The 35th Street Review

Hot news off the hot stove about the hot corner. Welcome to the Midwest’s new Little Havana.

Introducing the 35th Street Review’s newest feature. In this installment: three, maybe three-and-a-half easy steps to dominating the junior circuit next year.

In which the author pontificates on half-hearted lineups, progress, and the impending ugliness over there at third base.

Pitching and defense win championships, that much is true. With today’s announcement that Josh Fields will start the season in Charlotte and Juan Uribe will cover second base duties, the following are also true:

• Half of the Sox’ infield is proven to be untradeable, and not in a good way
• Their second baseman is a shortstop playing out of position
• Their third baseman has a back problem he hasn’t entirely recovered from, either in the field or at the plate
• Their center fielder is questionable with the glove although solid with the bat
• Their left fielder will be a platoon of an injury risk and a Gold Glove-caliber center fielder
• Their right fielder has come a long way back to earth since the 2005/2006 heydays
• Sixty percent of their starting rotation is coming off of seasons of 5+ ERAs
• All but one of their relievers are either wildly inconsistent, rapidly declining or totally unproven
• Exactly one starting pitcher has both a pickoff move and a compact enough delivery to hold a runner at first
• Their starting catcher has one of the lowest success rates throwing out attempted steals in the entire sport

Make your own predictions, folks. The 35th Street season preview will be posted over the weekend once the official 25-man roster is out, lest we make any hasty and premature statement’s about this team’s inevitable descent into a long, boring fight for third place.

Konerko to the Angels? Sounds even better the fiftieth time.

How Josh Fields’ Rookie of the Year vote makes Lance Broadway the greatest pitcher of all time.

The search for the next Juan Gone may have finally reached its end.