As Simple as One, Two, Three

The White Sox won their third straight game last night, 7-0 against the visiting Royals. You guessed it, they followed that can’t-lose recipe of pitching, hitting and defense. Starter Shane Smith looked like the pitcher he was the first 2-1/2 months of the season, throwing seven shutout innings, allowing just one hit and a walk. Simply put, Smith attacked, with 21 first-pitch strikes against the 23 KC batters he faced. He also struck out three, which means his performance was double old-school. In other words, Smith induced weak contact his defense was able to handle for outs. I’ve been on the fence all year about Miguel Vargas, and still am. I’ll jump on the bandwagon if he can add fourteen points to his batting average and end the season at .250. But I will say this regardless—the man hustles out of the box. That mentality turned two singles into two doubles. More, please. What do you do with a problem like Lenyn Sosa? Enjoy him, if only in the short term. Last night, Sosa went 2-fpr-4 with two run-scoring singles, giving him 59 RBIs on the season. And to think that two years ago, he looked utterly lost at the plate. More recently, Brooks Baldwin did too, until the end of July, Since then, he’s added 21 points to his batting average, which is what going 17-for-56 in August will do. Last night, Baldwin followed Korey Lee’s two-run homer in the bottom of the fourth with a solo shot of his own. Wait, there’s more. Playing left field in the top of the fifth, Balwin raced into foul territory to retire Adam Frazier on a sliding, cleats-into-the-wall catch. More, please, even though you can never get enough of that kind of thing.