White Sox 2, Royals 1: Winning incredibly ugly

A laugher akin to their 22-1 blowout on Friday night wouldn't have suited a tribute to the 1983 White Sox.

A game-ending Jacob Gonzalez single preceded by one of the strangest mistakes you'll ever see? Now that's winning ugly.

The White Sox's seventh walk-off victory of the year by their seventh different player -- and fourth rookie -- capped it off, but this one will be more remembered by the play that happened before it. The box score will show it as a Braden Montgomery bunt single, but this is why recaps exist.

Braden Montgomery came to the plate after Colson Montgomery and Chase Meidroth greeted Daniel Lynch IV with singles, and he dropped a bunt on the left side of the infield.

Third baseman Nick Loftin, who played in anticipating a Meidroth bunt the batter before, was even with the bag on this one, but retreated to third in hopes of a force out. Lynch fielded the ball with his glove with Colson Montgomery still several strides away from third, but he needed an extra stride himself to position his body, then whipped a throw from about 20 feet away.

"You have no idea where they're going to go with that ball," said Will Venable with a straight face. "It was a great bunt by Braden, and a nice effort by Lynch there, and we're lucky that we were able to have a successful play."

It didn't hit Loftin in the glove. Instead, it drilled Loftin in the groin, while all runners were safe, Loftin was not. He lay down on the ground for several minutes, and then stayed bent at the waist after rising to his feet. He eventually left the field with a trainer escort, and Lynch departed as well.

Righty John Schreiber entered to face righty Junior Pérez and came within a pitch of walking him, but Perez took on a full count and returned to the dugout after a no-doubt strike.

That brought Gonzalez to the plate, and he could have walked it off in three different ways. First, he jumped out of a way of a fastball that could've drilled his elbow armor, which would've been a winning HBP, but he had a surprised reaction for a reason.

"The pitcher has a low arm slot, so he was letting go of the ball right in Chase’s uniform," said Gonzalez, who signaled Meidroth to get a lead off second. "I needed him to move one way or the other because I couldn’t see the first two pitches. It helped for sure."

Then Gonzalez swung at a 3-1 cutter in off the plate which made it a full count. Schreiber then threw a fastball that Gonzalez had to swing at, as it would've dotted the outside corner otherwise, and Gonzalez shot it under the glove of a Bobby Witt Jr., who was drawn-in as part of a five-man infield.

"In my whole life, I’ve never had a walkoff hit," Gonzalez said. "I’ve had walkoff groundouts or sac flies, but that was my first walkoff hit. They are both wins, but hits are always better."

Grant Taylor picked up the win for two innings of ideal relief. He retired all six batters he faced, four of them by strikeout, and he threw 18 of 19 pitches for strikes.

"He's back," said Davis Martin. "He has a really good heater and when guys have to respect his really good heater, then he can throw his really good curveball. He can be one of the most dominant relievers in the league. He has the stuff for it. He has the mindset for it. He does everything right off the field."

Taylor's outing capped off an exceptional day of pitching all around. Michael Wacha once again stymied the White Sox for most of a day, throwing 7⅔ masterful innings on 105 pitches in hopes of bailing out an exhausted bullpen.

Attempts to ambush Wacha led to two single-digit-pitch innings. Attempts to run up his pitch count resulted in seven strikeouts. Attempts to pressure the Royals when they did reach base resulted in Miguel Vargas getting cut down at second trying to stretch a single into a double, and Braden Montgomery getting thrown out on a stolen base attempt.

The Royals finally provided him a lead in the top of the seventh against Sean Newcomb, although the Royals had two runners cut down that inning alone. Tyler Tolbert pinch-ran after a Michael Massey leadoff single and stole second and third. Newcomb struck out Salvador Perez and walked Starling Marte, but Loftin's attempt to safety-squeeze Tolbert home went back to Newcomb, who glove-flipped home to get Tolbert without a review.

Still, the Royals had runners on first and second with two outs, a walk to Isaac Collins loaded the bases, and then Carter Jensen lined a single to right for the game's first run. Braden Montgomery's arm should've warranted an easy stop sign, but Loftin slammed on the breaks way too late, and even though Romo didn't anticipate having to throw to third after catching the ball on the fly, he still had time to get it to Vargas for the final out.

The Royals led 1-0, but it still presented a huge inflection point, because Witt would've come to the plate with the bases loaded, and that probably would've necessitated Taylor entering in the seventh, rather than being set up to handle the last two innings by himself. Then there's, Loftin, whose last three innings included a bad bunt, a TOOTBLAN, and then getting hit the junk.

The White Sox were able to tie it up in the bottom of the inning in an unimpressive fashion befitting of the day. Andrew Benintendi singled to left, where he was replaced by Luisangel Acuña. Acuña stayed put while Colson Montgomery struck out, but he took off for second during Meidroth's at-bat. Meidroth diced a sinking liner up the middle that eluded Tolbert's best attempt to redirect after covering second, and Acuña made an athletic play tracking the baseball while sliding into second, popping up and hopping around Tolbert to continue to third. From there, he scored on a Braden Montgomery groundout to tie the game at 1.

Martin was just as effective as Wacha over 5⅓ shutout innings, but he wasn't as efficient. A 25-pitch second inning put him behind the eight-ball, as he lost a seven-pitch battle to Massey for a one-out single, and then Perez bounced a double off the foul pole to put runners on second and third.

"It was just mechanical," said Martin, who acknowledged he was off his game. "Felt like I was a little more left and right. That's why the misses were hard in, hard away, hard in, hard away. Just some stuff to clean up and go back out there and get ready for Cleveland."

Martin kept the Royals off the board, but he had to work for it. He fell into a full count with John Rave after five pitches, watched Rave foul the next five off before locking him up with a sinker on the inside corner. He then survived a middle-middle 0-1 slider to Loftin, who took a slider low and away before flailing at a fastball in the same direction for strike three.

Martin only struck out three batters all afternoon, but two of them were high-leverage. He ended up pitching into the sixth, but when Witt doubled off him with one out, Will Venable went to Newcomb. Martin's 10th win will still have to wait, but he was able to lower his ERA to an even 3.00.

Bullet points:

*The White Sox are on pace for 86 wins at the halfway point, and are on pace for a 34-18 record in one-run games.

"We want to be playing in October and we want to play as long as we possibly can," Taylor said. "I don’t think the clubhouse is very surprised. I think we kind of knew what we had coming into spring and as we worked together, especially with additions like [Munetaka Murakami] and some other guys, I think we were all pretty excited to get out here and play. We knew we had a lot to put out there."

*The White Sox have won a franchise-record 10 consecutive series at home, where they're on pace for a 56-23 record.

Record: 43-38 | Box score | Statcast