2015-4 April in Windy City

[Fat Nige]

May 1st, 2015

It may have been a shaky start for the Black Sox with several members of the rotation carrying around ERA’s near 8.00 after two starts but by the end of the month the Black Sox had steadied the ship somewhat. OK the middle of the rotation were looking at ERA’s still north of 5.00 but only two had losing records and the hitters were starting to make contact.

It wasn’t such a bad start for most teams but it was below what the Sox fans had come to expect. The opening series was won 2-1 against the Moonshiners but the Black Sox never turned up in Game 3 and were deservedly pummelled 9-0. Hawaii came to Chicago next and after they won the opener by one run were then shutout 1-0 & 5-0. The first series on the road in Louisville proved a bit of a disaster when Sox won the opener but went down in the next three including two shutouts. A 2-1 series win was then taken in Valencia before the Black Sox returned to Chicago to win the series against Yellow Springs 2-1 but once again the third game was a shocker with the Nines already 10 runs to the good before the Black Sox were on the board. A rare trip to Des Moines yielded a 2-1 series win before the Sox swept the Suns 3-0 in Marquette. Once again it was the home series that posed the problems as Birmingham left Chicago with a 3-0 sweep of the Sox. The Black Sox finished the month on a high though, winning the first two games of the series against New Orleans.

Tom MacDonald was his old imperious self with a 5-1, 2.36 ERA record and only Jason Brooks hadn’t won at least two games. No-one in the bullpen had lost a game and opponents were hitting less than .100 against Victor Waller & Craig Murray. Free agent signing Greg Hampton was proving a bit wayward in his rookie campaign, walking 13 in his 17 IP while only striking out six but in his defence he did come into some right jams created by the slow starting rotation, Josh Kennelly picked up some of that flak as well but better control (16/1 K/BB ratio) meant he only gave up five runs as opposed to Greg’s 13. Jonathan Sorensen was his reliable self converting all 10 save opportunities with just three runs across the plate and a 12/1 K/BB ratio.

Several well lauded batters failed to produce in April and some lost their jobs as a result but no-one could have predicted that a rookie would lead the team in homers at the end of the month. This was supposed to be the year Walter H. Uno finally established himself but a .193/.258/.351 hitting display saw Roberto Montoya (.301/.311/.438) regaining the first base role before the end of April. Nicholas Christodoulou also failed to hit above .200 and May will see Xander Jones once more taking the bulk of left field duties. Bart Lavigne hasn’t exactly excelled in centre field with a -5.2 ZR rating a the moment but his hot bat makes up for that, hitting in the #2 hole his slash line for April was .370/.424/.491 and he leads the team with four steals. Eric Thorne has had a good start to his search for his fifth straight 20+ homer season hitting five in the first month but the shock leader in long balls is rookie catcher Jake Norton who as well as clubbing six homers, one shy of his pro career best, has hit .362/.388/.675 with an OPS of 1.063.