It was a hot, humid day in the city of Chicago. The sun was shining high in the sky, the lake glistened in the perfect shade of blue, and if you were paying attention you could watch the planes coming in from the east. There was nothing wrong with this Friday in August.
Then, the White Sox played a baseball game.
It couldn’t be that bad, right?
The first inning started with a gut-punch: A one-out walk, then a double and a hit-by-pitch loaded the bases to bring Carlos Santana up to the plate.
Aaron Civale was probably thinking to himself at this point, “Santana is 1-15 against me; this should be easy.” He was wrong: Santana doubled to right field to make the game 2-0.
You will recall there was still only one out. How much damage could continue?
You shouldn’t have asked this question.
Gabriel Arias did the right thing and struck out, for the second out of the inning. But instead of closing the inning out, Civale — who I might remind you is coming from a 6 1/3 -inning shutout appearance — walked Bo Naylor. That brought C.J. Kayfus up. I had never heard of this man until tonight, and I will remember him because he hit a bases-clearing double to make it 5-0. One batter later, the inning was finally over.
Nothing happened for an inning and a half after that. I sat watching the game, thinking maybe the wound would stop bleeding. It was then that a ball was not read well off the bat of Kyle Manzardo, ending up in no-man’s-land over shortstop instead of being caught for the first out of the third. Manzardo landed on second base, and Santana promptly got his second hit of the night, resulting in a 6-0 lead.
The White Sox would finally show up for the offense portion of the evening in the bottom of the third. Brooks Baldwin, who homered in the series finale against Seattle on Thursday, had his second home run in as many games. It truly wasn’t much, but it was honest work.
I truly wish there was better news to share about the top of the fourth inning, but instead, I have three more runs to report.
[I want to pause here to let you know that I am engaged to a Detroit Tigers fan. This is important because tonight was a Tarik Skubal start. Under normal circumstances, I already would have been watching Detroit’s game. Instead, I subjected my fiancé to this circus. It was later discovered that the reigning Cy Young winner did give up four runs. Not all was lost with tonight’s action.]
Now, back to the Chicago White Sox. Civale would be responsible for two more runs in this game before departing, and he would be tagged with a final ninth run after Mike Vasil came in to relieve him. It would start with another Kayfus double and a Brayan Rocchio single.
The right fielder for the Guardians would come into score the seventh run of the game via a balk. The eighth run was scored in a more legitimate way, on a Daniel Schneemann single. That single would be Civale’s final batter and pave the way for Vasil. The rookie only gave up one hit after he came in, so I bet you are wondering how he gave up a ninth run: Not being able to find the strike zone, and walking José Ramírez. This would then be followed by the aforementioned single to load the bases and finally a walk-in run thanks to Santana. Luckily, Vasil’s fifth inning of work was a scoreless one.
It looked like the White Sox were finally going to break the Tanner Bibee code in the bottom of the sixth inning. The inning started with a double off the bat of pinch-hitter Corey Julks, as midway through the game the White Sox were waving the white flag. With one out, both Jacob Amaya (pinch-hitting for Luis Robert Jr.) and Colson Montgomery would draw walks to load the bases. Curtis Mead would deliver with a two-run single to left field to make it 9-3. This hit would get Bibee out of the game and make way for Matt Festa.
Festa seemed to be off to a great start to his appearance with a ground ball to second base. Rather than a potential double play to end the inning, Rocchio threw the ball wide of the shortstop, and another Sox run was obtained. A Michael A. Taylor walk would bring up the home run-hitting Baldwin. He fought off quite a few pitches down 0-2, but would ultimately pop out in foul territory for the second out. Mike Tauchman would strike out after an appeal to the third base umpire and promptly be ejected, to end the inning and the threat. Tauchman, if you’re reading this, you went around. Sorry you weren’t swapped to a contender, but you’ve gotta stay in games, the White Sox have no spare outfielders.
Speaking of depth, Will Venable’s bench was down to just Edgar Quero after Josh Rojas came in to replace Tauchman. Vasil entered the seventh, for a third full inning of work, and came out scoreless after Arias was caught stealing second base. Kyle Teel delivered a fantastic throw to Montgomery to execute the out.
The bottom of the inning brought in a new pitcher for the Guardians. Jakob Junis would be tasked with keeping the South Side squad at bay. He would do that, mostly. In a close game, a manufactured run would be very impressive. In this game, it merely turned the deficit from five to four. Julks would start the inning with a double. He would get to third base on a ground out by Benintendi and finally score on an Amaya ground out. The inning would end after a Mead ground out that left Montgomery on second base.
The highlight of the rest of the game was Wikelman González entering the game in the eighth and going six-up, six-down. Try as they might, the home team could not get a rally going in the bottom of the ninth, and the game would end on a deep fly out to right field.
The Guardians remain six games back from the Tigers, even with the win tonight, while the White Sox move to 10-9 after the All-Star Break. Bill Veeck Night is tomorrow, which should surely bring some entertainment even if the White Sox do not.