Who would you rather have—Hunter, Rowand or Swisher?

During this past offseason, the Chicago White Sox were strongly pursuing free agent center fielders Torii Hunter and Aaron Rowand. They started with Hunter, and couldn't sign him. They then tried for Rowand and that didn't work either. They had to "settle" for Nick Swisher by dealing for him from Oakland. However, when you look at the numbers here, nearly every number, and certainly all the key ones, favor Swisher:

Sometimes what you want may not be what's best for you. In this case, that's exactly what happened to the White Sox. Swisher may not wind up in center field for the Sox, but he is a very valuable acquisition for them, especially because he can play center field well if needed.

Warning: shameless advertising to follow.

Bill James and I have just launched Bill James Online (www.BillJamesOnline.com). The online and the book, The Bill James Gold Mine 2008, are a collaboration between Bill and me, with the help of countless others. The online has thousands and thousands of pages of information. The Gold Mine has what we could fit in about 320 pages. Take a look—I think you'll enjoy it. Here's a snippet from Bill's most recent article called "Clemens" that he posted in the online. It didn't make the book so you'll have to subscribe to the online to get the whole thing:

"I find numerous assertions that Clemens had his best seasons after age 40. The advocates of the various metrics seem to be engaged in a kind of proxy fight over whether or not that is true.

"Well, it isn’t true. Roger Clemens did not have his best seasons in his forties. I have two methods that are germane to this issue, either of which is much more directly on point than any of the metrics being cited in the debate."

Note: Projections are from The Bill James Handbook: Projections Update 2008 available at www.BaseballInfoSolutions.com