Indians 5, White Sox 2: So much for second place

If the White Sox and Indians are supposed to split every series this season, it would better explain some of the things that got in the way of the White Sox winning this one.

The White Sox couldn’t come up with a hit with runners in scoring position, at least when their runners weren’t eliminating themselves. Throw in a couple of (too?) late homers allowed by Iván Nova, and the Sox saw their five-game winning streak come to an end.

The Sox were held to just four hits, but they drew five walks and benefited from a couple more Cleveland errors to generate real threats. They just couldn’t capitalize in any meaningful way.

In the third inning, the Sox loaded the bases on Jefry Rodriguez via a single and two walks. Leury Garcia slashed a sac fly to center for the game’s first run to bring Yoan Moncada to the plate with two on and one out, yet he didn’t get to even complete his plate appearance.

How? First, Yolmer Sánchez got picked off of second, even though he at one point danced back toward the bag as if he detected Francisco Lindor coming in behind him. Compound the problem, Charlie Tilson broke too late to second during Sánchez’s rundown, and he was gunned down easily at first for the rare TOOTBLAN double play.

When Moncada was allowed to hit again, the game was tied at 1. He walked, then moved to third when the Indians tried to turn a 3-6-1 double play and got neither part right.

But Eloy Jiménez popped out to short and Yonder Alonso struck out to end that threat.

To cap it off, the Sox had runners on second and third with nobody out in the seventh, but after Alonso hit a sac fly, nothing else came of it.

Part of the run differential stemmed from Terry Francona managing this game more aggressively than Rick Renteria. He pulled his starter after four innings of one-run ball after just 58 pitches because Rodriguez wasn’t all that effective, and went with five relievers to get through the rest of the game.

Renteria rode Nova through seven with diminishing returns. Through five, Nova allowed just one unearned run, as Moncada took too much time and fired wide on Oscar Mercado’s leadoff chopper in the fourth, and he came around to score.

In the sixth, Nova grooved a 2-2 fastball to Carlos Santana, who smashed it out to right to give Cleveland a 2-1 lead. An inning later, Renteria let Nova get through seven, but at a cost. Nova gave up a no-doubt two-run shot to lefty Leonys Martin with two outs, and wasn’t even pulled when the top of the order came around. Francisco Lindor ended up recording the third out himself by getting caught trying to stretch a single into a double.

Renteria also used the struggling tandem of Jace Fry and Kelvin Herrera for the remaining two innings. Fry fared well enough outside of a one-out walk in the eighth, but when Herrera came in with two outs to try stranding it, he ended up allowing an RBI single instead, and didn’t back up the throw home, either. That put a run on Fry’s tab, and an error on Leury García, whose throw home bounced past James McCann to the unpatrolled backstop.

Bullet point:

*The White Sox committed two errors, but they also came up with a couple great plays. Moncada made maybe his best play at third to date with a max-effort dive and throw in the first inning, and Tilson robbed Jason Kipnis of a single with a fine diving catch in the second.

Record: 28-30 | Box score | Highlights

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