White Sox 2, Guardians 1: A hard-earned split

The White Sox offense didn’t put together the kind of showing I’d hoped for against Aaron Civale. That was mostly because Civale left after one inning with right wrist soreness, but even with a parade of front-end Cleveland relievers covering eight innings in emergency fashion, the White Sox could only put up offense in one of those frames.

Thanks to Lucas Giolito, the back end of the White Sox bullpen and a defense that helped more than it hurt, that one two-run inning was good enough to salvage a split.

Giolito threw 6⅓ innings of one-run ball, and it could’ve been scoreless ball had either Tony La Russa pulled him a batter or two earlier, or Josh Harrison not booted what should’ve been an inning-ending grounder with two outs on Reynaldo López’s watch.

But one blemish wasn’t enough to ruin the evening. Giolito himself was sterling, limiting the Guardians to five hits and a walk to the last batter he faced while striking out five. He wasn’t a whiff monster — only seven over 91 pitches — but he only allowed four hard-hit balls all night, and the shorter plate appearances kept him on the economical side. When the Cleveland lineup circled back for the third time through, he had more in the tank.

While Giolito suffered from a miscue to end his evening, he benefited from strong defense earlier, even if it was needed to override the Sox’s first error. Amed Rosario reached on an infield single and advanced second when Anderson’s throw went in the dugout.

José Ramírez followed by hooking a drive down the right field line, but AJ Pollock — starting in right field with Jiménez opening the game in left — ran it down before it dropped inside the chalk, then held the runner after crashing into the wall. Of the White Sox’s less-than-ideal corner options, I don’t think anybody else makes that play.

Giolito then struck out Josh Naylor before getting Franmil Reyes to pop up behind home plate. Seby Zavala located the ball, then made a lunging grab into and over a softer fence that guided him back into play with the out secured, which kept the game scoreless.

The Sox blew their own golden opportunities early and late, but they earned their two runs in the sixth. Yoán Moncada led off against Sam Hentges with his second walk, followed by a Luis Robert single. Up came José Abreu, who appeared intent on doing too much when he chased the first two pitches out of the zone to fall behind 0-2. But Hentges made a mistake with his third pitch, and Abreu pounded it off the right field wall for the game’s first run.

Eloy Jiménez was the one who struck out on three pitches, but that was only good for the first out, so Andrew Vaughn’s subsequent chopper over the mound was worth an RBI and a 2-0 lead. (Jiménez ended up leaving the game after the bottom of the inning when he pulled up lame after running down Ramírez’s line drive to the left center gap for the final out of the sixth.)

Other opportunities went by the boards. Two deep drives off Civale in the first inning died on the right field warning track, and Robert started the fourth with a double and advanced no further. In the sixth, Robert tried to add insurance when he followed Tim Anderson’s two-out single and Moncada’s walk with a shot to the left side, but a ball that appeared to have a good chance to skip by the shortstop instead plunked Anderson on the hip for the rare inning-ending HOTBLAN.

It didn’t matter, because after López got three grounders for two outs in the seventh, Kendall Graveman and Liam Hendriks each pitched perfect innings with two strikeouts apiece to close it out. Graveman did an especially fine job of battling back after falling behind against the top of the Cleveland order.

Bullet points:

*Moncada and Robert each reached base three times in front of Abreu in the cleanup spot, which is a fine recipe for success.

*Jiménez was removed from the game with tightness in his right leg. The White Sox are calling him day-to-day.

*The White Sox are back to a half-game behind Cleveland. They remain five games behind the Twins, who probably got what they wanted with a split here.

Record: 43-45 | Box score | Statcast

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