Meet Me in St. Louis – Lineups 6/12
The Sox go from the last team to suffer a loss by their hand before being given World Series rings to paying a visit to the man that called that game from the booth. John Rooney is in the house, y’all. Some would call the Rooney and Farmer days of White Sox radio something of a golden age. The Sox were winning and Farmio wasn’t saddled with full play-by-play duties. Rooney would go on to call his second consecutive World Series victory the following year with the Cardinals, and he’s been there ever since. I’m sure A.J. and Paulie will go up for a chat, Farmer will hold his gnarled fingers out for a handshake (seriously, have you seen his hands?), and then everybody will go back to the business of watching or playing in a baseball game.
Managing those baseball games, a couple of rookies in a battle of the inexperienced skippers as Robin Ventura and Mike Matheny both guide teams that lost long tenured managers in the off-season. Or, maybe just close to the off-season if your manager decided enough was enough with a couple games left. It’s been a while since the Sox were last in St. Louis, J.J. Stankevitz has some of the particulars for your perusal if you were curious as to how that went. Some particulars for this matchup:
1.De Aza – CF
2.Gordo – 2B
3.Dunn – LF
4.Paulie – 1B
5.Rios – RF
6.AJ – C
7.Alexei – SS
8.Hudson – 3B
9.Quintana – P
What we have up there could very well be a mess. Last time we put Adam Dunn in left field Paul Konerko almost lost his vision. Ok well maybe that wasn’t related, Paulie taking one to the face spared us from having to guffaw every time a ball took flight in the direction of left field for a while. Odds are this week there will be many guffaws. Ventura has indicated that he intends to have Adam Dunn play out in left field the majority of the time that interleague takes place in N.L. parks. The price we have to pay, I suppose. It may not be so bad; last season the Cardinals put an aging Lance Berkman in the outfield everyday and they won the World Series.
Jose Quintana will yield a bat in what may end up being his final turn in the rotation for a bit, depending on what Ventura elects to do about John Danks returning from the DL. That’s a debate best saved for a little later in the week, though. Adam Wainwright is on the mound for the Cards. Having missed all of last season following surgery, this year he’s been trying to regain his form but that objective has not been met with a great deal of success. He’s mixed a solid start or two into his various rough outings but unfortunately for St. Louis it’s the latter type that makes up the majority. The White Sox are proving to be a road team, and this is a road game, so it’s time to win.