Dunn deal? Sox should make it so

So, the White Sox are reluctant to surrender whatever it would take to acquire Nationals' slugger Adam Dunn.

Are they nuts?

It's early, however. Major League Baseball's nonwaiver trade deadline isn't until 3 p.m. Saturday and teams still are posturing for position.

Still, seriously, the Sox better trade for Dunn if they want to win anything significant this season.

I was wavering over this issue Monday night until the sixth inning of the Sox' 6-1 victory over the Seattle Mariners.

Then Sox' first baseman Paul Konerko hit a home run over Comiskey Park's left-field fence.

I was talking with someone about Dunn at that very moment, and the homer struck home: What if Konerko and Dunn batted back to back in the Sox' lineup?

Would that be enough for the Sox to not only win the American League Central but also compete with the Yankees in the postseason?

That's debatable. It's going to take an awfully good team to beat the batting order the Yanks can throw out there.

But the Sox won't even have a prayer to be that team if they don't make some additions before the playoffs, or maybe just one big addition in the 280-pound Dunn.

Sox manager Ozzie Guillen says his team has to win the division before thinking about other potential playoff teams.

But with Dunn the Sox can do both at once. He can help them win the AL Central more easily so they aren't mentally and physically whipped by the time they reach the Yankees, Rays or Rangers.

Anyway, just imagine Dunn batting behind Konerko or Konerko batting behind Dunn, lefty-righty or righty-lefty, thunder-lightning or lightning-thunder.

The combination would be better than the Konerko-Thome combo of the past few years because Dunn can play first base.

Guillen could use one at first and the other at designated hitter, switch it up the next night and then play around with it as much as he wants night after night.

Konerko's home run against Seattle was his 22nd of the season and Dunn has 23 for the Nationals.

"Dunn could hit 20 more this year playing in this ballpark," a scout said of Comiskey Park's homer-happy conditions.

Not only all of that, but the Sox drew a crowd of 38,815 on Monday night. Not bad, but this franchise always can use an extra added attraction to fill the seats.

The Dunn-Konerko tandem just might energize the fandom, to say nothing of Sox players. It never hurts for management to demonstrate that it's providing reinforcements for the stretch run.

"People think it's easy to make a trade like opening a bottle," Guillen said. "It's not easy."

Hey, if it were easy anybody could be a general manger. Kenny Williams is the Sox' GM, and he has a way of making blockbuster deals look easy.

Go ahead and make this one. The Sox aren't exactly a young team with Konerko, Omar Vizquel, Juan Pierre, A.J. Pierzynski, Mark Buehrle and Freddy Garcia, so next year might be too late.

If it takes Dan Hudson and, say, Carlos Quentin to acquire Dunn, pay the price. Or dare we say if it takes the precious Gordon Beckham, pay the price.

Maybe that would be nuts, but it would be more nuts not to force this trade.