Game 47: White Sox 12, Indians 6

The Indians scored 16 runs this series, and had no chance of winning a game. Was that because of bad pitching, or an offense as hot as an offense can get? Probably both.

In their last 13 games (including today, Chicago has scored at least 6 runs in 10 of them. They've averaged over 7 runs a game. But not all of the offensive explosion that we witnessed this weekend is due to them hitting good or even mediocre pitches. Today's starter, Ubaldo Jimenez, was his usual self, falling behind hitters. Against other clubs, he may have scratched out five or six innings and kept the Indians in the game, as in his last start against Detroit. The way Chicago is hitting right now, Jimenez couldn't get away with walks and 3-0 counts, because they didn't miss the inevitable hanging curves and fastballs on the wrong half of the plate.

Had the starters been reversed today, the score likely would be the same. The Indians could have knocked Gavin Floyd out of today's game just as quickly as Jimenez was dispatched, but they couldn't deliver the knockout blow. Floyd for whatever reason was throwing slider after slider to the Indians, and his control was almost as bad as Jimenez's. He hung a slider to Johnny Damon in the second inning, who with the batspeed boost jerked the ball over the right field fence for his first home run as an Indian. That blast tied the game at three, but the Indians just couldn't keep up with the White Sox, who after dismissing Jimenez, teed off on Jairo Asencio so that by the time the fifth inning was over, the score was 9-4.

Floyd hit three Indians, all on breaking pitches. Lou Marson got the worst of the three plunkings, getting a breaking ball on the left cheek. He stayed in the game initially, but would later leave to get a cut on the inside of his mouth stitched up.

Juan Diaz, who started again for Asdrubal Cabrera, got his first major-league hit, a single in the fourth inning. He would get a second hit in the sixth, If Cabrera isn't ready to go by tomorrow, the Indians will have to send someone else down to the minors.