For five scoreless innings at Rate Field on Saturday night, the game was a question of which hard-throwing right-hander would crack first: Sean Burke or Hunter Brown?
Instead, the second-straight galling top of the sixth inning against the Astros reminded that baseball is a team sport, and even a version of Burke that can reel off 10 strikeout in six innings of work is vulnerable without reliable defense. Or any run support.
As his line reflects (6 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 2 ER, BB, 10 K), Burke made plenty of his own trouble in the sixth. Plunking No. 9 hitter Cam Smith with an 0-1 sinker just as the Astros lineup turned over for the third time is the sort of mistake that gets a lot of starters in trouble. But Colson Montgomery one-upped him by whiffing on a medium-paced Jeremy Peña grounder to the hole that should have been worth at least one out in front of Yordan Alvarez, and instead went down as a line-drive in the box score.
"He’s out there working every day," Will Venable said of Montgomery's defense. "Like everybody, trying to be the best versions of themselves. He’s just got to find a way to finish some of these plays that have been some tough ones, but we’re used to seeing him making."
After a business decision four-pitch walk to Alvarez loaded the bases, Burke worked away from the pull-happy Isaac Paredes to such a degree that the Houston third baseman served a 2-2 slider off the corner into right, only for the other Montgomery to get in on the practice of whiffing on grounders. An in-rhythm Braden Montgomery had a decent shot of gunning out Peña, where as this version had to settle for holding Paredes at third after chasing his single to the wall. Burke fielded a hot comebacker from Jose Altuve himself, got LaMonte Wade Jr. to go around on a dirted breaker, and won a 13-pitch war against Christian Walker to end his night by stranding Paredes.
"I'm kind of frustrated with this game, with the way the sixth inning unfolded," Burke said. "I knew coming into it [Brown is] a good arm and has got good stuff and can make it tough on an offense. I felt, especially those first five innings, I put myself in position to go pretty deep into that game and then more just frustrated with hitting the leadoff guy. It's tough to hit the No. 9 hole [guy] and have to go face the top of the lineup with a guy on first where he didn't earn it."
Such an effort to prevent a fourth run could only be well-remembered if the White Sox offense began to resemble its better self at some point, when instead the only return to form that Saturday night witnessed was a redux of 2025 Hunter Brown.
Since missing over two months with a shoulder strain, last year's third-place finisher in American League Cy Young voting has been bedeviled by a 15.8 percent walk rate; slightly more than twice his mark from the previous year. Regression came in the form of seven walkless, shutout innings, where at least the Sox swapped out Friday night's blizzard of popups with medium depth fly outs. When Brown capped off the seventh by striking out Andrew Benintendi for the third time on the night, the Sox had still yet to put a runner in scoring position.
"The story tonight was Hunter Brown was really good," Venable said. "He’s got really good stuff. He was in the zone. He was able to get us to chase below the zone with the breaking stuff, beat us in the zone with four-seam and two-seam fastballs. Whatever you want to say about us not slugging like usual, today was a case where we just kind of got beat up by a guy with real good stuff."
That would come in the eighth, only after Peña led off Trevor Richards' second inning of work by chopping an 0-2 heater through the right side for his third single of the night, advanced to second on a not-that-wild pitch and scored on an aggressive send for a Paredes single directly to Braden Montgomery in right, when Edgar Quero couldn't handle the carom on his otherwise on-target throw.
Quero had a chance for redemption in the bottom half, jumping out to a 3-0 count against an erratic Bryan Abreu after he had already allowed a leadoff single to Braden Montgomery and walked Tristan Peters. But given four pretty middle offerings, he auto-took a 3-0 heater, fouled off two sliders before hitting a hard grounder to Nick Allen, who overcame two bobbles to still get Quero by two steps. Chase Meidroth struck out before Quero, and pinch-hitter Randal Grichuk popped out against old friend Bennett Sousa.
Sousa's march continued into the ninth, albeit not smoothly enough to give Josh Hader the night off. After Munetaka Murakami flew out to the wall in center, Miguel Vargas singled, took second when Lucas Spence bobbled it in center and scored when Colson Montgomery lined a slider into the right field corner. Montgomery was too sore from fouling a ball off his right leg to take second, and Josh Hader came on and struck out Luisangel Acuña (pinch-hitting for Benintendi) and the other Montgomery to make it moot.
Bullet points:
*Bulls-themed White Sox basketball warm-ups helped draw 30,029 in attendance.
*Burke's last seven outings: 45.2 IP, 32 H, 8 ER, 7 BB, 57 K, 4 HR, 1.58 ERA
*Colson Montgomery has a sub-.700 OPS since missing the Braves series last month with lower back tightness, but the more immediate physical concern would be that he fouled another pitch off his right leg in the ninth, prompting a trainer visit.
"It was just above where it got him the other day, so pretty sore," Venable said. "Obviously was able to finish that at-bat. He’ll get treatment and see where we’re at tomorrow."
*The Guardians lost in Tampa again, so the Sox remain 1.5 games up in the AL Central, and three ahead in the loss column. What a division.
*Grichuk is 5-for-31 and homerless in July.
