It wasn't a display of pitching dominance, but Shane Smith bowed his considerable, Igloo gallon jug of a neck to bruise his way through six tough innings. What mattered more was that he handily outpitched his counterpart, Bryce Elder. The White Sox led 10-4 when his evening was over, leaving the White Sox bullpen a six-run lead to carry over three innings.
It couldn't even make it through two.
After threatening the White Sox's massive lead the night before, the Braves finished the job this time around. They struck for five runs in the seventh, and Drake Baldwin's soft single dropped in front of a diving Mike Tauchman with two outs in the eighth for the two-run blow that put the Braves ahead for good.
The White Sox were 23-0 when scoring at least seven runs, and they should've been 24-0 when they opened the seventh with a six-run lead, but once Chase Meidroth let a grounder scoot under his glove to start the seventh, Sphincter Time set in. Tyler Gilbert then gave up singles to Matt Olson and Ronald Acuña Jr. to make it a 10-5 game, and while he got Michael Harris II to ground out, the approach of Marcell Ozuna inspired Will Venable to go to a righty.
Unfortunately, that righty was Elvis Peguero, who walked Ozuna on three pitches (he started with a pitch timer violation), and then Drake Baldwin on four to bring the tying run to the plate. He was able to get a gift strike on a low slider for an 0-1 count on Ozzie Albies, but Albies stayed with a sinker above the knees and lined it to center for two more runs, narrowing the White Sox's lead to 10-8. A 4-6 groundout made it 10-9, and that's when Tyler Alexander entered.
Alexander didn't have better luck, at least on his own, as he gave up a single to Vidal Bruján to put the go-ahead run on first, bringing Jurickson Profar back to the plate. Alexander started with a first-pitch strike, but missed with a fastball away. A second fastball was also called a ball, but while it should've been a strike, it also didn't matter because Edgar Quero whipped the ball to first to pick off Bruján to bring the inning to a merciful end.
That was the first of two times where the Braves gave the White Sox an out in the late innings. They loaded the bases on a walk, double and intentional walk,. but Harris' attempt to spring a squeeze bunt ended up with an easy 1-2 force at the plate. In came Steven Wilson, who got Ozuna to pop out. Baldwin followed, and while Tauchman was able to deny Nacho Alvarez Jr. a run-scoring single with a full-extension catch coming in in the fourth inning, his attempt to replicate that play came up a little short. The ball deflected back to the infield, two runs scored, and Raisel Iglesias set down the White Sox in order for his 20th save.
At least we didn't have to watch a White Sox bullpen try to cover a third inning.
Should this continue, we may have to write separate recaps for the offense and pitching, because the effort put forth by the White Sox lineup was as inspiring as the pitching staff's was deflating.
The White Sox were able to erase a pair of Atlanta leads early. While Harris homered off Smith for a 2-0 Atlanta advantage in the first, the White Sox rallied with a three-run third. Meidroth bunted two runners over after a pair of singles to start the inning, and they were not limited to one run. It looked that way when Tauchman's groundout scored a run, but put a second out on the board, but Miguel Vargas extended the inning with a walk, and Kyle Teel pulled a double into the right-field corner to put the Sox ahead 3-2.
When Smith gave up another two-run shot in the fourth -- this one by Profar with two outs -- the Sox chased Elder with a five-spot. Meidroth, Tauchman and Vargas all singled with one out, and while Meidroth should've been a dead duck on a bad Justin Jirschele one-out send, Baldwin couldn't handle the bounce on the throw from left field, and Meidroth was able to touch the plate as Baldwin meekly retrieved the carom.
That tied the game at 4, but while Teel flied out to center for the second out, the Sox were somehow just getting started. Lenyn Sosa shot a line drive to right center for an RBI single to put the Sox back ahead, Andrew Benintendi walked, and then Luis Robert Jr. dotted the chalk on the left field line with a line drive that barely cleared the head of a leaping Alvarez at third. That cleared the bases to make it 8-4, and Elder departed before record the third out.
More two-out magic in the sixth got the Sox into double digits for the second consecutive night, as Vargas doubled to right after the first two batters were retired, and Teel lofted a homer to right for his second homer in as many evenings. If you turned off the game right then and there, whether because you thought the game was over or because you feared how it might end, you chose wisely either way.
Bullet points:
*Meidroth made a great diving stop and throw on Nick Allen's grounder up the middle to end the sixth inning, which made the inning-opening error an immediate sort of regression.
*The White Sox went 5-for-9 with runners in scoring position. The Braves were 6-for-19, as they threatened throughout the night.
*Teel looked every bit like a No. 3 hitter, finishing 2-for-5 with a homer, double and four RBIs. Vargas reached base three times and scored three runs ahead of him.
*Smith's line: 6 IP, 7 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 64 of a career-high 101 pitches for strikes.
*The bullpen's line: 2 IP, 6 H, 7 R, 6 ER, 4 BB, 0 K, 27 of 58 pitches for strikes.
