Chicago White Sox Inside Pitch

Ken Williams came to the winter meetings with a plan. Unfortunately, as has been the problem the past few offseasons for the Sox general manager, plans often fall to the wayside quickly at the offseason gathering.

According to left-hander Matt Thornton, the Sox were interested in adding free agent reliever J.J. Putz to the bullpen, and they assigned Thornton the job of recruiter.

"There's no doubt that Kenny has interest in him," Thornton told the Sun-Times. "(Putz) has been asking me what I think about it, what I think about the Sox. I told him we expect to win. I tell that to anyone that asks me, we expect to win. We prepare to win and if we don't win, well, we're (upset). I told (Putz) that if you're a free agent you want to go to a winner."

Thornton and Putz have been good buddies since early on in their Seattle days.

"We've known each other for over a decade," Thornton said, laughing. "It's a bromance."

Williams has a history of having White Sox players try to persuade the opposition to join the club when it's time to get serious. The latest example was Scott Linebrink playing pitchman to Jake Peavy this year. It eventually worked, with Peavy waiving his no-trade clause to come to the South Side after initially turning it down earlier in the year.

The one problem is that the market on Putz is clouded -- enough so that Thornton said that Putz is still trying to figure out the value of a hard-throwing right-hander coming off a shortened season that resulted in surgery to remove bone spurs from his elbow.

It got cloudier, as far as Williams was concerned, when word got out that he had Putz targeted.

"We thought we had something going on but you know, like I've told you guys a million times before, when things become public, to a large degree the entire game changes and more times than not you're not going to get a deal," Williams explained, without saying Putz's name. "So something we thought we might be a little closer on becomes public and now it's not so close."

Sources have indicated that's not the case, however.

Yes, the Sox might have to up the ante a bit, but Putz wants to pitch on the South Side and there is still a deal close to happening.

If they are able to add Putz it gives them some flexibility. It gives them a weapon in the setup spot just in case Linebrink doesn't bounce back from a dismal second half, and it would also allow them to move Bobby Jenks if they so choose because of Putz's versatility to close games as well.

Thornton and Putz would give manager Ozzie Guillen interchangeable parts for the eighth and ninth in Jenks' absence, depending on matchups or which reliever is hotter at the moment.

If it were up to Thornton, however, he would like the club to add Putz as well as keep Jenks.

"I think what happened is Bobby set his bar very high for what he did in 2005," Thornton said of all the Jenks trade talk this offseason. "To be the closer in the World Series in this city, and then what he did in 2006 and '07 ⿦ this year he slipped up a bit but on his own standards. You look at the numbers in 2009 and they're good for most closers."