Sox fumble away chances as Detroit takes Game 1
More than 100 games remain on the White Sox schedule, but none might turn out to be as relevant as Game 1 of Monday's doubleheader with Detroit.
Or, to be more specific, none might turn out to be relevant at all after the afternoon portion of Monday's day-night doubleheader.
Third baseman Josh Fields' error on Miguel Cabrera's room-service bouncer in the ninth set up the Tigers' unearned run that gave them a 5-4 victory at U.S. Cellular Field.
Fields' miscue ruined dramatic game-tying homers by Jermaine Dye and Paul Konerko and set the opening tone for this crucial five-game set between this year's AL Central leaders and last year's champs.
Detroit (31-25) opened its lead over the White Sox (26-31) to 5.5 games.
Jose Contreras, pitching in the bigs for the first time since May 8, will try to salvage a split against Detroit's Jeremy Bonderman at 7:11 p.m.
"Be honest with you, these five games are going to be very important because that's the people we chase," Sox manager Ozzie Guillen said before Game 1. "That's the truth. I predict this: We play good against Detroit, we'll be in the pennant race.
"If we don't play good against these guys, it'll be hard to swing back and get it because mentally we've got to be tougher."
The White Sox, continuing their homestand-long routine, made it tough on themselves with a cavalcade of bad execution.
On the mound, Sox starter Clayton Richard turned a bases-empty, two-out situation in the fifth inning into a Detroit rally by allowing a soft Magglio Ordonez single and walking the next three Tigers.
That gave Detroit a 3-1 lead and forced Guillen to turn to bullpen stalwart D.J. Carrasco for the second day in a row.
In the field, Fields, catcher A.J. Pierzynski and shortstop Alexei Ramirez committed errors, and Ramirez could have been charged with another.
After Fields dropped the slow-running Cabrera's ninth-inning grounder to give the Tigers a runner with one out, Ramirez went to his knees too quickly and botched a backhand of Marcus Thames' hard-hit grounder.
Instead of hitting into a 6-4-3 double play, Thames received a single for his efforts to move the go-ahead run into scoring position. Brandon Inge then grounded a single into the hole off Scott Linebrink to score pinch-runner Josh Anderson with what stood up as the winning run.
At the plate, the White Sox went 0-for-6 with runners in scoring position, failed to execute sacrifice bunts with nobody out in the seventh and eighth innings, and grounded into two double plays.
The Sox could have set a different tone as early as the first inning when Dye and Jim Thome drew walks to load the bases with one out.
Struggling Detroit starter Armando Galarraga then fell behind Konerko 2-0. Galarraga followed with a fastball that split the plate, but Konerko could only lift a sacrifice fly to center. Pierzynski followed with a groundout that mean the Sox settled for 1 run when they could've enjoyed a huge inning.
Lindsey Willhite's game tracker
J.D. give and take: Not only did Jermaine Dye steal a home run from Marcus Thames in the second inning, he bombed a 2-run homer in the fifth to forge a 3-3 tie.
Carrasco el caballo: Ozzie Guillen trotted out middle reliever D.J. Carrasco for the fifth time in seven days. Carrasco threw 43 pitches over 31/3 innings on Monday after throwing 43 pitches over 2 innings on Sunday.
King Konerko: For the first time since May 25 (and the first time in 54 plate appearances), Paul Konerko slugged a homer. He pulled a 99 m.p.h. fastball from Joel Zumaya to tie it 4-4 in the eighth.
Sacrifice sacrificing: Alexei Ramirez couldn't get down a sacrifice bunt with no outs in the seventh, then Chris Getz bunted into a force out with no outs in the eighth.