A Ways to Go Still

So, the White Sox did in fact sweep the Tigers three games in Detroit, including yesterday afternoon’s 13-0 beatdown. Going into the season, baseball savants had the Tigers as a team to watch. How right they were, for all the wrong reasons. Detroit looks to have a good shot at 100 losses before its season comes to an end on October 5th. When a team pitches not one, not two, but three position players, things are bad. (In my mind, you subtract two of Yoan Moncada’s five hits because they came against pitching pretenders.) When a team signs a pitcher to a five-year, $77 million contract only to put him on the restricted list (Eduardo Rodriguez), things are really bad. When a team signs a shortstop to a six-year, $140 million contract and he’s hitting all of .188 with sixteen RBIs, things are terrible. Talk about karma. Last summer, Javy Baez was giving Mets’ fans the thumbs-down sign for daring to boo an underperforming team. I wonder what the over-and-under is for Baez reviving that bit of theatre in Detroit. Couldn’t happen to a nicer ex-Cub, by the way except maybe for Jake Arrieta. If only three games a season makes. Hooray, the Sox banged out twenty-two hits, with Jose Abreu following up Moncada with four and Andrew Vaughn three; my God, even Josh Harrison managed three (the homerun by Danny Mendick rates as more of the new normal). And rookie pitcher Davis Martin, whose 5.1innings of shutout relief with zero walks earned him his first major-league win—where’d he come from? Now, for the reality check. This is still a sub-.500 team, at 30-31; not winning series at home against the Dodgers and Rangers has consequences. Dropping the upcoming series in Houston will, too.