White Sox Hurting Big All Around

The American League’s Cinderella team of last season may be wondering if this year’s clock has already struck midnight. The loss of Frank Thomas for the season, and maybe more, compounds a rash of pitching injuries that has the Chicago White Sox operating with an 11-man staff that has six pitchers with less than a year of major league service.

Former UCLA left-hander Jim Parque, scheduled for shoulder surgery Tuesday, will become the eighth White Sox pitcher to have had elbow or shoulder surgery since September. He will be out for the year. Also out for the year is former Dodger reliever Antonio Osuna, who was merely having a shoulder cyst removed last Tuesday when doctors found and repaired a serious tear.

The Sox acquired Osuna on March 18 in a trade with the Dodgers, giving up three minor league pitching prospects, and signed him to a two-year extension, with an option on a third year, March 30.

Unlike Toronto Blue Jay General Manager Gord Ash, who accused the White Sox of sending him damaged goods when he acquired Mike Sirotka--who is out for the year after shoulder surgery--in a trade for David Wells, Chicago GM Kenny Williams refuses to implicate the Dodgers.

“These things happen--I know that firsthand,” Williams said. “I also know the Dodger organization. I don’t believe for one minute this was something they knew about or had detected. We didn’t detect it ourselves when we gave Osuna his initial exam.”

After winning the Central title last year, White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf approved doubling the payroll to $62.3 million. Now the Sox, already 11 games off the division lead and averaging only 19,000 in attendance, may start unloading, beginning with Wells, who figures to be one of the most coveted pitchers before the July 31 trade deadline.

The financial situation could also affect Thomas, who returned from his father’s funeral Thursday to learn through an MRI test that he has a torn triceps muscle suffered when diving for a grounder April 27.

Under the Revised Payment Right in his complex contract, unless Thomas is an all-star, wins a Silver Slugger award or finishes in the top 10 in most-valuable-player voting, all impossible if he is out for the year, the White Sox can defer all but $250,000 a year of the $49.6 million he is owed from 2002 through 2006.

If the club exercised that option at the end of the year, Thomas could become a free agent for 45 days before deciding whether to go elsewhere or stay with the Sox under the restricted terms.

It is doubtful the Sox would stoop to using an injury to trigger the RPR, but sorrier things have happened. In the meantime, the Big Hurt is scheduled for surgery this week, and the situation has quieted all those who have been doubting Thomas, a list that includes pitcher and radio host Wells, who recently questioned his teammate’s toughness, triggering a clubhouse and barroom debate on which the doctors had the final word.

So far, the Minnesota Twins have won games in which opponents started Pedro Martinez, Andy Pettitte (twice) and Wells. Thursday night, they even beat New York Yankee closer Mariano Rivera--or Super Mario, as Twin Manager Tom Kelly called him--on a passed ball in the 10th inning, increasing their credibility in what has become an improbable season with their fourth victory in six games with the World Series champions.

The Twins will not play the Yankees again unless they meet in the playoffs, but by winning two of three in their midweek series, Minnesota has now won four consecutive series and nine of 11 this season.

“That’s the key, to keep winning two of three,” pitcher Mark Redman said. “That says we’re not going to let up. We’re going to go out and play hard, whether it’s the Yankees or a lower-class team.”

Almost all teams are lower class when measured against the Yankees. However, some may take exception to the description, using it for a little bulletin-board fodder when playing Redman and colleagues.