Is it really a series in Cleveland if at least one of the games does not give you a punch in the gut? Despite falling behind early in the game due to back-to-back jacks in the bottom of the first, the White Sox fought back until they were able to take the lead in the sixth and actually get in position to secure the series. Through two outs in the ninth, Grant Taylor had the Guardians down to their last strike, but Brayan Rocchio struck once again and mashed a walk-off, two-run double that won the game for
Cleveland, 7-6.
There’s probably a lot of things you can blame this game on: Will Venable deciding to go with an opener for one of his most reliable starting pitchers this season, said opener giving up two straight homers, an unearned run caused by Davis Martin himself, Munetaka Murakami’s inability to make contact with the ball, or the inconsistencies that seem come with many recent Taylor outings. Whatever you choose, the Guardians wound up with the win, and the South Siders are right back where they were before the series started, still holding a half-game lead in the division race.
It feels easy to point at the choice Venable made to start Chris Murphy in tonight’s game ahead of Martin and call it the wrong choice. And that’s probably because it was. As much as I appreciate what the numbers say with regards to Cleveland’s splits against right-handed pitchers, Davis Martin has been fine all year without an opener. What is the saying again: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it? On the broadcast, Connor McKnight and Steve Stone referenced the Guardians performance at the plate based on the handedness of the pitcher; .657 OPS vs LHP compared to .701 OPS vs RHP. While that’s nearly 50 points better, it’s still not compelling enough for me to tempt fate for an inning with Chris Murphy, a pitcher residing in the very back of our bullpen, especially when Martin has been excellent in his last two starts.
As I noted in the game thread, Murphy has played in the opener role before and it hasn’t particularly gone well. After tonight’s game, Murphy has relinquished six total runs in his three starts this season (2 2/3 IP), and his overall 2026 ERA has risen to 4.68. The southpaw walked Steven Kwan to lead off the bottom of the first, and despite retiring José Ramírez with a fly out, he surrendered back-to-back homers to Jo Adell (two runs) and Travis Bazzana (solo) to give the Guardians an immediate, 3-0 lead.
Murphy was able to get Nathaniel Lowe to pop out to Murakami at first, but (thankfully) that was the end of the road for the lefty. Venable was forced to go to the bullpen earlier than expected and brought Martin into the game in the unfamiliar circumstance of mid-inning. Thankfully, Martn quickly navigated the last out to get out of a first inning that was running on nightmare fuel.
Martin settled in fairly well, begging the question: “Why did Murphy start, again?” The righty tossed scoreless frames in the second, third and fourth, and ultimately only one of the two runs allowed in his 5 1/3 innings was earned. Martin entered the game in a three-run hole, but there wasn’t much offensive support coming from the bats, either. Similar to Monday night, it took a few innings for the White Sox to get going, but they ended up scoring in three straight innings: one each in the fourth and fifth, and a four-spot in the sixth.
While the top of the order for the South Siders has collectively been riding the struggle bus as of late, that was most certainly not the case tonight. Among Chase Meidroth, Randal Grichuk and Miguel Vargas, the top of the lineup combined to go 4-for-12 with a double, walk, and five of Chicago’s six runs driven in. The other RBI came from a Sam Antonacci single in the fourth that brought in the first run of the game for the Good Guys, scoring Brenton Doyle after his leadoff triple, 3-1.
In the top of the fifth, Miguel Vargas snagged the first of his three RBIs, driving Tristan Peters in on a sacrifice fly to center, which brought the White Sox within one, 3-2:
After two straight hits to start the fifth inning, Martin nearly forced Ramírez to ground into a double play but he was able to beat out the throw to first. That put runners on the corners with one out, and Martin decided to attempt a pickoff of Ramírez but ended up making a bad throwthat ultimately allowed Rocchio to score and extend the lead back to two; luckily, the ball stayed in play because it hit the umpire.
For a brief period of time, this game was actually fun to watch. The White Sox seem to love the sixth inning, and after a six-run sixth the night before, they were able to put together a four-run rally to take a 6-4 lead. Antonacci triggered the rally with his second hit of the night, and Kyle Teel was called upon to pinch-hit for Jake Rogers, and ended up drawing a walk to keep the inning rolling. Peters also finagled a free base on balls, and Chase Meidroth came through in the clutch yet again, ripping an RBI single out to left that scored Sam to bring the Good Guys within one, 4-3.
