With the game tied at 4 and runners on second and third and one out in the eighth, Sam Antonacci's natural instinct almost led him in the wrong direction.
He squared around to bunt in an attempt to spring a surprise on rookie Riley Cornelio, whose inside breaking ball missed. Antonacci pulled his bat back to wheel out of the way, which also took his foot out of the way as the ball hit the dirt behind it. Nationals catcher Drew Millas made a great stop, and as he called time to address the spray that kicked up in his eye, Antonacci kicked his foot out a bit, pointed to the dirt and tried to see if home plate umpire Will Little thought the ball clipped him.
It would've been his second plunking of the evening, but he shouldn't have wanted that outcome. An HBP would've loaded the bases against a rookie reliever demonstrating a casual-at-best relationship with the strike zone in his major league debut, sure, but it also would've set up double play possibilities when Antonacci had a choice of shooting the ball through a drawn-in infield or lofting a fly deep enough to score Miguel Vargas from third and put the Sox ahead.
Fortunately, Little saw no HBP to consider, Antonacci had to stay in the plate apparance, and even though he backed himself into a corner by taking a 1-1 fastball down the middle, he sliced a slightly firmer challenge fastball down the left-field line for the go-ahead sacrifice fly.
"Those ones at the feet are a little iffy, you can go on the IL on those," said Antonacci, seemingly channeling a more safety conscious player for a moment. "Just trying to get a ball back up the middle or in the air to just get that guy from third home, worked out perfectly."
Tristan Peters came a couple feet from a three-run homer that would've pushed the game out of a save situation, but it died at the wall right of center, and Seranthony Domínguez indeed had an opportunity to convert. A one-out double complicated matters, because that allowed Washington's lineup to turn over to James Wood with the tying run on third.
"Scary as Wood is, we got our guy out there in Seranthony, so, trust him to get the job done," said Will Venable, who acknowledged that putting Wood on base was lightly considered.
Domínguez got ahead 1-2 with splitters, and when Wood spit on a fourth, Domínguez tried a fastball up top. Wood didn't bite on that one, but served the secondary purpose of changing his eye level, for Domínguez returned to the splitter on a full count, and Wood whiffed over it to end the game.
The White Sox's second late-inning lead stuck. The first one only lasted two pitches. Chicago turned a 3-2 deficit into a 4-3 lead when Cornelio opened his MLB career by walking Antonacci and Luisangel Acuña, and then made an out-of-control throw to first on a Peters bunt that was more "drag" than "sacrifice." Antonacci scored, Acuña advanced to third, and an Andrew Benintendi sac fly put the Sox ahead for the first time all night. Alas, Jordan Leasure's 1-0 center-cut slider to Brady House ended up in the patio behind the right field fence, and the Sox had to do it all over again.
The White Sox still managed to snap their six-game home losing streak despite that late burp, as well as a few other miscues. The Bryan Hudson-Erick Fedde combination was effective, but it would've been better had leaky defense not led to two of the three runs allowed being unearned.
They fell behind in the second because Acuña overran a single to center and gave up an extra 90 feet to a runner who would've been on second, which mattered when the inning's only run scored on a sac fly.
In the fifth, Edgar Quero blew up a safety squeeze attempt when he threw behind Nasim Nuñez, who drifted too far off third and was a dead duck in a rundown ... only to tap Millas' bat while framing a pitch for an unnecessary catcher interference. That put the ninth-hitting catcher at first for Wood, and a pair of Fedde walks made it a 2-1 game. When it looked like Fedde might've induced a 6-4-3 double play from House, Colson Montgomery waited one hop, then soft-tossed to Chase Meidroth, and the throw to first was too late to get both.
Nevertheless, the Sox plugged away. Murakami knotted the game at 1 in the fourth by lofting a Miles Mikolas changeup over the wall just right of the batter's eye for his 11th homer of the season. Postgame, Murakami was asked if he had anything to compare to his current hot streak of six homers in seven games, setting him up to dunk on an under-informed reporter via interpreter.
"In Japan, I hit five homers in a row; five at-bats in a row," said Murakami.
In the sixth, Andrew Benintendi led off with a double off the wall. He stayed there for the next three batters when Chase Meidroth grounded out, Murakami drew a 3-0 intentional walk from Richard Lovelady, the lefty brought in to face him, and then Vargas flied out. That theoretically set up another favorable matchup for Washington, but as Montgomery's been doing all season, he foiled the lefty-lefty pairing by lining a 2-2 sinker to right, narrowing Washington's lead to 3-2. That was just one of two hits in 13 at-bats with runners in scoring position tonight, but between that single and Peters' bunt, they timed them right.
Bullet points:
*The Sox played small ball well, as Quero followed up Peters' bunt in the seventh with one in the eighth that set the stage for Antonacci.
*Antonacci was cut down at second for the final out of the second, but he turned a single into a hustle double by a huge margin his second time up, and ended up finishing 1-for-1 with a walk, HBP and sac fly on the night.
*Everson Pereira led off the game to face Washington opener PJ Poulin, and then was lifted for Benintendi when Blake Butera switched pitcher handedness with bulk boy Mikolas. Venable said postgame that Pereira had been due an off day, and they opted to use him early rather than hold him for a late pinch hit chance.
*The White Sox held Wood to two true outcomes: 0-for-2 with three walks, and Hudson erased the first free pass with a pickoff.
*CHSN's Friday Night All-Access broadcast miked up Justin Jirschele, which paid off when they showed him talking to Montgomery in the dugout about whether he could have played the potential double play more aggressively in the fifth.
*Cornelio's line in his MLB debut: 2 IP, 2 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 4 BB, 1 K, and the unearned run was on his own error. The Nationals bullpen came into the game with a 5.41 ERA over the second-most innings worked, which might be all the explanation as to why he got a second inning.
