Folks seemed to dig the April review, so I thought I'd press my luck and offer a quick recap of May/ up to date. Again I don't expect you to become suddenly more enlightened but not everyone feels like looking for advanced stats.

The title speaks for itself as the palehose pay homage to Mr. Pacino in Godfather III.

After the Toronto sweep on May 18th even the most hardened Sox fan had to feel at least mildly concerned with what was going on with the team.

Consider the first 15 games of May.

5/1-5/17:

The team batted .227/.287/.344 Wow. I have heard of bad streaks but that line makes Juan Pierre look like Superman. The starting pitching during that frame, 2-9 7.29 ERA. Take that. It added up to a 4-11 start to the month (how did we win 4) and visions of 07 and a Baseball Prospectus "I told you so."

Well time to go all in on Larry's fine minor league threads. Time to count down to training camp and watch our future franchise QB sling the pill. Time to kill and have a fire sale right? Wrong.

In the final game of the Toronto series, Clayton Richard made his 2nd start of the season. It was quality start, one in which the team tied the game in 8th on a Thome blast, only to lose that same inning from a Dotel breakdown. Dye was ejected for throwing his helmet and Guillen was also given the heave ho.

"I just talked to the coaching staff and asked them, 'What can we do?'" Guillen said. "There's nothing really you can do, just keep playing and being positive. I don't want any of my coaches being negative. We have to prepare every day, come here every day and believe in those [players]. And make them believe in themselves."

Not exactly Knute Rockne. However the start proved to be a turning point. Much like last year after a 14-17 start the Canadian bacon and ass kicking seemed to wake up the starting pitching just in time for home cooking and the 2nd half of the month.

5/18-5/30:

Batting .282/.346/.444

Starting Pitching 2.09 ERA 7-2

What a crazy month. There was almost this little deal for a pitcher name Peavy. The same day the team lost 20-1. 20 internet strangers met up and watched Floyd impersonate a major league pitcher and channel Buerhle on a Friday night against the Bucs. On the road the team put up a 16 spot and beat Zack Greinke. And somewhere along the way the team got its act together to salvage a season (at least for now) and finish the month in 2nd 4 games out. We are shall I say, pulled back in...

record 24-25

RS 212

RA 226

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Offensive

May numbers .252/.314/.389.

YTD  .257/.324/.400 compared to 08 at this time .263/.332/.448

.724 Team OPS  (12th in the AL)

-6.1 Team VORP (12th in the AL)

The early May nosedive definitely took the team off last year's pace for output. The 08 team had already turned the corner in route to an above avg offensive year. That said there does seem to be recent life. A couple weeks ago the team was dead last in AL OPS. The common saying about the team heating up in the summer should hold at least some truth. June gives the boys 18 home games.

DH Thome- .256/.387.489  Last month I was asking if Thome had finally fallen off the cliff. I guess not (when will we learn?) He has gotten his health together and swing. Luckily they don't penalize for being the slowest runner in MLB (okay Konerko is slower but Thome has the heel...) VORP leader at 10.7.

RF Dye- .277/.339/.554 How can you not love JD? Slight slip in BA but the power is there.

1b Konerko-.309/.359/.497 Completing the 3 headed monster. The top 3 Sox hitters are scary close in production right now.

Q Superman- .229/.325/.458 No he is not dead  yet. He is however dealing with an injury that has him DL'd and contributed to a dreadful May. How he deals with the painful plantar fasciitis is key. The team has to have his bat. His BABIP is still very low .208.

2b Getz- .248/.309/.307 & 3B Fields- .244/.311/.335 Ugh. Both were a pleasant surpise in April. Both were disappointments in May (.518 & .566 OPS.) Seemed to find some sticks at the end of the month when our saviour was mentioned as a possible replacement. You can read an excellent summary of Beckham and the other baby faces over at Sox Machine. How this plays out will be very interesting. Bets on Gordon cracking the lineup by the end of June?

SS Alexei- .253/.300/.337 Believe it or not thats a huge improvement. Like last year he seems to be heating up. Added bonus 9 Stolen bases this year. Seems comfortable in the 2nd slot .333/.395/.410.

OF Pods- .297/.333/.376 I want to dog him out, I really do. But for now I can't. WTGTD be damned Pods has been a decent ball player since being called up. He still can't steal worth crap 3 sbs/3 caught, but he has seemed to provide stababilty to the lineup and punch with his new softball walking start stance. Will it last? Probably not but it is fun while it last.

