Back to .500

And just like that, the White Sox are back to .500, actually above .500 for the time being! They currently stand at 35-34 a .507 percentile and 4.5 games behind the Twins in the AL Central. They’ve spent the past two weeks feasting on the underbelly of the Major Leagues, the NL. The White Sox have always played well in Inter-league play, but they’ve dominated it this year going 11-2 with 5 Inter-league games left on the schedule, all of which will be wrapped up this coming weekend in part two of the Crosstown Classic on the Southside. They even beat up on an excellent pitcher Tommy Hanson on an excellent, best record in the NL team in the Atlanta Braves. The Braves will be a better test for the White Sox as they have 3 good oitching matchups and both teams have been hot as Atlanta won five straight before taking the loss to the Sox last night. They’re certainly a better test than the hot-grabage the Bucs and Nats put out between the foul lines. General Manager Kenny Williams is never a true “seller” but he was definitely on that end of the spectrum a couple of weeks ago, and now he’ll be looking to make an addition to the team to make a better run at the AL Central. They’re looking for left-handed pop in the batter’s box and possibly a left-handed reliever. Adam Dunn and Lance Berkman have been rumored to be on the White Sox radar. Berkman has been struggling at the plate and with injuries, especially to his knee which kept him on the DL for the beginning of the season. He does pick up the ball pretty well and could spell Konerko at first base. Dunn has been mashing with 17 homers, 8 of which came at home in a spacious National’s Ballpark. Imagine that man hitting within the smaller dimensions of Comiskey! I’m sure a few fly balls in that park turns into homers in this one. The bad news is, the Twins have been rumored to be the front-runners to acquire former Cy Young Award winner Cliff Lee from the soon-to-be-selling Mariners. The AL Central will be all but won if they make that acquisition.

As always tune in to Cover 3 on sportstownchicago.com every Monday evening from 7 to 9.

