What can you say that hasn't already been said about Javier Vazquez? He is what he is; an average pitcher who can't stand the heat in the kitchen.

I'd be lying if I said I expected anything better than 4.1 innings and 6 runs allowed from Vazquez, but there was a small part of me that knows that Vazquez can be a dominating pitcher at times, as he was in the first 4 innings of his last outing, or all 7 innings of the outing prior to the worst 4 consecutive starts of his career*. I hoped he would pitch well, better than expected, but I wasn't counting on it.

For that reason, and that reason alone, I don't feel too bad about the loss today. I was looking at this game as one that the Sox would be stealing if they were able to come out on top. And for about 10 minutes there, I thought they just might have a shot. But Vazquez gave the Sox 3 runs (earned on a two-out, two on Dewayne Wise HR) right back in the bottom half of the third.

I know there was considerable chatter in the gamethreads about Ken Griffey Jr.'s defense on Akinori Iwamura's triple in that inning, but I don't know if anyone gets to that ball. Junior was playing a bit shallow, by design, because of the moving-in-the-box type hitter at the plate, and I'd have to think that were Brian Anderson in the game, he might have been in even more. Junior played the ball as well as he can play it, and didn't even come close to making a play on the ball that hit at the base of the CF wall. Watching the replays, I think that ball was hit too hard, on too much of a line, to expect anyone to make that play. And this is coming from somebody who is always looking to point out Junior's defensive shortcomings.

* I went searching for a comparable stretch of games in Vazquez' past, but all I could come up with was a series of 4 straight games in which he allowed 5 runs earlier this season. Not surprisingly, Vazquez has had the two worst stretches of his career in the last 4 months on the south side.

If there was one bright spot for the Sox in their opening game loss, it had to be the pitching of Clayton Richard. In hindsight, he might have been an inspired choice for game one starter. But that's a move that I was admittedly against until I saw him pitch today, so it would be hypocritical of me chastise the organization for not having the balls (or foresight) to make that decision.

Unfortunately, Richard wasn't all that impressive out of the pen in relief of Vazquez late in the regular season. He was only alright, better than the other dreck littering the bullpen, which made the Sox decision an easy one. Vazquez would start game 1.

In the two biggest appearances of his career, his final start of the regular season in Yankee Stadium and the 3+ innings of playoff relief today, Richard has been very good. I suspect that the unusual left-handedness of those two clubs have something to do with his success, but Richard's two quality outings in high-stress situations for anyone, let alone a rookie who started the year in A-ball and outside the White Sox top 10 prospects, lie in stark contrast to the results of the $11+M proven veteran he relieved.

* * * * *

There were some ruffled feathers in the 7th inning, when Grant Balfour and Orlando Cabrera exchanged words following a ball well outside the strike zone on the first pitch of Cabrera's at-bat. It appears that Balfour, who relieved Shields with 1-out and the bases loaded*, got a little too excited for Cabrera's liking following a strikeout of Juan Uribe. Balfour said/yelled something, and Cabrera was not appreciative, kicking a cloud of dirt and chalk in Balfour's direction and, if my Associates Degree in lip reading is worth anyting, and it better be worth the 3 payments of $495 I paid, told Balfour "Fuck You!" Balfour responded by striking Cabrera out, and getting his Carlos Zambrano on as he left the field, almost having to be pushed into the dugout, as both managers found their way to the field.

* Great call by Maddon. Balfour is his best reliever, and arguably the nastiest reliever in baseball even though he essentially throws only one pitch. With Troy Percival being left off the playoff roster, most managers would probably have handed closer duties to Balfour without thinking twice. Balfour is exactly the type of pitcher you call upon in the 7th with the bases loaded, and Maddon's refusal to automatically stick the //obvious// choice into the closer's role allowed him to turn to Balfour in a much higher leverage situation.

