You thought that maybe momentum would be on the side of the Chicago White Sox as they played their final series before the All-Star break against the Minnesota Twins.  A series of major Central Division proportions against a rival surely would get the Sox playing at their highest level.  Add to that the Sox hadn't lost a series in a month and somehow you deluded yourself into believing that somehow this trip to the Horror Dome would be different.

As a wise, former coach once said "Not so fast my friend."

Poor starting pitching on Friday and Sunday sealed the Sox fate in the series.  First it was John Danks walking everyone except the Minnesota trainer in the first inning of Friday's game.  Yesterday, it was staff ace and lone All-Star Mark Buehrle getting hammered in less that four innings of work. 

Both pitchers put their team in holes they couldn't crawl out of, although Friday night both Danks and the Sox fought back to the point of coming close. Yesterday, the Sox got as close as three runs, but then a bullpen implosion took them out of the game for good in the seventh.  

Five days off might just be the tonic for a tired staff of pitchers, hopefully coming back fresh Friday night against the Orioles.

Lightning Round

• While The Savior has found his stride with his bat, he is nowhere near Major League level with his glove. Of course, the Sox have little defensive help organizationally with the similarly defensively challenged Josh Fields riding the bench and The Cuban Sandwich patrolling third at Birmingham.  Unfortunately, with the Cuban Missile at short and Chris Getz and Jayson Nix holding down second, there is nowhere to hide these guys.  The Cuban Sandwich may eventually wind up at either first or in left and Beckham will just have to keep working at it.  Sox fans have been spoiled the last few seasons by the magic of Joe Crede.
• The Cuban Sandwich made quite an impression at the Future's Game yesterday.
• The Sox seem to be taking their time in bring Carlos Quentin back.  This is actually good news as rushing him may just cause him to get hurt again.  Adding Q back to the lineup certainly will help, but it's a moot point if he goes down quickly thereafter.  The Sox do need him, as Scotty Podsednik's average has dipped almost twenty points in the last week.
• Rickhouse tries to accentuate the positive (Tremendous Upside Potential)
• Although his team leads the Twinkies and White Sox at the All-Star break, Mr. Grumpy is not in the mood to party (Deadspin)
• Beckham is having issues with his teammates.  In the modified words of Sam Axe, Bruce Campbell's character on "Burn Notice", "You know soccer players.  Just a bunch of bitchy little girls."
• Mark Buehrle wants a picture with The Savior.  No, not that one.  This one.
• Two of America's biggest stars will be working together at the All-Star game.
• Ron Santo is feeling better.  With all these celebrities dying off, this is good news.
• It's amazing how popular players are when they aren't getting much playing time.  This year's Caleb Haney award goes to Aaron Poreda.
• Larry does his outstanding weekly farm report.  (South Side Sox)
• He gone.  Eric Wedge, you are on the clock. . .
• In our ongoing series of former Sox done good, Ooh Ooh says no to perfection.  He didn't do good for himself as much as he did good for the other team. (Sox and the City)
• I want to add just a quick note about yesterday's 30th anniversary of Disco Demolition Night.  I was 18 at the time and working at a summer job getting ready for my first semester at SIU.  To this day, I have loathed Steve Dahl for this.  The people who showed up for this event weren't Sox fans, they were a bunch of losers, jerks and stoners wanting to blow something up.  I found no humor in this event at all as it cost the White Sox a forfeit and a lot of national embarrassment.  It's bad enough the 1979 White Sox were a pathetic baseball team.  This event didn't help.   For you younger folks that think this was funny, here's a similar event that went way wrong that was also the subject of national ridicule. It's the same thing, different  shape. (South Side Sox)