White Sox 9, Indians 1: An unexpected fun night against Trevor Bauer

White Sox win

Baseball is a funny sport.

Last season, Trevor Bauer had his way against the White Sox. In four starts Bauer only allowed six runs over 25 innings with 32 strikeouts to four walks. After an embarrassing weekend against Boston at home, Bauer was the last pitcher the White Sox wanted to see.

After Leury Garcia lead off the game with a single, Yoan Moncada blasted a two-run homer to start a hit party that lasted all night against Bauer as the White Sox crushed the Indians, 9-1.

Up 2-0 in the third inning, recently promoted Charlie Tilson made the most of his first at-bat in the majors this season with a single and would advance to third on Garcia’s second base hit of the night. Moncada barely missed hitting his second home run of the night when his fly ball to center fell short of the wall. Tilson scored on the sacrifice fly, and the Sox were up 3-0.

Then leading off the fourth inning, James McCann crushed Bauer’s hanging slider to deep left field for his fourth home run of the season to make it 4-0. If it weren’t for two bad baserunning decisions, the fifth inning could have been a lot worse for Bauer. Tilson doubled to center field as he almost took Bauer deep and would advance to third on Garcia’s third single of the night.

Setting the table for Moncada who hit a laser of a line drive to right field that fell short of another home run as it bounced off the wall. Tilson easily scored, but because Garcia held up for a possible opportunity to tag up if the ball was caught got a slow jump. Third base coach Nick Capra waved Garcia home, but he was dead to rights at the plate as Francisco Lindor quickly threw him out.

Jose Abreu fouled out in foul territory, but it appeared that Moncada thought there were two outs because he was seen rounding third. Jose Ramirez made the easy catch and completed the double play tossing it to second base. The White Sox scored a run, but there was an opportunity to make it an even bigger inning, and if there was anything to learn from this past weekend is that every run is precious.

Luckily, it didn’t matter as the crooked number came in the sixth inning with the bases loaded for Tim Anderson and no outs. On the very first pitch, Anderson hit a 69-mph grounder up the middle that Lindor couldn’t reach plating two runs. Down 8-1, the Indians replaced Bauer with Neil Ramirez. Bauer’s final line wrapped up when Anderson stole second base, his 12th steal of the season, and catcher Roberto Perez’s throw skipped into center field allowing Nicky Delmonico to score. In five innings pitched, Bauer allowed ten hits eight runs (seven earned) and two home runs.

While Bauer was struggling, Sox starter Ivan Nova had smooth sailing against the Indians offense. There was trouble in the fourth inning when Nova allowed a single to Jose Ramirez and walked Carlos Santana with one out. Carlos Gonzalez would strike out swinging, and Jake Bauers grounded out to Yolmer Sanchez to end that threat.

The Indians would score in the fifth inning as Nova allowed back-to-back singles to Jordan Luplow and Tyler Naquin. After a mound visit, Nova got Perez to fly out to right field and Lindor to pop out on the first pitch. However, Jason Kipnis singled to right field scoring Luplow to make it a 5-1 game. After a second mound visit, Nova was able to limit the damage as Jose Ramirez flew out to right field.

Cleveland would have two runners on again in the sixth inning, but Nova was able to escape that jam and pitched a clean seventh inning to give the White Sox a much-needed quality start. Nova’s final line was 7 IP 8 H 1 ER 1 BB 5 K on 104 pitches.

With the victory, the White Sox are now 2-1 at Cleveland in 2019 which already surpasses their win total last season at Progressive Field (1-8 in 2018).

Game Notes:

  • The White Sox are 8-6 against the AL Central
  • Yoan Moncada has eight doubles, seven home runs, and now 24 RBI for the season.
  • Carrying much of the offense this past week, Jose Abreu was the only White Sox batter that didn’t record a hit (0-for-5, 3 K’s).

Record: 15-18 | Box Score | Highlights

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Yolmer

Nice win. This is kind of a fun team sometimes, and they will be more fun when the cut Alonso and Castillo and bring up Collins and Cease.

knoxfire30

I cant believe the start James McCann is off too…. he has basically locked down the starting catching spot making Wellington pretty useless.

In a dual outcome move that benefits the sox why not cut bait with Castillo at some point soon and bring up Collins. Sox could utilize Collins behind the dish maybe 2 or 3 times a week then 1 or 2 games at 1b/dh to get him pretty regular mlb at bats while also eliminating the need for alonso to play daily. There is absolutely no reason to let his option vest that would be a terrible allocation of resources for the 2020 squad.

Only downside I see is Collins not getting as many reps defensively.

HallofFrank

Yeah, I like this. I’d probably give it another few weeks just to give Collins some more reps and see if Castillo can rebound, but if Collins was getting 3 games a week behind the plate that would be good work, I think. 

Replacing Castillo with Collins and adding back Eloy soon would make this a fun offense to watch. 

lil jimmy

Catchers get hurt all the time. Castillo could be moved pre -deadline to a team in need.

Neat_on_the_rocks

Castillo has been so bad I cant see any team wanting to pay him when they can just use their own minor league depth.

roke1960

I agree. Time to bring Collins up and dump Castillo. McCann has a good at bat almost every time up. He really looks good so far. McCann and Collins would provide a good lefty-righty balance at catcher. And then Collins can also take ABs away from Yonder.
I think they are starting to prepare for 2020. Engel should be done as far as his White Sox career goes. Tilson will get a good shot at being the 4th outfielder. He has never been healthy with the White Sox until this year. So far, so good. Leury is making a case to be our super sub in the coming years. Yolmer’s days are numbered. They can’t pay $4-5 million for that in the future. I think Mendick can hold down 2nd next year until Madrigal is ready. Nicky should be DFAd when Eloy comes back.
So that means by next year, Engel, Nicky, Yolmer, Castillo and Alonso would be gone, with Collins and Robert up, Madrigal in the wings and hopefully a good outfield bat acquired in free agency. Ozuna, Puig, Dickerson or Castellanos would upgrade one of the outfield spots, Eloy could slide to DH, and Basabe/Adolfo/Gonzalez/Rutherford/Tilson/Cordell could fill the other outfield spot.

knoxfire30

Yea I almost keep forgetting about Eloy, but hopefully when he is back, they can work him in at OF and DH a bit and allow Tilson, Delmonico, Cordell, some type of OF rotation. They need to start cutting into Alonso’s at bats.

Neat_on_the_rocks

Its just one game with Tilson but he was tearing up AAA as well. If he continues to be even a bit interesting, I think Delmonico’s days may be numbered. With Cordell/Tilson platoon in RF looking like the best use of 2019 reps, and ELoy due to get most LF ABs, Nicky ends up on the short end of things.

Unless of course they cut bait with Alonso. Which makes more and more sense with each day that passes. Problem is it will probably be dead money. If he doesn’t get hot ASAP nobody is going to want him.

knoxfire30

Yea, I dont see much of a market.

mikeyb

Bring up Collins and dump Alonso.

gibby32

I doubt that Collins is ready, offensively or defensively. Development is a thing, and just because Collins appears improved over 2018 does not mean that he is ready for the majors.