PREACH

Assessing the White Sox

We’re 60 games into the season, well more like 65….or so, but by now General Managers have assessed their teams. It’s time to determine whether to buy or sell. The baseball teams on both sides of town are in a seemingly perturbing predicament. The White Sox, thus far, have stood pat. A.J. Pierzynski’s 10 and 5 vesting rights have been implemented as of this past Sunday. One could think that should he have been moved this season, it would have been before the rights kicked in, but the truth is it really doesn’t matter all that much. Rumor had it that the Rangers had and may still have interest in A.J. as they’ve tried out a trio of catchers this season, none of which produced what management expected for a team in the race for the AL West. Jarrod Saltalamacchia can’t hit big league pitching and he turned into Rube Baker of the motion picture Major League II with his troubles of getting the ball back to the pitcher, not even dirty magazines could help this kid out. I’m sure White Sox GM Kenny Williams performed his due diligence and listened to and is listening to offers for A.J., but for one, he hasn’t been hitting well especially compared to last year, and two, he’s got that sort of negative reputation and the ol’ “punch me” face. Yet, the vesting rights still don’t hold much water as Pierzynski has all ready said that he’d be willing to waive his no-trade clause should the White Sox fall further out of contention and be given the opportunity to be moved to a contender. Mark Buehrle’s 10 and 5 rights kick in in July, so there should be a circus following him in the coming weeks. Buehrle, if not all ready, is rapidly turning into a NL pitcher. He has a limited no-trade clause that will soon turn into the full no-trade, but I have to believe that at this point in his career that he’d only accept a trade to an NL contender by the name of St. Louis. They have a good shot at winning the NL Central, they’re looking for starting pitching, and it’s Mark’s hometown.
The starting pitching got off to a slow, nay, a bad start. The staff is starting to come around as they’ve thrown nine quality starts in a roll and they have won 8 of their last 10. The problems are that the Twins win when the Sox win and they lose when the Sox lose. (Although, the Sox did gain a game last night to bring them to 6.5 games back). Also, Jake Peavy is now experiencing dead-arm. His next start is being pushed back to Saturday and possibly further. I know, first thing’s first and the Sox have to get back to .500 and the they’re still 3 wins away from reaching that goal, but it would be nice to steal more games away from Minnesota along the way. The Sox were once 9 games below .500 so there’s been a little progress. Some fans, including this one, may have taken the staff for granted and just expected them to produce quality start after quality start right from the beginning and continue to do so the entire season. Hopefully they’re back on the right track though. Rios and Quentin were the next big questions and Rios has been stellar and Quentin is seemingly a fallen star thus far. Rios is on pace to be the first 30-30 White Sox while having the best average on the team by far at .313. Konerko is second at .294. Quentin has struggled mightily with a .213 average. The silver lining for Quentin has been his average with runners in scoring position hitting at a .314 clip. That has helped him to pot a respectable 36 RBI as he seems to come thru when the Sox really need him.
All the talk of this “Ozzie ball” ((which isn’t even real, and I’d like to know who coined that term so I can hate them directly) it’s just known as small ball and it’s the way baseball has been played for over a hundred years, a style that is still alive and well and living in the National League), hasn’t panned out as expected. Sure they have a lot more stolen bases this year and that has helped to move guys into scoring position, but most guys still can’t lay down a bunt and are just plain bad at situational hitting. White Sox have missed out on plenty of opportunities when all they needed was a sacrifice bunt or fly or a grounder to the right side. And as I’ve pointed out before, the Sox are still reliant on the long ball! They’re just doing it throughout the entire lineup as opposed to a few base-clogging power hitters. This brings me to the latest and greatest White Sox news…the call-up of Dayan Viciedo. Mark Teahen went on the DL with a broken middle finger, Jason Nix wasn’t getting it done in the field or with the bat so he was designated for assignment, and they can’t ask Omar Visquel to play every day at 43 years old. So, Vicideo is back at The Show. He brings a power bat to the lineup, which I like because though the thought of playing small ball to win the Central is a nice idea to entertain, it has failed and the Sox have to play to the small dimensions of their ballpark to win more games. Viciedo’s stat line for this year in triple A has been pretty good. He’s your typical free-swinging Cuban prospect with extra pop. He batted .290 with 14 dingers and 14 RBI. He posted a poor OBP drawing just 8 walks with 52 strikeouts in 255 plate appearances (courtesy of baseball-reference.com). But, like I said, the Sox aren’t doing much as far as situational hitting goes anyway, so they may as well have another masher on the lineup card. This is besides the fact that they’re hoping he’ll be the shining star they’ve paid him to be in the coming years and it’ll be good to get him some quality major league at-bats.
Tonight the White Sox will face rookie Phenom Stephen Strasburg. It should be a good game as Gavin Floyd takes the bump coming off a strong performance in which he took a no-hitter into the 7th and was the tough-luck loser. Strasburg has command of 4 major league pitches. Considering the fact that he’ll be pitching at home and facing AL pitchers in the batter’s box, his strikeouts should easily reach double digits. The White Sox handed a much less dominant 8-0 Carlos Silva his first loss of the season, hopefully they can keep that trend going and give Strasburg his first loss of his Major League career.

As always, tune in to Cover 3 every Monday evening from 7 to 9 on sportstownchicago.com. A huge thanks to Matt Spiegel of WSCR 670 The Score for joining the show last week.

Also, a shout out to Jay BLAAck and Joe Quelleville! Thanks Mayor Richie!

