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Originally Posted by kutulu
My point is that you are using the wrong tools to evaluate them. Batting average is a terrible metric to use (not as bad as RBI though). HR are somewhat decieving too. Are you familiar with OPS+? It's on base plus slugging normalized so you can see how they compared to the league. An OPS+ of 100 is league average, 90 is 10% below average, and 110 is 10% above average. Here are Konerko's OPS+ for his career:
1999 120
2000 108
2001 120
2002 123
2003 85
2004 123
2005 136
2005 WAS a career year. I'm not saying he usually sucks, just that this was his best year yet. My comment on Dye was that he was the only other player to be significantly above league average. Iguchi was just above league average. It's not a typical recipe for success if 6 of the 9 hitters on your team are below league average.
Garland is similar. He had a fine year in 2001 and 2005 but has been league average the rest of the time. Also, did you even look at the BR link I posted? How can you not say the pen went way above their projections?
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I'm familiar with .OPS. However, I'd argue that offensive stats are down across the league this year, maybe because of steriod use. If Konerko is clean, and many of the players raising the "curve" were not, it's not a matter of him having an awesome year as much as him staying the same while the field dropped. Using that theory, or what I said originally, what he did this year could be expected out of him again, assuming he avoids injury.
As far as Garland, he has been decent, with everyone in Chicago screaming about "potential". I'll I'm saying is that he's reached it now.
With the bullpen, if Bobby Jenks does what he did the second half (and there is no reason to think he won't just get better with experience), and the depth they have, I'm not too worried.