You Are Not Your Embarrassing Fenway Series

Andrew Reilly · Posted on

In the movie Fight Club, Tyler Durden tells the narrator that “Hitting bottom is not a weekend retreat.”

Obviously Mr. Durden was not intended to be much of a baseball enthusiast, lest he foresee weekend retreats like the one the Good Guys just took to Boston. In summation, over the past 27 innings of baseball my beloved Chicago White Sox have:

  • Been outscored 29-10 despite only being outhit 31-25.
  • Handed out 20 walks while drawing 8.
  • Given up a grand slam to a Boston shortstop whose .225 average actually exceeds that of four players on the White Sox’ current 25-man roster.
  • Plunked two Red Sox batters.
  • Given up more runs in the seventh inning of Saturday’s game (seven) than they scored all game in any of the weekend’s three games (highest was today’s five).
  • Stranded 15 runners.
  • Turned a bases-loaded-with-no-outs situation into zero runs. Twice. In the same game.
  • Walked in three straight runs for Boston.
  • Moved team RBI leader Paul Konerko into a tie for 16th in the AL (58).
  • Moved team loss leader Jose Contreras into a tie for most losses in all of baseball (12).
  • Raised call-up Ehren Wassermann’s ERA 20 points in the space of five batters and two outs.
  • Fallen into a tie for last place in the AL Central.

Speaking of movies, on Saturday, Eight Men Out was on at the same time as the White Sox-Red Sox game. For those who haven’t seen it, it’s a Hollywood retelling of the 1919 Black Sox team that threw the World Series. And you know, I was flipping back and forth between those 1919 Sox getting mauled on the old-timey movie lot and the 2007 Sox getting mauled on Boston’s old-timey baseball diamond, and for a moment I could’ve sworn that was Charlie Sheen striking out against Kason Gabbard. It wasn’t, of course, but it would’ve been nice to think that for only a moment, this horrifying weekend was all an act and the real team was winning in splendid fashion on another channel.

But it wasn’t. And they weren’t winning anywhere. And even in the movies, they end up failing us in spectacular fashion. God I hate this team.