The Sox 11: Problems During The Sox - Rays Game 1

Is it one week ago again? It was the 8^th inning, the Sox had a chance at the game, and in comes Dotel, who we haven’t seen in awhile. I thought calmly to myself, “He had one bad game in Oakland, I’m not saying he’s done, and he’s a great asset in the bullpen a lot of the time.” Well, what I didn’t know was that an identical performance was about to take place. One inning, two homers. Three runs crossed the plate at the hand of Dotel. I don’t have to say he screwed the poch; all 38,000 fans in attendance said it all with a loud, synchronized boo of epic proportions. That about sums about this 9-4 loss to the Tampa Bay Rays.

11 Problems (Serious and Silly) With The White Sox Today:

1. The Sox aren’t a base stealing team, and they’re certainly not a team that relies on Juan Uribe to steal a base. (Yes, Ozzie’s signs indicated that Uribe & Cabrera should steal back-to-back bases and both failed.)

2. Jermayne Dye has been anything but hot at bat lately.

3. Ken Griffey was in CF today so Quentin and Dye had to do their job and someone else’s, making them (literally, in Carlos’s case) fall flat on their butts.

4. Horacio Ramirez is especially dangerous to use with Griffey in CF because he’s more of a fly ball guy than a ground ball guy- and he certainly isn’t the dominant pitcher many of our other relievers are; he is not expected to get a hold, he is expected to kill time.

5. Paul Konerko wasn’t playing. (I’m not sure if this is one of the silly ones or one of the serious ones.)

6. My time machine works but it took me back to last Friday in Oakland. (It’s the 8^th, the Sox are still in the game, Dotel comes on and gives up two home runs!) Perhaps my machine traveled further and we are once again dealing with a case of “elbow tendonitis.”

7. Badly umpired game. I agreed with most of the calls, but there was a lot of inconsistency.

8. Everyone was too busy perfecting the U-Ribe Chant to care what was going on in the game. [In case you missed it, Joe Cowley’s interview on the score talked all about Juan Uribe in the dugout and my favorite White Guy, Jermaine Dye.]

9. Dewayne Wise was insulted that no one mentioned him after leaving the field with an injury to his adductor, so he sold his soul in exchange for revenge. Come on, the forums and blogs were sparked on fire with cries of, “Don’t bring Owens!” and, “Lance Broadway can finally come back!” only to find out Wise isn’t going on the D.L.? Or is he…?

10. The Minor League version of GameDay is too slow and any curses I put on the makers of the poorly-designed javascript concoction for thwarting my plan of keeping tabs on Joe Crede (Who is 0-for-9 since restarting his rehab assignment) accidentally stuck to Joe Crede’s team.

11. It’s all about the numbers! Forget ERA, the real problem is that John Danks is 23. 2/3 = .666 (well, .667 but that wouldn’t prove my point!) so he is basically doomed! He will always pitch 6 (2*3 = 6!) innings and then his team will trail by 5 (2+3 = 5!) and will drop by -1 (2-3 = -1!) in the A.L. Central standings.