142

The Update staff has been away on business since last Wednesday, so there's some catching up that needs to be done. During those five games, the White Sox have combined their three wins with KC's four losses to reduce the Magic Number from 149 to 142. The Sox continue to lead the A.L. Central but have stretched their lead to 2.5 games over the Royals, and don't look now, the Twins. The Indians are 4.5 games back and Detroit trails the pack, 5.5 games behind the Good Guys. The division doesn't look nearly as tough as expected, with only the Sox being above .500.

Most encouraging over this period? The starting pitching. Jose "Can You See" Contreras threw 7.0 innings of 4-hit, 1-run ball. Gavin Floyd "the Barber" pitched 6.0 innings without giving up an earned run or allowing more than 2 hits. Javy "Nagila" Vazquez went 6.1 innings and gave up only 2 earned runs. Mark "of Zero" Buehrle, however, did not live up to his nickname, allowing five runs in his 7.o inning stint. And John Danks "You, Danks You Very Much" threw 7.0 frames of shutout ball on just three hits. Except for Buehrle, the starters looked pretty darn good over this stretch. Keep this up and the Sox will be back in the postseason come October.

On the hitting front, Jim Thome has awakened a bit, smashing three home runs during the period. That leaves him at 512, in a tie with Hall of Famers Ernie Banks and Eddie Matthews. Ernie holds a special place in Chicago -- even White Sox fans liked him -- and Eddie was on the cover of the first issue of Sports Illustrated. Not bad company for Mr. Thome.

One guy who's ahead of him though is Update favorite, Frank Thomas, who has 516 dingers. Unfortunately, the Blue Jays released the Big Hurt on Sunday. While Frank has been a little slow out of the gate -- not unusual for him -- it seems to us like this was about the Benjamins. If Frank had logged 376 plate appearances this season, Toronto would have had to pick up his option for 2009 at a salary of $10 million. The Jays weren't giving him the at bats he needed to get there and appeared to be trying to prevent the option from kicking in. There's got to be a place for a future Hall of Famer who's got some gas left in the tank. After all, Frank is one of only four players in Major League history to have a .300 average, 500 home runs, 1500 RBI, 1000 runs, and 1500 walks. Babe Ruth, Ted Williams and Mel Ott are the other three, so that's pretty heady company. Since Thome's presence means Thomas is not coming back to the Sox, we're hoping that he winds up with the O's so that we can make the drive up the Baltimore-Washington Parkway and watch Big Frank on a regular basis.

Go Sox! Go Big Hurt!