Further disasters

(July 3)

Short Take:  How predictable

The White Sox lost for the tenth time in eleven games to the Minnesota Twins Tuesday evening at Comiskey Park.  There was nothing very remarkable about this defeat from any of the previous nine suffered at the hands of the Twinkies.  This one simply made it official--the Sox aren't good enough to beat the Twins and haven't any business aspiring to a division championship let alone anything approaching a celestial body's worth.  5-3 Twins.  The Sox are four games under .500 and aren't even within shouting distance of first-place so why bother measuring it.

Sure, we could have won this game.  We could have won nearly any of the others, too.  Not withstanding some lucky breaks for the Twinkies, we may well have won half or more of them.  However there is never an excuse for stupid baseball and the Sox had an abundance of it in this game.

There was the first inning when the Sox failed to score a single run with Paul Konerko popping out to end the inning with runners at second and third.  

There was Jose Valentin caught leaning the wrong way at first base to end the third inning.  

There was Carlos Lee grounding out to the pitcher with a runner at second base in the fifth inning, and Magglio Ordonez popping out weakly to the catcher to end the rally with the runner stuck on third.

There was Carlos Lee failing to get a deep sacrifice drive in the seventh and Royce Clayton foolishly attempting to score off the arm of Torii Hunter anyway--tagged out by an embarrassing distance.

There was Bob Howry giving up a two-run dinger to the first man he faced in the seventh, saddling spot starter Sean Lowe with an undeserved loss.

The 2001 Sox could have won this game three or four times over.  They didn't and that's why they are losers.

Three months left to go.