White Sox take advantage of errors, punchless Cubs
The White Sox are trying their best to convince themselves there's enough time to make up those 7 games on Detroit and win the AL Central.
It might help their longshot chances if they had a few more games against the Cubs.
The White Sox at least looked like a team that still cared Thursday in their 5-0 win over the Cubs at Wrigley Field behind a strong effort from starter Carlos Torres.
That's two wins in a row for the Sox after a losing streak of five games. They took four of six from the Cubs this season to win the City Series.
"All we can do is take it one day at a time, and hopefully this turns around," Sox manager Ozzie Guillen said. "But you know what? All year long I've got the same stuff. I get excited for three or four days and all of a sudden backwards."
As for the Cubs, well, their biggest faults were all on display before a largely angry crowd of 40,741, starting with a punchless offense and the fourth worst defense in the National League.
An error by first baseman Jake Fox led to the first Sox run in the second inning, but it was a three-base error by Alfonso Soriano in left field in the eighth that turned out to be the most damaging for the Cubs.
With Gordon Beckham at first and nobody out, A.J. Pierzynski sliced a harmless-looking flyball toward the line in left. Soriano slipped chasing the routine fly and let it get past him. Beckham scored, Pierzynski reached third and was singled home by Paul Konerko for a 3-0 Sox lead.
"I think he overran it a little, and when he tried to plant he went down," Cubs manager Lou Piniella said.
Soriano contended he didn't overrun the ball, which never hit his glove. It was Soriano's 11th error, which leads all NL outfielders. Washington's Adam Dunn is second with 5.
"I know it's tough here, anytime the ball goes up here the way the wind blows and the sun," Pierzynski said. "He slipped and fell and I don't know how that's an error when a guy falls on his head, but apparently at Wrigley it is.
"We'll take the win. It led to a couple runs and gave us a cushion."
Guillen, who has had a rough two weeks on what was a 3-8 road trip, was happy to see another team making the blunders.
"Thank God, because all summer I've been watching my team doing that," Guillen said. "We took advantage of that a couple times. Hopefully, the ball will start bouncing our way."
Torres (1-0) allowed just 5 hits in 7 shutout innings, letting only two Cubs get as far as third.
One of those runners was Fox, who led off the seventh with a double in what was still a 1-0 game. But on Jeff Baker's single to right, Dewayne Wise cut down Fox at the plate with a perfect throw and nifty tag by Pierzynski.
"I had some huge plays behind me," Torres said.
"Carlos was awesome today," Paul Konerko said. "He's the story of the day."
Cubs starter Ryan Dempster (8-8) deserved better than what he got. He struck out seven and allowed only 1 earned run in 7-plus innings.
"He shouldn't have given up any runs," Piniella said.
The Cubs now hit the road for six games after a 5-5 homestand that pretty much summed up their mediocre season.
"We were hoping for better," Piniella said.
<p class="factboxheadblack">Scot Gregor's game tracker</p> <p class="News">White Sox 5, Cubs 0</p> <p class="News"><b>It's a wrap:</b> The Sox won the interleague series vs. their city rivals 4-2. The White Sox last won a season series against the Cubs in 2006.</p> <p class="News"><b>Rocky road:</b> The Sox wound up 3-8 on a road trip that also had stops in Boston, New York and Minnesota.</p> <p class="News"><b>Heating up:</b> Alexei Ramirez is 8-for-16 during a five-game hitting streak. The shortstop also picked up his team-high 10th game-winning RBI.</p> <p class="News"><b>First things first:</b> Starter Carlos Torres won his first major-league game, and Tyler Flowers popped out in his first major-league at-bat.</p> <p class="factboxheadblack">Bruce Miles' game tracker</p> <p class="News"><b>Wasted quality:</b> Ryan Dempster turned in the Cubs' 80th quality start of the season in a losing effort. Dempster worked 7 innings and gave up 3 runs, all unearned. The Cubs are 51-29 in quality-start games, and the starters have a sparkling ERA of 2.08 in those games.</p> <p class="News"><b>Bad day:</b> In addition to making a key error in left field, Alfonso Soriano was 0-for-4 with 3 strikeouts. He's batting .241 with a low .303 on-base percentage.</p> <p class="News"><b>Bullpen streak ends:</b> The Cubs' streak of 21 1/3 scoreless innings by the bullpen ended when the White Sox scored twice in the ninth.</p> <div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Stories</h2> <ul class="links"> <li><a href="/story/?id=318838">Torres makes a splash with 7 impressive innings<span class="date"> [9/3/09]</span></a></li> <li><a href="/story/?id=318834">Wise snags the spotlight with great catch and assist<span class="date"> [9/3/09]</span></a></li> <li><a href="/story/?id=318839">Another wasted homestand frustrates Dempster, Cubs<span class="date"> [9/3/09]</span></a></li> <li><a href="/story/?id=318843">Cubs hope they've fixed some flaws with Zambrano<span class="date"> [9/3/09]</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>