First, in defense of the Vazquez trade, Javier is 11-8 on a horrible team with a nice 3.91 era, and a sparkling 1.14 WHIP, not to mention a K:BB ratio of nearly 4:1. Vazquez has subsequently signed a three year 34.5 million contract extension which is a very nice deal for a 30 year old pitcher with those numbers. Dumping Thomas, and then trading for Thome was stupid. But the main problem is that last year Dye, Crede, Konerko, Thome, and Pierzynski generated enough offense to cover for the total lack of offense from SS, CF, and LF. Also, the pitching was still strong for the White Sox in 2006. This year, the early season slump by the entire lineup exposed their offensive weaknesses at SS, LF, and CF, plus the starting pitching outside of Buerhle and Vazquez struggled, and Williams power arm bullpen experiment blew up in his face. Plus their band aids to patch up LF and CF have failed (Erstad, Mackowiak, etc.) That being said Josh Fields has had a solid rookie year for the Sox at 3B and LF (.740 OPS, 18HR in 81 games). If Fields continues to improve as the LF, Crede comes back healthy, and they can land Torii Hunter in CF, they could make some noise in 2008. Of course, that is a lot of IFs.