Grichuk came up next with the bases juiced, and even though he didn’t come up with a huge knock, he tied the game at four with a sacrifice fly deep to the left-field warning track. In back-to-back nights, Vargas has seemed to snap back into his old self, and he, too, mashed a hit out to left that scored the go-ahead runs to put the Sox up two, 6-4:
It’s unclear if Vargas is simply rising to the occasion when he’s most needed, or if he just loves beating up on the Guardians. In 11 games against them (39 at-bats) this season, Vargas owns a .317 average and a 1.054 OPS with three home runs, three two-baggers, 10 RBIs and 10 runs. Not too shabby at all. More of this, please, Miguel.
Now holding a two-run lead, Davis returned for the sixth, and unfortunately served up a 2-0 meatball to Bazzana that put Cleveland back within one with a solo shot. The Aussie had Chicago’s number today, with both of his hits being solo bombs, but it also does not help when you throw pitches down the middle to known lefty power bat that has already tanked one on the day:
Because this was the time of the game that we were having fun and briefly experiencing joy, the home run was worrisome, but everything seemed (sort of?) under control, and Martin even recovered to get three straight outs. Was it his best start? Not necessarily. The righty isn’t a known strikeout guy, sitting around 20% on the season, but he didn’t ring anyone up today and only struck one out in his previous start. I guess the good news here is that he’s able to get batters to chase at a solid 32.2% chase rate and can eat innings, which is what the White Sox have been struggling with for months now.
Lefthander Bryan Hudson was called on for the seventh, and he produced a clean inning to maintain the South Side lead. Unfortunately, Chicago’s bats quieted down again after the sixth. In fact, the White Sox didn’t get another hit after that, and there was only one more baserunner in the game for them, off a walk in the seventh. They just couldn’t get the bats to ignite again, and it doesn’t help when their cleanup hitter can’t do anything except walk or strike out at the moment.
In five plate appearances in Monday’s game, Murakami reached twice: once from being hit by a pitch, and another from a walk. The other three PAs were all strikeouts, and Tuesday’s match was no different: 0-for-4, with four strikeouts and a walk. That marks seven of his last 10 PAs as Ks. An automatic out in a lineup — especially batting fourth — can’t continue to take regular ABs in an extremely tight playoff race. A day off for Mune is long overdue.
With just a one-run lead, Venable really needed the bullpen to lock in for the final two frames, and Grant Taylor was called upon to take both and close out the game. The righty used just 11 pitches to get through the eighth, so it wasn’t odd to assume Taylor had more left in the tank, having not pitched the day before.
Dear reader, this was almost true.
Taylor essentially choked in the ninth. Nathaniel Lowe reached on a leadoff base hit to start the inning, and immediately things felt like they were headed in the wrong direction. The righty worked a strikeout for the first out of the inning, but he couldn’t rein it in on the next batter, walking the catcher, PATRICK BAILEY, of all hitters to put two runners on. A weak ground out from Petey Halpin on the next at-bat felt like things could be righted, until Brayan freaking Rocchio stepped up to the plate.
You can debate walking him all day, and I get it, the guy is a Sox killer and has been all season. He’s even walked them off before, earlier this season. But do you really risk flipping it to Steven Kwan at the top of the order when you just need an out?
Taylor had Rocchio down to his last strike, and he smacked a fly ball into the left-field corner, just slightly out of reach from of diving Antonacci. With the game-tying run on third and the winning run on second, Sam was aligned more shallow and closer to center in order to be able to make a play at the plate on a single. The most annoying part is that the ball had just a .060 expected batting average. It’s simply one of those unfortunate times where they just got beat, but wow, does it suck so much that it was Rocchio.
According to Venable postgame interview, lefthander Anthony Kay is set to make the start in the series finale. Make sure you get some coffee in tomorrow folks, because we have a 12:10 p.m. CT start and a lot of anxiety to work through. Time to flush this loss and come back strong tomorrow to leave Cleveland with the series win and heads held high.
MVP
Miguel Vargas: 1-for-3, 3 RBI, BB, SF
Runners-Up
Brenton Doyle: 2-for-3, R, K, 3B
Chase Meidroth: 2-for-5, R, RBI, 2B
Randal Grichuk: 1-for-4, RBI, K, SF
Bryan Hudson: 1 IP, 0 H, Hold
Cold Cat
Chris Murphy: 2/3 IP, 2 H, 3 R, BB, 2 HR
Runners-Up
Munetaka Murakami: 0-for-4, 4 K, BB
Grant Taylor: 1 2/3 IP, 2 H, 2 R, BB, 2 K, Blown Save (7), LOSS (7-3)
Jake Rogers: 0-for-2, K, GIDP
Will Venable, for starting Murphy
