Here’s a not so fun fact: the White Sox now have 3 more wins than the Rays do in July (8 wins for Chicago to just 5 for the Rays).
What an incredibly frustrating game. Top to bottom, T to B, just a mind flaying of a game. You got bad pitching from Baz, who put the team down in a big hole early. You have the bats doing enough to almost put up big innings, and then failing. You even had a few near special defensive plays that are missed, just as a little treat!
Shane Baz is the big story for what went
wrong in this one. Right off the jump, you could tell Baz rhythm and command were a mess. He just did not look comfortable for the first few innings. Mix that in with some bad luck, and you get a recipe for disaster.
The first blow was in the 2nd, a 3-run bomb from Brooks Baldwin, the number 9 hitter on the worst team in the AL.
Statcast showed this as a HR in exactly 1/30 ballparks. Unfortunately for Baz he was pitching tonight in that ballpark.
On the whole, Baz would give up another 3-run inning in the 3rd and immediately put the Rays deep into a hole they could never crawl their way out of.
Although the Rays did have their opportunities to try. The Rays had multiple guys on base in the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th. A couple of double plays, 8 total left on base, and a whopping 1-for-11 with runners in scoring position erased all the good building work the bats did.
There’s a lot of potential outcomes where this game wasn’t played well by the Rays, and they still find a way to squeeze out a win. But that did not happen, and credit to the White Sox, they capitalized on mistakes, took advantage of their good luck, and worked their way out of several potential jams.
The potentially lasting bad from this game and something to watch is with Ha-Seong Kim, who had to leave the game with what is being described as lower back tightness. The potential tightness possibly occurred after a pickoff play that almost caught Kim leaning. Hoping for some good news tomorrow.
By far the highlight of the night from the TB perspective was this incredible and cool as a cucumber catch from the bullpen officer.
Hopefully the rest of this series will have the highlights be more on the field and for the Rays.
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