Sox Break Curse, Swept Past Greinke and the Royals

It has been a great week for White Sox baseball.  Heading into Friday, the White Sox were 2-1 on their six game road trip.  Angel’s pitcher Weaver was just too much for the Sox, and they failed to sweep on Wednesday.  With an important series starting on Friday, the White Sox needed to make up some ground on the Royals, Twins, and Tigers. 

The Pale Hose sent out Clayton Richard to the mound on Friday, and the young southpaw dominated the Royals lineup.  Not only did Richard pitch well, all the Sox hitters managed a hit and scored a run in the 11-2 shellacking.  It was Richard’s fourth start of the season, and it was his second win.  If Richard continues to pitch as well as he has in his last few starts, Ozzie is going to have a difficult decision with Contreras and Colon.  Currently Contreras is pitching in Triple-A trying to regain his lost command.  As for Colon, he has been hit or miss this season.  He is usually good one game and bad the next.  Hopefully he can break this pattern when he pitches against the A’s this week.

The 1-2 combination of Scott Podsednik and Alexei Ramirez are getting it done.  While the tandum isn’t as strong as it was with Podsednik and Iguchi, Ramirez has been working the field more and stopped trying to pull the ball.  He has been more discipline at the plate, and his average has gradually climbing.  Pods has been an excellent catalyst for the White Sox setting up the 3-4-5 hitters perfectly.  He is a much needed sparkplug for the offense, and he is one of the MVPs of the offense along with Dye and Konerko.

Saturday we saw Buehrle looking for win number seven, and he came close but he gave up a solo home run to walk away with a no decision.  The White Sox rallied past the Royals in the ninth to give them their forth win on their current road trip and in line for the sweep on Sunday.  With a 2-2 tie going into the eighth inning, the White Sox put runners at first and second with consecutive bunt singles by Podsednik and Ramirez.  JD managed a walk, and the White Sox took the lead on Thome’s RBI ground out.  Tied 3-3 in the ninth, Getz hit a one-out single, Fields walked, and Podsednik smacked a RBI single to give the Pale Hose the lead again.  Alexei got the Sox an insurance run, and Bobby Jenks nailed down his eleventh save of the season.  The White Sox offense managed to score three runs off the Royals bullpen to get them their second win in the three game set.

Sweeps haven’t been kind to the White Sox this season, and they looked to complete their third attempt of a series sweep in the last two weeks.  To complete this feat, the Pale Hose needed to get a win over Zack Greinke who has been magnificant this season.  At first glance, one might think that the Sox were doomed, but that was before Greinke had to pitch to Podsednik.  The speedy left-hander started the game with a triple and scored on a single to left from Thome who beat the shift.  The Sox lead 1-0, but the lead was a short.  The Royals managed to plate three runs off of Danks in the second.  I am sure there was a lot of collective sighs as Danks didn’t have his best stuff, but he battled and kept the Sox in the game going five and a third innings giving up four runs on nine hits, two walks, and five strikeouts. 

Dotel entered the sixth inning to get the Sox out of a pickle.  The righty has been lights out this season, and he continued to dominate Sunday giving up no runs in an inning of relief.  The Sox scored four runs, three earned off of Greinke in which he hasn’t surrendered more than two runs this season.  Thorton’s outing was superb going almost two innings in relief that lead to the Sox plating a three spot in the top of the ninth.  AJ started the inning with a single.  BA came in as a PH for Wise and coaxed a walk.  Fields walked which lead to Getz’s heroic GW single to right.  The ball sailed over the head of Guillen that plated both AJ and BA.  BA blew through the stop sign that Cox gave, but BA managed a beautiful slide that just beat the tag to put the Sox up by two.  Podsednik got an insurance run, and the Sox cruised to a 7-4 win. Jenks collected the save, and Thornton was awarded the win.  The Sox completed the sweep over insurmountable odds of beating Greinke and completing the sweep.

The curse is broken, and the Sox walk into their next homestand with a 5-1 road trip.  The Sox will see the A’s(4), Indians(3), and the Tigers(5).  It will be a long homestand, and the Sox play a double hitter with the Tigers to make up a previous rained out game.  It’s another important series with the Indians and the Tigers.  Both teams are playing well, and the Sox have the opportunity to gain some ground on the Tigers.  With the win on Saturday, the White Sox managed to slip into second plate in the AL Central.

Josh Fields has been playing much better on this last road trip.  He must have sensed his job might be in jeopardy because he has been delivering some clutch at-bats and showed better plate discipline.