There probably would have been a lot of angst following Tuesday's loss to the Yankees would the bullpen had been able to keep the game close in the late innings. I'd argue that angst would be misplaced, and instead should (theoretically) have been directed squarely at the offense unable to put together the big inning.

The White Sox had what looked to be a big scoring opportunities in the 5th, 6th and 7th innings, but could only net 2 runs total in those three frames. Jermaine Dye had a particularly tough day at the plate, stranding 6 runners and striking out twice in key situations to dampen Sox rallies. And when your hopes are riding on Juan Uribe at the plate, well, you don't have much hope at all.

Trying to find some positives in the breezy three hour, forty-four minute game...

• Jose Contreras looked pretty good. He threw over the top for much of the game, though I assume that had more to do with the general left-handedness of the Yankees lineup more than anything else. Still, his velocity is better than last year, and he looks like a guy who can at least keep the Sox in the game every 5th day.

• The Sox offense had a productive game against Wang. It just didn't result in--how do I put this--runs. They left a baker's dozen stranded on the basepaths tonight.
• With his second late-inning, bases clearing (in a bad way) outing in a White Sox uniform, Octavio Dotel probably won't be getting any high-leverage innings for a while.
• It was almost fun to watch Bobby Jenks pitch again... Then I realized it was Joba Chamberlain. I'm sure Bobby's just saving his heat for the playoffs.
• The Sox gave up 5 homers in their first 160+ innings pitched. In the 9 innings since an unnamed poster boastfully claimed the Sox have "some of the nastiest pitches" in baseball, they've given up 3 more. Coincidence? I think not.
• We're due to have a small, two hour (hopefully shorter) downtime on the site tonight, so don't freak out. We should be back to normal in the overnight hours.

I crapped out of yesterday's recap duties, so I thought I'd make it up to you with a couple of pitching notes on the young season. What have we learned?

• John Danks has transformed himself into a ground ball pitcher with the additions of a cutter. He's not going to be channeling Chien-Ming Wang any time soon, but through 4 games he has a ground ball rate quite similar to that of Jon Garland, except Danks can miss some bats.

  Quick math might make it seem like Danks' K-rate has dropped this season (7.06 K/9 in '07 vs. 6.08 K/9 in '08), but upon closer inspection Danks appears to have retained all of his K-inducing talents. Using the raw total K/TBF (Total Batters Faced), Danks strikeout rate has declined from 17.5% to 17.2%, a negligibly small amount given the sample size of just 4 starts.

  Danks is also doing one other thing exceedingly well, unsustainably well, in fact. The White Sox pitching staff as a whole has joined him. I'd get into specifics, but I'm superstitious and don't wish to throw my jinx their way. I'm pretty sure you can figure it out for yourself anyway.

• If a pitcher signs a 4-year contract, expect him to have his starts pushed back as much as possible. Mark Buehrle is of to a rough start, and the Sox are taking every opportunity to push his spot in the rotation back, all the while claiming he is perfectly healthy. I see no reason (yet) to doubt them, and attribute Buehrle's extra rest as a means to protect their long-term investment. The Sox have been extremely reluctant, with good reason, to hand out long-term contracts to pitchers, and I assume they have some data (or at least a theory) that the extra rest will help ensure Buehrle's effectiveness not just in August and September, but until August and September of '11.

  On the mound, Buehrle has allowed a troubling 35 hits in just 22+ innings pitched, which is surprising because he looked spectacular in spring training. I think we can attribute at least some of this to bad luck, Buehrle has allowed an astounding .384 BABIP so far. But there are at least two warning signs I can see in the data from FanGraphs; 1) Buehrle's K-rate 11% is tied with his poor '06 campaign for the lowest in his career, and 2) take a look at the pitch-type data. Buehrle is throwing about 33% fewer fastballs so far in the early going, and it looks most of those fastballs have been replaced with cutters, which have almost doubled in frequency. I don't know if there's enough data from which to draw any concrete solutions, but it's something to keep an eye on as the season continues.