{"id":1245,"date":"2012-04-06T05:47:16","date_gmt":"2012-04-06T11:47:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/?p=1245"},"modified":"2012-03-31T19:21:16","modified_gmt":"2012-04-01T01:21:16","slug":"the-robin-ventura-era-begins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/2012\/04\/the-robin-ventura-era-begins\/","title":{"rendered":"The Robin Ventura Era Begins"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>After playing alongside Ozzie Guillen on the left side of the White Sox infield for years, Robin Ventura now follows him in the dugout as skipper, starting with today’s contest against the defending American League champion Rangers. \u00a0Here’s a look at the roster with which he’ll be starting the 162 game grind.<\/p>\n

Starting Pitchers<\/h3>\n

John Danks, Jake Peavy, Gavin Floyd, Chris Sale, Phil Humber<\/strong><\/p>\n

With Mark Buehrle gone, John Danks moves up to the top of the rotation, getting his first Opening Day start today. \u00a0Peavy looks to have his first injury-free season on the south side. \u00a0Chris Sale attempts to move from the bullpen to the rotation and fulfill the promise he showed in college. \u00a0Humber was a surprise success last season and hopefully can continue that success.<\/p>\n

Relief Pitchers<\/h3>\n

Matt Thornton, Jesse Crain, Will Ohman, Addison Reed, Hector Santiago, Zach Stewart, Nate Jones<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thornton started last season as the closer and flamed out before being moved back to his familiar setup role. \u00a0Crain has been battling injury during spring training, but should be ready to go now that the games count. \u00a0Rookies Addison Reed, Hector Santiago, and Nate Jones join holdovers Zach Stewart and Will Ohman in rounding out the pen.<\/p>\n

Catchers<\/h3>\n

A.J. Pierzynski, Tyler Flowers<\/strong><\/p>\n

When Ramon Castro went down with an injury last year, Tyler Flowers finally got his shot in the big leagues and did enough to earn the backup job this year. \u00a0Pierzynski, one of only 2 remaining players from the ’05 World Champions, is in the last year of his contract.<\/p>\n

Infielders<\/h3>\n

Paul Konerko, Adam Dunn, Gordon Beckham, Alexei Ramirez, Brent Morel, Eduardo Escobar<\/strong><\/p>\n

The starting infield remains the same as last year. \u00a0Rookie Eduardo Escobar takes over for Omar Vizquel as the main backup.<\/p>\n

Outfielders<\/h3>\n

Dayan Viciedo, Alejandro De Aza, Alex Rios, Brent Lillibridge, Kosuke Fukudome<\/strong><\/p>\n

With Juan Pierre and Carlos Quentin toiling in the National League, Dayan Viciedo and Alejandro De Aza get their shots to shine. \u00a0Rios moves back to right field, where the hope is his comfort level on defense will help his woeful offense. \u00a0Brent Lillibridge had a breakout season last year, and should see time in both the infield and outfield. \u00a0Former Cub Kosuke Fukudome joins the team as the fourth outfielder.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After playing alongside Ozzie Guillen on the left side of the White Sox infield for years, Robin Ventura now follows him in the dugout as skipper, starting with today’s contest against the defending American League champion Rangers. \u00a0Here’s a look at the roster with which he’ll be starting the 162 game grind. Starting Pitchers John […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1246,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[300,299,2185,868,128,268,582,579,574,120,2184,1717,161,138,2051,145,573,149,139,623,86,164,2187,893,127,572,576,111,45,134,869,49,575,2186],"class_list":["post-1245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-baseball","tag-a-j-pierzynski","tag-adam-dunn","tag-addison-reed","tag-alejandro-de-aza","tag-alex-rios","tag-alexei-ramirez","tag-brent-lillibridge","tag-brent-morel","tag-chris-sale","tag-cubs","tag-dayan-viciedo","tag-eduardo-escobar","tag-gavin-floyd","tag-gordon-beckham","tag-hector-santiago","tag-jake-peavy","tag-jesse-crain","tag-john-danks","tag-juan-pierre","tag-kosuke-fukudome","tag-mark-buehrle","tag-matt-thornton","tag-nate-jones","tag-ozzie-guillen","tag-paul-konerko","tag-phil-humber","tag-ramon-castro","tag-rangers","tag-robin-ventura","tag-the-carlos-quentin","tag-tyler-flowers","tag-white-sox","tag-will-ohman","tag-zach-stewart"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1245"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1245\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1599,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1245\/revisions\/1599"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/learningturkey.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}