White Sox’ Sale returns to mound to face Royals
Keep one eye on Chris Sale on Monday night when he returns from a nine-day layoff.
Keep the other eye on the right-field scoreboard at U.S. Cellular Field, where pitch speed is posted.
In his last start, at Texas on July 27, Sale’s fastball never got above 91 mph. That’s a glaring drop in velocity, and a sure sign of dead-arm symptoms.
The White Sox wasted little time giving the first-year starter his third extended break of the season. Sale hopes he is strong enough to pitch with regular rest the rest of the way.
“It’s nice to be able to do it (take a break) now so the last couple months we can really make a push and nothing like this will hopefully come up again,” Sale said.
“We can just go through these two months every fifth day or whatever they have now for us. Make a good push these last couple months and put all this stuff behind us.”
Before Sunday’s win over the Los Angeles Angels, a local radio reporter kept asking Sale if he tried to “fight” the latest extended rest period, even though the Sox have said all along they are going to handle him with care.
“They came to me in Texas and said they were thinking about doing some things, and then the other day told me what was going on,” Sale said. “Not much to fight, to be honest with you.”
Sale said his arm “felt really good” after he threw a bullpen Friday. As for his velocity, stay tuned.
“We’ll see,” Sale said. “Like I said before, if it’s there, cool. If not, you’ve still got to pitch.
“It doesn’t matter how hard it’s going. Whatever it is, you’ve still got to make pitches and get outs. Whether it’s hard, soft, slow, in, out, up, whatever. You’ve got to get outs somehow.”
Danks set for surgery:After spending over two months trying to come back from a strained left shoulder, White Sox starter John Danks is going to have exploratory surgery Monday at Rush University Surgery Center.#147;I#146;m not exactly excited about going in, but I#146;m ready for it to be fixed and healed and get moving on with just getting back to being healthy,#148; Danks said.#147;That#146;s kind of the key. It#146;s been so long since I#146;ve been truly healthy, I#146;m excited about getting everything fixed and kind of starting clean next year.#148;Danks has had MRIs on the shoulder, and they showed no structural damage. He is hoping no serious damage to his labrum or rotator cuff is found during surgery.#147;I definitely want to know exactly what they have to do,#148; Danks said. #147;The least amount of work they have to do, the better. I talked with Dr. (Tony) Romeo yesterday and just said, #145;Fix what you need to fix.#146; That#146;s just where we#146;re at.#148;Local sound:It was a busy weekend for Haley Reinhart.The Wheeling resident and #147;American Idol#148; star performed Friday at Lollapalooza.On Sunday, Reinhart delivered a rousing version of the national anthem before the White Sox-Angels game at U.S. Cellular Field. She also sang #147;God Bless America#148; during the seventh-inning stretch, mixing up some of the lyrics in the process.ENT40002814Singer and Wheeling native Haley Reinhart performs the national anthem Sunday before the White Sox-Angels game at U.S. Cellular Field.Associated PressENT