{"id":663636,"date":"2026-04-04T23:40:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T23:40:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/663636\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T23:40:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T23:40:20","slug":"white-sox-opener-grant-taylor-bulk-pitcher-anthony-kay-combine-to-stymie-blue-jays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/663636\/","title":{"rendered":"White Sox opener Grant Taylor, bulk pitcher Anthony Kay combine to stymie Blue Jays"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the second straight day, righthander Grant Taylor served as the White Sox<\/a>\u2019 opener and blanked the Blue Jays.<\/p>\n

Taylor needed nine pitches to cruise the first inning Saturday, getting George Springer and Davis Schneider to fly out and striking out Vladimir Guerrero Jr. As Sox manager Will Venable intended, the smooth first gave Sox bulk pitcher Anthony Kay a softer landing by avoiding the top of one of baseball\u2019s best lineups.<\/p>\n

Taylor debuted last year with the Sox, making 36 appearances and compiling a 4.91 ERA. Like a lot of rookies do, Venable said Taylor \u201cfound out a lot about himself\u201d in 2025 and had to learn how he matches up with major-league hitters.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the second try now here in Year 2, we\u2019re seeing a much more confident guy that knows and is sure that he has great stuff that plays in this league,\u201d Venable said.<\/p>\n

Kay pitched 4 1\/3 innings, only allowing Guerrero\u2019s sixth-inning two run homer. The pitch itself, a 90.6 mph slider that clipped the lower left corner of the strike zone, wasn\u2019t bad but Guerrero still sent it 437 feet to left.<\/p>\n

Other than that, Kay was solid after adjusting to following an opener. Kay began his routine slightly later than he would if he were starting. The Sox also sent six hitters to the plate in the bottom of the first, making it difficult to time his bullpen.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to start. It kind of feels like our game out there when we start,\u201d Kay said. \u201cIt\u2019s just something they like to do, and we\u2019ve got to adjust a little bit.\u201d=<\/p>\n

Rule 5 return<\/p>\n

The Sox officially returned right-handed pitcher Jedixson Paez to the Red Sox organization. Paez<\/a>, 22, was a Rule 5 draft selection who had never pitched above Single-A before this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the second straight day, righthander Grant Taylor served as the White Sox\u2019 opener and blanked the Blue…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":663637,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2379],"tags":[5,138,49,2561,4,396,2562],"class_list":{"0":"post-663636","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-white-sox","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-chicago","10":"tag-chicago-white-sox","11":"tag-chicagowhitesox","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-white-sox","14":"tag-whitesox"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116349084029097154","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=663636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/663637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=663636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=663636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=663636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}