Having seen Mike Tauchman pull up lame between third and home twice last year, the White Sox are no strangers to a leg injury making the difference in a close game.
Austin Hays put a different spin on it tonight by getting hurt on the other side of the ball, but his pulled hamstring still resulted in one Baltimore run in a game that Baltimore won by one.
With a runner on first and two outs in the fourth inning, Erick Fedde got Tyler O'Neill hit hit a high fly down the left-field line. Hays had to run a decent distance, but he would've had time to get there had his hamstring not seized up about 20 feet from the spot. He began hopping on one leg as the ball hit dirt inside the chalk, and while he flipped it to Miguel Vargas for a relay throw that was closer to cutting down Rutschman than seemed possible, he still had to make the long walk back to the dugout with the trainer, with bad news likely to follow. Postgame, Will Venable confirmed Hays will go on the injured list.
"in that moment, him being healthy is more important," Fedde said. "Hopefully, it's not too bad. I'd love to see him get back quick."
While Fedde was unlucky to have allowed the game's first run, he was temporarily fortunate that O'Neill watched the fly drop from the plate area, so he advanced no further than first, and thus was unable to score on Ryan Mountcastle's single ensuing to right.
Except, while Fedde was able to get out of the fourth only trailing by one, he gave up a leadoff homer to Gunnar Henderson in the sixth that gave the Orioles the supplemental run they needed.
"I know he got the loss today but Fedde did an amazing job," said Grant Taylor, who opened the game. "Six innings, two runs. Nine times out of 10 that gets the job done."
After laying dormant for eight innings, the White Sox tried to make a run at it in the ninth against Ryan Helsley. Munetaka Murakami and Miguel Vargas led off the inning with walks, but Colson Montgomery's 103.6 mph grounder was stopped by a well-positioned Pete Alonso on the line, and from there, the Orioles were happy to continue trading 90 feet for an out. Lenyn Sosa's 100-mph grounder to short brought home Murakami, and while Vargas was eventually able to advance to third on Andrew Benintendi's swinging bunt single, Edgar Quero struck out on four pitches to end the game.
"It was nice to see the guys continue to battle, just couldn’t get anything going, really," Venable said. "A few hits sprinkled throughout the first eight innings there. We had some pitches to hit, just some soft contact on the ground."
Prior to the ninth, Chase Meidroth was the only White Sox hitter who could stand behind his body of work. He went 2-for-3 with a walk at the top of the White Sox order. The rest of the lineup went 2-for-26.
Benintendi tried to join him in the multi-hit column. His bid for a two-run homer in the second inning died on the right-center warning track, and two innings later, he lined out to left to strand Derek Hill on third.
Around those events, the Sox spent a cold evening frustrated by Brandon Young and two Orioles relievers. The Sox only struck out six times, but the quantity of contact lacked a certain quality and a fantastic diving catch by O'Neill in right to rob Tristan Peters didn't help matters.
Along the way, the Sox had two runners erased from the basepaths. Hays was caught stealing as Quero swung through strike three to end the second, and Hill also had an attempt thwarted via challenge when the replay showed he lost contact with the bag while Henderson maintained his tag.
When they didn't lose runners, they went 1-for-9 with men in scoring position, and the only hit failed to score a run. Then again, a second run would have merely delayed the discussion about what kind of outfield the White Sox are expected to deploy from here.
Bullet points:
*Quero was able to gun down Jeremiah Jackson on a stolen-base attempt, but it was a disappointing 23rd birthday otherwise.
*Meidroth also stood out defensively, making a diving stop and throw to his right to take a single from Rutschman in the sixth, and turning a 6-3 double play that Fedde avoided touching on its way back through the box to end the seventh.
*Vargas probably should've been charged with an error when he boxed Mountcastle's leadoff single in the seventh, but it merely set up Meidroth's nifty clean-up effort.
*Grant Taylor opened for a third time in four games, and while he posted another scoreless inning, he survived scarier contact.
*Fedde held up his end of the bargain with six effective innings: 6 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, 1 HR. Lucas Sims handled the other two.