The following piece was commissioned--well, commissioned would imply that money had changed hands, so that's not the right word--by The Hardball Times. They wanted the story crafted around the title "Why [insert team here] Will Beat [insert second team here]," but didn't seem to like my Why the Twins Will Beat the White Sox entry. So I threw a little something together to placate those slave drivers.

While everything I've written in the following piece is true. I've left some of those pesky facts out; like the Sox lack of speed, or their record when they fail to hit a HR, or their road record, or their record in domes. You know, facts.

I know how dangerous, and out of character, it is for me to express optimism here. So, I'm issuing this preface. This is made-to-order optimism, which doesn't count nearly as much a real optimism. Similarly, it doesn't have the jinx-ability, to make up a word, of real optimism. So we're safe. The Twins will totally take care of these upstart Rays.

I had intended to write a separate preview-type post specifically for you guys, but there just aren't enough hours in the day. So read below, or head over to THT and check out the same thing under a different name.

Continue reading this post »

I don't want to sound too hyperbolic, because a win in tomorrow's game with the Twins puts the White Sox right back at square one, 2.5 games up with 4+ games left to play, but the Sox looked like a team that had already begun to play out the string Tuesday night; like they had conceded the fact that they can't play in domes (4-14 in '08), let alone the Metrodome in September with the season on the line.

Ozzie Guillen issued a challenge to Javier Vazquez this week with some less than flattering comments. Vazquez responded by saying he didn't care, the controversy 'overblown,' then let it slip that he was teething "had an ear infection," or some other infantile malady. Vazquez had the opportunity to prove his detractors wrong; to reinvent himself as an ace, if only for a short time, as Jose Contreras did in late '05. But with the ear infection talk, it was almost as if he was looking for an out, an excuse for his poor performance, even before he threw a pitch.

Vazquez was staked* to early lead thanks to what appeared to be some inspired play by the white, immobile veterans. Jim Thome led off the second inning with a opposite field single to beat the shift, and advanced to third when he got a great read on Paul Konerko's bloop single (Yes, you read that right.). That was the extent of the Sox offensive highlights for the night, however, as Ken Griffey Jr. erased the threat, and gave the Sox the lead, with a routine double play ball.

Vazquez greeted the lead by throwing 6 straight balls to put the go-ahead run at the plate with a hitter's count. Seconds later, Hawk broke into "and we've got ourselves a 2-1 game" about halfway through Jason Kubel's swing on an absolute no-duobter of a homerun on a hanging changeup from Vazquez. In the span of 8 minutes, the Sox had gone from runners on the corners nobody out, to down by 1, and going through the motions.

Kubel led off the bottom of the 4th with a triple beyond the reach of a diving Griffey (read: an out for Brian Anderson), and quickly scored a bloop double that fell in front of Jermaine Dye (poor range again allowing the ball to find safety). What Griffey and Dye lack in range, they've clearly made up for at the plate, especially since Quentin's departure. (.257/.325/.343 6 extra-base hits, 0 HR for Dye; .244/.311/.341 4 XBH, 0 HR for Griffey)

The entire inning was a microcosm of the difference between the two clubs. Minnesota's first two runs of the inning came courtesy of the Sox' poor defense combined with some timely hitting, while their final run crossed home thanks to a stolen base and a suicide squeeze. The Sox showed a faint heartbeat in the top of the fifth, when the first two batters reached on a hit and a walk. The runners would stay right there for two outs, however, and when Orlando Cabrera came up with a clutch hit with a Runner In Scoring Position, the Sox only such hit on the night, Junior was unable to score.

That just about says it all right there. The Sox get a rare hit w/ RISP, nobody scores; and their offensive highlight is a second inning GIDP that plates a run. I suppose you could count Griffey's 9th inning HR as a highlight if 9th-inning-down-by-8-run-homers are your type of thing, but I can't count any play that makes his presence in tomorrow's lineup more likely as a highlight. The Sox finished the game win 1 extra base hit (Griffey's 26th out HR), and only put a runner in scoring position, a laughable term with this team, in the 2nd and 5th innings.

