Konerko always there, good times or bad

Imagine where the White Sox would be without Paul Konerko this season.

Even with their best offensive player picking up where he left off last year, the Sox have struggled to score runs since mid-April and sweeping changes seemed to be in order Friday after a loss to the Mariners in the series opener at Safeco Field dropped the Sox’ record to 11-22.

They managed to bounce back with a 6-0 win Saturday night, but Konerko had to exit the game early with a sore left wrist. X-rays taken after the game were negative, and Konerko was back in the lineup Sunday.

“It kind of comes and goes,” Konerko told reporters. “It goes as quickly as it comes sometimes. We can’t identify what it is, but it’s nothing serious, just something that’s nagging.”

Playing through pain has never been a problem for the Sox’ captain — just catch his TV commercial about staying in a game last September after being hit in the face by a pitch from Twins starter Carl Pavano.

Konerko also has had numerous cortisone shots the past few seasons to combat soreness in his right hand, so his return Sunday should not have been a surprise.

Wearing pink shoes to promote breast cancer awareness in the Mother’s Day game against the Mariners, Konerko tied his career high with 5 hits and the White Sox scored 3 runs in the 10th inning to beat Seattle 5-2.

It’s their first two-game winning since April 25-26.

Not only did Konerko raise his batting average from .295 to .323, he entered Sunday’s game tied with Toronto’s Adam Lind for the American League RBI lead (27).

“Paul is about as professional a hitter as you are going to see,” Mariners manager Eric Wedge told reporters. “He knows the situation and what he is trying to do and he does a good job with it.”

While he did go 5-for-5, Konerko did not have an RBI and he scored 1 run.

Last week manager Ozzie Guillen was again trying to determine why the Sox’ offense has had such a difficult time scoring runs.

While he was unable to come up with a concrete theory, Guillen did talk about the need for other White Sox hitters to stop waiting for Konerko to come through and start becoming contributors.

Alexei Ramirez finally answered the bell Sunday; his RBI single in the 10th put the Sox in front for good.

Adam Dunn drove in Ramirez with a double and scored the game’s final run on Alex Rios’ single as the White Sox took advantage of standout pitching from starter Mark Buehrle and closer-in-training Sergio Santos.

Konerko still gets the game ball, but the long-term health of his left wrist is worth keeping an eye on. He told reporters the wrist flared up right before Sunday’s game.

“Five minutes before the game, it slid out while I was in the cage,” he said. “It goes in easy and goes out easy. When it’s there, it’s a pain.”

sgregor@dailyherald.com