After a road trip that raised hopes of all fans of the White Sox, the team came home and laid an egg, at least on Friday. Bruce Chen is the best pitcher in the world. Well, that’s how it appears when he faces the Sox. Chen has pitched 20 innings against the Sox this year, and has given up only 2 earned runs. That is an ERA of 0 .90. I’ll give ya that Chen has developed in to a quality starter, but his dominance over the Sox is laughable. I don’t know if I should be upset that the lefty is so good against the Sox lefty, or the fact that they can’t hit the lefty.

The Sox announcers have lightened up on Chen. The first two starts they downplayed Chen’s transformation in to a good pitcher. Friday, they compared him to Mark Buehrle. Well, they said that he was the same type of pitcher that Buehrle is now. Take away the 2 Gold Gloves, 1 no hitter, 1 perfect game. an All-Star appearance and a World Title, and Chen is exactly like Buehrle. Did I mention that Buehrle has 103 more victories?

The Sox return to their home field was less than stellar. They were held to one hit for 7 innings, and the guy that got that one hit, A.J. Pierzynski had to leave the game after being hit on the wrist by a Chen pitch. That’s another problem I have, Chen has hit 5 batters in 3 starts against the Sox. The Sox either refuse, or don’t want to retaliate. Carlos Quentin has been plunked twice by the left hander. I’m not a believer that you need to retaliate every time a player gets hit, but 5 times. I liked baseball more when teams would repay a HBP with a HBP. Chen still has 1, maybe, 2 more starts against the Sox. I’m sure he’ll hit 2 or 3 more. BTW: AJ Pierzynski missed Saturday’s game with that wrist injury.

Could Alex Rios have had a worse evening on Friday? Rios left 7 runners on base, including leaving the bases loaded twice in the 1st and 3rd innings.

On a good note, Zack Stewart overcame some early wildness to pitch another good game. The Sox sure have a wealth of good starters, or should I say pitchers. The key is pitching coach Don Cooper, who doesn’t have a contract for next year. No big deal, Cooper has gone a number of years w/o a contract for the next season.

Jake Peavy is another one of those good starters. He has run in to some potholes as he continue to overcome last seasons lat injury. He threw another 115 pitches on Saturday, but didn’t get the win. Peavy, unlike earlier in his career, seems to have one bad inning per start. Saturday was the 6th inning, when he gave up 4 runs on 5 hits, a walk and an error.

I think we all know the best way for Paul Konerko not to continue to hurt his calf. Hit home runs. Konerko hit his 27th on Saturday, and didn’t make it around the bases very quickly.

Tyler Flowers, Pierzynski’s replacement, hit his first home run of the year. Flowers is gonna be the Sox starting catcher one day, so you better get used to seeing that name in the lineup.

I wasn’t sold that the Sox were gonna come back on Saturday, but thank’s to some Royal wildness, they did. 2hits and 3 walks in the 7th, including one that brought in the winning run allowed the to Sox escape with a 5-4 victory. They still trail the Tigers by 5 games.

I love Chicago, but why does it have to rain so damn much. A rain delay that lasted more than 2 hours. A game that started at 4, ended more than 5 hours later.

Did you see what Omar Vizquel did during one of the delays? He swept the water out of the dugout. Omar is one of the last vestiges to old time baseball. He loves the game, and would rather be out near the field, that listening to his head phones in the clubhouse. He does that during the spring, as well. While other players play with their iPads, Vizquel sits at his locker, talking to all comers.

Was there a bride behind the Sox dugout on Saturday? If that is true, what a way to spend your married day. Take that any way you want.

John Danks toes the rubber for the Sox tomorrow. Jeff Francis goes for KC. The Sox will try to improve on an American league worst 25 home victories.

Go Sox!