As far as I could tell, no current or past members of the Chicago White Sox stopped by the Sox Machine/From the 108 tailgate before today's game in Milwaukee, but they played like they did.
The White Sox totaled just six hits. They also gave up four homers while committing three errors, along with another blunder that the box scores -- and the instant replay system -- wasn't quite equipped to handle.
Carlos Rodón gave up a solo shot on his first pitch of the game, so he spent the entire evening trailing. He gave up another solo homer in the second, then watched his defense let him down in multiple ways in the fourth. First, Leury García was late covering first on Luis Urias' bunt, then couldn't catch Zack Collins' throw, which seemed to account for García being late. Collins was charged with the error as runners moved up to second and third, but it was a team effort.
Rodón then had a chance to erase the lead runner from that jam when Rowdy Tellez hit a grounder to first, but José Abreu fired high and wide on his throw home, and the run scored to make it 3-0 Milwaukee. And just when it looked like Rodón was about to escape with no furrther damage in the fourth, he walked in a run.
But those struggles took a backseat to the fifth, when the White Sox loaded the bases on two infield singles by Yoán Moncada and Andrew Vaughn, followed by a bloop single by Brian Goodwin. Up came Leury García, who hit a nubber toward the third-base side. Corbin Burnes tried to get the force at home, but he fired wide and Moncada scored.
Except Moncada never touched home plate. It took a while to learn it, because there was a mound visit, after which Burnes appealed the play by flipping the ball to Manny Pina. When the ruling was safe, the Brewers challenged the play, which was overturned.
Then Tony La Russa came out to challenge the challenge, because it was well beyond the 20 seconds allotted, and La Russa said after the game that teams were supposed to be prohibited from using a mound visit to buy time for challenges. That led to another review, but ultimately the call was upheld.
The White Sox ended up scoring a run when Zack Collins walked with the bases loaded, but pinch-hitting Jake Burger struck out, and Tim Anderson flied out on the first pitch.
Milwaukee added two more runs on Tellez solo shots -- one off José Ruiz, and the other off Reynaldo López.
Bullet points:
*Abreu was thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double to end the fourth, as he couldn't anchor himself to the bag.
*Collins recorded another error when his attempt to cut down Jayce Peterson at second bounced into center field.