If there was a You-Just-Have-To-Laugh moment in Tuesday night's mess, it had to be the last inning. First it was Horacio Ramirez proving he is good for something; he's good for a perfect inning of work anytime the game has a margin of 8 runs. Seriously, he has two perfect outings in his White Sox career, one in the 9th while up by 8 runs, and Tuesday in the 8th with the Sox trailing by 8. You can't make that shit up. Then it was Griffey, who hasn't homered in over a month, putting one deep over the baggy, all but ensuring he'll see more time in center this series.

Back when I was wondering what the heck the Griffey deal was all about, I never could have imagined that we'd still be complaining about Griffey in center field in the final week of the season... with the Sox holding onto a 1.5 game lead... in a Carlos Quentin-less outfield... with Nick Swisher on the bench. I gave Joe Cowley shit earlier in the year when he called Cabrera the 4th best shortstop on the White Sox--Cabrera's hit .301/.353/.392 since then--but you could honestly make a case for Griffey, who is, without a doubt, a first-ballot HOFer, being the Sox' 4th best CFer right now; even on a night when he drove in all 3 of the Sox runs.

Is it OK for me to use the word staked as a verb here, or does the only acceptable use refer to the act of driving a peg through Vazquez?

After the Rain Comes a Rainbow

Record rain fell on Chicago Saturday, postponing the White Sox scheduled doubleheader with the Tigers. Rain fell all afternoon and night on Friday, postponing that scheduled game to after the end of the "regular season." Rain fell all morning and into the early afternoon on Sunday, delaying the start of game one of the doubleheader by 3 hours and 11 minutes. According to head groundskeeper Roger Bossard, US Cellular Field saw about 9.5 inches of rain during the 50 hour span when the ACE hardware tarp saw more TV time than actual players. To his credit, the playing condition of the field was not an issue even with the record-setting rains.

The sun never came out; there wasn't any parting of the clouds, or a rainbow straddling the stadium; but there was baseball to be played. And after two days cooped up in flooded northern Chicagoland, that was good enough for me. With the Twins dropping a game to the faltering Orioles, the Sox had an opportunity to take advantage and pick up the 1.5 games they lost in their last doubleheader effort. And take advantage they did.

Vazquez Victorious, Verlander Vanquished

The White Sox have an incredible record against Justin Verlander. For some reason, they just seem to have the Detroit ace's number. But for the first half of the opening game, it looked like Verlander might have the Sox number on this night. Thankfully, Javier Vazquez was there to match him pitch-for-pitch.

The offense seemed content to help Verlander out in the early going, making an inning's worth of outs on the basepaths. Juan Uribe singled home Ken Griffey Jr. after he hit a double off the wall to put the Sox on the board after 5. That might have been enough for Vazquez, who altered his side-session schedule to be ready to go on short rest Saturday, but the offense didn't stop there. Alexei Ramirez added a solo-shot. And in the 8th, after Vazquez had been lifted, the Sox strung together a 2-run, 2-out rally.

That 4-0 lead headed to the ninth gave Ozzie Guillen some flexibility. I thought it would be a good time to turn to Scott Linebrink for some easy late-inning work to continue to ease him back into higher leverage situations. But Guillen decided to turn to Bobby Jenks, who has been getting hit around lately. The two runs he allowed were essentially meaningless, but he still brought the tying run to the plate for the second straight time in a non-save situation.

Wise, Thornton Rescue Wobbly Pen

John Danks was originally scheduled to pitch on Friday. In fact, his start was pushed to Sunday because he had gotten warmed up Friday when it still appeared as if the game would be played. So Ozzie had to keep an eye on the 23-year old southpaw who has seemed to tire over the last month. Danks showed no ill-effects from the impromptu side-session, and probably would have gone deeper into the game if not for the lingering concerns about his workload and a seemingly comfortable 7-0 lead. That lead would prove to be much more precarious than it seemed when Danks left the game and especially after ESPN cut the Carlos Zambrano no-hitter.

