May 19: Angels 3, White Sox 2
John Danks still doesn’t know how to win, and it’s getting increasingly painful.
Danks pitched his tail off, only to be abandoned by his teammates, first offensively, and then defensively. He allowed only one hit over the first seven innings, and pitched around a key eighth-inning jam as well.
There were only two problems.
No. 1: The first hit that he gave up was a two-run homer, as Torii Hunter ripped a high 2-0 fastball over the left-field wall.
No. 2: Jayson Nix committed a double-error on what should have been an inning ending grounder.
Oh, that second one was a fan-murderer. Danks had given up back-to-back one-out singles, but crossing the 100-pitch threshold, he made a beautiful 3-2 changeup to strike Brandon Wood to put him back in the driver’s seat.
The next batter, Erick Aybar, hit a firm grounder to first. The hop ate up Nix, and trickled behind him. Nix then lost sense of the play, rushing to fire to second — late — and throwing it into right field, allowing a run to score.
That one hurt, because Paul Konerko’s solo shot off Brian Fuentes leading off the ninth didn’t end up mattering. A.J. Pierzynski showed some fight with a one-out single, and pinch-runner Omar Vizquel would advance to second on a wild pitch, but Alexei Ramirez couldn’t get the job done. He fouled off a hanging curve, and then struck out on a fastball down the pipe to end the game.
Ramirez’s whiff was a fitting way to close this one out. The Sox grabbed a 1-0 lead with solid sequence in the second inning — a Konerko single, a Pierzynski double and a Carlos Quentin sac fly — but were largely ineffective against Joe Saunders the rest of the night. And they blew their only other chance royally.
It looked similar to their second-inning rally at the start. Gordon Beckham walked, and Pierre slapped a bunt single past the charging Brandon Wood. Nix then held up his end of the bargain by bunting them both over. But Andruw Jones went hacking at the first pitch — a fastball inside — and he harmlessly popped out to second. After pitching around Paul Konerko, Saunders got Rios to flare out to left to end the inning.
Pierre had a great game in defeat. Along with the single, he tried to start something with a one-out double. His teammates couldn’t drive him home. But at least he saved a run in the fifth, when he timed a leap at the wall and appeared to take back a Juan Rivera homer. It certainly made up for an Alex Rios earlier in the game, although Pierzynski (who had a fine game himself) picked up Rios by throwing out Hunter at third on a steal attempt.
Record: 16-23 | Box score | Play-by-play
