16 (Tigers and Twins)

The Sox are running out of steam and so is the Update. It's hard to write these things when the team loses, and it's especially hard to write them when the team is out of the race for even a Wild Card. And out of it they are. (Very Yoda-like sentence construction that was.) Losses by Detroit and Minnesota cut the Sox Magic Number to 16 over both teams, but it's too far away from zero to matter anymore. What counts is what the Tribune calls the Tragic Number, i.e., the number of opponent's wins and Sox losses that will clinch for the other team. The Sox TNs vis-a-vis the Tigers and Twins are four and five, respectively. Last night, they lost despite Javier Vazquez's decent performance -- 12 Ks and only three earned runs in 7.1 innings. Shaky defense, no hitting to speak of, and bad relief pitching (Neal Cotts and David Riske allowed five inherited runners to score) were the ingredients in a recipe for disaster, 9-0, to the lowly Seattle Mariners. With the Sox having lost six of the last seven, precisely at a time when they needed to win six out of seven, it's hard to muster the enthusiasm to say it, but here goes: Go Sox!