After scoring one run in their past two games, the White Sox offense was hyper-aggressive against Jose Berrios. In five pitches, the White Sox put up three runs thanks to Jose Abreu’s big blast. Even though Dylan Cease didn’t need much pitching support thanks to his very sharp outing, it got a bit dicey with the bullpen again, but the White Sox prevailed winning 5-2.
Luis Robert started the first inning with a line-drive single on the very first pitch. It should have gone for extra bases when Blue Jays left fielder Lourdes Gurriel misplayed the bounce. It wasn’t clear if Robert did touch first base on replay, and it appeared he wasn’t sure either as he retraced his steps back. Yoan Moncada singled down the left-field line two pitches later to extend his hitting streak to 11 games.
Next was Abreu, and he smashed a hanging 0-1 curveball 411 feet for his 26th home run of the season.
The White Sox offense didn’t stop there. Brian Goodwin and Jake Lamb singled to put runners on the corners for Danny Mendick, whose flare landed in fair territory down the right-field line. Mendick got an RBI double, and the White Sox put up a four-spot on Berrios.
Berrios would only last three innings as he allowed nine hits to the White Sox. He allowed one short of the ten hits in an 8-5 loss to the White Sox on July 1st.
Abreu picked up his fourth RBI of the night on a slow infield hopper that plated Robert from third base.
On the pitching side, Cease was terrific. Blue Jays hitters had a tough time squaring up Cease’s fastball early. Through the second time of the order, Cease threw more breaking pitches to feature a new way to attack. After five innings, Blue Jays hitters could only muster three hits while striking out seven times.
For the third time against the Blue Jays lineup, Cease walked Bo Bichette to start the sixth inning. That walk was wiped away when Marcus Semien grounded into a 5-4-3 double play, and Vlad Guerrero Jr. flew out harmlessly to right field. A big 1-2-3 inning for Cease to keep the Blue Jays key hitters at-bat.
In the seventh inning, Corey Dickerson was able to get enough of the barrel on an inside fastball to tag Cease for a solo home run. That’s all the damage Cease would allow as he induced back-to-back flyouts to end the seventh inning. On 95 pitches, Cease threw 58 strikes with a final line of 7 IP 4 H 1 ER 1 BB 7 K. Toronto was focused on Cease’s fastball, swinging at that pitch 27 times while only whiffing five times. But they had a terrible time against the slider (five whiffs on seven swings) and changeup (100% whiff rate).
Michael Kopech, not Craig Kimbrel, took over in the eighth inning. After getting a strikeout, Kopech allowed back-to-back singles to put runners on the corners. Batting was Marcus Semien, and instead of having Kopech face him, Tony La Russa called for Liam Hendriks to make another five-out save.
Just like Friday night in St. Petersburg, Hendriks couldn’t find the strike zone. Walking Semien on four straight pitches to load the bases for Guerrero Jr. Falling behind 2-0, Hendriks watched Guerrero Jr. foul off a fastball towards the right-field line. After another wayward fastball to make it 3-1, Hendriks could locate another fastball on the inside corner, which Guerrero Jr. whiffed on. Full count, Hendriks 98 mph fastball was in the middle of the zone. Luckily for the White Sox, Guerrero Jr. hit a hard grounder right at Mendick, who started the 6-4-3 double play ending the inning.
In the ninth inning, Teoscar Hernandez reached via the infield single as Garcia made an excellent play behind second base but Abreu couldn’t scoop his throw. After the home scorer gave Hernandez a stolen base, Hendriks got Dickerson to fly out to left field.
Then some more baserunning bizarre. Alejandro Kirk hit a deep fly to center field that Robert played off the wall, but not only did Kirk not reach second base for a double, but Hernandez didn’t score and only reached third base. Hernandez would score on Gurriel’s grounder that got through the infield for an RBI single making it a 5-2 game.
Struggling with Santiago Espinal, Hendriks again was deadlocked with another full count battle. On his 39th pitch of the night, Hendriks got Espinal to ground out to Garica ending the game.
Game Notes:
- After the White Sox scored three runs on their first three hits, they mustered two more runs on 15 hits and two walks.
- Luis Robert, Yoan Moncada, and Jose Abreu all had three hits.
- Eloy Jimenez, Leury Garcia, Jake Lamb, and Danny Mendick had two hits.
- Zack Collins was the only White Sox hitter not to record a hit.
Record: 73-54 | Box Score | StatCast