PREACH

Stanley Cup Finals Game 5 Breakdown

Coach Q decided that he needed to make some line shake-ups and he did that by breaking up the 1st line. It was Hossa and Kopecky with Toews this game. This gave a good balance to each line as it spread out the speed of the team. The Hawks’ power play was much better in Game 5 as the went 2 for 4. They missed out on their first opportunity when Krajicek was called for cross-checking 2:50 into the game. Dave Bolland gave the Flyers a chance of their own when he was called for cross-checking himself with 10:45 left in the 1st. With 8:44 left Hartnell was guilty of a high stick. During the power play Byfuglien absolutely trucked Powe for his 30th hit of the series. Big Buff had eight total hits in the game and leads the series in hits by far. Seabrook was credited with the first goal of the game. It was a power play goal that bounced off of every body’s favorite defensemen Chris Pronger, which made that particular goal a little bit sweeter. Steeger got the primary assist as Brower got the secondary. The Hawks continued to apply the pressure and scored a second goal with 4:34 left in the 1st. Bolland (Sopel, Byfuglien) was standing at the side of the net when he threw the puck off of Leighton’s skate and bounced into the net. The boys in the Indian-head sweaters didn’t stop there in the 1st either. With 1:45 Versteeg (Seabrook, Byfuglien) fired a snapper just over the right shoulder of Leighton, who may have been screened for a split second that was just long enough for the the puck to sneak past him. The Hawks had 13 shots on goal in the first, but the 2nd period didn’t start out so well. Philly decided to go back to Boucher for the second time this series, but :32 into the period Hartnell (Leino, Briere) potted a lay-up goal. Kopecky lost the puck along the boards and Leino fired a drive at Niemi, one which he thought he had covered up, but it squirted out for Hartnell to tap in and the Flyers were on the board. The Hawks answered quickly less than three minutes later when Kane (Ladd,Sharp) put the biscuit in the basket. Ladd fired a shot that was blocked by Pronger, but bounced right back to Ladd who found the trailing Kaner with a pass at the left side of the net. The Flyers responded even quicker cutting the lead in half when Timonen (Briere, Leino) scored the Flyers’s 2nd goal of the game. Byfuglien has his own way of responding when he downright WRECKED Pronger in the corner. It was a hit similar to the crumbling of the Walls of Jericho. It was very satisfying to say the least. Both teams traded penalty kills at mid-period. Soon after, Niemi made yet another disgustingly awesome sliding pad save. With 4:22 left in the 2nd, Pronger went to the penalty box for hooking Kaner. Pronger got his butt handed to him all night, whether it was by Big Buff putting Pronger shaped holes in the boards or Kaner skating circles around the old man. Seven seconds later, you guessed it, Byfuglien (Toews, Keith) potted a power play goal from just in front of the net thru the 5-hole of Boucher. Pronger wasn’t on the ice to cross check Byfuglien from behind in front of the net, what a shame. The Hawks should have had another power play, but there was no call when Campbell caught a stick to his face and two, count them, two refs missed it. After two periods, Big Buff had a goal and two assists. The Blackhawks continued to have good play through the neutral zone and had even better fore-checking, especially by Captain “Serious” Toews. However, the Flyers were still able to scratch out a goal with 13:24 left in the game when van Riemsdyk pocketed a big rebound from Krajicek. Van Riemsdyk must have grown some goal-muscles because he decided to cross-check Hossa in the back, which of course wasn’t seen by any of the refs, and sent Marion to the locker room for a few moments to regroup. Hossa did come back though and played with even more inspiration as if he needed any more. Byfuglien blew up Timonen and a ref on the same hit. The guy was all over the ice and later he gave Leino and then Pronger consecutive bell-ringing hits. With 9:22 Steeger went to the box for high sticking Pronger, but it was an excellent penalty kill as the Flyers were only able to get one shot on goal. The Hawks even almost scored a shorty by Toews as he collected a sweet drop-pass from Bolland, but to no avail….this time. Sharpie potted one from Kane with 3:52 left in the game and that was pretty much the dagger to the heart, although Gagne did cut the lead to two as he was able to score when Keith broke his still on a slapper and had to defend the zone stick-less. Eddie Olczyk pointed out that late in games defensemen with the lead should revert back to the harder wooden sticks, as opposed to the fiber, composite, whatever you want to call it stick so things like that don’t happen. The Hawks were playing well enough to get away with it this time though. The Flyers pulled Boucher and with 2:05 left in the game Byfuglien did a good job to settle the puck down and center it and scored an empty-netter to put Game 5 to rest and give the Hawks the 3-2 series advantage headed back to Philly. Buff, Bolland, and Steeger all were +3 for the game. Niemi had 23 saves and the Hawks had a faceoff advantage of 38-31. The Blackhawks came out with a good pace, attacked the net and kept up that pace throughout the game for the most part. It was the best response that they could have executed coming back from Philly and if they play their game again, this series will be over on Wednesday. If not, we’ll see the boys for the last game at the UC this season on Friday and hope the bounces go their way.

