Coleman wants Sox baserunners to be aggressive

GLENDALE, Ariz. - The White Sox were one of baseball's worst baserunning teams last season.

When Alejandro De Aza and Dayan Viciedo weren't getting picked off, Adam Dunn and Paul Konerko were clogging the bases or Adam Eaton was being thrown out stealing.

Vince Coleman's aim is to clean up things.

De Aza and Viciedo are both gone, and Konerko and Dunn are enjoying retirement.

What's left is now under Coleman's aggressive eye. In late January, the Sox hired baseball's No. 6 all-time base-stealer to shore up a big problem.

"The most important part of the game, the most intricate part of the game, I would say, is baserunning," Coleman said Thursday. "When you find a team that can go from first to third, score from second on all basehits and break up double plays ... and you don't have to be fast to be a great baserunner.

"You just have to be smart, alert and aggressive. And I think that's the nature that I'm displaying right now, and build into the program, and build their mentality, that I've done it in 1985 and '87 and I was on one of the best baserunning teams (Cardinals) that has ever been assembled. I'm just here to share my knowledge and wisdom."

Coleman wants the White Sox to be aggressive at all times, even if they run into outs every now and then.

"The only sport in the world that when you're on offense is baseball," Coleman said. "So I don't play defense when I get on first base. I'm on offense.

Reaction and anticipation is the key. If you're athletic and you look at the history of baseball and athletic guys, Rickey Henderson, Lou Brock, Maury Wills, myself, we're very athletic. Most of these players around here are athletic. You can get them to understand the importance of it and want to do it day in and day out and they can make a nice living doing it."