A little bit new, a little bit old — a lotta bit bad
White Sox seize loss from win, falling, 6-3
Happy Game 2 of the White Sox season, and happy Trans Day of Visibility to all who celebrate! Well, I guess it’s not a very happy Game 2 of the White Sox season, seeing as they lost, 6-3, and showed a lot of their old selves in tonight’s game.
Let’s start with the new things they’re doing, which was the story of the first six-ish innings. Tim Anderson WALKED to start the game, that’s right folks Tim Anderson drew a walk. He then promptly stole second base and Eloy Jiménez (get this) DOUBLED WITH A MAN IN SCORING POSITION, to drive in the first run of the game. Eloy did it AGAIN in the sixth to drive in Andrew Benintendi, and then Yoán Moncada did the same damn thing to drive in Eloy.
How could the White Sox have lost this game? Well ...
Lance Lynn was on the bump for the Pale Hose on the pitching side of things, and while he historically has been bad against the Astros, he continued our theme of White Sox players doing something new by pitching a strong outing. Two earned runs on three hits with six strikeouts in 5 2⁄3 innings doesn’t seem like a bad outing until you realize Lynn gave us a bad new thing by handing out four walks on the night — almost a quarter of his walk total for the entire 2022 season. Those two runs came off a Kyle Tucker home run with two outs in the sixth, but that blow ultimately ended Lance’s night. Overall the night was good, but some worry has been seeded with that walk total.
After Lance’s night ended came A LOT of the old and bad.
Example A: Kendall Graveman started the Sox slow descent into the abyss by loading the bases in the seventh.
Example B: Jake Diekman, for whatever reason, was brought in to face Yordan Álvarez with two outs in the same inning and promptly gave up a bases-clearing double just out of the reach of Benintendi, that made it 5-3, Astros.
Example C: Diekman was left in the game for the eighth and gave up a walk and stolen base to Tucker, who scored on a David Hensley single off of
Example D: José Ruiz to make it 6-3.
Bad bullpen pitching and bad bullpen management, the story of the last three years of White Sox baseball.
Is this game the end of the world? Hopefully not; it’s Game 2 of 162. However, suffice to say it’s better that the Sox continue to do new good things instead of falling into old habits. Is Benintendi to blame for not being in a good position to catch the go-ahead double? Not really — Diekman shouldn’t have been in the game in the first place, and this White Sox problem can be pinned on Rick Hahn for not getting another left-handed reliever, seeing as Garret Crochet is still injured and Aaron Bummer has been iffy at times.
White Sox fall to 1-1, and to .500 for what will probably be the first of many times this season. Game 3 is tomorrow afternoon, and our best shot at a series split, with Lucas Giolito on the mound. Maybe it’ll be better, or maybe old habits die hard and it’ll be worse, who knows! What’s exciting is everyone watching gets to experience the roller coaster of emotions together.