Black Sox Blog

This White Sox fan is glad that August is over and done with. Let’s put it in the books, close the book and then forget about it. The White Sox were 12-16 in the month, by far their worst this year. What’s odd is, their numbers before and after the All Star Break aren’t all that different. On the hitting side, they were .262/.324/.420 in the first half and so far this year, they’re .259/.313/.425 in the second half. On the pitching side, they had a 3.62 ERA and a 1.26 WHIP in the first half and a nearly identical 3.61 ERA and 1.27 WHIP in the second half.

Most of the reason is, they’re no longer getting into as many one and two run games, and when they are, this time they’re on the wrong side. I was hoping they would have made some kind of move prior to this last trading deadline, but it looks like we’re going into the playoffs with what we have right now.

On Monday, Mark Buehrle had a mediocre outing and the White Sox made four (yes, four) errors in the game. The new result of that was three unearned runs. Juan Uribe broke out of his season long slump and went three for four and Geoff Blum (more on him later) drove in two runs.

Yesterday was the doubleheader, which was a split. I don’t feel like talking about the loss, so let’s talk about the one shining moment in this series. Brandon McCarthy got his first major league start in almost two months and he looked like he did when he made his debut. He only struck out two batters, but he went 7 2/3 innings (117 pitches) and gave up only two hits and one walk. That one outing got his ERA down nearly two points.

This afternoon, the White Sox got shelled. They actually had a 2-1 lead through the top half of the sixth when Texas exploded for five runs. The Rangers added three more in the eighth just to run up the score. Orlando Hernandez gave up three homeruns in five innings of work as he took the loss.

The Indians are tied 2-2 with the Tigers. If the Tribe wins the game, we’ll only have a six game lead. We still have six games with Cleveland, so this is going to be a bit scary. While I’m all for a good playoff race, I really hope that final weekend series of the season means nothing.

The Tigers are on deck. We’ve owned them so far this year, so hopefully that continues. We need wins.

It’s been the story this season. Their pitching is stellar, and they score just enough to walk away with a win. The scary thing is, we’ve outplayed our Pythagorean Win/Loss by six games. The Indians have underplayed their’s by two. Those eight games make up our current lead in the AL Central. While we’re not quite the hitless wonders of 1917, we’re definitely a touch below average.

What does it all mean? For this White Sox fan, not much. We’re in first place in the real standings, not some hypothetical one. We’re going to the postseason (I’m more confident then I was at this time last week) and we’re going to have a shot at winning our first World Series in almost 90 years.

Brian Anderson was the hero of Friday’s game. Since making his debut almost two weeks ago, he’s been given spot time by Ozzie Guillen. If I ran the Sox, the Carlos Lee deal doesn’t happen and Anderson is the starting centerfielder. Podsednik has done well, but I think his value to the team has been overstated. Had he played the entire year, some jokers would have probably talked him up as the MVP of the American League.

I’m sorry, I got on a tangent here, so I’m going to continue. This season has been an odd one for this White Sox fan. On the one hand, I don’t think Ozzie Guillen’s one run at a time style is a good one. On the other hand, the Sox have the best record in the American League, so it’s hard to argue the moves they’ve made. It’s a divergance of what you believe in and what you want to happen (see the team win).

Where were we. Ah yes, Brian Anderson. He hit his first two career homers on Friday and drove in three runs. Orlando Hernandez threw eight good innings, but he let the tying run score in the eighth. Fortunately, Tad Iguchi came through in the twelth inning with a two run shot to win it.

Yesterday’s game had some suspense. The White Sox jumped out to a four run lead, only to see it evaporate to a mere one run cushion. Damasco Marte got the job done in the ninth and he earned his fourth save of the season. Jermaine Dye was four for four with a homer, two runs and two RBIs. He also stole two bases.

Today, the time away from home must have caught up with them. After his one hit loss earlier in the week, Freddy Garcia was shelled this afternoon. Aaron Rowand had three hits and an RBI and Paul Konerko had two hits, a run and an RBI.

A four game trip to steamy Texas is on deck before we head home to face the Tigers. At this point, I’d take a split. The last series of an extended road swing is always a tough one and I’m sure the players are really not looking forward to Thursday’s afternoon game.

Despite the way the White Sox’ series with the Twins started, it really didn’t turn out that bad. Mired in their worst slump all season, the Sox bounced back from the disappointing loss on Tuesday and won the final two games of the series.

Tuesday, sigh. Freddy Garcia pitched the game of his life. One hit, two walks and three strikeouts in the complete game. Unfortunately, that one hit was a solo homer by Jacque Jones in the bottom of the eighth inning to give the Twins a 1-0 win. The White Sox couldn’t get a single man across home plate because Johan Santana was equally as effective. The Sox were held to three hits and two walks and all five of those base runners were stranded.

