At this point, we might catch the Tigers before we catch the Twins. The White Sox play them sooner and the Twins just don’t seem to want to lose. The bad news is, the White Sox enter the portion of their schedule where things get tough and this week is the time to play out of our minds.
Cleveland took the first game in this series in a blow out loss for the White Sox. Mark Buehrle slipped back to .500 and he lasted only four innings. He gave up five runs (four earned) on ten hits and a walk. The only White Sox run came on Jermaine Dye’s RBI single in the sixth inning.
Friday’s game was a roller coaster. The White Sox took a 5-3 lead into the ninth but Bobby Jenks blew it when he gave up three doubles and summarily three runs. The White Sox magic from last year hasn’t completely disappeared though. A.J. Pierzynski hit a two run walk off homerun in the bottom of the ninth to win it. Freddy Garcia didn’t get a decision for a solid start and Juan Uribe hit his seventeenth homerun in the 7-6 win.
Saturday’s game started out as a blowout. The White Sox jumped out to a 10-1 lead, but a seven run seventh inning by the Indians made things very interesting. Jon Garland threw six solid innings and won his 17th game while Boone Logan and Brandon McCarthy got knocked around for most of those seven runs. Paul Konerko hit two homeruns and he drove in five while Juan Uribe and Jermaine Dye also went deep.
A great start by Javier Vazquez went to waste yesterday. He gave up two runs on four hits and two walks with ten strikeouts in seven innings. Brandon McCarthy gave up two ninth inning runs and he took the loss. He dropped to 3-7 on the season. Tad Iguchi was the offense in the 5-2 loss. He hit a two run shot to account for all of the White Sox runs. It was his fifteenth of the season.
The White Sox now hop on a plane and head to Anaheim to play the Los Angeles Angels for three games. They do get a day off on Thursday to head over to Oakland. This isn’t the best time to have a west coast swing, but so be it.
