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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It's not going to be the College of Coaches, but after eight years of The Ozzie Guillen Show, it seems like Robin Ventura is going to allow the members of his staff to showcase their personalities.

For instance, during SoxFest weekend, Ventura knows he's going to have to rely on Don Cooper. In turn, Cooper asserted his clout by reacting somewhat snippily to the suggestion that Matt Thornton was the front-runner ... not knowing that Ventura made the suggestion. And even then, he was skeptical.

Now you have Mark Parent, who made waves during SoxFest with his "Chicago Way" comments about HBPs, which provoked garden-variety well-I-never commentary from those who are unaware of just how many lumps the Sox have taken. His philosophy involves more than Hammurabi's Code, as he told Mark Gonzales:

"It's something that needs to be done here," Parent, the White Sox's new bench coach, said of the uniformity of fundamentals that was stressed throughout the Orioles organization and helped make the club perennial postseason contenders from the mid-1960s to the early 1980s. Those teams were taught by longtime teachers like manager Earl Weaver and the late Ripken.

"The last couple of years (the Sox) have got too big of a separation between the major leagues and the minor leagues," Parent said. "The minor leagues weren't on the same page. They weren't doing the same things they were doing in Chicago."

This isn't the first time we've heard this -- somebody mentioned the lack of continuity late in the season, and it might have been Ozzie Guillen. Alas, I'm not coming up with the link. But I like that we're hearing it again, and in reference to a team that isn't the White Sox.

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Former Oakland Athletic and Tampa Bay Ray Dan Johnson will be signing a minor league deal with the White Sox, likely with an invitation to major league camp at spring training. The lefty-hitting first baseman has spent the majority of the last few seasons in AAA and also had a stint in Japan in 2009.

Johnson may be most familiar to fans as the guy who hit the dramatic bottom of the ninth inning, two out home run against the Yankees in the final day of the 2011 regular season that sent that game to extra innings. The Rays eventually won the game and dumped the Red Sox from the playoffs.

With a career line of .235/.334/.405, Johnson is pretty much the definition of a replacement level player. And with Paul Konerko and Adam Dunn inhabiting the roster, barring significant injuries, Johnson is unlikely to see the major league roster.

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The spring training schedule once again presents multiple opportunities to see or hear the White Sox in preseason action. The schedule includes six games on television (five on Comcast SportsNet and one on WGN), nine games on WSCR and twelve games on chisox.com (all of those webcasts are free).

Of course, the press release does not actually tell you exactly which games will be on what. For example, this is how they describe the TV coverage:

The first televised game will be March 9 against the Cubs on WGN-9 at Camelback Ranch at 2:05 p.m. CST. Comcast SportsNet will carry five games, starting with a March 23 game against Arizona at Camelback Ranch in Glendale. CSN will wrap up its spring TV schedule April 3 against Houston at Minute Maid Park at 7 p.m.

Thanks for that, I guess. [Edit 7:30pm: The White Sox put up the other dates. The six games are 3/9 v Cubs; 3/23 v Diamondbacks (night game); 3/25 v Giants; 3/29 v Dodgers; 4/1 v Reds; and 4/3 v Astros (night game).]

The real fun will be this:

WSCR broadcasts the first of its nine games on Monday, March 5 at 2:05 p.m. CST when the White Sox open spring training against the Los Angeles Dodgers in Glendale. WSCR again will feature the on-air tandem of Ed Farmer and Darrin Jackson. Four of the nine game broadcasts (March 10, 17, 24 and 25) feature an "interactive" format, allowing listeners to interact with Farmer and Jackson, as well as pre and post-game host Chris Rongey during the broadcast.

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Fresh off his honeymoon, Chris Sale talked to White Sox beat writers on a conference call Monday afternoon, informing them that the project to convert him into a starter has not hit any snags.

Among the other noteworthy points:

*There's no hard-and-fast innings limit. Sale didn't dismiss the notion of pitching 190 innings, pointing to the 135 combined innings he threw at Florida Gulf Coast University, the White Sox bullpen and his brief tour of the farm system in between back in 2010. He said he felt just as good at the end of that season as he did at the beginning, so he's not prematurely concerned with fatigue.

*He has the pitches, and now he's "sharpening the tools." He made fastball command an offseason priority. With hitters facing him multiple times in a game, he knows he'll have to use all parts of the zone. He's also going back to his changeup, which was his key secondary pitch in college, but he hasn't used it much in the big leagues.

*He's "really, really excited" to start. He's also "very excited." And "really, really looking forward to it."

I joke about his enthusiasm, but it's actually refreshing to hear a member of the White Sox openly and audibly enjoy his line of work. He even handled a couple of hypothetical questions about returning to closing in the same manner as before (basically saying, "I really want to start, but sometimes things happen").

There are plenty of obvious reasons to root for Sale to stick as a starter -- it helps the Sox immensely, it proves Keith Law wrong, etc. But having Sale as a reliable presence in the rotation would give the White Sox an opportunity to put him out front more. The collective voice of the players has taken a back seat to Ozzie Guillen for the last eight years, and it could use some energy.

Hell, even his name is built for promotions. I'll get the ball rolling: SALE'S PITCH!

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Jake Peavy and Ozzie Guillen have conflicting accounts regarding the last days of the former White Sox manager, so Jerry Reinsdorf decided to step in with a statement that likely aims to cut off a pointless argument before it bleeds into SoxFest.

"Regarding Ozzie Guillen’s departure as White Sox manager last September, I want to make it clear that he left with our organization’s blessing and at my urging. Ozzie told me he wanted to finish out the year, the Marlins really wanted him in Miami for the conclusion of the season, and I told him that he had no choice but to go given the excitement surrounding the opening of their new stadium and the unveiling of their new uniforms. Ozzie needed to be in Miami at the end of the season for the Marlins.

"We will always be grateful for the 21 seasons Ozzie spent in a White Sox uniform as a player and coach, especially his role in helping us win the 2005 World Series championship. We wish him nothing but the best."

That seems to address the key point of contention. Peavy didn't explicitly say Guillen quit on the team, but he left his early departure open to interpretation. Reinsdorf is saying it wasn't Guillen's idea to leave the Sox with two games left, but he also splashes in some enthusiastic language to imply the Sox had reasons to accommodate him so willingly.

Both sides appear to get something out of the statement, and hopefully this answers everything (except the questions about tampering!).

The White Sox released their list of non-roster invites to their major league camp at spring training. Included are players who signed minor-league contracts: RHP Brian Bruney, LHP Leyson Septimo and Eric Stults, C Damaso Espino and Hector Gimenez, INF Dallas McPherson and Ray Olmedo and OF Delwyn Young.

Receiving invites from within the organization are OF Jared Mitchell, Jordan Danks, Brandon Short and Trayce Thompson, RHP Jacob Petricka and Brian Omogrosso, C Michael Blanke and Josh Phegley and INF/OF Jim Gallagher and Tyler Kuhn.

As it appears that there are bullpen spots open for competition, Bruney in particular has a strong chance of making the opening day roster. The lefties, Septimo and Stults, have an outside chance. The remaining minor league signings are roster filler for Charlotte.

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