As always tune in to Cover 3 every Monday evening from 7 to 9 on sportstownchicago.com

PREACH

Western Conference Final Game 4 Breakdown

Everybody knew San Jose would be in desperation mode in a must-win elimination game. The Blackhawks did a good job of keeping things under control to start the game, even with Hendry’s holding penalty at 5:02 into the game. The great penalty kill line had a nice shift with contributions from Hossa and Toews, a big save by Niemi, and blocks from Seabrook and Hossa. With 8:50 left in the first the Sharks scored the first goal of the game off the stick of Couture. Setoguchi threw the puck to the net and Couture potted the rebound over the glove of Niemi. The Hawks didn’t get a power play until the middle of the second period, but to no avail. It was the Sharks who would score the short-handed goal. Marleau blasted a one-timer from Vlasic past Niemi. This deflated the UC for some time and it was Ben Eager who smashed Heatley for his second big hit of the game in an attempt to get the crowd back into the game. The Hawks missed another power play opportunity after Heatley was sent to the penalty box for hooking. Toews was sent to his respective box shortly after for a cross-check that took place right in front of the net. The Hawks netted their first goal with 6:42 left in the second. Seakbrook scored with a little help from Hjalmarsson and Versteeg. Dave Bolland tied it up at 2 with 1:22 left in the second. He made a great fundamentally-pack play starting from behind the net. He raced to the puck and lifted Couture’s stick off of the puck. He then got good body position to box Couture out and was able to bring to puck to the front of the net on the other side. He elevated the puck, which was redirected by a Shark and got past the glove-side shoulder of Nabokov. In the third, The Hawks were given three straight power plays. Boyle was called for delay of game, Clowe was guilty of holding, both of which were penalty kills, and Heatley went to the box for slashing. It was on the third and final power play that Byfuglien potted his third game-winning goal in four games. Kane got the primary assist as Toews received the secondary and extended his franchise record for consecutive postseason games with a point to 13. Steeger put the cherry on top with an unassisted empty-netter with :42 left in the game. The boys in the Indian-head sweaters are headed back to the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time since 1992 in the hopes to break the 39 year drought!

Be sure to tune in to Cover 3 every Monday evening, except Memorial Day, from 7 to 9 on sportstownchicago.com

PREACH

Western Conference Game 3 Breakdown

The Blackhawks are headed to the Stanley Cup Finals, and it only cost them seven shattered teeth of Duncan Keith! The Hawks swept the Sharks in four straight games, but it truly was closer than what outcome may insinuate. For instance, Friday’s game three was decided in overtime. It was an interesting game from the beginning. Not even a minute and an half into the game Dave Bolland was called for goalie interference on a B.S. call that came after a great save by Nabokov. Less than a minute later Joe Pavelski scored on the power play. O, but wait, after the replay the goal was taken off the board as it showed that the puck was kicked in and Pavelski never got his stock on the puck before it passed the goal line. It turned into a penalty kill and somewhat deflated the Sharks for the rest of the period. Excellent back checking by the Hawks helped them nearly score on a turnover. They played well through the neutral zone as well as the Sharks could only set up the cycle with a chip and chase. Early in the second Andrew Ladd absolutely lifted Big Joe Thornton off the ice with a sweet hip-check as they raced to the corner. Though, Thornton would get Ladd back late in the third with a nice hit, but not as good since Ladd really didn’t see it coming like Thornton did. With two minutes into the second period Bolland got called for his second penalty of the day for holding. 37 seconds later Hossa was called for hooking and after missing some pretty easy shots, Marleau finally potted one on the 5 on 3 advantage. Niemi was pinned between the pipes and the puck just went off the web of his glove and into the net. The Hawks finally caught a break when Couture went to the box for slashing and Sharpie put the biscuit in the basket after a needle-threading pass from Toews as he centered the puck from the right corner. Toews broke the Blackhawks’ franchise record with his 12th consecutive postseason game with a point. After two periods it was a slight 23-21 SOG advantage for the Sharks, but a commanding 26-11 faceoff advantage for the Hawks. I thought it was interesting that the announcer for NBC said that San Jose was “Hanging in there” with the Hawks. What? I know that the Hawks had the two game series lead over the Sharks, but the game was tied at the time and they were the number one seed of the Western Conference. They shouldn’t be the ones “Hanging in there” with anybody they should be playing the game. The first two-thirds of the third period were ugly. Duncan Keith was sent to the box not even a minute in for hooking after an awful turnover. About five minutes later Big Buff was called for tripping and later Bolland was called for tripping to make it his third penalty of the game. The puck was in San Jose’s zone for way too long and the only bright spots was Ben Eager’s blast that went off the post and the fact that the Hawks penalty kill special team had comes through not once, not twice, but thrice in the third period alone. Bolland’s game was a little sloppy as indicated by his three infractions; however, he did score with 3:55 left to give Chicago a 2-1 lead. Unfortunately, Marleau scored his second game with 4:23 left in the game, which eventually went to sudden death. It was an exciting extension to the game as Niemi made three great saves in a roll around 10:30 into overtime. This created the chance for Bolland to get another point as he got the assist for Big Buff’s game winner from between the circles as he went top cheese over Nabby’s shoulder sending the Gatorade bottle flying in there air! Niemi had 44 saves. 44! Out of 46, almost a 96 in save percentage! Nabby had himself a game as well saving 35 of 38 SOG. The Hawks took game three and were 11-0 all time in series’ leading 3-0. Stay tuned for breakdown of Game 4 from the UC. Game 4 breakdown coming soon...