C AJ- .299/.331/.435 Aj remains AJ

OF BAnderson- .275/.353/.352 also returned from injury. Would like to see more power but .700 OPS from him is all we hope for and he is 27.

Health remains the biggest question as the team enters June and tries to get back on offensive pace. After all the team is only 10th in HRs in the AL, WTF?

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Pitching

Team  ERA/FIP 4.33 (5th in AL)/4.16 (2nd)

K/9-7.03, BB/9-3.51 & HR/9- 0.92 (great so far)

Buerhle  ERA 2.71/FIP 3.95

Danks    ERA 4.80/FIP 4.03

Richard  ERA 3.38/FIP 4.09

Floyd      ERA 6.12/FIP 4.16

Colon     ERA 3.80/FIP 4.96

Contre   ERA 8.19/FIP 5.49

25 Quality starts (tied for 5th in AL)

The starting pitchers have been very good lately. 3 runs or less in 10 of the last 13 and twice giving up 4. We all know about the 20 spot. 2.39 ERA for them in that span.

Buerhle- Walking less people this year (1.63/per 9) which is really really good news. Looks to be on the way to a 5+ WAR season.

Danks- 2 steps forward, 1 step back. Unlike his mentor Danks walks are up back to the 07 level. Not good. Luckily his Ks are up which has cushioned the blow but the concentration needs to get better. Danks has all the skills and pitches to move to the upper tier. Will he use them?

Richard- After a subpar start in Cleveland, Richard has delivered 3 solid outings and touches 95 on the gun from time to time. Will he last or be traded? He's making it tough to take him out of the rotation.

Floyd- Nothing new here. Floyd holds his walks down, he does great. 4 free passes a game is maddening. His K's are also up. High ERA but solid FIP so we should continue to see a downward correction. He also has continued to decrease HRs but it is still early. Floyd has had bad luck his BABIP against is .346

C * C factory- Pot Pie odds? 50/50. Maybe wishful thinking. Colon has settled back to look like the 4 or 5 expected, but the end maybe near (still a good deal though). There is a reason KW is looking for pitching. Contreras pitched his way to triple A where he is trying to get it together. He pitches in the double header this week. At some point Contreras may give the White Sox 1 good run before taking his 10 million contract away for ever.

The Big 4

Jenks         ERA 3.00/FIP 4.50  7.5k/9  83%strand

Linebrink   ERA 2.04/FIP 2.71   9.17k/9 88% strand

Dotel          ERA 1.04/FIP 3.68    10.38 k/9 97.1% strand

Thornton      ERA 1.80/FIP 2.46  12.15 k/9 89% strand

Again very solid. FIPs are up a bit but great K rates and strand%. One thing that stands out is Thorton and Dotel seem to be getting the high leverage work. I'm okay with that.

The rest-

DJ Carrasco- ERA 2.56/FIP 3.22 anyone noticed the solid year he has put together? DJ has been quietly doing his work under the radar.

Broadway- ERA 5.06/FIP 3.82  Traded.

Gobble- ERA 11.81/FIP 7.85 My mom said if you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at all.

The White Sox have one of the better bullpens in baseball.

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Defense

.676 defensive efficiency.

12th in AL

Overall team

UZR -9.4

UZR/150 -3.5

I know we discussed last month how these small samples might now offer much. R.J. over at fangraphs  does offer an interesting take. Though the data offers nothing from a predictive nature, there is still value in knowing what the players have done up to this point. Here is the summary page.

Alexei (3.7) and Konerko (3.2) continue to be the top White Sox defenders. The defense as a whole at least seems to have hit bottom and is now moving in the right direction. Getz (-4.2), Dye (-5.8) and Fields (-6.1) bring up the rear. The slightly improved defense has definitely helped the pitching, fueling the turn around.

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Team Base running.

Per BP the team’s Equivalent Base Running  Runs (EqBrr)

The White Sox rank 18th with an aggregate score of -2.32.

Team leaders Getz 1.94 & Alexei 1.31

Team anchors Thome -1.58 & Fields -1.82 (again no excuse for this.)

Pods has actually provided negative value -.46.

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Well that's some of the highlights. Feel free to add stuff in the comments.

The late surge saved the month. Still I would give a C-.

I see Jim over at Sox Machine put up a June 1st so now what?