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It's a new day and the Orioles still must win. They need to close out the season 19-4 to match last year's record. As I ask every day, will 93 wins even be enough? Would 90 be enough? That "only" takes a 16-7 mark in the final 23 games.
The good news is that tonight they'll be facing John Danks of the White Sox, who is left-handed and has a fastball that averages 89.2 miles per hour. If you've been paying even cursory attention to this season, you know that is not in fact good news at all, because that means their nemesis this night is the dreaded soft-tossing lefty. Game over, man.
This is the lineup of the damned:
#Orioles lineup vs white sox: Roberts 4 Machado 5 jones 8 Davis 3 Wieters 2 hardy 6 Markakis 9 morse 7 Valencia DH. Feldman RHP
— Roch Kubatko (@masnRoch) September 6, 2013
Danks is from Round Rock, Texas. Do you think Jim Palmer might have something to say about that?
He's been around for long enough that several Orioles have significant action against him over the years. Whether this year's version of those O's hitters are better than this year's version of Danks, we will find out tonight. Danks pitched seven innings and gave up only two runs back on July 2 against the O's.
The ugliest of the ugly numbers belong to Adam Jones, who has faced Danks 28 times and has one hit and one walk.
Your White Sox lineup:
Alejandro De Aza CF
Gordon Beckham 2B
Jeff Keppinger 3B
Adam Dunn DH
Paul Konerko 1B
Jordan Danks RF
Dayan Viciedo LF
Josh Phegley C
Leury Garcia SS
Konerko has had good numbers off Feldman in the past, with a .983 OPS in 26 plate appearances, but that was a younger Konerko. Beckham is 5-16 with two doubles and a home run. Those are very good numbers, but Dunn and Viciedo both have terrible ones with a .154 average across 13 at-bats apiece.
The Chicago offense is terrible and Feldman needs to make sure they stay terrible tonight, because the soft-tossing lefty factor is in effect. The Orioles can lose a few more games on the season, but they don't want to use up one of those losses against an awful Chicago team.