The emerging consensus around baseball is that former White Sox starting pitcher Jose Contreras is old and just about washed up. Certainly, his traditional stats of a 5-13 ERA and a 5.42 ERA do little to convince you otherwise.

Which is why I was shocked when I looked at Alejandro’s White Sox WAR pie and saw that Contreras has actually been the fifth most productive player on the White Sox this year, with a 2.3 WAR. Clearly some investigation was warranted.

Reports out of Colorado are that GM Dan O’Dowd’s first choice for a replacement starter was Brad Penny, but that manager Jim Tracy, who had had to deal with Penny when he managed the Dodgers, was against acquiring him, so O’Dowd was forced to fall back on Contreras as a second choice.

But looking at Contreras’s FIP this season, it is a mere 4.12, which is significantly better than Brad Penny’s 4.48 FIP when he was signed by the Giants. Indeed, looking at Contreras’s peripherals, they are all right in line with his career norms. In fact, his groundball rate is slightly up, and his line drive and home run rates are slightly down, all of which are good signs for a pitcher.

Well, actually there is one glaring exception. Contreras’s strand rate is at 56.8%, which is one of the lowest strand rates I have ever seen. So basically, Contreras is not letting all that many guys on base, but when he does, almost half of all baserunners score.

Now, some old-school baseball guys might tell you that this is a reflection on the weakness of Contreras’s character, and that he must be somehow “cracking under the pressure” when guys get on base. But given that most stats guys are convinced that strand rate is almost entirely based on luck, and that Contreras’s career mark is a much healthier 67%, a natural conclusion to draw is that the Rockies just got themselves a much better pitcher than they maybe even realized.

As everyone knows, the White Sox won the World Series in 2005 primarily on the strength of their lights-out starting rotation. The front four starting quartet of Mark Buehrle, Freddy Garcia, Jon Garland, and Jose Contreras all won at least 14 games and all had ERAs of 3.87 or lower. The dominance of the quartet was underlined most clearly when each pitcher tossed a complete game in order in the Sox’ 4-1 triumph over the Angles in the ALCS.

In 2006 the rotation was supposed to be even stronger thanks to the addition of one-time ace Javier Vazquez as the 5th starter, but whether you want to call it regresion to the mean or fatigue from all those innings they threw in 2005, the original quartet all regressed in ‘06, as all four  saw their ERAs into the 4’s and threw much fewer innings.

But don’t look now (or *do* look, if you are a White Sox fan like Alejandro), because the White Sox rotation is getting back to its ace-laden look of the 2005 world champions. Freddy Garcia is gone now, having been shipped to the Phillies in the offseason, but Javier Vazquez is looking more like the pitcher that dominated as the ace of the Montreal Expos than the pitcher of recent years who looked very mediocre in stints with the Yankees and D-Banks, and rookie John Danks (acquired from Texas for Brandon McCarthy) is pitching much more like a veteran  third starter than a rookie fifth starter.

Last season, White Sox starters had a 4.65 ERA, but this year they are a full run lower, at 3.65. Garland’s 8 1/3 innings against the Royals last night marked the 17th game in a row that the White Sox starter went at least 6 innings. Indeed, so far this season the White Sox are second in the American League only to the Red Sox with 6.25 innings pitched per start, and trail only the D-Backs, Giants, and Reds in the National League, despite the fact that NL starters don’t have to face the designated hitter.

Perhaps most amazing of all, all five White Sox have allowed fewer hits than innings pitched, and as a whole they have allowed the fewest hits and the lowest batting average against in all of baseball. And it’s not like they are walking a lot of guys either, as they have yielded the fourth fewest walks of any rotation.

Although the Sox have gotten off to a somewhat lackluster start in the extremely competitive AL Central, if their rotation can keep this up all year, they will have a good shot at turning it around and making a run.

First and foremost, I am not Cuban. I’ve never been to Cuba; and I don’t know the plight that many say they undergo everyday under Fidel Castro’s regime.

What I know about what some émigrés go through, especially baseball players that defect, is what I hear from the American and Latin-American press. Reports of players obtaining Mexican, Nicaraguan or Colombian nationality to be able to enter the United States legally are not uncommon.

Cuban players are, after all, highly sought commodities in this Baseball Marketplace, and many will go far beyond what may seem as typical transactions to obtain the services of such players.

The wet-foot, dry-foot policy that the U.S. maintains towards Cubans has forced many to risk their lives, launching themselves aboard makeshift boats in hopes of reaching American soil, where, if they set foot as a result of their own power and will, they’ll get a chance to stay legally.

The trick is getting to terra firma before the Coast Guard catches you. Or before the government discovers that you’re part of a alleged plot to smuggle your own family out of Cuba.

As the L.A. Times reports:

Contreras implicated in smuggling case

By Kevin Baxter

April 11, 2007

KEY WEST, FLA. — Chicago White Sox pitcher Jose Contreras pledged $200,000 to finance the smuggling operation that brought his wife and two daughters to Florida from Cuba in June 2004, one of the men involved in planning the trip said in court Tuesday.

Geoffrey Rodrigues, a convicted felon who admitted to participating in two smuggling operations in 2004, testified in federal court that he received $5,000 for recruiting a housemate, Edward Hernandez, to co-pilot the boat that brought Miriam Murillo, the couple’s children and seven other friends and relatives to the U.S. Hernandez and Roberto Yosvany, the other pilot, split another $65,000, Rodrigues said, adding that he didn’t know whether Contreras ever paid the full $200,000.

Jaime L. Torres, the pitcher’s Miami agent, did not respond to calls Tuesday.

I can only think of what ramifications this may have for the White Sox pitcher. If the authorities believe what Rodrigues is saying, Contreras will face, at least, charges brought upon by Federal agents. His family may be in jeopardy of being deported back to Cuba.

Although first thought of as rumor and speculation, Contrera’s involvement in the case has taken a toll on his performance, as evidenced during opening day. He did rebound for his last start, but performance on the field becomes almost an afterthought after learning about this case.

Los pensamientos de la fanáticada están contigo y con tu familia, José.