2007 State of the Sox

July 16: White Sox 11, Indians 10

For one glorious inning, the White Sox were actually enjoyable to watch.

Then they spent the next four innings undoing everything they'd achieved.

The Sox sent 13 batters to the plate in the sixth inning, and one of the outs was a Josh Fields sacrifice bunt.  They actually took advantage of a bad decision by Ryan Garko, missing an out at home instead of taking the out at first.  They also used a horrendous Eric Wedge miscoach to their advantage, when he opted to intentionally walk Juan Uribe to load the bases.  Jerry Owens increased his season RBI total by 200 percent, A.J. Pierzynski had two hits (including a double to the center-field track), and every player except Tadahito Iguchi reached base.  And even Iguchi made a contribution with a sacrifice fly.

Basically, everything that could've gone right for the Sox in that inning did go right.  In fact, they scored as many runs in the sixth inning as they did in the last three games of the Baltimore series.  Woo.

But White Sox pitching wouldn't allow an easy victory.  First, John Danks, who had been hit hard in the fourth but rebounded in the fifth inning, must've gotten cold in the sixth.  He departed after allowing a three-run homer to Franklin Gutierrez.

Nick Masset and Matt Thornton actually worked a scoreless eighth, but Thornton gave up a single to lead off the eighth and the meltdown began. 

Ryan Bukvich retired one out of three batters.  Boone Logan walked Grady Sizemore, and then when he finally got a fielded ground ball, Uribe booted it.  After a sacrifice fly, Boone Logan first issued a wild pitch to advance those runners on first and second one base -- then they both scored on Travis Hafner's single to make it a one run game.

Dewon Day finally ended the insanity when he induced a first-pitch groundout to preserve the lead.  Bobby Jenks recorded the save, but only with the help of a diving stab by Paul Konerko to prevent the leadoff runner from reaching.  Hafner singled with two outs, and his pinch-runner, Ben Francisco, stole second.  However, Jhonny Peralta popped out to A.J. Pierzynski to end the game.

Record: 41-50 | Box score | Play-by-play