Detroit Tigers give White Sox captain Comerica Park's first base, and Felix Hernandez stumbles
Paul Konerko received the last of his parting gifts from opponents, as Detroit first-base coach and former White Sox teammate Omar Vizquel presented Konerko with a framed first base and dirt for Comerica Park's right-handed batter's box.
I'm pretty sure Cleveland and the custom Les Paul win this one, not that people are keeping score. Some people just really like guitars.
At any rate, Konerko may have played his last game on the road, which leaves four games at home. Robin Ventura said Konerko is scheduled to play on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, so plan the rest of the week accordingly.
On the Konerko Koverage front, Colleen Kane wrote an excellent story about what comes next, mostly because isn't entirely about Konerko. His post-baseball future has been asked/speculated about endlessly, and Konerko doesn't add much to it. But Kane offers insight by covering a fairly wide spectrum of post-career careers, citing discussions with:
- Adam Dunn, who started learning about investing early.
- Steve Stone, who had a TV job waiting for him after retirement.
- Mike Huff, who worked in real estate before hooking up with the Bulls/Sox Academy
- Mark Salas, who did side work as an electrician
And up in Toronto, Mark Buehrle was asked about a farewell tour when his time is up:
No, no, I think you know that. The whole reason I'm not going to announce anything is because I don't want to have to deal with the media every time you go to a new city where they're going to, that city's media is going to want to talk to you about retiring. Just as I came into the league, I'm going to go out of the league. I came in as a quiet, young, non-prospect guy and I'm going to go out playing.
Chris Sale's flat night against the Royals knocked him out of the American League Cy Young race, but that doesn't mean you can engrave Felix Hernandez's name on it.
No, Hernandez added to the Mariners' woes with a disaster start against Toronto, allowing eight earned runs over 4⅔ innings. That comes after Corey Kluber struck out 14 batters for the second straight outing, which, combined with Hernandez's stumble, sets up a photo finish for their last starts, and without a postseason appearance to serve as a tiebreaker.
Here's how they stack up (bWAR listed first):
| W-L | ERA | GS | IP | H | HR | BB | K | ERA+ | WAR | |
| Hernandez | 14-6 | 2.34 | 33 | 230.2 | 170 | 16 | 46 | 241 | --- | --- |
| Kluber | 17-9 | 2.53 | 33 | 227.2 | 202 | 14 | 49 | 258 | 147 | 6.9/7.0 |
| Sale | 12-4 | 2.20 | 25 | 168 | 125 | 13 | 36 | 198 | 177 | 6.2/5.2 |
(*I'll update Hernandez's last two columns when FanGraphs and Baseball-Reference.com do.)
While Sale looks like a third-place finisher, he has a shot at winning the ERA title if he can hold down the Tigers this afternoon. That's the same team Chris Bassitt and Scott Carroll limited to one earned run over 13⅔ innings combined, so Sale really has no excuse for slipping up himself.
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