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White Sox hope to stay hot at home versus the Royals

Aug 12, 2011 - 3:03 PM (Sports Network) - Still alive in the hunt for AL Central supremacy, the Chicago White Sox hope their recent road success carries over into tonight's opener of a nine-game homestand, starting with a three-game series versus the Kansas City Royals.

The White Sox are four games behind Detroit for the division lead and just went 6-1 on a seven-game road trip through Minnesota and Baltimore. They will host Kansas City for three games this weekend before Cleveland and Texas touch down in the Windy City next week.

Chicago won two of three at the Orioles and got back into the win column with Thursday's 6-3 victory in the series finale from Camden Yards. Mark Buehrle is now 10-5 on the season after the left-hander held the O's in check with eight innings of three-run ball and six strikeouts. He did not walk a batter, while Sergio Santos came on in the ninth for his 25th save.

"We just can't go home and go 1-6 now," Buehrle said. "That seems like it's been our problem. We do this for a week and then we play bad for a week."

Juan Pierre finished with three hits and a pair of RBI, Alexei Ramirez hit a two-run homer and A.J. Pierzynski collected three hits for the White Sox. Chicago has lost six in a row at home and is the only AL team with a winning road record (34-27) and a losing mark at home (24-32).

Rookie Zach Stewart will make his second start for the White Sox and was acquired from Toronto. He earned his first major league win in Saturday's 6-1 decision at Minnesota, as he fired 6 1/3 innings of one-run ball and allowed eight hits with two strikeouts and one walk.

Stewart was 0-1 with a 4.86 ERA in three starts with the Blue Jays before being dealt to the Pale Hose. He will face Kansas City for the first time.

Meanwhile, the Royals have lost four straight and six of seven games, and lost all four meetings in Tampa Bay. In Thursday's 4-1 loss in the series finale, Royals starter Danny Duffy was saddled with the loss for giving up three runs and five hits in seven innings of work.

Eric Hosmer had the lone RBI and Melky Cabrera ended with three hits for Kansas City, which got two hits apiece from Salvador Perez, Mike Moustakas and Alcides Escobar.

"This is where it hurts. You start showing improvement, but you can't get over the hump in winning games," said Royals manager Ned Yost.

Yost is expected to have catcher Brayan Pena back behind the plate Friday after he was on paternity leave in Miami for the birth of his son. He is batting .257 with three home runs and a .298 on-base percentage in 62 games this season.

The Royals will hand the ball to Bruce Chen Friday night and the left-hander was able to get back into the win column his previous time out. Chen was 0-3 in four starts before beating Detroit in Sunday's 4-3 verdict, as he lasted five innings and allowed three runs with five K's and no walks.

Chen is 1-0 with a 1.29 ERA in two starts against the White Sox this season, but only 1-3 in 12 games, seven of which have been starts, lifetime in this matchup. He is also 2-4 in six road assignments in 2011.

Kansas City has won five of eight encounters with Chicago this season.