On the tails of some (mildly) expressed lurker interest in learning more about sabermetrics during the South Side Sox open house, I've decided to compile some of my personal bookmarks and other useful resources to help simplify things. I share some links ‘round these parts, so naturally I am expert. Perhaps this can be a database. Or just a one-off. Either way, maybe a few more people will ask more questions and really get the sabermetric ball rolling. If you're only vaguely familiar with some of the more obscure terms and acronyms thrown around on here, well, it can be overwhelming. There is a lot to learn, of course, but there are also a host of White Sox fans willing to help with that process. Just read up a bit first, eh? The links below provide a ton of material, but it's all good stuff, I promise. For the sake of brevity, I'll try to keep my comments clipped.

So, new jack, what is sabermetrics? Where to start? What a coincidence. Fangraphs, perhaps the most-cited outside resource on SSS, recently asked themselves that exact question. The rest of the links are focused on the numbers, but it's a larger field than that to be sure. As you'll find, many of the sites mentioned below are extremely interesting; I highly encourage new users to simply dive in. Select a couple favorite players, use the search functions and click away in any and all directions. Reading stat descriptions is fine, but you'll learn a lot more by putting them to work for you.

Next, to start the technical descriptions, this is an excellent primer. Yep, it has 24 articles on 24 subjects, but it's concise (if you can believe that) and very easy to understand. The listed subjects are largely concerned with player value, which is good since that's probably where most discussions and arguments originate. Those articles give us the meat and potatoes background behind concepts such as Wins Above Replacement. For some quick references, use the Fangraphs library. I've linked to a few of more frequently used stats and concepts below.

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Over the last 25 years, I have had the opportunity to meet plenty of White Sox players. I have met these guys at fan club luncheons, SoxFest, out and about in the city or on White Sox road trips. I've met Matt Thornton and Sergio Santos at Miller's Pub, A.J. Pierzynski and Brian Anderson at Angels and Kings, Tim Raines and Craig Grebeck at The Old Barn but none of the stories compare to when my friends and I took a road trip to Milwaukee in 2001 to see the White Sox face the Brewers.

There was some funky scheduling that led up to that series. The first game took place on a Sunday. My friends and I took the 90 mile drive up on Saturday evening to party and hit up the Sunday day game. We bounced around a few bars on Water Street finally settling on one that had an outside beer garden and two levels with pool tables upstairs.

My guys and I settled in nicely, drinking a lot and shooting pool when to our surprise a large contingent of White Sox players made their way up the stairs. I was 21 at the time. This was pretty much the greatest thing to happen to me up to that point. Jon Garland, Alan Embree, Keith Foulke, James Baldwin, Coach Gary Pettis and Royce Clayton were now in the house.

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When Jake Peavy kinda-sorta suggested that Ozzie Guillen quit on the team during an appearance on Chris Rongey's show, Guillen, who wasn't in the States, promised to respond to Peavy with guns blazing upon his return. It took Jerry Reinsdorf's mediation to keep a pointless controversy from spiraling out of control.

Today, though, another member of the team jumped on another radio show and detailed further mismanagement by Guillen. This time, it concerned Adam Dunn. The source said Guillen knew something was wrong with Dunn's swing as early as spring training, and still, Guillen ran Dunn out there often enough to come within six plate appearances of qualifying for the batting title.

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Since the White Sox sent Sergio Santos to Toronto, they didn't just lose a closer -- they also lost an unlikely, made-for-TV salvation story.

Enter Mitch Mustain, who told a Northwest Arkansas TV station that he signed a minor-league contract with the Sox.

Who is Mitch Mustain? A former five-star quarterback from Arkansas who was supposed to be the next great Razorback quarterback. This story from NWAhomepage.com sums it up: He went 8-0 at Arkansas before getting benched after a bad throw. He clashed with coaches, transferred to USC, where he backed up Mark Sanchez and Matt Barkley and only started one game. In February of 2011, he was arrested and accused of selling a prescription ADHD drug, although felony charges were dropped because it wasn't actually a controlled substance (it was originally thought to be Adderall, which would have been trouble).

He was going to try his luck in the Arena Football League, but now he's apparently going to try a baseball career. The 23-year-old hasn't pitched since high school, but he says he threw 90 mph for a White Sox scout.

It's an unorthodox way to make the minors more interesting, but given the White Sox's occupation of the cellar in all major farm system rankings, we'll have the resources to keep track of him. The Sox signing a former college quarterback automatically brings to mind Joe Borchard and Josh Fields, but hey, Clayton Richard turned out OK.

