If there's ever a time to be humbled, it's after winning four consecutive postseason games and holding a 2-0 lead in a best-of-5 series.
The excitement from a crowd of 40,590 was subdued by a four-run Cleveland outburst in the second, and while the White Sox offense mounted various threats to close the gap, a two-run eighth pushed the game out of reach, and a two-run ninth made it a laugher.
The good news? The White Sox still have two more chances to get it right, and Cleveland closer Cade Smith pitched the final two innings.
The bad news? The White Sox have a lot of things to correct, be it a plate approach that led to a record 19 strikeouts, a staff that needs to reevaluate its list of trustworthy relievers, and even smaller things like challenge strategy.
The game took a few turns, but it turned out the Guardians scored all the necessary runs in the third inning, which started with Bryan Hudson following Sean Newcomb's two scoreless innings, and ended with Hagen Smith allowing a bases-loaded triple to Jo Adell.
Hudson only retired one of the four batters he faced, and on a lineout to Colson Montgomery. Otherwise, he started the inning with a walk to Travis Bazzana, then gave up one-out singles to Bryan Rocchio and Steven Kwan, the latter tying the game at 1.
That's when Will Venable called for a third consecutive lefty in Hagen Smith, who walked José Ramírez to load the bases. He got Chase DeLauter to ground into a force at home for the second out, but just when it looked like he was one batter away from escaping disaster, he tried to sneak a high 1-2 fastball past Adell, who shot it down the right field line and into the corner for a three-run triple and a 4-1 Cleveland lead.
The White Sox spent the rest of the game trying to claw their way back into it, and at various moments, it looked like they might. Chase Meidroth and Tristan Peters started the fourth with doubles that made it a 4-2 game, but Foster Griffin struck out Braden Montgomery, after which Shawn Armstrong entered and got Randal Grichuk to line out, followed by a Colson Montgomery strikeout.
José Ramírez answered that run in the top of the fifth by doubling with one out, stealing third and beating Chase Meidroth's throw home on an RBI fielder's choice, but the Sox had one more rally in them.
A fifth-inning threat was stunted by Kyle Teel lining into an inning-ending double play when Miguel Vargas broke for third with the intent to score on a single to right, only to realize too late that Bazzana might've been able to catch it, but they tried once more in the sixth after two outs. Braden Montgomery drew a two-out walk to end Joey Castillo's late afternoon, after which Grichuk greeted Hunter Gaddis with a single and Colson Montgomery was plunked to load the bases.
Up came Sam Antonacci, who was also plunked to make it a 5-3 game, but while Vargas actually put the ball in play with a firm liner, Ramírez stopped it with a lunging effort, and threw across the diamond to end the threat.
At that point, Venable settled for his lower-leverage arms and guys who hadn't pitched, and the Guardians bled them for four more.
David Sandlin entered in relief of Tyler Davis after an iffy-but-scoreless seventh and promptly walked Bazzana. Patrick Bailey followed with a single, but Brayan Rocchio bunted to give Sandlin some footing, and it nearly backfired when Steven Kwan's flyout was too shallow to score Bazzana. But that brought Ramírez to the plate, and while he hit a floater towards the left field line, it was away from where Grichuk was shaded, his diving attempt fell short for a two-run triple that more or less kicked the game out of reach.
And if it wasn't, Davis Martin made sure of it by issuing the Sox's ninth and 10th walks of the game before giving up an RBI double to Angel Genao, and an RBI single to Rocchio.
The game was effectively lost with the strike zones. White Sox pitchers issued 10 walks against six strikeouts, and all those walks were issued from the third inning onward. Meanwhile, White Sox hitters struck out 19 times against three walks, including three strikeouts in the first inning that dampened the White Sox's best chance to take control of the game.
Antonacci started the game by drawing a walk against Cleveland opener Daniel Espino, followed by a Vargas single. Munetaka Murakami struck out, but Teel picked him up with a double to right that scored Antonacci and advanced Vargas to third. Alas, Chase Meidroth saw a drawn-in infield and was hunting everything up to get a ball in the air, only to chase five high pitches for a strikeout. Trsitan Peters then got locked up in a lefty-lefty matchup as Griffin's appearance got underway, and the only White Sox lead was limited to one run.
Bullet points:
*Antonacci reached base four times on a walk, single and two HBPs. The rest of the lineup went 5-for-30 with two walks and 18 strikeouts.
*Teel lost both White Sox challenges over the course of two batters in the third inning. The second one was the first pitch to Bailey with a runner on first, which was the decidedly worse one.
*The White Sox lost one of their replay reviews in bizarre fashion. Home plate umpire Todd Tichenor originally said Peters was hit by an inside pitch from Griffin, but the Guardians challenged, and the replay showed that the ball cleared Peters' body parts and only hit his bat for a foul ball. OK.
But then Venable came out and challenged for catcher interference, which the review did not show. Peters' bat came nowhere close to touching Bailey's mitt. It may have hit a string, but that's not considered a valid part of the mitt. Given that the White Sox had all the time to consider a challenge while the original call was being reviewed, it seems like they didn't understand the rule. After all that, Peters stepped back in the box and eventually won the battle against Griffin with the RBI double.
*Grichuk started the game with a strong break and diving catch on Ramírez's liner two batters in, but wasn't so lucky later on.
*Vargas was able to double off Adell after catching a liner in Newcomb's second inning of work, before the tables were turned on him.
White Sox lead series 2-1 | Box score | Statcast
