After getting swept in a three-game series to the Boston Red-Handed Cheaters (seriously, does anyone believe they’ve gone 26-3 over their last 29 games legitimately?), the Chicago White Sox now find themselves in a dogfight in the AL Central. For most of the season, the race has been between the Cleveland Guardians and Chicago, and this series allows the South Siders a real chance to deal a devastating blow to Cleveland’s playoff hopes.
With every team in the division but the Kansas City Royals within
four games of each other, every single game moving forward is absolutely crucial. While the White Sox are coming off a tough sweep, they aren’t the only ones struggling lately as Cleveland is also coming off of a sweep of their own, dropping three straight to the lowly New York Mets.
With the Minnesota Twins on the road against the best team in baseball in the Milwaukee Brewers, it’s not a stretch to believe this series will give the winning team a leg up on the rest of the division. With Chicago leading the season series over Cleveland four games to three with only six left to play, a series win would assure the White Sox a crucial head-to-head tiebreaker as long as they aren’t swept in the final series against the Guardians.
Somebody has to break their losing streak tonight, and the Guardians must feel pretty good about their chances with Parker Messick taking the mound. Although Messick has a record of just 1-3 over his last seven starts, he has posted an impressive 2.30 ERA during that time. Messick has been one of the best pitchers in baseball as of late and hasn’t allowed more than two earned runs in a start since June 29 against the Texas Rangers.
In two starts against the White Sox this season, Messick has pitched just shy of 13 innings, allowing just eight hits and three earned runs. He has a vast repertoire of pitches and excels in limiting hard contact. While Messick’s past success against the White Sox is certainly not the greatest sign for Chicago, it is important to note that both of those starts were against the South Siders sans Munetaka Murakami. Fans have seen how much his presence alone boosts this team, so it’s anyone’s guess how Messick will perform against a stronger Chicago offense.
While the White Sox also come into this series cold, they also have to feel pretty good about their chances moving forward but for different reasons. This series against the Guardians kicks off an interesting quirk in the schedule that sees the South Siders play 16 of their next 19 games in Chicago. With the White Sox holding a 34-21 record at home, the long stretch inside city limits is a dream scenario. In a tight divisional race, the rest of the month of August provides a great opportunity to solidify themselves at the very top.
On the mound for Chicago tonight is Noah Schultz, who quite frankly will be heavily outmatched by Messick. I know advanced metrics aren’t everything, but the only metric Schultz has better than the 50 percentile is fastball velocity, at 60. There aren’t many things he’s done well lately, either, as seen by his 1-5 record and 6.82 ERA over his past seven starts. The other issue is that he doesn’t go late into games, which will put some extra strain on what will already be a tired bullpen after last night’s extra innings affair.
While on paper it certainly seems that the White Sox are outmatched, fans certainly thought the same thing last Friday before the team batted around Tampa’s Cy Young candidate Nick Martinez on its way to a 6-1 victory.
Here are the starting lineups for the Chicago White Sox:
Here are the starting lineups for the Cleveland Guardians:
Game time is 6:40 p.m. CT, available in all the usual places.
Join the conversation!
Sign up for a user account and get:
- Fewer ads
- Create community posts
- Comment on articles, community posts
- Rec comments, community posts
- New, improved notifications system!
