2013 Record: White Sox 21-24, 4th in AL Central. Marlins 13-34 5th in NL East

2010 Series Record: 2-1

All-Time Series Record: 4-5 (The Sox are 3-3 at home against the Marlins)

The following pitchers are expected to start in the three games:

John Danks: 0-0, 0.00 ERA, 0K vs. Tom Koehler: 0-2, 2.82 ERA, 17K

Jake Peavy: 5-2, 3.31 ERA, 58K vs. Ricky Nolasco: 3-5, 3.96 ERA, 50K

Dylan Axelrod: 2-3, 4.13 ERA, 28K vs. Alex Sanabia: 3-6, 4.56 ERA, 28K

Friday’s game begins at 7:10 pm. Saturday’s game starts at 6:15 pm and Sunday’s game begins at 1:10 pm. Friday’s game is the free MLB dot tv game of the day. Saturday you can get discounted tickets via the ticket deal I was able to get for readers AND a sweet 1983 Sox logo cap for the first 20,000 fans.

You know how the White Sox have played of late. Some of the more disappointing players seemingly are coming around. Big Donkey in the last week or so is doing dirty things to the baseball when it hits his bat. Jeff Keppinger also seems to be coming around. In the past week, he has taken a walk and hit his first home run for the White Sox. Oh, and Paul Konerko seems to be coming out of his funk.

Additionally, Alex Rios has the longest hitting streak of his career going on. Yes, there is still some pitiful defense that is happening. Perhaps not in the box score of an E on someone, but in just general lackadaisical play. That has to be the most frustrating part when you see that the offense is coming around to support what has generally been great pitching.

However, the Sox this weekend will face a test of sorts in the Miami Marlins. No way to say it other than the Marlins are a bad team. After the 2011 season, the team seemed to go on a spending spree in acquiring players as well as getting a new stadium. That all blew up early on in the 2012 season. This past off season saw the team unload many players as well as launch a manager who was brought in because it was thought he’d provide a spark. While there is some young talent around, the real star of that team is Giancarlo Stanton and he was not happy with how things turned out last season.

So why is this a test for the Sox this weekend? Because the Sox in the past have had a habit of playing down to their competition. The Marlins having only 13 wins are a prime target to make the Sox play even worse baseball than we have seen most of the season. The good news is that give how the Sox appear to have turned a corner of sorts, they just might come away with a series win. They should, but you never know with this team.

Santiago was playing for a spot in the rotation tonight as John Danks is expected to return this weekend. Santiago pitched six innings tonight and gave up just two runs on three hits and four walks. He also struck out nine. Unfortunately he picked up the loss since the bullpen gave up four runs after Santiago was pulled. This outing may have kicked him out of the rotation, and it wasn’t entirely his fault.

Brian Omogrosso came on in the seventh and pitched 1.1 innings. He allowed two runs, one earned, on four hits and a walk. Nate Jones came on for an inning of work, and he gave up two runs on a hit and two walks. Donnie Veal finished the ninth inning without allowing a run.

While Santiago had an OK outing, the offense didn’t do much to help him stay in the rotation. They managed to pick up just two runs on six hits and three walks. Alex Rios now has a 17-game hitting streak, and he batted in a run. Paul Konerko had the best night, going 2-for-4 with a home run in the ninth inning. Alejandro De Aza, Jeff Keppinger and Tyler Flowers each picked up a hit as well.

The Sox are off tomorrow as they prepare to face the Miami Marlins. The Sox have yet to announce who their starter will be, but they will face Tom Koehler. He pitched a career high in innings pitched, strikeouts and pitches in his last start against the Diamondbacks, but it wasn’t enough for a win.

Edit: The White Sox will send John Danks to the mound for his first start of the season on Friday. Danks made his last start on May 19, 2012, before having season-ending shoulder surgery.

Quintana has shown that he’s a good starter for the Sox. Usually he has a decent outing, although sometimes they can be frustrating. Today was not a frustrating start. Quintana took a no-hitter into the seventh inning. With one out in the sixth, David Ortiz broke up that no-hitter. Quintana gave up two more hits before Robin Ventura pulled him. He left the game after giving up three hits and two walks while striking out five.