With the exception of Matt Thornton, the bullpen has provided no relief lately. In addition to Jenks troubles which I touched on above; the lightning has escaped DJ Carrasco's bottle; Octavio Dotel has allowed 8 homers, including the game-tying grand slam Sunday night, since the All-Star break; Linebrink is understandably rusty, and probably not 100% after spending 2 months on the DL; Ehren Wasserman has sprinkled brief outings of effectiveness in between long periods of awful. I think it says a lot about the shape of the White Sox pen that Mike MacDougal, who spent nearly the entire season wasting away in Charlotte, might be the best available right-hander right now. So, when the Sox managed to blow a 7-run lead over the span of about 25 minutes, it's hard (read: impossible, to those who possess critical thinking ability) to blame Ozzie for the blowup.

As quickly as the Sox lead disappeared at the hands of a grand slam allowed by their bullpen, it was given back by a grand slam off the bat of Dewayne Wise off an equally bad Tigers pen (read: Kyle Farnsworth). Wise, who drove in a key insurance run while starting in LF of the first game, earned himself some more playing time in Konerko's absence with his day of work, culminating in his pinch-hit, eventual game-winning slam and curtain call.

The two victories, which lowered the White Sox Magic Number to 13 and increased their division lead over the Twins to 1.5 games, were the spoonful of sugar to wash down the medicine that is the alarmingly shaky bullpen. The Sox will need to rely heavily on the pen down the stretch, as they eventually plan on throwing some starters on short rest. It goes without saying that the pen can not continue to pitch this poorly if the Sox have hopes of holding off the Twins in the final 13 or 14 games (if necessary).

Meta (Moron Prevention)

We get it. The bullpen blew a lead. Therefore, Ozzie is an idiot. You have AOL--don't they all--and you seem to think it's your god-given right to use it as an avenue to vent your misdirected rage.

Thanks to an influx of, how do I say this nicely--ah, fuck, who cares about being nice--short-bus riding mouth-breathers, who think that the ability to complete the registration process and string together 75 words gives them poetic license to infect this site with their own special blend of ill-informed stupidity, I've implemented a 24-hour waiting period for all new posters. This obviously won't effect any of the regular users here, but it should help curb the mongoloids who wish to misdirect their anger towards Ozzie and other troll-types.

The only thing that fills Juan Uribe with more joy than a well-priced all-you-can-eat buffet is hitting homers (Profundo!) and dancing to some latin music in the clubhouse. He got to do a lot of the latter, and probably some of the former as well, on Friday Night against the Angels. It was latin night at the Cell, and an inspired Uribe hit two 2-run homers to help push the Sox to an early 7-0 lead.

On the mound, Mark Buehrle struggled with the zone a bit early in the game, but still had good control of his stuff, specifically his breaking ball. He was chased with a smallish strike zone-influenced high pitch count after 6 scoreless innings. He only walked 2 and struck out 7, so it wasn't that he didn't have great control or the ability to put hitters away; it was just an atypical Buehrle start. We had early season John Danks back on the mound for a night.

As I'm sure you all know by now, Carlos Quentin has a broken wrist. He suffered the injury last Monday slamming a his fist into his bat after fouling off a Cliff Lee pitch. It's a move we've all seen him make dozens of times this season, and as such, I see no reason to get indignant. Not once before this afternoon did I see anyone complain about Quentin's bat antics.

As much as we all love Q!, his loss will almost certainly be overstated. It's an easy thing to do. He's unquestionably been the Sox most valuable player this season, yet he was not the player they could least afford to lose to injury. That title falls to AJ Pierzyski, who, while a far inferior hitter than Quentin, plays a premium position at which the Sox have a paucity of replacement options.

The loss of Quentin is softened by the questionable Ken Griffey Jr acquisition. At the time of the trade, the only value I could see in acquiring Griffey was to both insulate the Sox against injury to their old sluggers and lessen the likelihood of those injuries by giving them some extra days off in the final two months of the season.

