Beckham hopes to put 2011 behind
Comments (...)CHICAGO – It would be easy for White Sox second baseman Gordon Beckham to try and make excuses for a lackluster and underwhelming 2011 season.
A volatile combination of a career-low batting average and career-high number of strikeouts left Beckham’s confidence at the plate shaken. Despite kidding at SoxFest “I don’t even remember last year,” in reality, Beckham has used it to fuel him this offseason.
“I don’t want to have that ever happen again for me or my team,” Beckham said. “That’s one of the things that’s going to drive me hopefully for the rest of my career because I don’t ever want to feel that again.”
Swinging at bad pitches in bad hitters counts often doomed Beckham en route to a .230 batting average. However, new hitting coach Jeff Manto and Beckham connected during the offseason and though the 25-year-old acknowledged there’s no magical cure to fixing last season’s problems, he’s focused on getting back to the basics.
“You’ve just got to be confident and I lost a little bit of confidence last year but recently I’ve felt like myself, more so than I’ve ever felt like myself in the last two years,” Beckham said. “… (My swing) it’s there. You just know it when you can see it and you can feel it. It’s there.”
Beckham was hardly the only Sox hitter to struggle in a disappointing season. Still, the Sox’s 2008 first round pick has yet to build off a successful rookie season when he hit .270 with 14 home runs.
“If anybody thinks that I need somebody to push me, they don’t know me very well because I work as hard as anybody,” Beckham said. “Last year was not a good year but I will remember every part of it because I don’t want to ever feel that way again.”
Although he reported to Spring Training at 205 pounds last year, Beckham, who began hitting in early December, said he’s closer to 195 pounds now, a weight he hopes to maintain through the season.
Plenty have clamored for someone to challenge Beckham for his starting spot – specifically super-utility player Brent Lillibridge – but don’t count Sox manager Robin Ventura among them. Beckham locking in mentally, Ventura said, is all he can ask of somebody “especially when he has his heart it in.”
“I don’t have to put a carrot out there that’s some other guy that oh my gosh, we’ve got this mystery guy that’s going to come in and take your spot if you don’t play well,” Ventura said. “I want him to play well because he wants to play well.
“I probably have the closest feel for what he’s gone through because early in my career it was kind of the same thing,” Ventura added. “So I kind of know where he’s at. I didn’t need somebody behind me to motivate me. He’s a motivated kid and he’s a competitor, a proud kid. He’s ready to go.”
For all his offensive struggles, Beckham never carried that onto the field. Defensively Beckham was one of the best at his position as his .989 fielding was among the best which should be one of his strengths again this season.
“What’s most important for Gordon this season, I’d like to have him – however he turns out – at the end of the day play to win and have fun while you’re doing it,” General manager Ken Williams said. “Two goals for me for him: Play to win and have fun doing it because I think the success will be there at the end if he just lightens up a little bit on himself and goes back to it being a game.”
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