When Ozzie Guillen filled out his lineup card throughout the 2010 season, the DH spot in the lineup was often a black hole. It seemed like the White Sox had this hodgepodge of players trying to fill the position and none of them could cut the mustard.

White Sox DH’s hit .247/.332/.396 with 18 HRs in 2010. Now they have a guy who might hit 18 HRs in the first half of the 2011 season.

The White Sox signed DH/1B Adam Dunn to a four-year, $56 million contract on Thursday. Dunn spent the last two years of his career in a Washington Nationals uniform.

I don’t have a problem with the length of the contract, as Dunn will be 35 when the contract ends. With the position he plays, he should still be productive by that age.

I do however think the dollar amount per year is a little high for what Dunn will bring to the table, but not completely outlandish. If I were going to go four years with the big Texan, I would have gone four for $44 million.

Dunn made $10 million a year for the last two years with the Nationals, so a $4 million/year raise isn’t crazy. It wasn’t like Dunn made $3 million and GM Kenny Williams gave him a huge raise.

Money aside, I think the one thing people don’t realize with Dunn is that he has been one of the most consistent players in baseball over the past seven seasons.

Here is what I know I am going to get with Dunn every year. Dunn’s 162-game average looks something like this: .250/.381/.521 with 40 HRs. And guess what? He pretty much comes close to that line every year.

I would expect it to be bombs away in the hitter-friendly US Cellular Field. Forty-five to 50 HRs won’t be out of the question for Dunn in 2011.

I also know Dunn is going to take the field every day. Dunn has played in over 150 games eight out of nine years in the majors. For a guy his size, that’s pretty impressive.

Dunn will be the primary DH for the White Sox in 2011, but will sprinkle in time at first as well. His time at first will mostly depend on whether or not the White Sox bring back Paul Konerko, which I expect them to do.

If there is a concern with Dunn, it’s that his BB percentage has decreased three years in a row and his K percentage has increased three years in a row—never a good trend to have.

However, my positive spin on that is that Dunn was playing on a pretty bad team the last two years and that could be the result of him trying to do too much. Dunn will be joining a pretty decent lineup in Chicago, so we will see if this is a trend or just a product of his environment.

 

You can follow The Ghost of Moonlight Graham on Twitter @ theghostofmlg

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com