USA TODAY International Edition
Hit parade in Series a surprise
Pitchers not ruling games as expected
HOUSTON — Match up the second- and thirdranked pitching staffs in baseball and two offenses that rely on manufacturing runs in the World Series, and you’d expect lines of zeroes on the scoreboard.
But the Chicago White Sox and Houston Astros are defying conventional wisdom again. They combined for 21 runs on 38 hits through the 7 rst two games of the Series.
The Go-Go Sox have turned into the Going, Going, Gone Sox, hitting four home runs in the two games; the Astros have eight extra-base hits, including two homers.
“I thought I would see better pitching performances because our pitching staff is pretty good and so is theirs,” White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen said.
“Right now they’re not throwing the ball the way people thought.”
The Astros staff 7 nished the regular season with the secondbest earned run average in the majors ( behind the St. Louis Cardinals) at 3.51, and the White Sox tied the Cleveland Indians for third at 3.61. They sent a total of 7 ve pitcherst o the All- Star Game — Chicago’s Mark Buehrle and Jon Garland and Houston’s Roger Clemens, Roy Oswalt and Brad Lidge.
Clemens’ hamstring problems and early exit from Game 1 wasu nexpected, and both teams’ usually reliable bullpensy ielded leads in Chicago’sw ild 7-6 victory in Game 2 Sunday.
“ I think people underestimate the ability of both these teams to score runs and the resiliency of both of us,” White Sox out 7 elder Aaron Rowand said.
Astros third baseman Morgan Ensberg said he didn’t 7 nd the 7 rst two games particularly surprising. “ If it were 15- 12 that would jar me, but this just seems to be within the realm of baseball to me.”
Small ball isn’t exactly dead — both clubs are still sacri 7 cing and moving runners over — but it has been overtaken by power, such as Paul Konerko’s grand slam and Scott Podsednik’s game- winning homer.
“ We’ve played a little bit of small ball, it’s just not winning,” Houston manager Phil Garner said. Big blast: Scott Podsednik connectst o win Game 2.