Another Santana, another loss. The White Sox suffered their most thorough beating of the year at the hands of the Minnesota Twins. The only good thing you can say about it is that since Minnesota started Johan Santana, it’s not like the Sox missed an opportunity.
Santana was the Santana we’ve all come to respect, striking out 10 batters through seven. Only a Paul Konerko homer – a long one inside the left field foul pole – kept the Sox from suffering their first shutout of the season.
Pablo Ozuna led off with a double, but was thrown out trying to stretch it into a triple, and that just about set the tone, as the Sox never really threatened when Johan was in the game. Joe Crede had two hits and made a couple nice plays in the field, but everybody else struggled. But it’s really not worth going into the offensive struggles of the Sox because Santana does this against us every single time. The Sox struck out 13 times against one walk (Brian Anderson off Santana, of all people).
The pitching was a bigger concern. We knew runs would be tough to come by offensively, but Garland should’ve kept it closer. It wasn’t so much the second-inning homer that barely fell over the center field wall – Anderson had a shot at it – it was the rest of the game that was discouraging. The Twins were up there hacking and Garland obliged with plenty of first-pitch strikes that did not throw them for a loop.
He gave up a lot of hits – 11 in less than six full innings – and perhaps the most disappointing was the solo shot by Tony Batista in the sixth. Garland had him down 0-2, and usually that means Batista will be out within three pitches. Yet Jon couldn’t get him out – Batista worked the count full, then blasted a line-drive homer into the left field seats. Garland’s night would be over soon after.
Agustin Montero got his first shot in the big leagues, and promptly surrendered a two-run homer to Joe Mauer. He did settle down thereafter, but his debut did not excite to say the least. Boone Logan was Boone Logan, giving up two earned runs in his only inning of work. He’s not long for this league, but his still-somewhat-low ERA (3.38) will probably help him stay up for at least a couple more weeks.
Record: 23-11 |
Box score |
Play-by-play