When Tarik Skubal started off the game walking Chase Meidroth — quite a rarity for him — it looked possible the AL Cy Young holder might have an off-night and give the Sox a chance. A double play later, the walk was rendered meaningless. Seven innings and two singles and no walks later the whole idea of a Skubal off-day turned out to be wishful thinking.
That left it up to Martín Pérez to try to do his part of what looked like it might have been a pitchers’ duel — but when Jahmal Jones deposited Pérez’s
second offering in the seats that turned out to be wishful thinking as well. Pérez managed to escape the first after giving up a single and making an error himself, but only because outs two and three of the inning traveled a combined 813 feet but ended up caught at the wall in center.
The Tigers had a man on via walk in the third, but danger was averted by a nice sliding grab by Brooks Baldwin in left:
No such luck for Pérez in the fifth, when the Tigers went single, walk, fly out, RBI double, sac fly, walk, Gleyber Torres three-run homer to make it 6-0 and end the starter’s day.
Meanwhile, the White Sox just kind of rolled over, with only one of their outs even hard-hit. That left the bullpen as the only bright spot of the day, with four innings of one-hit ball and nine strikeouts. Wikelman González set the bar high, whiffing five in the first two of those innings.
Steven Wilson and Dan Altavilla pitched in with a couple of K’s of their own, and there was even a nice catch by Michael A. Taylor in there, too.
Two Tigers relievers, including old buddy Tommy Kahnle, finished off the shutout, the only Sox offense being Meidroth’s second hit of the day, which naturally got wiped out in another double play, this one ending the game.
The rubber match tomorrow afternoon should give the Sox offense a chance to recover from dealing with Skubal, because they’ll face 41-year-old Charlie Morton. Morton hasn’t gotten much of anybody out all year — including getting hammered by the A’s and Mets his last two times out — although he did hold the White Sox to one unearned run when he was with the Orioles back in June. It will be Davis Martin on the mound for the Sox, who are now 54-89 and needing at least a 9-10 record the rest of the season to avoid 100 losses.
