WHITE SOX SIGN MISSING PUZZLE PIECE?

by Jack Cobra, Cobra Brigade

While the rest of the AL Central is signing players left and right to push the Tigers, Indians and Twins this offseason, for the most part the Chicago White Sox have struck out. They did their best to make up for that yesterday by signing......Octavio Dotel? General Manager Kenny Williams could barely hide his excitement:

"What we needed to do was make sure we had a bridge to get the ball to Bobby," Williams said. "Now, I believe we've got multiple options -- not just with Dotel but obviously Linebrink. I expect Matt Thornton to rebound and Mike MacDougal to rebound from disappointing years. We feel good about the quality. We feel good about the depth of our bullpen. We also feel good about the ability to not tax Bobby Jenks to the point where we wear him out."

Regardless of his price tag (2 yrs, $11 million), and with all due respect to Bobby Jenks and his nasty stuff, what the White Sox need is a center fielder, at least one more respectable starting pitcher and a trade to get Joe Crede out of town (kill two birds with one stone, maybe?). If I'm a White Sox fan, I'm can't be too happy about this signing.

It was just 2005 when the White Sox took over Chicago with their World Series victory and in less than three years they've already lost that momentum as the Cubs have signed big name free agents the past two offseasons.

The Baltimore Orioles tried to load up their bullpen a couple of years ago with high priced free agents much like the White Sox are doing now......it didn't work for them and I don't see it working for the White Sox. For a team with a lot of holes and playing in what could be the toughest division in baseball, the White Sox could be in for a very long season.