Good start for what Sox need to do

One of the lead stories on mlb.com Monday afternoon previewed the Yankees-White Sox series.

“Beasts from the East meeting up with best from Midwest,” was the hook.

The Sox badly needed to win this opener of a three-game series between division leaders, and they did 9-6.

The weather has started to cool down toward playoff temperatures. The pennant race is in the air. The gold-standard Yankees are in town.

It was a compelling atmosphere for a team like the Sox trying to prove it belongs among the best in the American League. Most compelling of all, however, was that the Sox just came off being swept in three games by the Royals, of all teams.

So, yes, this would be a big one to get if the Sox could get it. Naturally the Yankees didn’t make it easy.

“It was going back and forth … That’s a good team,” Sox manager Robin Ventura said of the Yankees. “They keep scratching and clawing. We did, too.”

Let’s face it: The Sox have to start playing better, winning more games and gaining some traction heading into the stretch run.

Not all first-place teams are created equally. The Yankees lead the A.L. East with a 72-50 record, while the Sox led the A.L. Central at 66-55.

The Sox’ record is mediocre for a division leader, which makes it awfully tough for the public to believe in them.

A Sox fan is like a married woman waiting for her husband to be the man she thought she married, the man she could trust to love her back until death do they part.

Fans are waiting for their team to at least indicate that they are worthy of the considerable expense of attending a game. They’re waiting for the Sox to start looking like they are not only division leaders but World Series contenders also.

Every time the Sox start social climbing they fall back. That’s the season to this point: Fire and fall back, fire and fall back, fire and fall back.

The Sox went to Kansas City at 13 games over .500 for the first time this season and appeared primed to make a run to at least 20 games over.

But even at 11 games over .500 now approaching September, well, that’s no way for a first-place team to win friends and influence people.

The Sox began Monday night with the worst record of any of the major leagues’ six division leaders. If that weren’t dubious enough, four second-place teams had better records than the Sox, one had the same record and only one had a worse record — Detroit in the Sox’ own A.L. Central.

This isn’t meant to diminish the White Sox’ season to this point. It’s to put it into some sort of perspective.

The Sox have to start actually playing like the best of the Midwest should play if they’re going to hold off the Tigers. If they don’t, they might even lose out on the two wild-card playoff berths.

The Sox’ beating the Yankees was a good start toward proving to doubters that they aren’t merely pennant pretenders.

“There was a lot of stuff going on,” Ventura said of the long, wild ride of a game.

Now the Sox have to keep on keeping on the rest of this series, this month and this season.

It’s getting too late to keep firing and falling back.

mimrem@dailyherald.com