Life In The Cell

Catching Up with the Gimps

The Sox recently have seen a lot of players hit the DL. I already touched upon Jose Contreras, but since then the injury bug has bitten a few more players.

We’ll start with Matt Thornton, since his injury is the one of least concern. He missed Friday’s game against the Tigers due to a sore back. I’m going to go ahead and assume that Thornton was hurting for longer than just Friday considering between July 22-27, he did not pitch. Thorndog did come back and pitch a scoreless inning of relief on Sunday. This back soreness could spell doom for the Sox if it reoccurs later in the season. Easy Heat has been, arguably, the Sox best reliever this season, and now with others hurt and struggling, his presence is more important than ever.

Scott Linebrink’s injury has placed even more importance upon Thornton’s health. Initially, it was thought he was suffering from tendinitis in his shoulder which brought on the call for Linebrink’s foray into Asian medicine. Unfortunately that combined with rest didn’t heal him, so he underwent an MRI which came up as good as possible. It has nothing to do with his rotator cuff, some of his muscles in his shoulder are inflamed, which means he needs rest. Apparently mid-August is the expected time of return for Linebrink. In his place, the Sox recalled Ehren Wassermann. Wassermann was one of the few relievers that actually pitched well for the Sox. In 33 games (23 innings) he had a great 2.74 ERA. This year, however, he struggled initially in the bigs which led him to being demoted. He regained his form at Charlotte, posting a 1.67 ERA in 27 innings of work. I have faith in Wassermann that he will pitch far better than he did earlier in the year. He should be an adequate replacement for Linebrink for the time being. Since he is in essence replacing Linebrink, I don’t think he’ll be used as a ROOGY. He wasn’t used in that role at Charlotte (pitching more innings than appearances) so he’ll be in the right mind set.

The biggest injury and most severe injury has felled Joe Crede. It’s obviously the biggest since he is an every day player. Crede’s back (suprise, surprise) has flared up which has necessitated a move to the DL. Here’s what may surprise you; I’m glad he’s on the DL. If I had to guess, his back has been hurting him for quite awhile now. Since mid-June, he has hit horrible. Since June 15th his slash stats are .202/.245/.351/.596. That’s awful and clearly a slump. I’m willing to bet, though, that that slump was spurred on by a balky back. Ideally, something like 2005 happens again; that year, Crede was out Aug 25 - September 10. Prior to getting hurt, Crede was hitting .232/.285/.408/.693, but upon his return to the lineup he hit .371/.409/.726/1.135 to close out the season. To expect him to hit like that upon coming off the DL this year is obviously optimistic, but it is something to root for.

In the meanwhile, I reckon the Sox are better off with Crede healing on the DL. I’m sure a platoon of Uribe and Josh Fields (who was called up in Crede’s stead) can easily out produce Crede’s recent form (.202/.245/.351/.596). If Fields can come close to last year’s numbers .244/.308/.480 with 23 homers, the Sox will come out of this situation for the better.