posted on Friday, May 25, 2007 11:59 PM by Jim

May 25: White Sox 5, Devil Rays 4

The bullpen prevented Mark Buehrle from gaining his 100th career victory the last time around.  This time, he has nobody to blame but himself.

Staked to a 4-1 lead with a runner on second and two outs in the seventh, Buehrle went recklessly hard inside against the slumping Brendan Harris, eventually hitting the Rays' shortstop.  Please note that James Shields had already plunked two White Sox.

The HBP brought Elijah Dukes to the plate, and Dukes cranked a bad changeup over the left-field fence to tie the game.  Ozzie Guillen had visited Buehrle just before Dukes' AB, but returned to the dugout without taking action.

Then again, Mike MacDougal entered the game next, and considering MacDougal continued to struggle, no positive outcome could be guaranteed.  MacDougal fell behind 3-0 to the first two batters he faced (single and a popout the results), and ended up intentionally walking the other after Carl Crawford stole second.  He left to a chorus of boos, but fortunately Matt Thornton cleaned up his mess -- with the help of Crawford.

Crawford thought he had Thornton figured out after a couple pitches, and tried to steal third before Thornton had delivered a pitch.  But Thornton checked second one more time, saw Crawford wasn't there, and fired the ball to Joe Crede in time for out No. 2.  Thornton and Bobby Jenks -- good call by Ozzie using him in a non-save situation -- would set the stage for Crede in the bottom of the ninth.

The Sox had the bases loaded with one out after two walks and a single, but the situation was reminiscent of one earlier in the game.  With one out, the sacks packed and Crede at the plate, he hit a flyball pretty well to right field.  Delmon Young caught it, threw a strike home to Dioner Navarro, who blocked the plate and stopped Jim Thome short.  Navarro should've been knocked on his back, but with the Sox needing Thome in as many games as possible, they had the wrong guy running home.

Fortunately in the ninth, Tadahito Iguchi stood on third, and Crede hit his flyball to left and deeper.  The ballgame was ovah.

This game had a few other strange developments:
  • Luis Terrero hit the longest homer of the season, a three-run bomb that nearly reached the concourse straightaway left.  Even more peculiar: Juan Uribe preceded it with a 10-pitch walk that started out with Uribe down 0-2.
  • The Sox turned a 1-6-2-5 double play when Buehrle snagged a comebacker, looked Crawford back to third and fired to second.  Crawford forgot that Uribe has an arm, and tried to score after Buehrle's throw.  Uribe fired home, Crawford tried backtracking, but was eventually tagged out by Crede.  This event was preceded by a nice lunging play by Darin Erstad that Paul Konerko wouldn't have made.  He didn't record an out, but it saved a run.
  • Rob Mackowiak made a great running catch in left on the second play of the game. 
Record: 24-20 | Box score | Play-by-play

Comments

# re: May 25: White Sox 5, Devil Rays 4

Saturday, May 26, 2007 2:25 PM by Dad
The Sox were lucky to win this game. I don't know if Ozzie ordered it, or Buerle thought it up himself, but drilling Harris was pretty stupid. Harris played dodgeball with the first two pitches and then got nailed with a fast ball body shot, which looked very intentional to me. When Dukes followed that stunt up with a game tieing home run, it almost turned out to be a very generous game give-away by the Sox. It should be noted that Terraro's "plunking" resulted from him not moving on a pitch off the inside edge of the plate that nicked his body armor (and Hawk & DJ described it as such).
On a positive note, seeing Terraro play in a couple of recent games has raised my interest in his potential. He seems to have good outfielding skills, impressive speed and so far is a good contact hitter with surprising power.