Has Ozzie Guillen Gone Soft?

A quick thought... I've got another //crazy// idea brewing that you might see before gametime.

Ozzie Guillen the manager has undeservedly garnered the reputation for being an out of control headhunter. His White Sox teams have hit a number of batters, no doubt. But they've never been a malicious headhunting bunch. They've just got more attention because Ozzie Guillen isn't shy about talking about sending a message with a well-located beanball.

This season, however, Guillen's Sox have been used as target practice for opposing pitchers without fear of retribution. So far White Sox batters have been hit 13 times this season -- not an outrageous number when you consider the Carlos Quentin factor -- yet their pitchers have only hit 4 batters. And Mark Buehrle hit 2 Royals with his wild opening day performance. In fact, Buehrle has 75% of the Sox pitchers HBPs, with fellow lefty Danks picking up the other.

Jermaine Dye and Josh Fields both went down over the first two games of the Texas series after being hit on the hand by a pitch. Both players escaped without broken bones, but required X-rays and haven't taken the field since. Sunday should have been a game when John Danks took a shot at somebody. But he wasn't all that effective, maybe he didn't get a good 2 out, nobody on situation. Fine. Lance Broadway should have sent some of his 88MPH cheese at somebody's backside.

We've seen Zack Greinke face the Sox twice this season, and in both games he's used chin music on multiple occasions to open up the outside corner for his slider. He's hit only one batter (Quentin) in 45 innings this season while demonstrating pin-point control. Quentin has been on the receiving end of no less than 5 brush-back pitches from Greinke this season. There's not much the Sox can do to stop Greinke from throwing inside, but sending one back across the bow of Billy Butler, David DeJesus or Mark Teahen would be a good start tonight.