Garcia lights out in daytime starts

Garcia improved to 9-0 this season in 10 starts during the day as the White Sox salvaged the final game of the series with an 11-2 rout.

“They changed [the time], I was lucky,” Garcia said after moving to 13-11 overall this season.

“I felt pretty good,” he said. “I had every pitch today?fastball, slider, changeup?I threw for strikes.”

Garcia had plenty of offensive support as the Sox slammed five home runs in what is normally a tough park to hit in.

“It’s unbelievable,” Sox manager Ozzie Guillen said. “I thought we were playing in U.S. Cellular Field the way the ball was jumping out of here.”

Carlos Lee hit two home runs?including a grand slam?and had six RBIs. Lee is one RBI away from consecutive 30-homer, 100-run, 100-RBI seasons.

Ross Gload, Juan Uribe and Joe Borchard also homered.

For all the blame for this lost season on injuries to Magglio Ordonez and Frank Thomas, the Sox have more than made up for their loss in the home run department.

The five they hit Wednesday gave them 236 for the season, shattering the club record 220 they set only last season.

The Sox hope to be more of a well-rounded team next season and not rely as much on the long ball. They would like to feature pitching and defense so those plans may bear fruit if they get performances out of Garcia next season like they did Wednesday.

Garcia pitched seven shutout innings, allowing five hits and three walks while striking out eight. It was only the second time since joining the Sox on June 27 that he didn’t allow a run.

“I’ve seen him throw the ball better,” Guillen said. “He has been kind of inconsistent with us. He hasn’t been the guy we know we’re going to have next year. He’s a big part of this organization for the next three years and the guy we are going to count on.”

Garcia is at a loss to explain his success during the day. The numbers are as different as, well, night and day.

Under the lights, Garcia is 4-11 with a 4.46 ERA. Aside from his perfect 9-0 record, Garcia’s ERA is two full runs better during the day at 2.43.

“I don’t know; it’s just happened this year,” Garcia said. “Maybe if I pitched in all day games I would have a better record.”

One thing is certain, in the future teams will be checking the Sox pitching rotation before changing the times of their games.

Extra innings

The victory Wednesday gave the Sox at least 80 wins for the fifth straight season. ? Gload extended his hitting streak to 13 games. He’s hitting .435 during the streak. Gload came into the game second in the AL with his .419 average in September. ? The grand slam was the eighth of Lee’s career and also his ninth multihomer game. Lee extended his errorless streak to 163 games. ? Juan Uribe has a modest six-game hitting streak, during which he has hit .391 with three home runs and eight RBIs. ? Borchard had three more strikeouts to go along with his home run. He has struck out 55 times in 187 at-bats.