White Sox' Gillaspie looks to improve
Conor Gillaspie was at SoxFest over the weekend, a good sign that he will be on the 25-man roster this year.
But the White Sox spent a lot of money during the off-season to get better, and Gillaspie needs to follow suit.
Gillaspie is still the starting third baseman, but general manager Rick Hahn said he's keeping an eye on potential internal upgrades such as minor-leaguers Matt Davidson, Tyler Saladino and even veteran newcomer Emilo Bonifacio.
At first glance, Gillapsie's .282/.336/.416 hitting line last season looks pretty solid. But the 7 home runs, .221 batting average against left-handed pitchers and .228/.284/.330 slash line after the all-star break are red flags.
Gillaspie clearly appeared to be worn out during the final month or two of 2014, so he has added 15-20 pounds of muscle this winter and is determined to keep his starting job.
"At the end of your season, you have to look yourself in the eye and just figure out, 'OK, what did I like, what did I dislike?' and you have to be honest with yourself," Gillaspie said. "There are quite a few things I disliked about last year, about myself, about the way I acted, about my attitude, about my confidence.
"It showed sometimes. But at the end of the day I feel like I have been open about that and looked in the mirror and said, 'What can I do to fix it?' "
Good riddance:
Over the last three seasons, Detroit Tigers starter Max Scherzer was 9-3 against the White Sox with a sub-3.00 ERA.
Scherzer signed a free-agent contract with the Washington Nationals, and the Sox are happy the right-hander is out of the AL Central.
"Anything that's going to take away strength from our opponents, especially in the division, I'm OK with that," pitching coach Don Cooper said. "Not having to face Max Scherzer X amount of times, facing anybody but him has got to be better.
"But I'm not concerned with Max. I'm not concerned with Detroit. I'm concerned with the White Sox."
While the Tigers lost Scherzer and the Kansas City Royals lost top starter James Shields, the Sox added Jeff Samardzija. Is that a factor in the upcoming division race?
"That hasn't entered my mind that we're the favorite," Cooper said. "What's coming into my mind is we were in a difficult spot the last two years and we've been pulled out of that spot, and now the playing field has been leveled off a whole lot more."
Welcome back:
Aaron Rowand, the starting center fielder on the White Sox' 2005 World Series team and longtime fan favorite, is going to be a guest instructor in spring training for 7-10 days.
Rowand said he'd like to coach or manage full time, preferably with the Sox, once his 10-year-old son is older.