Jesse Crain came on after Quintana left the bases loaded. He faced off against Will Middlebrooks and Stephen Drew and successfully struck them both out to end the inning. Matt Thornton came on to start the eighth, and he didn’t have a great night. He gave up a lead-off walk and a single before Robin pulled him in favor of Matt Lindstrom. Lindstrom allowed one of Thornton’s batters to cross home plate after a wild pitch and a fielding error by Alexei Ramirez, but that one run was all that scored, as Addison Reed picked up his 16th save in the pouring rain.

White Sox batters had an OK night. They didn’t score too many runs, but they scored enough to get Quintana his third win of the season. Alex Rios extended his hitting streak to 16 games, notching two hits and an RBI today. Ramirez also picked up two hits and scored the run in the eighth that Rios batted in. Jeff Keppinger picked up one hit, but it was an important hit. It was his first home run of the season, a two-run shot in the fifth that also scored Dayan Viciedo.

Chris Sale was supposed to start the series finale tomorrow night, but he was scratched with shoulder tendinitis in his left shoulder. As that’s his throwing shoulder, the White Sox told him he was not starting tomorrow, and that didn’t sit well with Sale who was determined to be out there. Starting in his place is Hector Santiago, who is pitching on three days’ rest. He didn’t have a great start on Saturday, throwing 80 pitches in just 3.1 innings.

He has to have a great performance if he wants to remain in the rotation. With John Danks set to return probably this weekend, it’s a duel between Santiago and Dylan Axelrod. Santiago has to face Clay Buchholz to prove he’s worthy of the rotation. Buchholz has had a stellar season so far. He’s 6-0 with a 1.78, although his last three starts have been no-decisions. However, in his five career starts against the White Sox, he is 1-2 with a 5.02 ERA.

2013 Record: White Sox 19-23, 4th in AL Central. Red Sox 27-17, 2nd in AL East

2013 Season Series: 0-0

2012 Season Series: 2-6

All-Time Series Record: 925-962 (The White are 536-408 at home against the Red)

The following pitchers are expected to start this series:

Dylan Axelrod: 1-3, 4.27 ERA, 26K vs. Jon Lester: 6-0, 2.72 ERA, 50K

Jose Quintana: 2-1, 3.97 ERA, 34K vs. Felix Doubront: 3-1, 6.03 ERA, 42K

Chris Sale: 5-2, 2.53 ERA, 61K vs. Clay Bucholz: 6-0, 1.78 ERA, 69K

All three games begin at 7:10 pm CDT. Don’t forget, you can get discounted tickets for tonight’s and Tuesday’s game here as part of the CTA construction on the Red Line. 

Did you know the White Sox are coming home after having a winning road trip? If you don’t believe it, that is okay. It is almost as difficult to believe as the Sox not being in the AL Central cellar anymore. Yeah, they are just .002 percentage points in front of the Twins, but still. The team managed to split their series with the Angels over the weekend. While there were some annoying things in the games, there were also some nice things to see. Like offense. Saturday saw the boys pound out 17 hits. That is a certain high for a season when if you see a number greater than five in the hit column, you think “wow, that was amazing! this team got FIVE hits.” And Rios has a 14-game hitting streak going. You have to enjoy that.

On the bad side, there was still sloppy play by the defense. In yesterday’s game, a hurried relay throw from Alex Rios was missed by Jeff Keppinger. Granted, you would prefer to get a good throw, but if you have time to corral the ball and you choose not to – as Keppinger apparently did – well, that is just bad defense. Those things don’t necessarily show in the box score, but they do hurt.

On the WTF side of things, the White Sox pitching staff has been quite generous with the free passes of late. Saturday was a day of double digit free passes. Yesterday, Jake Peavy walked in two runs when the bases were loaded. Normally, that isn’t a super huge thing if it is a risk of one run via the free pass versus numerous thanks to a well-placed hit. However, in this case, it turned out to be a bad thing because the White Sox offense just hasn’t been there to overcome things. But maybe they are learning to do so now since they are capable of getting numerous hits now.

