The Chicago White Sox have been on fire under Miguel Cairo. They are 11-4 since he took over following the departure of Tony La Russa because of a medical condition. After beating the Cleveland Guardians team that they trail in the division on Thursday, they sit 3.0 games back.
Now, the White Sox need to keep the momentum going if they want to come back and catch those Guardians. They play them three times next week but they have a three-game set with the Detroit Tigers coming up this weekend starting on Friday.
Honestly, the White Sox would be much better off if they swept the Tigers. At 54-89, the Tigers have no business beating the White Sox. You would hope that the White Sox have enough desperation to beat these guys.
At the same time, the Guardians will be facing off the against the Minnesota Twins who have all of the sudden fallen off. The Twins allowed the Guardians to sweep them last week which is partially why the White Sox are in this mess right now.
The Chicago White Sox need a sweep and some help from within the division.
If Minnesota can get at least one win against them while the White Sox sweep Detroit, that would really help. The series between the White Sox and Guardians next week is obviously the most important thing but sweeping the Tigers would really help out.
It won’t be the end if they only take two of three but you’d like to come into that series with Cleveland down 2.0 or 3.0 games in the division. Of course, if it was even less that would be better but both teams atop the division are playing great baseball right now.
It is all going to start on Friday for the White Sox in Detroit. Lucas Giolito is going to face Matt Manning of the Detroit Tigers.
Giolito has had a rather up-and-down year that probably has had more downs than ups. A big game from him here would be huge. They didn’t trust him to face Cleveland on Thursday so he was pushed back to pitch in this game.
Getting Giolito some run support early would really help him. This team has shown the ability to score runs lately which might help him if they are able to do so in this one. It is certainly easier to pitch with a lead.
On Saturday, Johnny Cueto is going to face Eduardo Rodriguez. That is a matchup that the White Sox like as Cueto has been brilliant this season but he needs to go out there and have a good start after a rough one last time out.
To close out the series on Sunday, Michael Kopech is going to be facing off against Drew Hutchison. It should be a great way for the White Sox to cap off what we hope is a winning series for them. Again, this is a very important set of games for them as they try to win a division.