Griffey's pinch hit sends Mariners over White Sox in 14

Alex Rios made his debut for the White Sox at Seattle on Wednesday night, starting in right field for the slumping Jermaine Dye.

But it was a former Sox player, Ken Griffey Jr., who ended a lengthy pitcher's duel with a game-ending single off Tony Pena with two outs in the bottom of the 14th inning.

The clutch hit gave the Mariners a 1-0 win.

Claimed off waivers from the Toronto Blue Jays on Monday, Rios gives the Sox' offense another weapon.

But before the White Sox closed their three-game series against the Mariners, manager Ozzie Guillen identified the keys to the stretch run.

"Starting pitching and defense," Guillen told reporters. "We are going to hit. If the starting pitchers do their job and we catch the ball for them, we're going to compete for the pennant race. There is no doubt in my mind."

The starting pitching was there for the Sox on Wednesday, as Mark Buehrle rebounded nicely from three straight stinkers while looking a lot more like the guy who threw a perfect game against Tampa Bay on July 23.

Buehrle pitched 8 strong innings, and the last one was the biggest.

Matching up against Mariners ace Felix Hernandez, Buehrle had little difficulty through the first seven innings, but Seattle loaded the bases with one out in the eighth inning on a single, intentional walk and an error on shortstop Alexei Ramirez.

Buehrle was able to pitch over the fielding miscue, getting Jose Lopez to popout to Ramirez in short left field and retiring Mike Sweeney on a flyball to center.

Hernandez pitched 7 scoreless innings against the White Sox, allowing 6 hits and 4 walks while striking out 10.

The Sox did have some chances against the all-star pitcher, but failed to come through.

Their best opportunity came in the seventh inning, when Mark Kotsay led off with a double and moved to third on Jayson Nix's single. But Hernandez struck out Scott Podsednik and Gordon Beckham's hard grounder up the middle was turned into a double play.

In the fifth inning, Rios (1-for-6) hit a medium flyball to right field with one out, and Nix was thrown out at home after tagging up and trying to score from third base.

Rios started in place of Jermaine Dye, who is batting .156 since the all-star break.

"He's got today and tomorrow off," Guillen said of Dye. "Hopefully, when we got to Oakland (Friday), he gets back to it."