Which Liriano will it be for White Sox?
Maybe it’s just me, but Tuesday night’s White Sox’ game at Minnesota has the potential to be the most important of the season.
This will be the Sox’ debut of Francisco Liriano, who over the next two months is capable of pitching them into the playoffs or out of the pennant race.
At this point nobody knows which.
Liriano, acquired over the weekend from the Twins, could be Rick Sutcliffe, who went 16-1 after the Cubs traded for him in 1984. Or he could wind up being a bust with a busted arm.
That’s Francisco Liriano’s history. He’s this and then he’s that. Good Francisco/bad Francisco might provide Chicago with the most polarized performances since Good Rex/Bad Rex.
We’re talking about “Franchise” Liriano, as his Twins teammates called him at times. Or “Frankie Enigma,” as a startribune.com story referred to him in Minnesota after the Sox-Twins trade. Or both, as the back of his baseball card screams.
Sox general manager Kenny Williams made another of his daring moves that wasn’t all that daring.
Like recent trades for Kevin Youkilis and Brett Myers, Williams didn’t surrender too much in exchange for Liriano’s talented arm, which can baffle opposing hitters one month and teammates the next month.
“See all this gray hair?” Minnesota pitching coach Rick Anderson was quoted as saying. “It was frustrating to me.”
The trade depends on which Liriano the Sox plug into the starting rotation because few major-leaguers have pitching personalities more split.
Liriano had a great rookie season but finished it with Tommy John surgery.
He is a former all-star who was in the minor leagues two seasons later.
His stats were 5-13 record, 5.80 earned-run average in 2009; 14-10, 3.62 in 2010; and 9-10, 5.09 in 2011, the year he no-hit the Sox before twice going on the disabled list.
This season Liriano had a terrible first two months and a much better next two months.
Liriano himself characterizes his career as “up and down.” His 50 career victories and 52 career losses confirms it.
The question about Liriano when he’s “up” is how anybody on any team ever gets a hit off him. The question when he’s “down” is whether he’ll ever throw another strike to another hitter.
So here the White Sox are, in first place, their pitching staff enduring injury and fatigue, the stretch run approaching …
And a 28-year-old veteran coming to the rescue, maybe, depending on whom Williams actually acquired, “Franchise” Liriano or “Frankie Enigma.”
Liriano is the latest puzzle that Williams handed to pitching coach Don Cooper, who has had mixed results with earlier ones.
Gavin Floyd has had good seasons and mediocre seasons. He’s still with the Sox and still experiencing his own “ups and downs.”
Javier Vazquez and Edwin Jackson are gone after occasional flashes of brilliance amid too many flickers of flops.
Tuesday night, when the Sox play Minnesota in the middle game of a three-game series, will provide the latest reading on Liriano, an initial sample that might be the start of something big for this team or maybe the start of the end for it.
The Twins shared periods of joy with Liriano when he looked like a staff ace, and then suffered with him through arm troubles and control problems.
All the White Sox can hope is that for two months they’ll have “Franchise Liriano” rather than “Frankie Enigma.”
mimrem@dailyherald.com