White Sox winning, but White Sox bullpen lacks a shape

Thanks to seven strong innings by Reynaldo Lopez, Rick Renteria was in his happy place during the late innings of Wednesday’s White Sox winner over the Yankees. He had just two innings to cover, and he could use his two most-trusted relievers to get the job done. Xavier Cedeno pitched a 1-2-3 eighth, Jace Fry kept a leadoff single anchored to first, and the Sox had a series victory to show for outplaying the Yankees in the Bronx.

The night before, things didn’t quite go Renteria’s way. James Shields couldn’t close out the sixth, try as he might. Fry got the game through the seventh, but that left two innings for righties. He used Juan Minaya for the second straight game, but he faced two batters and allowed a single and a homer. Dylan Covey fared better, but he was in the position of one pitch ending the ballgame, and a first-pitch fastball to Neil Walker did the job.

Ryan Burr’s been on the team for eight games and has pitched once.

— Patrick Nolan (@SoxMach_pnoles) August 30, 2018

Minaya is a popular object of scorn for a few different reasons. He hasn’t been fun to watch on the whole, and because he’s been around more than the other righties, he’s had a lot more opportunities to foster the familiarity that breeds contempt.

Still, he’s been better since his early-season demotion. The walks have persisted (15), but they’re softened by more strikeouts (36) and a better handle on contact (.214/.323/.286) over his 29 innings after returning to the bullpen in early June. It resulted in a 2.79 ERA over the 33 outing leading up into the Yankee games, with 19 of his last 21 appearances being scoreless. He’s won more battles for Renteria than other pitchers, so it’s understandable why Renteria would lean on him until he broke. Give Jeanmar Gomez and Thyago Vieira those opportunities, and they’ll break sooner.

Ryan Burr? It’s harder to say. He made a fine first impression in his professional-looking MLB debut, during which he retired all four Tigers he faced, fanning two of them. He threw just 12 of 20 pitches for strikes, but didn’t walk anybody. Perhaps another way to put it is: He threw 12 of 17 pitches in the zone after getting the nerves out of the way.

Burr came out pumping 95 mph fastballs to Mikie Mahtook, but pulled them glove side and quickly found himself down 3-0 against his first big league hitter.

“I got to 3-0 and I was like, alright, I’m going to to throw it down broadway and see what happens,” said Burr, who recovered to strike out Mahtook with a high full count fastball. “Luckily I did that a couple times and he chased the last one. At that point you just throw it right over the plate, hope something good happens, but hopefully you don’t have to do that again.”

Coming on the heels of an excellent couple months in Charlotte — with peripherals besting everybody’s except Ian Hamilton‘s — we should be seeing more of him.

Then again, Burr said he wasn’t satisfied with his sliders, and that he’ll have to adjust to a major-league ball, so I can understand why Renteria might be reluctant to drop a rookie into high-leverage situations at Yankee Stadium. Thanks to sound starting pitching, high-leverage situations were the only ones available.

With the White Sox returning home against Boston, the “hostile road crowd” argument should be out. The other factor limiting Burr’s appearances might hang around a while. Should Sox starters like Lucas Giolito and Michael Kopech avoid proving FanGraphs wrong, Burr won’t be getting a heap of garbage time to hone his craft.

The White Sox are 16-11 in August, so Renteria’s done well to turn better performances into wins. Ideally, this improved play will continue over the final month of the season to lift everybody’s spirits about 2019, even if there’s little confidence in contending. There are complete efforts on a more regular basis, which is the whole idea.

But as the bullpen is expanded and distended in September, and with a good idea of Minaya’s capabilities, I wouldn’t mind seeing the Sox risk a losing month if it allows guys like Burr and Covey or Hamilton chances to falter over full innings. Perhaps multiple times. This is something that’s easier to say before it happens, but the fastest way to beating projections is with a completely crazy bullpen performance, and the easiest way to forge high-leverage relievers with fire is to do it when losses aren’t the worst thing in the world.

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