{"id":563532,"date":"2026-02-10T03:58:32","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T03:58:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/563532\/"},"modified":"2026-02-10T03:58:32","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T03:58:32","slug":"today-in-chicago-white-sox-history-february-9","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/563532\/","title":{"rendered":"Today in Chicago White Sox History: February 9"},"content":{"rendered":"

1914
Future two-time White Sox<\/a> owner Bill Veeck was born, in Chicago. Baseball\u2019s greatest promoter presided over two of the most exciting seasons in team history, the 1959 pennant winners and 1977\u2019s South Side Hit Men. More vilified than appreciated by baseball\u2019s ruling class, Veeck\u2019s career saw him also owning the (minor league) Milwaukee Brewers<\/a>, St. Louis Browns<\/a> and Cleveland. He helped bring free agency, expansion, playoffs, interleague play and the designated hitter to the majors. Today, on his 109th birthday, his wisdom still resonates.<\/p>\n

1950
The White Sox purchased catcher Phil Masi from the Pirates. Masi had spent the first 10 seasons of his career with Boston in the NL before a 1949 midseason trade to Pittsburgh. From 1946-48 he\u2019d been an NL All-Star, and Masi also received MVP votes in both 1945 and 1946.<\/p>\n

Masi\u2019s 1950 season for the White Sox would be solid (.279\/.366\/.390, 1.9 WAR) if slightly subpar in a hyped hitting environment. The 1951 season saw Masi hit his mid-30s and begin to slow. The White Sox released Masi toward the end of the 1952 season, and he would not reach the majors again.<\/p>\n

1953
What surely was billed as a blockbuster acquisition would turn very sour for the Sox.<\/p>\n

The club brought in a seven-time All-Star, third baseman Vern Stephens, from Boston, sending the Red Sox<\/a> three pitchers: Marv Grissom, Bill Kennedy, and Hal Brown.<\/p>\n

Stephens didn\u2019t pan out from the get-go, starting his South Side career 3-for-28 and getting waived in July, just 44 games into his White Sox career. (Ironically, he ended his career back on the South Side two years later, earning 0.5 WAR in half as many contests.)<\/p>\n

Making this trade a minor disaster was the fact that Grissom and Kennedy were young players destined to have long careers. Brown played a minor role in the Boston bullpen until 1955, when he was traded to Baltimore and joined the Orioles rotation to put up four seasons of more than 2.0 WAR and netting a career total of 17.9 WAR in 12 seasons outside of the White Sox org (he was -0.4 WAR in two Chicago years). Grissom blossomed at almost the same time, burning more briefly but brighty in his rotation stint for the New York Giants<\/a>: 13.8 WAR, plus an All-Star berth. At least Kennedy was on the wrong side of 30, pitching in just 25 future MLB games.<\/p>\n

1971
Exactly 11 months after acquiring him from Boston as an emergency thrown-in to the December 1969 Gary Peters trade, the White Sox<\/a> sent pitcher Gerry Janeski to the Washington Senators for outfielder Rick Reichardt.<\/p>\n

Janeski wasn\u2019t even supposed to change his Sox; originally the Red Sox<\/a> sent pitcher Billy Farmer in the package for Peters. But career minor-leaguer Farmer opted to retire rather than report to Chicago, prompting Janeski to be shipped to the White Sox during Spring Training 1970.<\/p>\n

A month into Janeski\u2019s acquisition, it looked like a steal, as the righthander threw a complete game shutout against the Oakland A\u2019s in just his second MLB start, on April 15. But that three-hitter was the only shutout and one of just four complete games Janeski threw for the putrid, 106-loss 1970 White Sox. Janeski ended the year without missing a start (35 in total), going 10-17 with a 4.77 ERA\/4.25 FIP, 80 ERA+, and staking a claim as the second-best Sox starter behind Tommy John.<\/p>\n

However, Janeski was never more than a filler arm, so he was shipped off to the Senators. He would win just one more game and appear in only 27 future contests in his MLB career.<\/p>\n

1988
This was another one of the smaller moves completed by White Sox<\/a> GM Larry Himes that paid off in a major way. Himes shipped pitcher Jos\u00e9 DeLe\u00f3n to the Cardinals for pitcher Ricky Horton and outfielder Lance \u201cOne Dog\u201d Johnson. Johnson would blossom into one of the better defensive center fielders in the American League, become a solid hitter and steal 226 bases in his eight years on the South Side. He led the American League in triples for four straight seasons (1991-94).<\/p>\n

Johnson had a 25-game hitting streak in 1992, batting .439 during that stretch, and also collected six hits in six at-bats in a game at Minnesota on Sept. 23, 1995 (three of his six hits were triples).<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s most significant defensive play came as part of Wilson Alvarez\u2019s no-hitter in Baltimore on Aug. 11, 1991. In the eighth inning, Johnson sprinted to his left and dove full-out, catching a low line drive off the bat of Chris Hoiles to preserve it.<\/p>\n

Johnson left the White Sox after the 1995 season, signing a contract with the Mets<\/a>. He remains, per 21.3 WAR, the 23rd-best position player and eighth-best outfielder in White Sox history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"1914Future two-time White Sox owner Bill Veeck was born, in Chicago. Baseball\u2019s greatest promoter presided over two of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":563533,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2379],"tags":[10777,23835,12234,18492,10421,5,74258,12224,138,49,4726,31244,2561,64213,39972,26132,35398,15838,4,74259,27740,35399,4727,12227,396,38997,2562,16537],"class_list":{"0":"post-563532","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-white-sox","8":"tag-10777","9":"tag-23835","10":"tag-12234","11":"tag-18492","12":"tag-10421","13":"tag-baseball","14":"tag-bill-kennedy","15":"tag-bill-veeck","16":"tag-chicago","17":"tag-chicago-white-sox","18":"tag-chicago-white-sox-history","19":"tag-chicago-white-sox-roster","20":"tag-chicagowhitesox","21":"tag-gerry-janeski","22":"tag-jose-deleon","23":"tag-lance-johnson","24":"tag-larry-himes","25":"tag-marv-grissom","26":"tag-mlb","27":"tag-phil-masi","28":"tag-rick-reichardt","29":"tag-ricky-horton","30":"tag-today-in-white-sox-history","31":"tag-vern-stephens","32":"tag-white-sox","33":"tag-white-sox-executives","34":"tag-whitesox","35":"tag-wilson-alvarez"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116044334463937119","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=563532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/563533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=563532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=563532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=563532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}