I mentioned this in the gamethread, but you could clearly see that Garland had a plan for just about every hitter.  

For Maggs, it was set him up with the fastball and put him away with the changeup.

For Thames, they tried to make him hit a pitch the other way.  That's a great job of knowing your hitter -- Thames got about one pitch on the inner half of the plate.  That was in his third or fourth AB, on a first pitch when he wasn't expecting it.

For guys like Polanco and Infante, they tried to bust 'em in.  

It was a brilliant performance, really.  Love to see Jon working both sides of the plate with his sinker.

But maybe Garland's current run will quiet some critics. As badly as he pitched to start the year, I think it's odd that some people (like the supposedly wise ones at BTF and BP) were so quick to say KW made a terrible move with Garland's new contract.

I'm not saying he's a great pitcher. He may even be overpaid. But a young guy that can be league average in the AL for a bunch of innings is really pretty valuable. And he did a great job tonight in a big game against a good lineup.

For the hardest of hardcore fans, baseball is the most torturous and yet ultimately rewarding sport.  It's like a rollercoaster that swings up and down, up and down. For over 162 games we are all on the ride, like giddy 6 year olds on too many simple sugars we scream and kick and yell every day.

Sometimes the ride thrills us, other times it scares the pants off us because we have wet them in fear.

And yet the analogy is far from perfect, baseball is the discrete game, the game of standardized outcomes and predictable performance, it's the anti-emotion game, the domain of reason and logic.

F. Scott Fitgerald famously said the mark of a fine mind is the ability to hold two contradictory ideas in one's head at the same time.

It's nothing a baseball fan doesn't experience ever week of every season.

Over at SoxMachine, a couple of 'deadline deal' names were mentioned that I liked.

Really, at this point, I don't think there's a match in all of the big deals that are being mentioned with Freddy Garcia going to some NL team.  The Sox pretty much have to hope that their rotation pitches to it's "potential", even if that means relying on Garcia' 88 MPH fastball.  

That being said, the two spots I'd like to see upgraded, and guys I'd like to see pursued (again, a couple of these were mentioned at the SoxMachine blog):

Backup C - Jason LaRue and Yorvit Torrealba are two names that have been brought up.  I'd prefer Torrealba, as over his career, he's hit lefties well (.856 career OPS against southpaws).  LaRue has been good against lefties in 2004-'05 (limited ABs this year), but only owns a career .727 OPS against them.  Plus, I think his contract is pretty hefty, so it's probably not even worth it.  

Backup OF - Any chance we could get our hands on a guy like Jason Michaels for either Haeger or Phillips?  Or would KW fear the potential blowup of a Sox farmhand turning into a solid pitcher?

I like Gload, but I'd rather not see Mackowiak in CF a whole lot in the second half.

Thoughts?

or Williams is throwing a curveball to the media.

I'm taking the bolded quote to mean that Williams will not trade anyone on our ML roster to a contender, not that he will not trade anyone on our ML roster?  Anyone see that differently?

There are some times when I just can't put a lot of stock into what a GM says, and I think this is one of those times.

I still think if the right deal for Freddy came along, he'd make the move.  For example,  if Omar Minaya called Kenny back up and said he would move Pelfrey and Sanchez (again -- extremely unlikely, but it was reported, and I believe that) for Garcia, I'd bet that Kenny would say yes in a heartbeat.

I'm sure it was commented on in the game thread, but I didn't want to wade through the 100+ posts...

Jermaine looked like a kid out there last night!  His glove played as big a part in the win as Paulie's HRs.

Most impressive.

On yesterday's broadcast, DJ made mention of BA making it to the .200 mark and, in a hushed tone, Hawk said, "Before it's over, he's going to blow right by that." As if to say .200 is no big deal, we can all expect .275 by September.

I'm not the numbers guy...but I've noticed some of you certainly are.

So...what type of pace does BA need to keep to get to say, .250 or .260 by regular season end?

1.  Why in the world did BA let ScoPo catch a fly ball that came down in dead center?
2.  Jim Thome's at-bat in the sixth(?) before Paulie hit the three-run homer was brilliant.  When the Carlos Guillen couldn't turn that double-play I thought he would get out of trouble since Thome had looked so bad against Robertson all night.
3.  Did anyone else notice the guy waving a red t-shirt behind the plate all night (you had to have)?  It was annoying me but when he was still holding out hope that it was actually helping his team after we scored seven runs, I was laughing at him.

John Sickel's 'White Sox Top 20 PRE-SEASON Prospects in Review'

featuring Cheat's Top 11!

On Sports Center last night, they pointed out that Detroit is a mere 3-12 vs. "good teams."

Then a tear came to my eye as ESPN revealed Detroit's record vs. the Sox, Red Sux and Yankmees. Yes, ESPN has actually elevated our beloved Sox to the level of the east coast AL teams.

They commented that Detroit was "feeding off the bottom-feeders"...ouch!