The Sox offense nearly won it for them, but the defense ended up losing this one.
The Royals scored all their runs by the fourth inning thanks to three errors and some poor pitches by Jose Contreras, then hung on as the Sox mounted a rally that managed to be furious and sluggish simultaneously. It came up short, however, and in the end, the Sox were lucky the Twins lost to the Yankees.
The fourth-inning rally by Kansas City started as many do, with a leadoff walk to Emil Brown. Contreras then dropped down about four times in a row to Ryan Shealy, who finally found a pitch left up in the zone and singled to center. Rob Mackowiak earned the first error in the inning when his throw to third skipped away from Joe Crede, and Shealy rolled into second.
Alex Cintron then failed to get down on Paul Bako's nubber, and the Royals took a 2-0 lead. Crede then compounded mistakes when his barehanded field-and-throw of Andres Blanco's sacrifice bunt sailed over Tadahito Iguchi's head. Two more runs and a 4-0 lead. The rest of the inning was on Conteras, with David DeJesus hitting a solid double to left center and Mark Teahen hitting a two-run homer that just about sealed the deal.
Meanwhile, Runelvys Hernandez kept the Sox down in his second straight start, with Crede putting up the only run via a shot that hit water in left center.
Only until Buddy Bell went to his bullpen did the Sox start to mount rallies, and they arguably had the worst batting-round inning ever. They sent 10 guys to the plate and only scored three runs in the eighth. The Sox loaded the bases on a Scott Podsednik single, an Iguchi walk and a Jermaine Dye single, and the Sox kept the sacks packed after that.
But station-to-station baseball kept the damage minimal. Jim Thome looked bad striking out against Jimmy Gobble. Paul Konerko was hit by a pitch to drive in one. A.J. Pierzynski drove in another with a nice single on the 12th pitch of his at-bat -- but only one run scored. Crede hit a medium-range fly ball to left, but Dye couldn't score on it. Ross Gload followed with a single, but only one run scored because Konerko can't score from second. Alex Cintron then ended the inning with a pop foul to left.
It was the same deal in the ninth, with Iguchi walked, Dye doubling and Thome walking to load the bases with one out. Paul Konerko flew out to left, Pierzynski walked, and then Crede left them loaded with a flyout to left to end the game. Either of those innings could've completely blown up, but the Sox couldn't find the gap to do it.
On the other hand, the
September call-ups kept the team in the game. Boone Logan, pitching for the Sox for the first time since the
debacle on May 16, pitched a scoreless inning with one strikeout, and Charlie Haeger added two perfect innings of his own. Haeger looked worlds more relaxed in his second big-league outing. During
his start against Anaheim, his knuckleball was hitting 77 or 78 m.p.h. and often sailed high. This time, he was sitting at 70-72 and most of them dropped into (or around) Pierzynski's mitt knee-high.
The other September call-up, Ryan Sweeney, saw his first big-league action when he entered as a defensive replacement in center in the eighth inning. He finished the game standing in the on-deck circle after Crede flew out to end the game.
Record: 78-56 |
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