--Manager Ozzie Guillen is already getting a good idea about his 12-man pitching staff, and what it will take to be successful. Problem is, some might not like his answer. "The key is going to be, to me, (Mike) MacDougal, (D.J.) Carrasco and Clayton Richard," Guillen said. "Those guys do no less or no more that they should do, this pitching staff is going to be fine. But if two of those three guys do well, we are going to be good. If one of those three guys do good, it will be tough for us to compete. All of a sudden, I have to overuse (Matt) Thornton, (Octavio) Dotel and (Scott) Linebrink. We have to be careful with those guys too because it's a long season."
--Pitching coach Don Cooper said that he was happy with the way the current starting rotation is setting up, now that they flipped John Danks and Jose Contreras with the rainout in Detroit earlier in the week. The team has an off day on Monday, but Cooper said things will stay as is. The key in switching the two was Danks is now a buffer between Contreras and Colon, lessening the chance that manager Ozzie Guillen would have to go deep into the bullpen on back-to-back days. --Thursday's 3-1 win over the Rays at Tropicana Field was a good sign for the White Sox, especially since they were a dismal 4-16 on turf last season. But manager Ozzie Guillen feels this 2009 version is better equipped to handle games on the fake stuff.
"We played Toronto, Minnesota and these guys," Guillen said. "Minnesota always played well there. These guys do well in this park, and Toronto destroyed us in their park. Last year, playing here, we should have swept them (in a late-May series) the way we played. We got people on base, all over the place, boom, home run, we lose the game. We have an opportunity to sweep them and when we went home, it was the opposite. And I wasn't too happy with it because I thought we could have beat them and we competed well against them. We played good against them, it's just whoever has the
best shot to win the game, and it's a matter of who has the best shot this year."
--DH Jim Thome, who played three seasons in Philadelphia, was saddened by the news that longtime Phillies announcer Harry Kalas died Monday afternoon. "Very sad," Thome said. "I mean, the short time that I spent there in Philly, you know, he was just a legend. I remember sitting on the bus with him and the conversations, you just wanted to hear him talk. His voice was so legendary. He represented the Phillies for a lot of years. His voice was Philadelphia."
BY THE NUMBERS: 27 -- Of the first 52 pitches thrown by Mike MacDougal this season, only 27 were strikes. That's why the reliever posted a 7.71 ERA over that span and already had Ozzie Guillen second-guessing the decision to put him on the roster.
QUOTE TO NOTE: "He's the manager, and I guess if he feels that moving me down in the lineup will get me going, I'm cool with it. It's still early. I know I didn't do much at the top of the order in those two games, but at the same time, regardless of where I am in the lineup, Ozzie still has me back in there. I have to go out there and just keep playing." -- CF Dewayne Wise on his demotion from the leadoff spot to the bottom of the order after just two games.