PREACH

Stolen: Home-Ice Advantage

The home ice advantage for the Sharks has evaporated…for now. We witnessed, very arguably, the best game Annti Niemi has played in an Indian-head sweater. He stopped 44 shots on goal out of 45 all while standing on his head! (As the saying goes, if you will, if I may). The one that got past Neimi was by no means a softy. It came during the second Power Play out of three during the first period alone off the stick of Jason Demers at 11:19 minutes in. Demer’s shot was deflected off of a defending Duncan Keith that was redirected just over the right should of Niemi. From there on out, the “Finnish Fortress” made several exceptional saves including a few with the glove. San Jose played with seven defensemen and the Hawks saw a steady diet of Heatley, Thornton, and Marleau. The Sharks easily controlled the entire first period with three Power Plays, but were only able to capitalize on one. A possible turning point in my mind was a three on two Sharks advantage that came before there was even a goal on the scoreboard. It essentially was a three on one, but Keith skated straight back and used an active stick to break up a play that could have resulted in an open net goal and changed the complexion of the game. Both teams squandered some good opportunities. Toews and Thornton both miss out on good scoring chances simply by not squaring up the puck on the stick on spoiled one-timers that produced weak shots off the heel of their respective sticks. The Blackhawks were able to tame the Sharks from about five minutes into the second period throughout the rest of the game. They were able to out hustle San Jose and recover more loose pucks. Sharpie scored the tying goal with 12:13 left in the second period with assists from Keith and Brouwer. Keith was again a key player here as he recognized the opportunity for a four on three and sped down the ice to create the play and got a point on the assist. The Hawks ran into some trouble after a holding penalty on Seabrook at 14:01 in the second. This is when Niemi made a sick glove-save sliding from post to post in desperation mode. It was a thing of beauty especially from the goal-cam. The Sharks did however have a 31-22 shot-on-goal advantage after the second period. The third period was all Hawks though as the game was being played completely to their tempo and playing a lot of fast-paced cycle-play. Coach Q made an exquisite line change, which resulted in some Shark confusion leaving Big Buff all alone for an open-lane shot from between the circles to score the game-winning goal with 6:45 left in the game. The Hawks faced more adversity as Dave Bolland was called for a tripping penalty with :55.1 seconds left in the game. Although, the Blackhawks did receive a small break as the refs escorted Versteeg to the box instead of Bolland, who is a crucial part of the penalty-kill special team. San Jose played with an empty and had a six on four advantage, but to no avail and the Blackhawks stole a game at the Shark Tank. The keys for game two are tightening up the fore-checking and cutting down on all of the shots on goal. They can’t ask Niemi to play out of his mind for every game here on out, though it would be sweet if he did.

