Friday Jerry and the trophy paid a visit to LaSalle Street. I arranged for my kids to come to work with me so they could see it.

 Yes those are my kids. No that's not my truck!

Jerry R was here to ring the opening bell.

I had not had an opportunity to see the trophy until yesterday. This turned out to be very up close and personal. I was so excited when we had our picture taken I forgot to get a close look at it. I did get a chance to do it later. It was cool because the line was short, the pictures were free and it was a chance for us Sox fans to celebrate yet again. Not to mention the mega brownie points I picked up with my kids as a result.

I have a great picture of Jerry R. with me and my kids. All in all it was a great day even a loss couldn't spoil.

Still vibrating from Saturday's beating the Sox sent their #4 against the Yanks Jaret Wright hoping the bats would carry Freddie to a W. But it seemed like every time the Sox had RISP they manufactured an out rather than a run.

Freddie seemed to have decent control but early on he just could not make a good pitch when he needed to. He really pitched a pretty good 5th 6th and 7th but there was just too much going wrong offensively today.

I'd rather not discuss the fact that we got swept.

On the positive side BA continued to show a good presence at the plate.

I heard a rumor that the Sox traded Garcia to the LAD but I don't see it in print anywhere.

The Sox get a day off and then send Jon Garland against Detroit for what now looms as a pretty big series. Taking 2/3 would still leave the Sox 3.5 out of first.

I'll give you my abbreviated recap.

Freddie Garcia showed why the mental aspect of pitching is more important than the physical one. He was cruising along when Mack and Cintron failed to field a high pop up. After that play Freddie, visibly upset, began a string of 4 2 out hits. When the smoke cleared the Sox 1 - 0 lead was a 3 - 1 deficit.

Now as its been pointed out, the Sox bats once again turned into buckets and bailed out another sinking pitching performance. And once again the leaks were too many to keep the game afloat.

Riske allows a run.
Garland allows Cotts runners to score and tosses in one of his own for good measure.

The final nail in this coffin of a game was when  Becket loaded the bases and Thome, Konerko and Dye fail to do squat. You could hear the groan all the way up here in Rogers Park.

The Sox went into today's game having won the first two of the set. With Jon Garland on the bump expectations were low. Still 2 out of 3 would have made me happy.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the park - Garland brought his A+ game.  His line was 8 IP 4 hits 1 run 1 BB 4 ks.  Add a hit, a fielder's choice, 2 runs scored and 2 RBI. It was a nice hit too. Jon deposited an Esteban (our old friend) Yan pitch into the left field stands! Garland looked like the same pitcher he always did. The difference was avoiding the dinger(s).

Meanwhile the Sox offence produced 8 runs on 14 hits with Jim Thome playing first base and Paul Konerko getting Father's Day off.  Rob Mackowiak went 4 for 4. Jermaine Dye had 2 hits including a 3 run shot - #20.

Meanwhile the worst team in the NL is getting pounded again. I guess you can't have everthing.

Next up for the Sox are the Red Birds .

Have a happy Father's Day. I know I will.

Update [2006-6-18 18:5:45 by thewizardsofoz]: Garland's 2-run homer was his first career homer and the first homer by a Sox pitcher in 35 years (Steve Kealey hit that on September 6, 1971, against Minnesota, before the AL adopted the DH rule)!

I have a lot of memorabilia from the championship season. When I heard about this I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Go buy a couple of boxes and empty the contents. One is for my shelf at home and one for my Sox shrine at work. The work shrine has a brick from old Comiskey (stolen), the 4 tribune headlines from each WS win. A picture of the new Cell, pennants, a flag, and a shadow box mounted WS sweatshirt. But this, this is just so cool. Check this out -

The write up is by Dan Wetzel. I'll transcribe it upon request.

I have no idea when these finally came out but Cheat's post the other day made me go and check.
I hope this is not incredibly old news.

I like reading the Sox press notes. They toss out a lot of factoids.

Jim Thome has scored a run in 12 straight games.

The Sox have homered in 6 straight games and have an extra base hit in all 11.

The Sox have 47 (Thome has 13) walks in 11 games. Last year after 11 games they had 17.

The Sox have scored double diget runs twice. Last year they took 59 games to do it twice.

Since we have a player in need it seems fitting we should try to help him out. I found an article here that provides lots of useful information including this from the Babe -

Ruth was among those who tried to eat his way out of bad hitting. "Scallions are the greatest cure for a batting slump ever invented," the Bambino once said.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FCI/is_10_64/ai_n15756682/pg_1#continue

Ok another fluke injury for the North Side's top talent hurler. I've been asking my North Side buds about the situation for a couple of weeks now. No, they said. Nothing odd about it at all. Now in fairness the spin today was they wanted to avoid what happened last spring. Ok I'll bite. But maybe they should consider a better off season program instead.

I think this topic is fair game considering KW tried to aquire him in the off season.

I don't want to make light of it but the Heckler sure does. This is worth a read. Seriously.

http://www.theheckler.com/index.php?page=0000-DH-06-03-14&idrub=65&idsite=1

Its becasue you left the greatest pitcher off your list that SSS was forced to choose from the list of also rans. I'm going to state my case this time.

17 years in the big leagues.
11 years with the Sox
From 1971 and 1975 he started 182 games, completed
99. In those same years he posted era/inning combos of 1.91/334, 2.50/376, 3.46/359, 3.60/320 and 4.11/291 innings.

I believe he is also the last of the few pitchers to pitch both ends of a double header.

On top of all that he was greatly loved by the fans.

Sure BJM had a cool name and played in a rock band but give me a break!