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The new and possibly improved PECOTA projections from Baseball Prospectus came out Wednesday, and if you want to know how it works, Colin Wyers will explain to you using Adam Dunn as an example. If you're interested in the numbers, you can just look at Kyle's FanPost.

But if you're like me when you look at the spreadsheet, your eyes soon drift towards the comparable players column. Or, if you're Grant Brisbee, you seek it out immediately. They're fun to mull over no matter how fast you get there, because in many cases, it would be better for PECOTA if they were left unsaid.

Sometimes the comps are ridiculous on the surface, but you can at least draw a Hawk Harrelson STRETCH! connection, because, hey, Eduardo Escobar and Luis Aparicio are both diminutive Venezuelan shortstops. But then you get ones like ...

• Brent Morel: Andy Marte, Aramis Ramirez, Adrian Beltre
• Dallas McPherson: Harmon Killebrew, Mike Schmidt, Mike Hessman
  

And you get the idea that PECOTA isn't an intricate baseball projection system, but a high school student with senioritis mailing in a project ("Here are three third baseman. Can I graduate now?").

But amid the carnage, I did find four that ended up being somewhat profound upon some reflection.

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So I was supposed to write an article this morning, but couldn't log in. Oops.

Yesterday I was watching Baseball IQ on MLB network and the MLB.com fantasy expert couldn't name 1 guy out of the top 20 active stolen base leaders. Really? Your job is fantasy baseball expert for MLB, and after the guy who worked for the Hall of Fame said Juan Pierre you had nothing? Really? That's terrible.

Especially considering they exclusively talk about the 5x5 format, which grossly inflates the real life value of stolen bases. Carl Crawford? Ichiro Suzuki? I made a mental note to ignore everything that guy says ever from here on out.

I have a little bit of down time so I thought I'd run through a quick list of strategies and observations on this upcoming season of fantasy baseball.

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In the last four installments of this series, we've looked at the clippings for two Hall of Famers (Ed Walsh, Ray Schalk) and another one who should be in Cooperstown, too (Minnie Minoso).

Today's subject, Henry John Bonura, aka "Zeke," might be equally memorable for those who watched him play for the White Sox from 1934 to 1937. The first baseman made his mark on the franchise's record books and an indelible impression on observers, although not always for the best reasons.

Why Zeke Bonura?

Before Albert Belle went and ruined all the fun, Bonura was an answer to a fantastic trivia question: "Who holds the White Sox single-season record for RBI?" He drove in 138 runs for the White Sox in 1936, and that record stood for 62 years before Belle shattered it with 152 in 1998.

It was easy to see how Belle set the record -- he also set White Sox records for homers (49) and doubles (48). Bonura, on the other hand, drove in 138 runs on only 12 homers, which is by far the most RBI for any 12-homer season in baseball history (Goose Goslin is second with 129, if you care).

Bonura was the team's clean-up hitter, and given that he batted .330/.426/.482, he deserved it. But he also scored a whopping 120 runs because Luke Appling was batting fifth and setting records of his own. That year, Appling hit a franchise-high .388, winning the batting title while driving in 128 runs ... on six homers. And yes, that's also a record number of RBI for any six-homer season (Honus Wagner is second with 126, if you care).

But Bonura was the White Sox's first real slugger of the live ball era. He set the team record for homers in his rookie season with 27 (Carl Reynolds hit 22 in 1930), and he held the record -- or a share of it -- until Gus Zernial hit 29 for the 1950 White Sox.

With his unprecedented power and a big-time personality to match, Bonura became a fan favorite on the South Side. In fact, fans liked him a lot more than his manager did, because he was a designated hitter four decades before the position came into existence.

Also, he was Italian. And this was a big deal to some people.

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Now that football is over, there's no excuse to not start thinking about baseball, so let's make sure we're all on the same page here.

As I mentioned before in my FanPost about it, today will be a day to extend a hand to new readers and longtime lurkers who might want to get more involved in one way or another, but haven't found a good place to start.

We can use this as part introduction thread, and part All Questions Answered a la John Sickels' blog.

If you're new (or even if you aren't), please make yourself known, share your White Sox background, and feel free to offer up any question you've had while reading South Side Sox. To throw some topics out there:

• White Sox coverage
• Advanced statistics
  
• Prospects/farm system
  
• SSS Meet-ups (a.k.a. meth-ups)
• SSS community
  
• Etc.

Ask a genuine question, get a helpful answer. That's the deal today. If you can answer or question or address a thought, please do. Just so we make sure to get the most out of this, please make sure questions/comments have been resolved/responded to before taking it in a different direction. And let's not get carried away. At least for today. Whaddya say?

Fire away.