Meanwhile, the Boston Red Sox are quite the story this season. No one was expecting that team to do anything this year. They were supposed to be bad. They were supposed to be out of contention. They were supposed to be not where they are.

Yet, they sit in second place just a half game behind the New York Yankees (another team doing what it is not supposed to.) I’m sure the fans of this team are enjoying this immensely because the team was counted out from the start. Will it last? Who knows but the Red are on a five-game winning streak. They have two guys pitching in the series who are looking to go 7-0 on the season. Hopefully, the White will put a damper on that. Especially with the new found offense.

In any event, there should be some fun baseball played on the South Side this week. Don’t forget, you can get discounted tickets for select games because you are an awesome SSHG reader. See the box on the upper right for more details. The next SSHG discounted game is Saturday against the Marlins and you can get a super awesome 1983 Sox logo hat.

Certainly not I as this team has been one bad outing after another. It was amazing if this team would win two games in a row, let alone three. Four just seemed like something that was never going to happen. But it did.

It isn’t really a surprise that Chris Sale was on the mound. He has really only had one bad outing this season against the Cleveland Indians. The first time he faced the Angels, he took a perfect game into the seventh. Last night he was just as brilliant, jut not perfect. Pitching really has not been the problem for the White Sox.

No, that has been hitting and defense. We have yet to see flawless defensive baseball, but at least the flaws of late haven’t cost the team wins. If this team keeps playing defensively poorly, I may have to start tracking the games when there is flawless defense and that may be a rare site this season.

Additionally, we are starting to see some offense come around. In last night’s game, Alex Rios provided all that was needed to win with his solo home run. Fortunately other guys stepped up to add some insurance and not put pressure on the pitching staff to be flawless. Adam Dunn during this four game streak even has two No-K games. However, wonder of all wonders, Jeff Keppinger FINALLY took a base on balls this week. That was a huge walk since it turned out to be the wi Ning run in Thursday’s game.

In the grand scheme of things, this all seems like madness. After watching the first forty games of the season and coming to expect bad, seeing good things is just so. . . foreign. I would like to think this keeps going, but we will have to wait and see.

Are you surprised by this four -game winning streak?

2013 Record: White Sox 17-21, 5th in AL Central. Angels 15-25, 4th in AL West

2013 Series Record: 1-2

All-Time Series Record: 349-349 (The Sox are 164-185 at Anaheim)

The following pitchers are expected to start the four games this weekend: 

Jose Quintana: 2-1, 3.72 ERA, 30K vs. Jerome Williams: 2-1, 3.06 ERA, 20K

Chris Sale: 4-2, 2.88 ERA, 49K vs. C.J. Wilson: 3-2, 3.88 ERA, 47K

Hector Santiago: 1-2, 2.23 ERA, 31K vs. Joe Blanton: 0-7, 6.46 ERA, 29K

Jake Peavy: 5-1, 2.6 ERA, 51K vs. Jason Vargas: 2-3, 4.03 ERA, 34K

Thursday and Friday’s games begin at 9:05 pm. Saturday’s game starts at 3:05 pm and Sunday’s game begins at 2:35 pm. All times CDT. 

I thought last weekend when the Angels and White Sox met up, that whoever won the series might get a bump in play and potentially go off on a tear. Both teams have been playing badly. You probably know all the “struggles” the White Sox have been dealing with in the form of poor defense and lack of offense. The Angels have been dealing with bad offense as well as having their pitching ace on the shelf.

Though, looking at the last few days since the Angels and Sox met, it doesn’t look like either got much of a bump. The Angels have gone on to lose two games to the PITA Royals. The Sox somehow managed to pull out two in a row against the Twins. While the back to back wins is pretty huge, it does not really seem real. After all, there was still sloppy play in the first win. Perhaps they will make it three in a row. however that might be tough.

The West Coast hasn’t been kind to the White Sox in general. Yes, lately in the past few years they have had some success there, but it will be tough. When you don’t pick up the ball, it is tough to win a game no matter where you play. Now, the offense seems to have picked up a bit. Hopefully that trend continues and the Sox can come away with at least a split. But if they walk away with just one win, I wouldn’t be surprised.