Remember to tune in to Cover 3 every Monday evening from 7 to 9 on sportstownchicago.com

PREACH

Blackhawks Looking to Clinch, Again

Game 6 is upon us and the Blackhawks are headed in with a three games to two advantage over the Canucks. I’m not one to believe in game-to-game momentum, but the boys in the Indian-head sweaters may be feeling some pressure before they take the ice tonight in British Columbia. And, well, that’s just fine with me. Oddly enough, the Hawks flat out do not play well when there isn’t any sort of pressure or urgency. They’ve also been road-warriors in these playoffs. This is contrary to most other clubs. Other clubs tend to play well when there is no pressure and can play a loose type of game. But NOOOOOOO, the Hawks had to go and come out sluggish, at home mind you, in Game 5 and make things a little more interesting as far as this series goes. They didn’t seem to be themselves right of the stick. They were a step slower than the Canucks no matter who was on the ice at any given time. They took far too many dumb penalties and were given a taste of their own acetaminophen. It didn’t help that Erhoff deposited the biscuit in the basket with the help from a Burrows screen within the first minute so that they could revert to a neutral-zone trap for the rest of the game and stymie the Hawks’ offensive attack. Bieksa potted the next two goals taking a 3-0 lead into the third period. Luongo standing on his head and not coughing up any succulent rebounds was the cherry on the top for Vancouver. This coming after he was called out by his coach to perform better between the pipes and shaving his playoff beard to switch things up. Still, the Blackhawks expect to win this series in six as indicated by their heavy packing with extra tighty-whiteys. They plan on jumping on a jet to fly south down to San Jose after their victory to begin that series. My keys to a Game 6 victory are as follows: no dumb penalties and Big Buff’s big butt in Luongo’s grill. That is all.

Tape & Pine Tar:

The Cubs have brought up their number one prospect in Starlin Castro at what I believe is an odd time. If they had just waited three more weeks the Cubs could have locked him up for an extra year with arbitration. If they didn’t start him down in Double A to begin the season to wait until June to bring him up, then why didn’t he just break camp with them and start the season in The Show? Albeit, he had an historic debut when he went oppo on a 3-run bomb and also had a base-clearing triple to be the first player ever to rack up 6 RBI’s in their first game in the Bigs. It’s also untimely because “L-L-Lil Fontenot” (in a stuttering, mouth-breathing Sweet Lou voice) has been hitting above .300 and he’s been the odd man out, even though it was Chad Tracy who was designated for assignment, as Theriot has shifted over to the 4 position as Castro has taken over the 6.

To say the Sox are underachieving would be an understatement. They’re bad right now with a few bright spots. Danks & Santos have been lights-out on the bump. Konerko leads the majors with 13 dingers, Rios is playing well and working out even though Kenny truly didn’t want him, and Jones has been producing gravy for a plate with no mashed potatoes. Other than that, bad. Pierre leads the majors with 15 swipes, but his OBP is below .300. BAD. Beckham is batting below the Mendoza-line at .193 and is on the brink of getting at-bats in the minors, ‘nough said…BAD. The list goes on and that’s just for the starting lineup…go to whitesox.com, scroll over stats and click on sortable player stats and try to keep from losing your lunch. The big question facing Ozzie this week is what to do with big Bobby Jenks. 6.75 ERA in 12 IP with an average of 20.4 pitches per IP. BAD. Well Putz has 103 career saves…Oh but he has an ERA dangerously close to 5, so that may not be the best idea. Thornton has been pretty reliable collecting 25 K’s in 15.1 IP….but Ozzie has all ready been riding him hard this season. I’d say use him late, especially in their upcoming series versus the Twins and their left-handed-heavy lineup and play the match-ups. Otherwise, Sergio Santos has been stellar finally giving up his first ER of the season this past Saturday. He’s got great stuff, particularly his slider, to compliment his high-90’s fastball. He’s got confidence right now and I’m sure Ozzie has it in him as well so let’s get what we can out of him now in those late-inning situations. Maybe Jenks can work his way back into the roll with a good stint as a middle-reliever, which will be tough as he doesn’t pitch well without the lead…then again he hasn’t pitched well WITH the lead this year either. I’m fairly indifferent when it comes to Jenks. Should he start doing well and have his stock rise by mid-season to be trade bait, fine. If he stays in the roll and slams the door shut with every save opportunity, fine. Right now, he’s just a guy.

As always tune in to Cover 3 every Monday evening from 7 to 9 on sportstownchicago.com

PREACH