This is the 2005 version of the White Sox though. We don’t just lie down. Wednesday, the White Sox bounced back with what was, for them, a mini offensive barrage. Six runs on thirteen hits with Carl Everett providing the bulk of the offense. He homered for the 19th time this season and he drove in four runs. No hitter in the starting lineup that day ended the game with a batting average above .280.

Mark Buehrle was reliable as always. Eight innings, six hits and one run. The pen got roughed up for three runs in the ninth, but at that point, the game was pretty much over.

The Sox locked up the series with another pitchers dual yesterday. Jon Garland had another very solid start but again walked away without a decision. Timo Perez was the hero as he drove home the go ahead run in the 10th inning while Carl Everett and Jermaine Dye both had two hits.

We now have an eight game cushion over the Indians, which at one point after Tuesday’s game was only seven games. We travel to Seattle where it’s more difficult to score, so hopefully our pitching will come through for us for what’s like the 100th time this season so we can take two of three.

One good inning. That’s all the White Sox could manage this weekend. Fortunately, that one good inning resulted in six runs that ultimately snapped the Sox seven game losing streak. I really didn’t want to see the White Sox play a meaningful series in September, but when you’re a White Sox fan, you’re used to being disappointed. While I’d say an eight and a half game lead is “pretty safe” at this point, you just never know.

While our hitting was never good this season, it really went away this weekend. On Friday, we only managed six hits off of Mike Mussina, and while Jon Garland was pretty good, we needed perfection. A.J. Pierzynski drove in the only run with a single in the first.

Unfortunately, it was more then what they got yesterday. This time they only managed four hits, none of whom crossed the plate. Orlando Hernandez made two errors, one of which ultimately resulted in three runs. He threw a ball into the outfield that should have been the start of an easy double play.

Today’s game was better, barely. If you take out the fourth inning, they scored no runs on four hits. Of course that fourth inning was huge as the Sox exploded for six runs on four homeruns off of Randy Johnson. Chris Widger capped it all off with a three run shot and Iguchi, Rowand and Konerko hit back to back to back solo shots. Jose Contreras threw a nice game to earn his eighth win of the season.

The one “good” thing is, though Cleveland is eight and a half back, they’re ten back in the loss column. We travel to Minnesota and we get a day off before starting the series on Tuesday. Hopefully we do better then we did last week.

When you’re a White Sox fan, you expect the worse. A week ago, I thought that there was no way they could blow this lead. While I still feel the White Sox are a lock to make the playoffs, I’m getting a bad feeling. I’ve had it before, and you Sox fans know what I’m talking about.

The White Sox were swept in their three game series with the Twins. Normally this series would have meant something, but with the Twins mediocrity and the White Sox early run up in the standings, it was more of a formality. The fact that they dropped all three games and have lost five in a row has this Sox fan a little worried.

It’s amazing how much we rely on our starting pitching. With Monday as an example, the Twins tagged starter Jose Contreras for four runs in the fourth. With this teams offense, a four run deficit is almost insurmountable. We need the gems. The Sox did scrape together two runs on a Juan Uribe single and Jermaine Dye sac. flybut it wasn’t nearly enough. Kyle Lohse and the Twins pen held the Sox to eight singles and a double.

Tuesday we had the tables turned on us. All year we’ve managed to put together comebacks, but this time we were on the receiving end. We took a 4-3 lead on a two run Timo Perez double, but the almost always reliable Dustin Hermanson blew his second game of the season by letting Michael Cuddyer go deep. Seven innings later (in the 16th), the Twins exploded for five runs off of Jon Adkins. In all, they used eight pitchers.

Yesterday was more of the same. The Twins jumped out to an early 5-0 lead and never looked back. Johan Santana took a no hitter into the seventh inning and all we could manage was a Paul Konerko solo homer in the bottom of the ninth. Mark Buehrle was tagged for two homers as he dropped his sixth game of the season.

It doesn’t get any easier. We have today off before the Yankees come into town. We handled them well last week, but we obviously need to play better. I think at this point, anything short of a World Series is a failure. And while I expect to make the playoffs easily, we’re not playing like a playoff team right now.

I’ll have to check but this might be the first time the White Sox were swept. I just rolled back into town, so I’ll check back in tomorrow with a full report. Needless to say, it wasn’t a good showing against the World Champs. Even worse, we had a nice three run lead only to see today’s game postponed because of rain.

Three more one run games, and we walked away with two of them. And in hostile territory no less. As the season wraps up, this is looking more and more like White Sox fan’s dream season.

