The White Sox have never had much of a defined bullpen hierarchy in 2025, but they entered the season viewing Mike Clevinger and Cam Booser as their most trusted leverage options.
More than halfway into June, Clevinger is an increasingly effective Triple-A starter, and Booser has a 5.11 ERA that doesn't even fully account for all of Thursday's damage. Do yourself a favor and don't look up Yhoiker Fajardo's ERA.
Staked to a 4-2 lead in the eighth on the strength of Michael A. Taylor whipping a hanging changeup around the left field foul pole for a go-ahead two-run shot in the sixth, Booser ceded the advantage two batters into his eighth inning appearance. Alec Burleson staying on a down and away sweeper for a bleeder up the middle happens to a lot of guys, but Willson Contreras followed it by cranking a fat first-pitch, thigh-high heater with such force that it's surprising it counted for the same number of runs as Taylor's drive. Maybe Contreras' trot just took so long that it felt like it meant more.
There's a three-batter minimum to adhere to and all, and Will Venable got Steven Wilson up soon enough to have him available as an alternative, but Booser alternated between leaking oil and stringing together faint hope of an escape. He induced a weak comebacker from Nolan Gorman, but inexplicably lobbed it over Miguel Vargas' head to put the go-ahead run aboard. He induced a popout from Nolan Arenado, but then walked Lars Nootbaar to push Gorman into scoring position. Booser was on the cusp of an escape after inducing a terrifying 103 mph fly out to the warning track fly out from Jordan Walker, but his seventh pitch to pinch hitter Yohel Pozo was a backdoor sweeper that caught too much of the plate to not get rifled to left for the eventually game-winning run.
"The velo was down," Will Venable said. "We’ll check him out here between games and see where he’s at and get him evaluated just to make sure he’s alright."
If it felt like a slow-motion car crash that everyone sensed was coming, that's apropos, because for the first hour or so of a long afternoon at 35th & Shields, no one had much interest in refuting their priors.
Even on an afternoon where he struck out a season-high seven, Sean Burke stumbled out of the gate. He walked two in the first, including a four-pitch free pass to Burleson that loaded the bases with no one out. Even as he wriggled out it with nothing more than a Contreras sacrifice fly for damage, he seemed less than convinced of his method of escape, if this reaction to Arenado's warning track fly out is any indication.
"I didn't feel like I was searching for anything or I was out of sync," Burke said of the first inning. "It was just a small adjustment kind of set-up wise, and then I was able to just get my direction back over the plate."
Entering the afternoon riding a six-game losing streak where they had scored only 13 runs, the White Sox offense initially still looked incapable of extra-base damage against Erick Fedde. They knotted the game with singles in the fourth, if you're willing to fudge the details and count Josh Rojas' single-shaped contact that Masyn Winn admirably gloved before bouncing a throw that Contreras couldn't scoop at first for a run-scoring two-out error that brought in Miguel Vargas from third.
Andrew Benintendi broke through with the first extra-base hit of the game with a one-out triple in the fifth, which itself was single-shaped contact ripped down the right field line, where Walker boxed it around in right field for three bases. Vargas followed by drilling an Fedde backdoor sinker back up the middle through a drawn-in infield. Granted, the 2-1 Sox lead only lasted for another 15 minutes, but it was enough time for Fedde to likely regret his well-meaning wishes for Vargas' career trajectory.
Burke struck out Contreras to leave two on and one out for Brandon Eisert in the sixth, who induced a weak tapper from Gorman, but answered Venable's call to intentionally walk Arenado to load the bases by unintentionally walking Nootbaar to re-tie the game at two. The Sox saves leader tempted fate by running the count full to Walker too, but out-guessed him with a full count changeup, which was probably only sealed the third-most frustrating plate appearance of the afternoon for the young outfielder.
There was plenty of frustration to go around.
Bullet points:
*The Sox are 4-20 in one-run games. Blaze it.
"I don't think we're far off in these games," Burke said. "I don't think it's any one part that you kind of point out and say, you know, this is the reason why we're losing these games. I think there's a bunch of things we can do better as a team like top to bottom."
*Luis Robert Jr. laid down the first sacrifice bunt of his career in the fourth. Sure, it led to a game-tying run, but this is an indicator equivalent to seeing a polar bear walking down Michigan Ave. Our planet is not healthy if Robert is bunting runners in scoring position for Ryan Noda.
*Teel got dinged for the White Sox's second instance of catcher's interference all season, at the end of Burke's 10-pitch battle with Burleson in the sixth. It loomed large.
*Grant Taylor worked a scoreless seventh, which featured both him vaporizing Victor Scott II with fastballs and giving up a scary warning track fly out to Iván Herrera.
