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Everett homers twice, Crede once for win
By Kelly Thesier / MLB.com


Joe Crede's two-run blast in the fifth off Kyle Lohse tied the game at 3.

CHICAGO -- For Ozzie Guillen, a win is a win, but Monday night's victory over the Twins might have meant a little bit more to the White Sox manager.
After getting berated on talk radio and in the newspapers Monday for his comments about Frank Thomas, Guillen admitted afterward that the 5-4 win over Minnesota helped put a good finish to an otherwise tough day.

"I think my day finished real great," Guillen said. "I had a tough day today and everybody knows about it.

"Having this win makes everybody feel better, myself included after the rough day I had today."

While the win may have soothed over the storm of media attention focused on the Sox, it was not the type of win Guillen would normally like to see.

"We did not play the way we should be playing or the way we should be pitching," Guillen said. " I think we tried to beat ourselves today. But the team, they believed in themselves and believed that they can do it."

Jose Contreras struggled in this third start of the season. Without strong pitching, the White Sox had to again rely on their offense to come up with the big hits when it counted. In what is becoming a trend, those hits came in the form of home runs.

Carl Everett hit two home runs, a solo shot in the first and a two-run blast in the sixth. Joe Crede added a two-run homer of his own in the fifth.

Crede's home run tied the game at 3 after the Twins battled back from a 1-0 deficit in the first to take a 3-1 lead. Contreras' inability to find the plate gave the Twins plenty of scoring chances. The Twins scored one in the second off an RBI single by Michael Cuddyer. Another two runs in the fifth off a balk and a wild pitch by Contreras would put the Twins up by two.

"The play with the balk got me a little out of control and I thought I got a little emotional," Contreras said. "I lost the zone there but there is nothing you can do about that."

Contreras was pulled after the wild pitch. He lasted only 4 2/3 innings while allowing three runs, two earned, on six hits with four walks and two strikeouts. Along with his balk and the wild pitch, Contreras also hit a batter.

While the Twins were able to produce some runs off Contreras, the team could not take full advantage of the right-hander's control problems. The visitors left 10 men on base and went 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position.

"Man, we were all around home plate," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We just couldn't seem to touch it. (Contreras) battled enough and made enough big pitches to get himself out of it. By no way was that a masterpiece."

Contreras himself seemed to agree with Gardenhire's assessment of his outing. The right-hander said that he struggled to get anything working and couldn't find a rhythm while pitching.

"I couldn't dominate my zone," Contreras said. "The splitter wasn't working at all today and the slider wasn't hitting the spots and I couldn't find the fastball."

With the score tied at 3 heading into the sixth, Everett hit his second homer of the night to put the Sox up 5-3.

"My second at-bat, the fly out, I realized they were going to throw more fastballs to me," Everett said. "I knew they were going to throw me more so I was going after it."

The multi-home run game was the 17th of Everett's career and his first since April 17, 2003 in a game at Toronto.

The Twins attempted one last comeback in the top of the ninth when Joe Mauer hit a solo home run off Shingo Takatsu. The right-hander then retired the next two batters to earn his fourth save.

The win over the Twins puts the White Sox alone in first place at the top of the American League Central. The two teams will square off for one more game Tuesday night before not facing each other again until August.