The first game was the rough one and the first of three where we scored a pair of runs. Mike Mussina outdueled Orlando Hernandez and while the White Sox outhit the Yankees 9-4, we lost the game 3-2 mostly because of an Alex Rodriguez homer. Paul Konerko and Timo Perez both had two hits and a solid start by El Duque went to waste.

Yesterday went a little more smoothly albeit with just as much drama. The White Sox got on the board first with a solo homer by Tadahito Iguchi and added a run in the ninth on a solo homer by Paul Konerko. In the meantime, Jose Contreras was awesome. Seven innings, six strikeouts, three hits, no runs. Alex Rodriguez stuck in the bottom of the ninth, but his homer came with nobody on base so the Sox escaped with their 25th one run game of the season.

The Sox wouldn’t have to wait too long for that 26th one run game of the season because they once again pulled out a close one. Aaron Small and Freddy Garcia pitched to a one run draw before the pen took over, and it took an extra inning RBI by Scott Podsednik for the White Sox to claim this one in the win column.

The White Sox are now 35 games above .500 and they’re on pace to win a franchise record 106 wins. This weekend will showcase the current best team in baseball against last year’s champions at historic Fenway Park. I’ll be home this weekend so I’ll get to catch the Saturday game on WGN.

A pretty good weekend for the Sox. First we’ll take a look at the weekend series, then we’ll contemplate the Sox playoff picture.

Things got off on a down note Friday when the Mariners rolled into town and shut down the Sox. Joel Pineiro and four Mariner relieverz held the home team to two runs on eight hits.
All six runs in the game were scored in different innings. Aaron Rowand and A.J. Pierzynski both homered to account for the two White Sox runs.

Mark Buehrle turned the tables on the M’s this past Saturday. The score was the same (4-2) but this time it was the Sox who came out on top. Mark Buerhle was his typical, reliable self. Seven innings, one run and seven hits. The Sox only managed four hits, but they only left two men on base. Paul Konerko connected for a two run homer and Scott Podsednik scored twice.

Yesterday was the third straight two run game of the series and this time it was Jon Garland throwing the gem. Garland held the Mariners to five hits through 7 1/3 and earned his sixteenth win of the season (Cy Young?). Paul Konerko helped out with the bat again by going yard with a two run shot. Joe Crede helped out with a solo homer.

If you’re a Sox fan, you definitely like close games. At least this year. The White Sox are twelve games above .500, at 24-12, in one run games. The Padres are the only team even close to that at 10 games above .500 (21-11). The Diamondbacks are next closest at only six games above .500 (21-15).

In two run games. the Sox are just as impressive at 42-20. And while they’ve outplayed their expected win/loss by six games, they still lead the league in expected wins. You can check this out at the Hardball Times team stats page.

At this point, with a thirteen game lead over the Indians, the White Sox simply need to play .500 ball. There’s only eight weeks left, so the Indians would then need to play at least .650 ball to keep pace. If the Sox finish the season winning six out of every ten, then the Indians need to be nearly perfect the rest of the way.

Which brings us to who the Sox likely first round opponent will be. If the season ended now, it would either be the Angels or the A’s, who are tied for both the Wild Card lead and the AL West Crown. The White Sox can also play spoiler as they go up against the Yankees. I think the Yanks are still the team to beat even though they’re a few games out of the Wild Card, and if we can knock them down a peg, we’ll be that much better off come playoff time.

I have a feeling things are going to be boring for White Sox fans the next couple of months. I’m sure there will be some excitement as they chase 100 wins, but they have a fairly safe 13 1/2 game lead over the Indians. The Twins are an after thought, and with Torii Hunter on the DL, I think it’s safe to say they don’t pose much of a threat.

The White Sox were also the first team to reach 70 wins on the season. The Cardinals have 68. No other team has more the 65.

Probably the most disconcerting about the series with the Jays is their offense once again was relatively absent. On Tuesday, the Sox took an early two run lead (Paul Konerko two run homer) in the first, but Jon Garland gave up five runs in the next half inning and the Jays never looked back. Garland dropped to 15-5 on the season.

Yesterday, the Sox once again only managed three runs. Toronto scored all four of their runs in the first inning, and while Orlando Hernandez calmed down to throw seven innings, the Sox fell one run short of coming back.

Today was more the same. The Sox put four runs on the board in the first inning only to see the Jays come back to tie it up in the eighth. Fortunately, Tadahito Iguchi came up huge with a solo homer in the bottom of the eighth to win the game.

The Mariners are on deck. Hopefully Ozzie Guillen keeps everyone fresh. The last thing we need right now are injuries.