Eating Crow With the White Sox

When you write about baseball long enough, sooner or later, the writer is going to look like an idiot. Unfortunately, it happens a lot but that goes with the territory. Earlier in this season, the Fan counted David Ortiz among the dead. Big Papi has only hit a million homers since then. Today, the story lost in the Carlos Zambrano meltdown is that the Chicago White Sox won their tenth game in a row. Uhh...the Fan guesses his earlier statements that the White Sox were dead were a bit premature.

Think back ten games. Manager Ozzie Guillen and Kenny Williams were feuding. The team was six games under .500 and eight games out of first place. Now the White Sox are four games over .500 and with a Twins' loss (and the Tigers are losing), the White Sox are a game away from first place. Way to call it, Fan.

The White Sox are still not a great offensive team. Too many of their batters are below the .250 level. But every time you look up these days, the Sox score four, five and six runs. Carlos Quentin has been on a tear and has raised his OPS 70 points in those last ten games. Konerko has maintained a good start and is having a great year. Alex Rios has been the best centerfielder in the game, both at bat and in the field. So the offense is still weak, but a core of four players is carrying them.

But this streak is really about the pitching. Blog buddy, Josh Borenstein of Jews in Baseball defended the White Sox pitching when this old blogger didn't believe in them. And Josh was right. Peavy has 21 consecutive scoreless innings. Floyd and Danks have been better. Buehrle has come back from a bad start and out pitched Tim Hudson the other night. So the starting pitchers have been fantastic. The bullpen has also been better as Putz and Jenks have started to take care of the eighth and ninth the way Kenny Williams designed it.

So, yes, if you are going to write about baseball, there are times when you have to eat crow. And the White Sox just gave the Fan another cruddy black wing to nibble on. But [gulp] the Fan still thinks the Twins are going to win that division.