBA is like that for the most part, but how fun would a rookie draft be based on two rounds of real draft? I'd hate to get the turn on that one.

The draft was delayed by one owner who had some personal issues. It used to be that people had personal issues, said as much, and everyone understood. Now we must go into painful detail. I'm not saying that this situation was painful. It was illuminating because most of the people in this league I know only through the league, and 99% of the discussions are 100% football related. The other 1% is my performance as commish. Real life intervened, although it didn't for long, as the owner made his latest pick this morning. Brandon Tate at 4.03, which means his head is still in the game.

At 4.08 I had a minor quandry. I could take a need position or go for a guy who had dropped according to other draft ADP. I went with the best player available. I took Mike Thomas aka the mighty mite. He looks like an ideal slot guy with his 5'8 stature. Like I've said before, you can't get enough rookie wideouts, because they are fantasy gold. Would the opposite of fantasy gold be fantasy manure? You'd think that I learned my lesson from Sidney Rice and Limas Sweed. When you end up with Dwayne Bowe and Greg Jennings, you tend to have optimistic feelings about the rest.

I had a pick two slots later. It was a pick I acquired for Dwight Freeney. I was sick of Freeney putting up nothing if he didn't get a sack. So I let him go for Juqua Parker, a journeyman defensive lineman who was borderline rosterable but outscored Freeney last year, and the 4.10 pick in this year's draft. I thought it appropriate that I took a DE in Everette Brown. Brown seems like the best defensive end drafted who will actually play defensive end in the NFL. Also I picked up Charles Johnson in free agency, and those guys will compete, and perhaps rotate, opposite Julius Peppers. If Peppers doesn't sign, then my odds of getting a top 24 defensive lineman only increases.

I made the short-sighted trade of a 5th rounder for Lorenzo Booker, so I don't have another pick until the 6th round. I'm itching to make a trade, because there are plenty of good players left. At this point in the year you can't help but want to press the fast-forward button to August.