Axelrod had an OK start, but it was good enough for the win. He went 5.1 innings, giving up three runs on nine hits and a walk. He struck out four, but he allowed a solo homer to Eduardo Escobar in the second inning. Matt Lindstrom came on in relief, and he didn’t have such a good day. He recorded one out and gave up a run on two hits. Matt Thornton finished off the sixth and pitched all of the seventh without giving up a run, a hit or a walk. Nate Jones pitched a perfect eighth, and Brian Omogrosso pitched a perfect ninth.

Sox bats actually heated up this afternoon too. Dewayne Wise and Hector Gimenez were the only starters who didn’t pick up a hit or get on base. Alex Rios and Adam Dunn had great days today. Especially Dunn.

You guys might want to sit down for this next part. Dunn went 3-for-4 today. He walked once. He scored two runs. He drove in FIVE runs. One was on a double while the other four were on TWO HOME RUNS! To top it off, HE DIDN’T STRIKE OUT! Adam Dunn had a fabulous day today!

Rios had a great day too. He went 3-for-4 with three runs scored and a walk. Dayan Viciedo batted in two runs and went 2-for-4, and Jeff Keppinger also batted in two runs and went 2-for-5.

Sox batters definitely figured out Twins pitching today. Mike Pelfrey picked up the loss, giving up five earned runs in four innings. Brian Duensing gave up two runs in a third of an inning, and Josh Roenicke gave up two runs in 1.2 innings.

Maybe their luck is turning around now. As Daryl Van Schouwen mentioned on Twitter prior to the game, a win today would put the Sox at 17-21, the same record they had this time last season. While the Sox seem to be drastically worse than this time last season, it does give a little hope that maybe they can turn things around and possibly contend.

Let’s see how well the Sox can do. They’re headed to Los Angeles to face the Angels for a four-game set. Jose Quintana gets the start tomorrow. His last outing was against the Angels on Saturday, and he started off horribly. He gave up two hits and two runs to the first two batters, but he did settle down and allowed one unearned run over six innings. He faces Jerome Williams again. His last start was on Saturday against the Sox, and he gave up two runs in 6.2 innings. Hopefully the outcome will be different this time.

Remember Sox fans: you have an opportunity to purchase discounted tickets through the Grand Slam group Cheryl got for all SSHG fans. Your next opportunity is Saturday, May 24 against the Marlins. Get your tickets!

Then again, I shouldn’t be so surprised since Jake Peavy started tonight. With tonight’s win, Peavy’s record improves to 5-1, and he had a solid start tonight. He pitched seven innings, allowing two runs on five hits while striking out six. Jesse Crain pitched a perfect eighth before Addison Reed picked up his 12th save in the ninth. I know it’s hard to believe, but the Sox really have won enough games for Reed to have 12 saves.

Sox batters did well tonight too. Everyone except Jeff Keppinger had at least one hit, while Alexei Ramirez, Conor Gillaspie, Dewayne Wise and Tyler Flowers each picked up two. Adam Dunn and Dayan Viciedo’s one hit each of the night were back-to-back home runs in the second inning. They were Dunn’s seventh and Viciedo’s third of the season. Ramirez and Flowers each batted in a run as well.

Tomorrow afternoon, the Sox finish this series against the Twins before heading out to Los Angeles. Hopefully they’ll pick up the series win rather than suffering yet another loss. Dylan Axelrod gets the start for the Sox. He’s still looking for his first win. Last time out, he failed to get a quality start, allowing five earned runs on seven hits. He faces off against Mike Pelfrey. Pelfrey is 3-3 with a 6.03 ERA. He picked up a no-decision in his last outing, giving up three runs on nine hits.

You’ve seen your record of 15-21 as of May 14th, 2013. It is amazing that you sit only six games under .500 at this point. If you watch any moment of the games, you’d think you were as bad as the Houston Astros or Miami Marlins, but with a ton more talent. Instead of  seemingly making an effort to be good at this game, this team seems only interested in when they can home or back to the hotel and perhaps play video games.

