With Phil Humber's perfect game barely a week old, fellow Chicago White Sox starter Gavin Floyd tried to make that a distant memory on Sunday against the Boston Red Sox. Unfortunately for Floyd, he lost the perfect game in the fifth with a walk and lost his bid for a no-hitter in the seventh, when Dustin Pedroia grounded a single up the middle.

Floyd still managed to limit the Red Sox to only one run in his 6 2/3 innings of work as the White Sox held on for a 4-1 victory, ending a five-game slide and avoiding a four game sweep.

“Gavin just had it,” manager Robin Ventura said. “I don’t know if you can sit there and kind of visualize a perfect game, no-hitter, I think people were probably doing that. But he's been that way. He's just been consistent, just locating and his off-speed pitches have been great.”

While pointing out that Floyd’s curveball was great as usual, catcher A.J. Pierzynski credited the use of his fastball for his success on the day. Pierzynksi said that Floyd had gone to his slider in big situations in the past, but today went with the fastball and caught the hitters off-guard.

With the White Sox holding on to a slim lead and facing a potent Boston lineup that has proven they can score in bunches, Pierzynski knew that the focus had to be on keeping the Red Sox off the board.

“You don’t even worry about that [no-hitter] stuff until the seventh, eighth inning,” said Pierzynski, who was behind the plate for Humber’s perfect game. “Gavin pitched well. He deserves a ton of credit. There was never a thought of perfect game or no-hitter or any of that stuff. You are trying to get through because you know at any moment they could strike for a bloop and then a home run and they are right back in the game.”

However, when Floyd was asked if he the thought of perfection had entered his mind, he gave a different point of view.


“Absolutely,” Floyd said with a smile. “Especially since Phil did it recently, so it was natural. But obviously you've got to put it behind you. Your object is to get in there as late as you can and if it happens, it happens. You've just got to keep your focus and keep attacking.”

Floyd exited with two outs in the seventh, ending the day with only three hits allowed while striking out nine and walking only one. It was the second consecutive strong performance from a White Sox starter. A welcome sight after they allowed 10 runs in each of the first two games of the series.

“I think we feed off each other,” Floyd said of the starting pitchers’ success early in the season. “I think we learn from each other and have some talks and try to have a game plan and go out there and try to do our best. We have five starters that can be really good any game and just try to focus on what you can do that day.”

After the Sox offense hung Jake Peavy out to dry in a 1-0 loss on Saturday, Floyd was the beneficiary of some early offense. The White Sox touched up Josh Beckett for three quick runs in the first inning, including a two-run homer off the bat of slugger Adam Dunn.

“Whenever you get a guy like [Beckett], you gotta score early,” Dunn said. “He’s a workhorse man, those guys only get better. Usually your best chance to get runs is early and we were able to do that.”

It was Dunn’s fifth home run of the season -- which puts him in a tie for the team lead with Paul Konerko -- a feat he didn’t accomplish last season until May 24. Dunn also added two walks and now has a .368 on-base percentage and is slugging .513 as he attempts to bounce back from a disastrous 2011.

“He swung it good the other night but the conditions were, everywhere he hit it the wind was blowing in,” Ventura said. “He probably would have had two the other night. But he's had some good at-bats. It's nice to see he's still bringing that consistency and getting his walks at the same time.”

Though Matt Thornton finished off the game for his first save of the season, Ventura said Hector Santiago is safe in his role as the team’s closer. However, Ventura indicated that he’s confident in the back of his bullpen and in time could even see flame-throwing rookie Addison Reed close out a game here and there.

Despite having just ended an extended losing streak, the White Sox sit only one game back of the first place Cleveland Indians, who come into town for a three-game set on Tuesday.

“I like where we are at,” Pierzynski said. “I think that we are playing better than anybody expected us to. But we believe that we can be OK and hang in this thing for a long time. As long as guys continue to get better and stay healthy and do their job and not worry about everything else that is going on, we should be OK.”