I hope they got their rest. Because it's all hands on deck now. 22 games left. A 1.5 game lead. It's gonna take a 13-9 record, with one or two of those wins coming against the Twins to lock this thing up. And it doesn't matter how they get there.

Yes, Griffey should be in left field. Yes, he should be platooned with Brian Anderson, who would shift Swisher to LF. But, I'm not going to complain when neither of those things take place. I'm just going to sit back and enjoy--well, try to enjoy--a division race that nobody could have predicted at the beginning of the season.

I should never say a positive word about the White Sox. When the Sox swept the Twins in June and found themselves with a 6.5 game lead and what appeared to be a favorable schedule ahead of them, I openly wondered if they might be able to put the division away in June. They lost 5 of their next 6. After Gavin Floyd and the offense made light work of the Orioles last week, I said "They almost look like a playoff team. Almost." They haven't won a game since. And they haven't even been close.

So from now on, I promise to never utter another positive word about the White Sox. It's a sure recipe for AL domination.

• Mark Kotsay has been more of an asset to the Red Sox in the first two games against the White Sox than Ken Griffey Jr has been in a month for the White Sox.
• Dustin Pedroia has reached base in 10 consecutive trips to the plate against the Sox, gaining himself automatic induction into the SSS Douchenozzle Hall of Fame.

Light recaps will continue throughout the holiday weekend

The top of the site tells me that I have approximately 2 hours to write a recap, and, as has become SSS custom, get what might be the worst thread in the history of SSS off the front page. So, in the interest of burying the ugliness, here's your recap, to which I will be adding (in between masturbatory sessions) until the site goes dark for the night.

Limited time constraints and a general lack of focus results in a bullet point recap for you.

• The first game played Monday, which was actually April, BTW, had to be one of the most frustrating losses of the year; 12 walks leads to only 3 runs thanks to 18 men left on base, Cubs castoffs Rocky Cherry and Luis Montanez proving the winning formula in the late innings, the decision to start Horacio Ramirez over Thornton or Carrasco, a number of well-struck line drives which never seemed to find the grass between the white lines. It was just one of the most frustrating games of the year to watch. And it took nearly 3 months to complete.

• Clayton Richard turned in his second consecutive quality start, with all of the damage coming in one inning. And the damage might not have been as severe if he had a competent defense behind him. General Soreness was unable to get to bloop hit and Alexei Ramirez dropped a glove-to-hand transfer (ruled a hit) to give the O's two extra outs in the inning. I still don't know how he's getting it done, but I'm not gonna argue with the results. Keep sending him out there against the also-rans of the AL, I say.

• Joe Crede returned to the Sox lineup, and actually looked pretty good at the plate in the first game. As somebody commented that's probably because the first game was played in April. Crede lifted a deep fly to center his first at-bat, and laid out a rope to right field in his second, but both found the gloves of Orioles fielders.

  Defensively, it didn't appear that Crede had any ill effects from his lingering back issues. He made a number of nice plays over the two games, though he did start hitting the ball weakly to the right side in the nightcap.

• Chris Getz was optioned to AAA in between games to make way for the curiously effective Lance Brodway. Getz will be back in 10 days, the minimum time required (barring injury) for a minor league assignment, with rosters set to expand on September 1st.

Note: Previously, there has been a loosely enforced--is anything strictly enforced around here?--policy against political posting. But, observing the generally cordial conversations which occurred during primary season, I let everything slide. I think the last thread shows why that policy should be more rigorously enforced. But enforcing rules is hard work, so I've come up with something different.

Over the next two weeks, spanning the conventions--I like to think of them as the political equivalent of SoxFest--if you should still feel the need to shout obscenities at your TV or your fellow Sox fans, you're welcome to do so in the soon-to-be-difficult-to-find previous thread. (no link) Please be so kind as to keep them out of the rest of the threads. kthnxbi.

