It's hard to build up a reputation in nine starts, and the White Sox aren't exactly good enough to designate anyone as their streak stopper.
But if there was a man in the Sox home clubhouse best-suited to stand athwart the Blue Jays' 10-game winning streak and halt his own team's three-game slide, it's apparently 32-year-old Adrian Houser.
Even if he gets sick in the dugout after the first inning.
"That's probably about the fifth time," Houser said when asked if he's dealt with this before. "Nothing new. The trainers knew. I told them when I came in. I was like, 'Hey, this is a possibility.' So once I get it out, it's all good, ready to rock and roll. I felt a lot better after it. So I was able to settle in after that and just, you know, puke and rally."
While the concept of puke-and-rally is utilized more at keggers than major league games, Houser is subverting a lot of expectations this year. For example, seven innings of one-run ball is a performance typically associated with bat-missing, but Houser opened his afternoon by allowing bullet singles to the first two hitters and didn't enjoy a 1-2-3 inning until the fourth.
Until that point, Houser needed an escape of every conceivable variety (ground ball double play, lineout double play, TOOTBLAN) to get through the first three innings, with the only run across coming on Tyler Heineman bunting home Will Wagner after a leadoff double in the second. But once more peppering sinkers at a red-hot Blue Jays lineup that could scarcely figure him out two weeks ago, Houser only struck out two, but found the right sort of contact to protect the slimmest of leads.
"Every time I catch him, he's been pretty good," said Edgar Quero. "Our defense is pretty good right now, especially with him. His sinker makes those guys hit a lot of ground balls, and we did a really good job today."
What little offense the White Sox managed was centered around a Quero vs. a lefty-based attack. After his leadoff double against Eric Lauer in the second went for naught, Quero repeated the trick in the fourth by pulling his hands in on an inside cutter for a grounder down the left field line that cashed in an Austin Slater leadoff single. Following him was a classic Lenyn Sosa swing decision of letting it fly on an 0-1 slider aimed at his foot, producing the perfect size of bloop single to easily score Quero from second.
Two empty at-bats followed Sosa to end the fourth, Luis Robert Jr. flew out just short of the warning track with the bases juiced in the fifth, and no serious notions of insurance runs followed.
So when Nathan Lukes led off the sixth with another single followed by a Bo Bichette walk, the game was on the line and Houser pitched accordingly. He induced a would-be double play ball to short from Vladimir Guerrero Jr., but Colson Montgomery's feed required an extra stretch from Chase Meidroth, and the Sox second baseman couldn't find the handle for the turn afterward. No matter, as Houser just got another grounder from Addison Barger that led Tim Elko to step on the first base bag, before firing to Montgomery in time to tag Guerrero out at second just before Lukes could score the tying run from third.
"It does become a timing play, so really good job putting the tag on him and a good example for us as baserunners, you gotta make sure you don’t get tagged there," Will Venable said. "Vladdy is trying to make a play and be safe."
Grant Taylor pitched around a Bichette double for a scoreless eighth against the top of the Toronto order, but Will Venable elected not to go back to the well. He instead tapped Jordan Leasure for the ninth, where he struck out a pair before pitching over a two-out, two-strike, pinch-hit Alejandro Kirk single.
Leasure admittedly grooved a fastball to Myles Straw on the final pitch, but that turned out being just as non-threatening as it sounds in writing, with a lineout to Robert to end the afternoon.
Bullet points:
*Miguel Vargas let a Guerrero popup drop in front of him on the infield grass with one out in the third, but the only damage was all the groaning it caused as he corralled the ball in time to get a force out of Bichette at second.
Houser followed it with a pickoff throw that got away down the right field line, only for Meidroth's lob back to the infield to bounce away from Montgomery, prompting Guerrero to make an ill-advised bid for third. Vargas eventually foiled the plot by retrieving the bouncer, and lobbing it to Houser as he arrived to the bag just in time to tag Guerrero right in the groin, ending the inning. If you take the Sox at their word, it was sort of a long con.
"I think Vargie was exchanging runners there, although I think Vladdy you could make an argument is a bigger stolen base threat than Bichette," Venable said, "But he was thinking the right thing and it was an instinctual baseball play."
*Houser now has a 1.56 ERA over nine starts, and has gone seven innings or more in each of his last three outings.
"Kinda hoping he was going to be an All-Star," Leasure said. "We all think it has been [worthy]. Obviously he hasn't had that many starts up here, but still it's been really impressive."
*Leasure became the fourth Sox reliever with two saves or more on the season. Taylor leads the team with three.
