The White Sox won their third in a row Sunday with a 10-2 decision against the hapless Detroit Tigers. As was their pattern this weekend, the Sox did it in the way a cat plays with prey for a while, then swats it into oblivion when the game gets tiresome.
The Sox let early opportunities fritter away, leaving men in scoring position through the middle innings, then devastated the Tigers with a nine-run explosion in the eighth inning. Pitching again kept the Sox close until their bats arrived, with rookie Josh Stewart going into the seventh in his first major-league start and only losing his shot for a win when Domaso Marte gave up a single for a short-lived Detroit lead.
“When you get good pitching it gives you the opportunity to break the game open,” manager Jerry Manuel said after his team went from a 2-1 deficit to a laugher in a single frame.
Frank Thomas led off the eighth with a walk, and Josh Paul came on to pinch run. Paul moved to second on a wild pitch by Franklyn Germand and moved to third on a single to right by Magglio Ordonez.
Paul Konerko, who walked as a pinch hitter for starter Brian Daubach in the sixth, then hit a slow roller to first baseman Carlos Pena. Pena looked home, but had no chance to get Paul, who scored the tying run. He looked to second but was too late to force Ordonez. Finally, he lobbed a soft toss to pitcher Steve Sparks, who dropped the ball in an error that would lead to eight unearned runs.
Third baseman Joe Crede walked to load the bases, and two outs later, catcher Miguel Olivo walked to force in the go-ahead run for a 3-2 lead. Second baseman D’Angelo Jimenez, whose first home run of the season in the third started the Sox scoring, then lined a double inside third to score Konerko and Crede for a 5-2 lead.
Jose Valentin was walked intentionally, and Paul, in his first at bat of the season, drove in Olivo and Jimenez. Ordonez then delivered his second hit of the inning, a three-run missile into the left-field seats for the game’s final runs before Billy Koch finished up with two strikeouts in the ninth.
The Tigers earlier had ended a string of 16 scoreless innings against Sox pitching with the tying run in the fifth.
Stewart pitched into the seventh and left with two outs and two on to the sound of his first major-league standing ovation from the crowd of 14,514. Marte promptly gave up a single to Bobby Higginson, scoring Ramon Santiago, who had doubled, from second.
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Sox at Indians
Season series: Indians won 10-9 in 2002.
Monday: Bartolo Colon (0-0, 4.50) vs. Ricardo Rodriguez (1-0, 1.29)
12:05 p.m.; Fox Sports Net; WMVP-AM 1000
Wednesday: Jon Garland (0-0, 11.25) vs. Brian Anderson (1-0, 0.00)
6:05 p.m.; Fox Sports Net; WMVP-AM 1000
Thursday: Mark Buehrle (1-1, 1.20) vs. Jason Davis (0-1, 15.00)
6:05 p.m.; WCIU-Ch. 26; WMVP-AM 1000