I closed yesterday's recap with a note that the Sox were due to give back the game they had just picked up on the Twins because of the incredibly lopsided pitching match-up facing them Tuesday night. Clayton Richard entered the game with zero major league wins, and hadn't allowed fewer than 5 runs or pitched more than 5 innings in any of his 3 previous big league starts. Felix Hernandez, on the other hand, is one of the best pitchers in baseball; he strikes guys out, he gets ground balls, he throws in the mid-90's, he doesn't allow many homers.

To put it another way, Hernandez is the pitcher you create when you're cheating on MVP baseball, while Richard is the pitcher you turn to when your 5th starter ruptures his Achilles and all the other options seem unpalatable. The Sox were supposed to get owned hard, like that kite-surfer who thought it would be fun to set sail in a tropical storm; but Richard was up to the task, and the White Sox offense chipped away at Hernandez in each of his 6 innings of work. Baseball is a funny game. Any team can beat any other team on any give night. Take your pick of any number of clichés.

If I was the type to draw drastic conclusions after one encouraging start--and I don't think I have to tell you that I'm not--I might say that Richard looked like he learned something from his first go around with the big club. I missed Richard's first start, so I don't really know how he struck out 7 in his big league debut. But I caught every pitch of his last three, and can see the makings of future major league pitcher.

Richard's main weapon is a fastball that he adds and subtracts off of to great effect. According to GameDay, Richard's fastball averaged 90.26 MPH on the night, yet some of his fastballs clock in around 86 and below, and one even hit 94.7 MPH. In both this start and the first four innings against the Twins, Richard showed a veteran's ability to ramp up his fastball to get key outs. In fact, the 94.7 MPH pitch was an expertly located 2-2 fastball to strike out Wladimir Balentien with 1-out and a man on third base.

Richard is still rough around the edges, however, as he showed when he once again threw away a throw to first on the opening play of the game. His secondary stuff still needs work and he always seems on the verge of giving up the big inning, but you can see the hints of a possible back-end rotation fixture in there somewhere.

The Sox offense, outside of General Soreness, is really clicking right now. Everyone had a base hit except Griffey and JD, who combined to ground into three double plays. We'll forgive Dye on account of his great season thus far, but Griffey needs to do something or take a seat for good. Swisher, Konerko, and Thome have all hit well since his acquisition, and I see no reason to worsen the defense in favor of less offense and a better box office draw.

I said last night that I'd likely end up penning a mea culpa in apology of my earlier write-up of the Griffey trade.  Well, reading it again, I still like what I wrote.  In the comments at the time (though annoyingly not in the post), I said there should be about a two week cushion at which point we could expect Griffey's routine to have more or less become clear.  To quote myself:

If any of the parties in question care about winning more than they care about anything else, Griffey will end up where he should.

What that implies, I hope, is that merely watching him play should make it obvious what he can and cannot do and that through the simple mechanism of trial and error, his proper place on the team would be found.  Having seen what happened last night on a couple critical plays in center that in the very least changed the course of the game, I have to suspect that these are the kinds of plays that everyone on the team noticed, Ozzie, Kenny, and Junior included.  In the original post, it's fairly clear that I expected that it was Junior's ego that was the largest factor in play here.  What I've seen so far puts the matter in the hands of the bosses.  Whether it's Kenny's ego or Ozzie's mad whims that are on the hook, the fact is The Kid can't play center.

On the other hand, Kenny has been criticized by certain factions of the SSS faithful for having failed to find pitching help.  With Jose Contreras done for the year, a fifth starter certainly fits the bill.  But to my knowledge, there were all of two seeming possibilities: Paul Byrd and Jarrod Washburn.  The former was nabbed by the Red Sox and was likely never a possibility to begin with.  It is extremely doubtful the Indians would be willing to help the White Sox get back to the playoffs.  Mr. Washburn pitches for the Seattle Mariners, perhaps the most dysfunctionally managed club in all of Major League Baseball.  Getting him for less than Aaron Poreda and the Additional Pieces also appears doubtful.  Considering the cost and the available "talent," it looks to me like Kenny's shrewd judgment in the trade market is paying off again.

