GM: Sox must fight harder

Thursday's gem by Mark Buehrle aside, the White Sox haven't played quality baseball by any means over the last week or so.

A day after manager Ozzie Guillen proclaimed the Sox good enough to win the AL Central, general manager Kenny Williams agreed, but he issued a warning.

"You've got you got to prove it on the field," Williams said. "Is the talent there, the talent to win this thing? Absolutely. But you've got to play as a team, pulling from the same rope. You got to be unselfish in your play. If the runner's on second base with no outs, you've got to give yourself up. You've got to move that runner over, you've got to fight tooth and nail to get that runner in."

Williams also chastised the pitching staff for not throwing inside enough. White Sox pitchers have hit only four opposing hitters. The Sox have been hit 14 times.

"You can't allow other teams to pitch inside and knock your players down and not reciprocate," Williams said. "You can't do it. You have to establish the inside part of the plate and move hitters off the plate in order to open it up more. If you don't do that and allow the other team to do it to your hitters, then you're losing at both ends.

"So we've got to get better at those areas. We got to fight a little bit harder. And if we don't fight a little bit harder, it doesn't matter whether we think we're the best team or not. You got to go out there and prove it."

Alexei's no dog: Slumping shortstop Alexei Ramirez was not in the starting lineup Thursday night, and his replacement, Jayson Nix, hit his first major-league home run against the Tigers.

White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen stressed again that Ramirez is not being punished.

"He's not being benched because he's not hitting," Guillen said. "He's not being benched because he's not producing. He's on the bench because I need better results every at-bat. That's the only reason."