1953
Somewhat astoundingly, Joe DiMaggio was not elected to the Hall of Fame on his first ballot, finishing eighth.
However, by the skin of his teeth (one vote), ex-White Sox outfielder Al Simmons achieved immortality, along with Dizzy Dean. With 51.3 WAR at the time of his 1933 trade to Chicago from Philadelphia, Simmons was a Hall-of-Famer before ever setting foot on the South Side. But for three seasons with the White Sox, the left fielder added another 10.3 WAR to his ledger, including All-Star seasons and high MVP consideration in both 1933 and 1934.
After being sold to Detroit after the 1935 season Simmons become a bit of a baseball journeyman for eight more seasons, but his case as one of the most fearsome sluggers ever to step on the diamond was well-established.
(And, to provide some cover for the BBWAA writers who flubbed on DiMaggio, even as late as 1953 the eligibility rules were not well-established. DiMaggio had only retired two years earlier — the standard today is five years of retirement before eligibility — and the entire ballot itself was just a blank piece of paper, all write-ins.)
1985
The White Sox signed free agent pitcher Dave Wehrmeister.
Wehrmeister was a No. 3 overall pick in the 1973 January draft, by the San Diego Padres. Still, players bypassed in the summer and grabbed later (back in the days of two drafts) weren’t all just oversights — there indeed were significant players signed in the middle of winter.
And Wehrmeister seemed on track to be just that, starting in Double-A at age 21 and making a quick ascent up the San Diego system, making his MLB debut at age 23, in 1976.
Now, the bad news: Wehrmeister yo-yoed from the minors to majors for nine years and in three organizations, his 310 games logged in Triple-A (84% of his total MiLB games) making him the epitome of a AAAA player. Over five of those nine years Wehrmeister saw MLB time, and in none of those campaigns did Wehrmeister put up a positive WAR.
When the local product (Lyons Township High, in Ber-wyn) signed with the White Sox, let’s not say for sure that it was his swan song in baseball — but, at 32 and with a career -3.0 WAR, the clock was ticking short for him.
And boy, did Wehrmeister end his 76-game major league career on a good note. Coming to Chicago never having had better than a 5.14 ERA or -0.1 WAR in a single season, he was a solid contributor to the solid, 85-77-1 White Sox in 1985. He had 0.9 WAR and a 3.43 ERA (3.37 WHIP) over 23 games, which included four games finished and his first two career saves.
In fact, in a cool moment, Wehrmeister made what would be his final MLB appearance on the second-to-last day of the season. In a game at Comiskey Park where both starters took their lumps, Wehrmeister entered in the sixth inning of a Tom Seaver start and threw zeroes the rest of the way, earning his second career save and preserving a shaky 16th win of the season for Seaver. Wehrmeister’s .298 WPA in the game also made him the contest’s de facto MVP.
(Ironically, Wehrmeister’s other career save, in August 1985, was also a bout of scoreless, four-inning support, this time preserving a win for Britt Burns.)
For a career that was a bit star-crossed, how sweet is it for Wehrmeister to say that his last moments on a major league mound were preserving a win for one of the greatest pitchers of all time?
2011
With considerable hullabaloo and in a public show of brotherhood, White Sox GM Ken Williams announced during SoxFest that the option on manager Ozzie Guillén’s contract had been picked up for 2012.
It had been a winter of love between the two White Sox leaders, as a powwow at the end of the 2010 season resulted in relationship-mending and securing Ozzie’s commitment to the White Sox for 2011. And after an “All-In” offseason that saw the White Sox spending big to establish themselves as AL Central favorites, vibes were so good Williams went ahead and guaranteed his manager’s deal on this day for the next year as well (for 2012 to have been guaranteed for Ozzie, he would have had to outright win the division in 2011).
However, once play began, things turned sour: Ozzie and Ken were locked in a power battle for control of the roster and for owner Jerry Reinsdorf’s affection, Ozzie counterintuitively insisted on playing badly-slumping stars Alex Ríos and Adam Dunn well past their expiration dates as some sort of twisted “punishment” for Williams having acquired them, and Guillén made noise late in the season about getting a pay raise and contract extension in spite of his ballyhooed team playing worse than .500.
The final straw came with Ozzie negotiating with the Florida Marlins for their manager job with the White Sox season still playing; Ozzie released a post on his blog that indicated he was resigning and moving to Miami while the White Sox were starting their final home series of the season.
At least that final embarrassment saw Ozzie leave the White Sox and put a miserable, underachieving season to rest, for good.