The good news is, the White Sox only failed to get a hit with runners in scoring position twice. The bad news is, they only had a runner in scoring position for two at-bats.
That was in the second inning, when Colson Montgomery and Edgar Quero led off with singles (yes, Montgomery had a hit again this week!) only to have Lenyn Sosa hit hard into a double play and Will Robertson ground out. The only Sox run came when Mike Tauchman led off the fourth and Baltimore starter Tyler Wells put a 2-1 changeup
too far over the plate:
Tauchman’s drive cut an early Orioles lead to 3-1, the first Baltimore run coming because of the kind of absolute defensive slop that wasn’t supposed to happen this year — a two-out single that put Gunnar Henderson on second because Will Robertson overran the ball trying to pick it up, a walk, a double-steal (the first two of seven Oriole steals on the day — yes, seven steals, honest — while never being caught, but who’s counting?) and an infield single. The next two runs needed no defensive lapse, since Dylan Beavers sent the ball waaaaaay out of anybody’s reach and into the right field stands with a man aboard in the fourth.
Unfortunately, Beaver’s homer wasn’t the worst news of the inning, as starter Martín Pérez had to leave the game three batters later with shoulder stiffness. The good news there, though, is that the bullpen came through big time, with 5 1/3 innings of two-hit, no-run ball, including Steven Wilson getting all four of his outs by strikeout and Grant Taylor whiffing the side after a leadoff walk in the sixth.
As for the offense, well, uh, er, it was pretty offensive. Quero got his second single three batters after Tauchman’s fourth-inning dinger, but that was it for any Sox on base until Chase Meidroth led off the ninth with a slow roller that found its way through the right side to stretch his hitting streak to 13, longest for the team this season. The White Sox ended up with five hits, no walks, and only that one runner way back in the second getting to second.
The 3-1 loss not only gave the Orioles their first-ever season sweep of the White Sox (as Orioles, who they’ve been since moving from St. Louis in 1954), but dropped Chicago’s record to 57-96. Yes, the Sox have to go 6-3 through a remaining season that includes six games against the Padres and Yankees in order to avoid a third straight year with triple digits in the L column.
Day off tomorrow, though, so there is that.