All that's left now is to bicker about a bullpen.  From highest leverage usage to lowest:

1. Bobby Jenks
2. Octavio Dotel
3. Matt Thornton
4. Horacio Ramirez
5. Adam Russell
6. Lance Broadway

The top 3 + LOOGY looks fine to me.  It would obviously be preferable to have Scott Linebrink back, but there's 4 arms available for games where we're ahead or tied and 2 for games that we're trying to finish out with minimal damage to pitchers that matter.  The competence of each group seems certain to me.  We'll be able to rapidly add an arm since it appears that Dwayne Wise is readily disposable at this point.  The only problem is that we can't add anyone better than Scott Linebrink either internally or externally. The same is true with Contreras.  The annoying fact of baseball is dealing with the unexpected.  Shoulder soreness, ruptured achilles, or a bunch of tiny fish with sharp pointy teeth that just will not go the hell away.  But hey, who thought we'd be here in the first place?

Javier Vazquez was infuriatingly inefficient over his first three innings against the Tigers Thursday night. He needed 60 pitches to get out of the third. Thankfully, his only real mistake, beside throwing too many damn pitches, was a low and inside fastball that Miguel Cabrera parked for the Tigers first two runs.

Ozzie Guillen must have given Vazquez a talking to in between innings, because when Vazquez returned he was a strike throwing machine. He needed just 15 pitches to set down his next 4 batters, all of them on strikeouts. The success was short-lived, however, as Detroit countered with back-to-back extra-base hits, the second of which was our third triple hit to Ken Griffey Jr in just his 4th game played in the field.

By my count, that's 5 extra bases that Griffey has allowed in the field (over an average fielder), which nearly matches the total number of bases he's produced offensively; 6: 4 singles, a walk, and a HBP. In just four games, it's become painfully clear that Griffey is exactly what I expected defensively, an amazing liability any time he takes the field. How long will the Sox keep trotting him out there?

Making matters worse, Nick Swisher reached base in 3 of his 4 plate appearances, hitting two doubles, but he never came to the plate with RISP. Alexei Ramirez made sure of that. The only time Swisher came to the plate with a man on, Ramirez, who reached one batter in front of him on a error-ruled-a-hit, failed in an attempted steal of second base to end the inning.

The Sox had their chances Thursday night, but each time it seemed like Griffey or Ramirez was there to make a key out. Though in Ramirez' defense, he did lay out a rope in the 8th. When Griffey and Ramirez, who left 4 and 5 runners on base, respectively, weren't killing the Sox rallies, they found other ways to shoot themselves in the foot. Moments before Ramirez' rope in the 8th, Paul Konerko doubled down the left field line into the corner. The ball took a funny hop and scooted by Ryan Raburn. It was the type of play that should have allowed even the slowest of baserunners to score from first, but Jim Thome looked like he had MS rounding third and was thrown out by a solid 15 feet. It's hard to fault Jeff Cox for sending Thome after the bobble, but he'll have to be more conservative in the future.

Ozzie stuck with Vazquez for as long as he could, letting him throw a season high 122 pitches. But not even Nessie could bring home the Sox a victory. Ozzie didn't use him properly. You have to leave him in to be eligible for the win, not pull him with men on base. Ehren Wasserman, whom Ozzie called upon to replace Russell, immediately put the game out of reach.

The loss puts the Sox just a half game up on the Twins--as if I had to tell you scoreboard monkeys--who play the Royals this weekend while the Sox host the BoSox for a 4 game set. Let's hope it turns out better than last season's 4-day ass-whooping.

* * * * *

Scott Linebrink, who last we heard was well on his way to recovery, now "isn't close to throwing a bullpen session," which pushes his return to the team back to the end of the month at the earliest. Ugh.