1971
Todd Ritchie, author of one of the worst seasons in White Sox history, was born in Portsmouth, Va.
He came to the White Sox from Pittsburgh in a ballyhooed deal that saw three pitchers dealt away for a player in Ritchie — who was never destined for much more than middle-rotation innings-eater. And in 2002 for the Pale Hose, Ritchie was … awful: a 6.06 ERA (to be fair, something was fishy, as he sported a 4.84 FIP), 5-15 record and 1.706 WHIP. All those peripherals added up (down) to a -1.7 WAR,
which is still tied for the 15th-worst pitching season in White Sox annals.
Ritchie was eligible for free agency after the season, and unsurprisingly the White Sox let him go.
1997
The White Sox bought reliever Doug Creek from the San Francisco Giants. There’s a chance the lefty was someone that Chicago wanted as part of the return in the “White Flag Trade,” given this purchase’s proximity to the deal. If so, something turned pretty quickly, as Creek was sold a month later to the Hanshin Tigers of the Japanese Central League.
Creek would make his way back to the States and play in another six MLB seasons, but never with the White Sox.
2005
In an utterly shocking and embarrassing move, despite going wire-to-wire in first place and sweeping to a World Series title White Sox GM Ken Williams did not win Executive of the Year from The Sporting News. Instead, Cleveland GM Mark Shapiro took home the honors.
It’s noteworthy that not only did Cleveland finish in second place in the AL Central, six games behind Chicago, but a White Sox sweep on the season’s final weekend eliminated their rivals from playoff contention entirely.
The award was not given to Shapiro for his club’s massive jump in the standings from 2004 to 2005, either, as Cleveland improved by 13 wins in 2005 — but the White Sox jumped ahead 16.
Williams’ work in piecing together a 99-win team that lost just one playoff game en route to a title after leading the AL Central from wire to wire was nothing short of masterful. To wit, seven players brought in by trade or free agency for their first full seasons in Chicago in 2005 combined to provide 18.4 WAR toward the title season — the very definition of brilliant executive work.
2012
The White Sox acquired center fielder Blake Tekotte from the Padres, for minor league reliever Brandon Kloess. While Kloess never made the bigs with San Diego, it might have been best that Tekotte didn’t in Chicago, either: a .226/.306/.355 slash in 20 games and caught in three of four steal attempts, for a -0.2 WAR.
After spending most of 2013 and all of 2014 in Triple-A Charlotte, the White Sox sold Tekotte off to the Arizona Diamondbacks on Aug. 3, 2014. He never played in the majors again.
2014
Long after he played his final game in his home country, Minnie Miñoso was inducted into the Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame — eight years before the legend found his way into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.
Given that Miñoso had played his last professional game in Cuba some 55 years earlier, it seems Cuba was just as tardy in honoring one of its greatest players of all time, right?
Not so. After the communist revolution in 1959, there were no official inductions to Cuba’s Hall of Fame; otherwise, Miñoso surely would have been enshrined decades earlier.
Miñoso had started his professional baseball career at age 16 in Cuba’s Serie Nacional. Five years later, he was in the U.S., playing for the New York Cubans of the Negro Leagues, with whom he won his sole World Series. Another four years later, Miñoso made his MLB debut, with Cleveland.
But Miñoso found his greatest fame with the White Sox, and remains No. 12 overall with 41.5 WAR with the club and fifth overall among batters.
Miñoso was part of a class of 10 players inducted in 2014, and he had the good fortune of being alive for the honor. Sadly, with Miñoso’s passing in 2015, Cooperstown was years too late to treat him similarly.
