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<\/a>Detroit has taken control of the AL Central race by taking three of four in Minnesota over the weekend and now return home to face a team that is just 4.5 games back in the standings.\u00a0 The Tigers used a big third inning to drop the Twins in a 5-2 win at Target Field Sunday afternoon.\u00a0 \u201cIt was a good win for us,\u201d commented Tigers manager Jim Leyland.\u00a0 \u201cWe got some big hits.\u00a0 To take three out of four, that\u2019s not easy to do.\u201d\u00a0 The club has dominated divisional foes this year, entering this series with a 22-11 record.\u00a0 That number could improve by the middle of this week, as the Tigers have won 14 of the last 18 meetings with today\u2019s opponent.\u00a0 Detroit is 20-11 versus left-handed starters and 26-19 when playing teams with a losing record.<\/p>\n
Tigers starting pitcher Duane Below will be making his second career start, as he was handed a no-decision in a 7-5 home loss versus the Athletics.\u00a0 The left-hander allowed three runs (one earned) and five hits over five frames in the effort.\u00a0 He tossed 77 pitches in the outing and bounced back nicely after losing some velocity in the middle frames.\u00a0 \u201cIt made me nervous because he dropped a little bit in velocity at one point, but he picked back up again,\u201d Leyland stated.\u00a0 Below will be facing the White Sox for the first time in his career.<\/p>\n
Chicago may be two games below .500 for the year, but the clubhouse has never felt better after a 4-2 road victory over the Indians Sunday.\u00a0 The White Sox benefited from numerous mistakes made by the Indians and certainly nobody is complaining.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t think we have had many breaks like that,\u201d said designated hitter Adam Dunn.\u00a0 \u201cI can\u2019t think of one time this year when we had something like that go our way.\u201d\u00a0 The club has now posted a 38-29 record since May 7, the fifth-best record in the AL over that span, moving within striking distance of tonight\u2019s opponent.\u00a0 Pitching has been key for the squad since the All-Star break, as the staff has posted a 1.87 ERA.\u00a0 The bullpen has enjoyed an even longer amount of success, recording a 0.99 ERA over the last 21 games.\u00a0 Chicago is 13-13 versus left-handed starters and 21-25 at home this year.<\/p>\n
White Sox starting pitcher Mark Buehrle is 7-5 with a 3.38 ERA in 19 starts this season and has led the club to five consecutive victories.\u00a0 He is coming off a 5-2 road win over the Royals, allowing two runs and five hits over seven strong innings.\u00a0 The veteran left-hander is a solid 4-1 with a 2.47 ERA in nine home outings, issuing just 11 walks in 62 innings.\u00a0 In 32 career appearances (31 starts) versus the Tigers, Buehrle has collected a 17-9 mark and 3.22 ERA, including a 6-4 win at U.S. Cellular Field on June 3.\u00a0 He allowed three runs and 10 hits over six frames in that contest.<\/p>\n
Bettors will likely back the Tigers due to their 13-3 record on the road versus left-handed starters, while the White Sox are 1-5 as a home favorite<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Detroit Tigers and Chicago White Sox begin a crucial three-game series in the American League Central race Monday night at U.S. Cellular Field Detroit Tigers at Chicago White Sox Detroit has taken control of the AL Central race by taking three of four in Minnesota over the weekend and now return home to face […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4526,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[1784,171,48,5072,2268,1810],"class_list":["post-16634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-american-league-central","tag-chicago-white-sox","tag-detroit-tigers","tag-duane-below","tag-mark-buehrle","tag-u-s-cellular-field"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16634"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16636,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16634\/revisions\/16636"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}