123

While we were gone, the White Sox split the last two games of their three-game set with the Angels, to take their third consecutive series by a 2-1 margin. More on the games later, but assuming the Good Guys continue to Meat Loaf the opposition in the 28 remaining scheduled three-game series and just split their other games, they'll finish with a 93-69 record. That ought to be good enough to win the division and get back to the post-season. Of course, that's a tall order for a team that hits as poorly as the Sox do, but if they get even close to the kind of pitching they've been getting lately, it's doable. In each of the last 10 games, the starter has given up three or fewer earned runs -- 13 earned runs in 63.1 innings for a 1.85 ERA. The team is 17-6 when getting a Quality Start (at least six innings pitched with fewer than four earned runs allowed), for a .739 winning percentage.

Tuesday's game featured another strong performance by Bartolo Colon (6.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R) and two home runs by Jayson Nix. The winning percentage when a Sox player homers in a game is almost as good as for Quality Starts. When Dr. Longball pays a house call, the Sox are 18-7 for a .720 percentage. When he shows up more than once in a game, the Sox are even better: 14-4 and .778. By the way, Jayson's brother Laynce (what's with the "Y" stuck in the middle of their names?) hit one out on Tuesday as well. They became the fourth set of brothers to homer on the same day this season: Bengie and Yadier Molina have done it twice; Adrian and Edgar Gonzalez and Jerry and Scott Hairston have done it once each.

Unfortunately, the team reverted to its anemic offense on Wednesday, notching only one run on five hits. Gavin Floyd's quality start (8 IP, 3 R) wasn't enough to overcome the lack of hitting. No one wins a lot of games by scoring just one run, and the Sox are just 3-22 (.120 percentage) when being outhit as they were yesterday.

The split leaves the Sox 5.5 games behind the Tigers, the only team in the division above .500. It reduces the Magic Number to 123. Now, it's on to KC for three games with the Royals. Go Sox!