John E. Sokolowski – USA TODAY Sports
The Chicago White Sox are not running on all cylinders right now: they have a small fraction of their roster on the DL, most of their hitters are hitting way below their career norms and they have been wasting plenty of quality starts from their starting pitchers. However, they came into tonight’s game against the Tampa Bay Rays winning their last two contests. As the great fake manager Lou Brown once said, “three would be a winning streak, it has happened before”. Well, after defeating the Rays 5-4 — it’s official! The White Sox are on a winning streak! While the win is all fine and dandy, the story of the game is the bench of the Chicago White Sox.
Coming into the season, the bench was one of the many areas that concerned me about the team: I think Dewayne Wise is the worst, I never heard of Hector Gimenez, Conor Gillaspie was a cast-off from the San Francisco Giants and no one could have expected much out of Angel Sanchez. Because of injuries and shaky overall production from some of their starters, all of these guys — sans Sanchez, sub in Tyler Greene — are getting more playing time than expected. For tonight’s game, Robin Ventura strutted out Gillapsie, who is a regular now, Gimenez and Greene. Not exactly Murderer’s Row by any means, but those three combined to hit three home runs and drive in four of the White Sox five runs.
If it wasn’t for the emergence of the White Sox bench, things would probably be even worse on the Southside. What else can I say, really? This bench just must have the will to win. #TWTW
