From down by 5, to clinging to a 2 run lead with the tying run aboard in the 7th, to watching Jenks finish the save with the tying run at the plate, this was quite the game. When the Sox went down a few runs early and Johnny Cueto on the mound it was seemingly over before it started, but that was far from the case.
Unlikely homeruns from Gordon Beckham, Scott Podsednik, and A.J. Pierzynski were able to bring the Sox back in and then the long one by Alexei gave the Sox the lead. I was seeing flashes of the old White Sox, but I was also weary of what parts of the old Sox we were seeing.
I'm not going to come on this blog and complain that the Sox scored 10 runs including 8 unanswered at a time, but I'm praying we are not going to become reliant on the home run again. Too many years did we sit through that where it was feast or famine, score a hundred or score none.
Maybe it was just the ballpark playing small last night in Cincinnati (it is known for that) or maybe it was a breakthrough for some of the guys last night. But I hope for two things after watching that game.
1) We continue to score runs at that pace. It was nice to see the Sox being smoked and then find their way all the way back, only to take over the lead and hold it.
2) The Sox do not fall into the same mold we saw for years and years in the past in regards to scoring high percentages of runs on homeruns. I don't think it's going to be a problem because of the athleticism this team has, but I just don't think I can go through that again.
As a whole though, it was nice to see a poorly pitched, poorly defended game find it's way into the Sox win column. And for me it's nice to get back to writing something positive in this space.
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