Zach Duke is more committed to the tank than I am to waking up every morning. Brought in with two outs in the bottom of the 10th, just so he could go lefty-lefty against No. 9 hitter Anthony Gose, Duke promptly walked Gose, and then started 3-0 on Rajai Davis before handing him a walk-off double into the right-field corner to lose the game 2-1 in extras.
Read MoreMy heart is not too cold and frozen over to not enjoy the delicious irony of Jeff Samardzija capping his ultimate opus in fan torture last week, only to turn around and twirl a one-hit shutout in his very next start, during a 12:08pm CT Monday afternoon start that no one got to watch. That's poetry. That's the dramatic sweep worthy of the great cinema epics of 70's auteurs. That's fine villainry, and I am satisfied that I have spent my summer being tormented by a master.
Read MoreThe White Sox played a sleepy bad series in Cleveland against sleepy bad AL Wild Card contender, keeping the Indians on the periphery of a sleepy bad AL Wild Card race, whose sole source of drama is the Astros falling into the void. They capped things off Sunday with a 6-3 loss featuring a fairly rough John Danks start, a characteristically high-strikeout outing against soft-tosser Josh Tomlin
Read MoreLife can't stay a ridiculous terror show forever, so the A's held serve and delivered a horrifically garbage performance in response to the White Sox effort Tuesday night. I don't pretend to be deeply invested in A's roster affairs, and can't even guess what brought them to the point of giving recently acquired rookie reliever Cody Martin his second career MLB start.
Read MoreIt just wouldn't be a White Sox season without the eventual slide toward full-blown humiliation. It just wouldn't have their natural full dramatic sweep from beginning with moderate goals of slipping into the playoffs via some lowered bar for performance, quickly dousing that already jaded optimism with a disappointing start, before capping their demise with some season-ending demolition to confirm that the Sox haven't merely underperformed, but are simply in another class from any team any non-diehard would waste a casual glimpse at.
Read MoreI'm wondering how much time I should give to this 14-inning marathon when interest seems like it's...waning.
Read MoreShouts to Jeff Samardzija for lowering the expectations such that giving up two dingers and four runs to half of a real Cleveland Indians lineup over 6.2 innings doesn't even trigger a twinge of disappointment. Even this snapshot of recent performance--I'm assuming meant to be shocking to the less grizzled and beaten-down of us--just serves to remind: Oh yeah, Jeff Samardzija did win his last start, didn't he?!
Read MoreReunited with his Spring Training battery-mate, Carlos Rodon threw his sixth-straight outing of six innings or more with two or less runs allowed in Tuesday night's 7-4 victory. His seven-inning, one-run gem--spoiled only by whatever spirit has inhabited Michael Martinez's body--gives him a line over that stretch of 41 IP, 27 H, 8 ER, 4 HR, 15 BB, 41 K, 1.76 ERA. He's throwing real good, guys.
Read MoreFreaking out about the success of Ryan Raburn against the White Sox is the type of small-sample, meaningless matchup data drivel that I have always loathed. But uh, the numbers are starting to add up just a bit.
Read MoreA good litmus test of whether a runaway division leader has gone into cruise mode is if they just casually allow themselves to be firebombed for 25 runs over a three-game sweep by a woebegone fourth-place team that averages under four runs per game. Having their ace (Johnny Cueto) shelled and getting beat by a busted prospect restoration project (Erik Johnson) 7-5 was the liveliest and closest effort the Royals managed the entire weekend.
Read MoreThe White Sox finally got the thrill and satisfaction of plugging a mediocre pitching staff, launching a comeback to rescue the oh so sympathetic Jeff Samardijza from his personal six-game losing streak, and capped a week of destroying Casey Fien's ERA.
Read MoreCarlos Rodon was pretty solid again Wednesday night. That's probably the most important thing to focus on. In his fifth-straight smooth and efficient start under Tyler Flowers, he floated through six innings with the only mark against him being Miguel Sano obliterating a get-ahead fastball, which for the most part have served him well since he dedicate himself to throwing them
Read MoreTuesday night, the White Sox sure played a baseball game. Most baseball games are boring. Some, aggressively so. But with a coordinated series of disasters in every unit of the game, you can really go on quite the emotional rollercoaster in one night, even in September of an awful year with no hope
Read MoreIn the soon-to-be seven year drought between White Sox playoff berths, and in the nine years out of the last 10 where they have missed the playoffs, the Sox have finished within five games of first place in their division just once. That year, 2012, is probably more remembered as a gut-wrenching collapse than a spirited playoff bid that finished just short. Their next-most impressive season, 2010, saw 88 victories, but was dead on its feet after Jim Thome walked-off the Sox with a 450-foot blast of irony out of Target Field in mid-August. In gunning for the playoffs with annual thirst, the Sox have not only failed to deliver anything to hang a banner about, but they failed to deliver us from the doldrums of expanded roster September goof-off sessions.
Read MoreThose 1976 uniforms sure were fun to look at. Coupled with CSN's compilation of file video from the late-70's Sox and full commitment with disco segue music and cheesy graphics, the Sox mixed a fun callback to rather ridiculous uniforms with a genuine examination of their own history. Let's do something like this every year
Read MoreNate Jones is mortal. I don't particularly agree with the way he announced it--allowing an eighth-inning two-run bomb to Boston first baseman Travis Shaw by placing a fastball in the lefty down-and-in dinger Bermuda Triangle--but sometimes you really have to grab people's attention for them to really take in your message.
Read MoreWe rag on the heavy handed emphasis on the importance of the bullpen that Hawk Harrelson trots out, especially in the light of the Royals 2014 success model, but it's hard to think of a game more clearly poisoned against the Red Sox by their own previous failures than Tuesday night's 5-4 come-from-behind Chicago victory.
Read MoreI do not covet watching this man pitch anymore. The rippling thrills of watching Jeff Samardzija vaporize the first two hitters of an inning with electric stuff in the mid-90s that wiggles in every direction, and follow it up by drilling some dude in the ribs, then backing up a couple sliders and giving up three runs in a matter of minutes, well, it has dissipated over the last few months, I must say. All it takes is a few pitches to see the enormous potential sitting on Samardzija's broad shoulders. But it's the end of August, the team is bad, and he's 30. Who cares what he can do? How many more of these almost-good starts do I have to watch?
Read MoreThis weekend offered some comforting return to White Sox normalcy--no, not just the part about playing pointless late-August baseball and lacking any real hopes of the playoffs--but the part where they get a series win against the Mariners, where Seattle routinely looks incompetent and the Sox just kinda stand there. In particular, they stood there while the Seattle bullpen walked 10 batters in 9.2 innings and nearly lost two games singlehandedly, rather than just one.
Read MoreAfter a rough weekend against the Cubs and four runs in three games to start this awful West Coast swing, the Sox had their periodic and overdue "the offense is breaking out!" game to avoid a sweep in Anaheim with an 8-2 victory Thursday night. Given an opportunity against rookie spot starter Nick Tropeano (pitching because the Sox off capped Matt Shoemaker's downward spiral last week) and bullpen filler Cam Bedrosian, the Sox teed off, finally hitting their 100th home run of the season at a fairly embarrassingly late date in the year and smacking four doubles.
Read MoreThe Catbird Seat is a White Sox blog by White Sox fans that focuses on intelligent and humorous baseball commentary. Brought to you by ESPN's SweetSpot Network.
An ESPN SweetSpot blog | Design by ofvoid
