It was a one-sided slugfest on the South Side as the Pirates (72-73) teed off on the White Sox (75-69), mashing 18 hits and scoring nine to defeat the South Siders in Tuesday’s series opener, 9-3. Sean Burke relinquished a career-high seven runs in tonight’s start, and only lasted 1 1/3 frames before surrendering the game to the bullpen. And on the other side of the ball, Chicago couldn’t manage to string multiple hits together and were retired in order for their first 12 at-bats.
In the simplest
of terms, it was simply not the night for Burke. The righty floundered through the first inning, giving up five runs on six hits and a walk as the Pirates batted around, with four of those hits being two-baggers. The South Siders were suddenly looking at a five-run deficit before they even got an out, but finally on the eighth batter, Burke maneuvered a strikeout against his old teammate, Jacob Gonzalez, for the first of the inning. Getting Gonzalez out seemed like it broke the ice a little bit for Sean, and he managed to snag the next two outs to stop the madness, ending with a fly out from Konnor Griffin in his second at-bat of the inning.
White Sox manager Will Venable likely was trying to avoid taxing his bullpen in their first of 13 straight games, so he had Burke back on the mound to start the second. Unfortunately, Pittsburgh picked up right where it left off, as Brandon Lowe singled to leadoff the inning, and Bryan Reynolds smoked his second double of the night to put ducks on the pond. Burke walked his second batter to load the bases up for Spencer Horwitz, and with how the first inning played out, Venable went to the pen. Tyler Schweitzer was called upon to clean up the mess, but Horwitz had other plans, driving in two more runs on a base hit up the middle, marking a season high of seven runs charged to Sean Burke.
Outside of that one hit, Schweitzer worked through the second with two straight outs, and remained in the game for another two scoreless frames in which he only gave up two more hits. The rookie Schweitzer has done a decent job in the long relief role, posting a 3.06 ERA in 35 1/3 innings this year.
The South Siders called upon José Urquidy in the fifth, and while he immediately struggled, the veteran recovered well enough. Raphael Flores Jr. was the first batter up to face Urquidy, and Flores poured salt in the wound by blasting a solo shot to tally the eighth run for the Pirates. To keep the inning rolling, Pittsburgh loaded the bases once again after two hits and a walk as Bryan Reynolds stepped up to the plate. Reynolds just missed a grand slam, but took a sacrifice fly as a stumbling Tristan Peters was able to track it down at the wall, making it nine unanswered runs.
You’ll notice I haven’t mentioned the White Sox bats yet, and that’s because they were doing absolutely nothing, allowing Pirates starter Bubba Chandler to hold a perfect game through four innings. Thankfully, Andrew Benintendi finally cancelled the postgame show by sending a double into the right field corner — his first of two today — and ended up scoring the first run of the game for the Good Guys when Braden Montgomery drove him to shave the lead to 9-1.
While Urquidy was able to fend off the Pirates, the South Siders tallied one each in the fifth, sixth and seventh innings to cut the lead down to 9-3. Kyle Teel led off the sixth by shooting a solo shot over the right field wall, his second homer in as many games, and the only other run that Chandler surrendered.
The third and final run for the Sox came from an RBI ground out by Colson Montgomery in the seventh, scoring Benintendi for the second time, after his second straight double into the corner. The South Side bats were quiet for the remainder of the game, unable to further rattle Wilber Dotel, and Yohan Ramírez shut them down in order in the bottom of the ninth. Even with their six hits, the Good Guys hardly had opportunities to score, and went 1-for-3 with runners in scoring position.
As Tyler Davis came out for the ninth in an effort to prevent any further runs from scoring, and he wriggled out of without a scratch, even with two hits against him. Perhaps it was one of those days where if you are not named Tyler, you were not going to have a good day. Or perhaps Burke is just human, and the Pirates beat him today.
Even if Burke had pitched better, there wasn’t really any run support. One of the main issues with the bats tonight was the lack of production at the top of the order from those not named Andrew Benintendi. Among Sam Antonacci, Miguel Vargas and Munetaka Murakami the linescore was 1-for-12 with seven strikeouts: the only hit came from Sam, Mune struck out every time he stepped up to the plate and Miguel grounded into a double play along with his 2 Ks. In comparison, every single batter who started the game tonight for the Pirates managed to tally at least one hit, as even Gonzalez managed to snag one in his final at-bat. On top of that, seven of their nine hitters racked up multiple hits, and their first three batters went 6-for-13 with five runs scored, two RBIs, and three doubles.
With Cleveland’s win in Baltimore, it’s down to just a two-game lead over the GuardiansThe best-case scenario is that Burke doesn’t run out of gas before the playoffs, and that tomorrow’s starter, Davis Martin, can throw even remotely like he did in his last outing.
MVP
Kyle Teel: 2-for-3, R, RBI, K, HR, 3-for-4 ABS challenges
Runners-Up
Andrew Benintendi: 2-for-4, 2 R, 2 2B
Braden Montgomery: 1-for-3, RBI
Tyler Schweitzer: 2 2/3 IP, 3 H, 0 R
Tyler Davis: 1 IP, 2 H, 0 R
Cold Cat
Sean Burke: 1 1/3 IP, 8 H, 7 R, 2 BB, 2 K, WP, LOSS (8-7)
Runners-Up
Miguel Vargas: 0-for-4, 2 K, GIDP
Munetaka Murakami: 0-for-4, 4 K
Tristan Peters: 0-for-3
Chase Meidroth: 0-for-3, K
José Urquidy: 4 IP, 5 H, 2 R, BB, K, HR
