July 26: White Sox 6, Mariners 1
Facing Felix Hernandez for the second time in a week, the Sox looked far more comfortable against Seattle’s ace. It helped that Hernandez wasn’t at his best.
John Danks was, though, and he cruised to an easy victory, killing a two-game losing streak and preserving the division lead in the process.
It looked like a pitching duel early on; one that Danks might’ve been on the losing end of when he fell behind 1-0 on a bloop double and a clean single in the third. But Danks recovered, while Hernandez started getting distracted.
He wasn’t enamored with Hunter Wendelstedt’s strike zone, and he had a hard time holding runners, too. Both played a part in his undoing in the third.
Alexei Ramirez reached on an infield single off Jose Lopez’s glove, and then stole second when the ball got past Rob Johnson. He scored on Juan Pierre’s single, and Pierre, who reached second on the throw, would score on Omar Vizquel’s hard line-drive single for a 2-1 lead.
The Sox never trailed afterward, although they needed three innings to pad their lead. Paul Konerko led off with a homer just inside the left-field foul pole in the sixth, and after a Carlos Quentin walk, Mark Kotsay almost left the yard, too. Ichiro robbed him with a leaping catch at the wall, and actually doubled off Quentin at first. The umpire erroneously called him safe, but Quentin made up for it by getting caught stealing on a busted hit and run.
A.J. Pierzynski made up for it. He hit a shot down the right field line that a security guard interfered with, giving him an automatic double when Ichiro would’ve likely held him to a single. That turned out to be big, because Alexei Ramirez launched a double over Franklin Gutierrez’s head to make it a 4-1 game.
Danks faced one more challenge the eighth, when he faced runners on first and second with one out after two infield singles. He ended the threat by getting Chone Figgins to ground into a 5-4-3 double play, and it ended his night with just one run allowed on six hits and a walk. He threw just 95 pitches.
Vizquel, who started the DP, teamed up with Pierre to have a big day at the top of the order. They reached base six times between them, driving in three runs. Ramirez had three hits as well.
Record: 54-44 | Box score | Play-by-play