In any event, last night’s game was just another example in what has become the norm for this team. Hector Santiago (who appears jacked up on sugar – which is rather amusing to watch) went out and pitched pretty well to start the game. This despite having to wait a really long time before getting to throw a pitch because the offense for once actually scored some runs right way. Then just as fans have come to expect, an error is committed leading to some unearned runs. As per usual, those unearned runs ended up tying the game. That error also led to Hector seemingly coming unglued since he wasn’t able to pitch over the mistake.

can we get some of this in the form of runs to overcome the poor defense? picture via: http://www.free-extras.com/images/hawaii_volcanoes_eruption-12146.htm

More importantly, the runs gave hope to the Twins fans that the team wouldn’t lose to the lowly White Sox. And of course they were right. After the game ended up tied, then the Twins would go on to take the lead and then just have a field day of scoring runs and making the Sox look bad. Wait, who are we kidding? You have looked bad most of the season. The Twins just held a mirror up for you to look into to remind you of this fact.

I know there are injuries and you might be blaming the poor play of the season on that. But let’s be real for a minute. You can’t blame that for the poor play. Because you lost a starting pitcher, your second baseman and an outfielder to injuries, that is why no one is hitting the ball? I think not. Oh and sure, having guys not play their “normal” positions puts a strain on your defense. But NO, that is no excuse for why you cannot pick up the ball period. Or throw it to the right cut off man. Or to the cut off man period. And no, it is not the reason that you should get lazy when throwing the ball to another guy so you can make an out.

I’m not sure what the problem is, but I do know that I along with all of your loyal fans really hope you find a fix for this problem. And do it right now. It is only May 14th and we already want to turn the television off when you are on. The thought of sitting and watching what has turned out to be decent pitching performances go to waste thanks to poor defense and lack of offense is not fun. If it isn’t fun for us, I cannot imagine how boring it is for you to put on that kind of show.

So please, can you guys get your ish together so the next few months are fun for us all?

Thanks and as much love as I can muster after yet another crappy performance,

Cheryl

2013 Record: White Sox 15-20, 5th in AL Central. Twins: 17-17, 4th in AL Central

2013 Series Record: 2-0

2012 Series Record: 14-4

All-time Series Record: 385-420 (The Sox are 175-226 at Minnesota against the Twins)

The following pitchers are expected to start the three games:

Hector Santiago: 1-1, 1.69 ERA, 25K vs. Pedro Hernandez: 1-0, 5.6 ERA, 11K

Jake Peavy: 4-1, 3.03 ERA, 45K vs. Kevin Correia: 4-2, 3.0 ERA, 20K

Dylan Axelrod: 0-3, 4.17 ERA, 22K vs. Mike Pelfrey: 3-3, 6.03 ERA, 15K

Monday and Tuesday’s games begin at 7:10 pm. Wednesday’s game starts at 1:10 pm and is the free MLB dot TV game of the day. All times CDT.

Last night’s win was a much needed win. It was on the national stage and Chris Sale just looked spectacular. While he was utterly amazing, there was a part of me that wondered what was going to happen to mar the performance of Chris. Fortunately, the offense did come through and didn’t waste the pitching gem that Chris threw.

That Sunday night game was definitely a wonderful game to watch in a season mired with horrible game after horrible game. There was still an error in last night’s game, but fortunately it didn’t have a negative impact on the final result of the game. The Sox were able to salvage one game on the brief homestand. Maybe that one win will start to turn things around for the White Sox.

The Twins on the other hand are sitting at .500 right now. Before the season began, most people thought the Twins would easily be buried in the cellar. Instead they are middling along. Playing .500 ball at home and on the road, the Twins are only 2.5 games out of first place. Granted, the Sox are only five games out, but this just shows how no one has really taken a commanding lead of the AL Central.

In the last 10 games, the Twins have gone 5-5 (sensing a theme with that team?) Some of those recent wins include winning three of four from the Boston Red Sox. They are coming off of a weekend series loss to the Baltimore Orioles. Hopefully that lost series will continue against the Sox. However, if I am honest with myself and how the White Sox play, the Sox will probably walk away with just one win. That of course, if they are lucky.