Twins vs. White Sox News And Notes

Schedule (all games FSN)

• Friday: 7:10pm, Esmerling Vasquez vs. Chris Sale
  
• Saturday: 12:10pm, Samuel Deduno vs. Jose Quintana
  
• Sunday: 1:10pm, Scott Diamond vs. Jake Peavy
  

White Sox Notes

• The Sox still lead the division by a game, after dropping two of three to Detroit and having yesterday's game get rained out. They'll make up that game on Monday, the final game between the teams, after Detroit makes a weekend trip to Cleveland and the Sox spend the weekend in Minnesota.
• The postponed game means that Chris Sale will start tonight's game, not Francisco Liriano as originally scheduled. Liriano was moved to the bullpen and then back into the rotation, but now stays in the bullpen, which is confusing - but I think you'll agree, entirely in keeping with the Francisco Liriano way of doing things.
  
• Despite the Sox's easy fixes for Liriano's problems, the lefty still had a 5.09 ERA in his eight starts for Chicago, and walked everybody. On behalf of Twins fans, I'd like to say: AHAHAHHAHAHH HAHAHAHA YOU GUYS THOUGHT YOU COULD FIX HIM, HOW DUMB ARE YOU AHAHAH HAHAHAHA
• You should be aware that everybody hates Robin Ventura right now.

Twins Notes

• Matt Capps played long toss on Wednesday, which means... I don't know, exactly. Maybe he'll be around to blow one final save as a Twin, sometime before the season's over?
• Cole De Vries is done for the season, after taking a line drive in the ribs that cracked one of them. That seems like a pretty bad way to go out.
• Meanwhile, Joe Mauer missed games with back spasms last week, which means that Joe Mauer is getting old. That first back problem is always a milestone, isn't it? You reach for something on the floor and tears come to your eyes and suddenly all of life - stairs, sidewalks, slightly long grass - is frightening.
  
• Ryan Doumit has a strained left oblique, presumably caused by accidentally throwing the ball into the stands while trying to return it to the infield.
• Chris Parmelee is also battling a sore groin muscle, though he did get a pinch-hit last night.
• Denard Span is back in the lineup, which is nice to see - I genuinely thought we might not see him again. Josh Willingham also started last night, albeit at DH; his hamstring has meant he's only played in the field twice this month.