Sox manager Ventura: I'm the right guy for this

The first week of the season was a rough one for Robin Ventura.

Managing the best team he's had since replacing Ozzie Guillen in 2012, the White Sox lost three straight at Kansas City to open the schedule and returned to U.S. Cellular Field on Friday and played even worse in a 6-0 loss to the dreadful Minnesota Twins before bouncing back to win the final two games of the series.

Even though 156 games remain on the schedule, Ventura was instantly placed on a very hot seat.

The media zeroed in on his job security, fans wanted him fired and even Sox general manager Rick Hahn acknowledged the heightened expectations.

"You evaluate it differently than the last couple years, just because perhaps he has more weapons at his disposal," Hahn said before Friday's home opener. "When you have better personnel and more expectations then it's only fair for all of us in the organization to be judged by different standards."

Hired before the 2012 season with no managing or coaching experience at any professional level, Ventura had the White Sox in first place for 117 days before a September collapse knocked them out of the playoffs.

The Sox lost 99 games in 2013 - their worst showing in 43 years - and they dropped 89 games last year.

Hahn revamped the roster of the winter and the White Sox emerged as an instant contender.

But questions about Ventura's competence as a manager remained, and the slow start raised the volume.

Before Sunday's game against the Twins, a 6-2 win, Ventura addressed his status for the first time.

"A lot of it, people just need somebody to point at and this job kind of has that already built into it," Ventura told the Daily Herald. "My concern is inside the clubhouse and what I feel is going on with our team. Outside, you'll hear stuff, but that's part of the job. For fans, every game is the most important game of the year.

"When we don't play well there's displeasure, and I think it builds if you're 0-4 or whatever the record is. To me, it's just having a thick skin. When you struggle as a player, it's the same thing. People want you to do well every single game and when you don't do it, you usually get booed. That's part of the action. For the players or for myself, you have to have thick skin to be in this and do this."

Ventura has no doubt he can do the job for the White Sox.

"I think I'm the right guy for this," said Ventura, a star third baseman for the Sox from 1989-98. "I'm not going to go out of my way to defend myself. People are going to think what the way they want to think. I know I love being here, I'm passionate about the White Sox and I want to do right for this group and for what we did in the off-season."

One of the big knocks on Ventura is an alleged lack of fire. It's there, the 47-year-old manager insists, even if most don't see it.

"People act like you don't care because you don't stomp up and down," Ventura said. "That's not going to happen with me. There are times when you go out and argue and do things like that. But stomping up and down just to stomp up and down ... it always reminds me about being a lawyer.

"If you're a lawyer and you have the evidence, use the evidence. If you have the law, use the law. If you have nothing, just pound the table. I'm not going to just pound the table. A lot of this job is what your convictions are and what you believe in. I believe I'm the right guy and we'll move on."

Ventura said he doesn't read the papers or listen to sports talk radio, so he's not even aware of all the speculation surrounding his job as Sox manager.

"For me, it's what my players think," Ventura said. "They know what my personality is like and they know the things I care about and how I go about things. If negative things came out of the clubhouse, it would probably bother me. But they know the things we're holding ourselves to. The outside stuff doesn't bother me."

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