Defense Part 1 of a Lot: White Sox CF

As simple as the title is, that's how important defense is in baseball. In football and basketball the saying is that "defense wins championships", and while its pitching that is most important thing come playoff time, defense plays an important role. Especially defense up the middle, meaning SS, second base, centerfield, and catcher.

Look at the 2008 Phillies. They won with great pitching from Cole Hamels and Brad Lidge, but also because of their defense. Charlie Manual made it a point to play better defensive players in the World Series. 

Now look at the 2008 Cubs and White Sox, ultimately both teams were overmatching in their playoff series. Defense played a part in that, Game 2 of the NLDS the Cubs defense broke down behind Carlos Zambrano. That's because they had bad defenders at second and short. Theriot is an average at best shortstop and DeRosa isn't very good at second. The White Sox defensive problem was at second base where Alexei Ramierez was the third worst regular defensive second baseman. They also had some defensive problems in the outfield, especially on days when Brian Anderson wasn't starting in center. Now obviously each team can't have a perfect fielder at each position, and a lot of the time a guy is such a good hitter that you can put up with his bad defense (see all three of the guys I mentioned as bad at defense earlier). 

Coming into this season the plan for both sides of town should be to try and maximize their defense when possible. That's the plan I think the White Sox should take when it comes to their open spot in center.

Lets start with the Sox centerfield competition. I think there are three guys competing Brian Anderson, Jerry Owens, and Dewayne Wise. Out of the three, none are good hitters, Owens has the upside of being able to leadoff and steal bases, Wise and Anderson can give you an occasional homer. The problem is that Owens has never shown that he can hit major league pitching, and Wise and Anderson both suck. Really it comes down to who can give you the best defense while not killing you offensively. So if I'm the White Sox, that takes Wise out of the running to start in center. Owens has a UZR of .05 and Anderson has one of .01 which makes them both essentially average. In my opinion (and Ken probably has better knowledge of this) Anderson will give you somewhat of something on offense, while Owens has the potential to be average, but also the potential to be just awful. I would think that if Anderson can hit .250 he has to be the regular starter. Maximize your defense and put Anderson in center, especially since Jermaine Dye (UZR -18.2) and Carlos Quentin (-3.7) aren't good defenders. 

Much, much more to come about defense on both sides of town. I'll have something about the Cubs outfield defense sometime this weekend.