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Dye, Iguchi help power White sox past Orioles

Jul 6, 2007 - 4:55 AM CHICAGO (Ticker) -- When the Chicago White Sox provide decent run-support for rookie John Danks, he usually takes care of the rest.

Danks pitched 6 1/3 effective innings and Jermaine Dye and Tadahito Iguchi each homered and drove in three runs apiece as the White Sox defeated the Baltimore Orioles, 11-6, on Thursday.

Jim Thome had two hits and also drove two and Juan Uribe also hit a two-run homer for Chicago, which has won eight of 11. The 11 runs were the most by the White Sox this year.

"Lately we've been swinging the bats pretty good," White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen said. "We've started to get better on offense and hopefully we continue to do that."

Chicago, which split four games with Baltimore, also avoided losing its first home series to the Orioles in over six years. Baltimore last won a road series here on June 29-July 1, 2001.

After the White Sox scored early and often in the first two innings, Danks (5-6) took over the rest of the way.

"It's great anytime you can pitch with a seven-run cushion," Danks said. "It makes my job a lot easier. These guys were great tonight. They made some great plays behind me and obviously put up a lot of runs."

The rookie allowed five runs, seven hits and a walk for his second win in his last three starts. The lefthander, who struck out three, is 5-0 when the team scores five-plus runs and 0-6 when the White Sox only tally three runs or less.

"It's obviously a lot more fun to win," Danks said. "We all feel great. We've won a few games here as of late, and hopefully we keep it going."

Danks ran out of gas in the seventh when, with a runner on second, he allowed a one-out single to Freddie Bynum before surrendering a two-run homer to Corey Patterson to make the score 10-5.

Guillen then replaced Danks with reliever Nick Masset, who retired the next two batters to get out of the frame.

In the bottom of the first, Iguchi lined a double into right-center field off rookie Brian Burres to put Chicago on the board. Jim Thome followed with an RBI single and advanced to second on a base hit by Paul Konerko. One out later, Dye smashed his 12th homer into the second row of seats in left field to give the White Sox a 5-0 lead.

"To put up five runs in the first gave everybody a lot of relief not to stress and to just go out there and have good at-bats," Dye said. "I think that kept everybody loose all night."

Chicago added two more in the second when Iguchi belted a 3-1 pitch from Burres (4-3) over the right field wall to increase the lead to 7-0.

The blast knocked the Orioles' rookie out of the game. The 26-year-old was tagged for a season-high seven runs, six hits and a walk in 1 1/3 innings. It was his shortest outing this season.

"Burres didn't have it," Orioles interim manager Dave Trembley said. "He pitched behind and was ball one it seemed on every batter. Then when he did throw it in the middle of the plate, they whacked it."

In the sixth, Uribe hit an opposite-field two-run homer and Iguchi tripled and later scored on Thome's groundout to make it 10-2. An RBI single by Josh Fields in the seventh completed the scoring for Chicago.

"I really believe Sox baseball is about getting consecutive hits, and keeping a rally going," said Iguchi through an interpreter. "We're finally getting back to what we're able to do. Hopefully we can get a lot of games like this in the second half."

Nick Markakis had two hits, including a two-run double, for Baltimore.