A blowout loss is a tough way to start a series at home in a playoff race, but the South Siders hope to flush Monday’s game and come out strong behind Anthony Kay today. After defeating the Sox yesterday, the Rangers now hold a half-game lead over the Houston Astros in the AL West, while Chicago’s lead in the AL Central has shrunk to just 2 1/2 games over the Cleveland Guardians. The Guardians have rebounded from their rough stretch, winning seven of their last 10 and riding a five-game winning streak after defeating the Los Angeles Angels yesterday. The Angels, of course, had opportunities to come back but naturally didn’t.
The South Siders are 5-5 in their last 10, and the offense has been struggling as a whole lately, basically living and dying by the long ball as we’ve seen in the last several games. In August, the White Sox are hitting just .208 with runners in scoring position as a team — the second-worst average in baseball over that stretch — while also racking up the most strikeouts (70). It also probably doesn’t help that both Colson Montgomery and Munetaka Murakami are building Strikeout City from the ground up, with Colson leading MLB in Ks over the last two weeks (24 in 51 ABs) and Mune’s 21 ranking third in baseball. Woof.
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With both the rotation and bullpen continuing to struggle, the pitching staff took another hit when the White Sox announced that Huascar Brazobán is headed to the IL with a left lat strain. Righthander Jonathan Cannon is being called up from Triple-A Charlotte to help fill the hole. Jonathan Cannon is most certainly not the answer, but at this point, the front office seems ready to try anything.
The only other roster update for today is that our sweet (mostly) clutch Andrew Benintendi has been placed on the bereavement list, and Rikuu Nishida will rejoin the team in his absence. We send our thoughts to Andrew and his family during this time.
Regardless of what the masses may think, lefthander Anthony Kay has been solid for the Good Guys and is probably the second-best starter they currently have behind Sean Burke. Kay will make his 25th start of the season and has a 3.96 ERA and a 1.327 WHIP over 127 1/3 innings. He seems to keep improving, and in August alone, Kay has allowed just seven earned runs over 23 2/3 innings (four starts), good for a cool 2.66 ERA and a 2-1 record. If you ask me, his great outing against the Atlanta Braves last week went unrewarded because the offense was nowhere to be found.
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Hopefully, the bats — or really anybody not named Miguel Vargas or Tristan Peters — can wake up to provide some early run support for Kay, but they will have a tough matchup with righthander Jacob deGrom on the mound. Peters has homered in three straight games, however, so let’s see if he can make it four.
With Benintendi unavailable and a righty on the mound, Sam Antonacci is taking over as the DH and leading off today. Peters will shift to left field in Benintendi’s place, while Brenton Doyle slots into center field and bats eighth. With those changes, today’s lineup is almost identical to Monday’s, and as we know, Will Venable loves the righty-lefty matchups. Still, I would be remiss not to mention Randal Grichuk’s career performance against deGrom: In 14 plate appearances, Grichuk has dominated. He’s slashed .385/.429/1.000 with two home runs, amassing a 1.429 OPS.
Chicago White Sox Lineup
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deGrom is also making his 25th start of the season and holds a 3.77 ERA across 126 2/3 innings. The 38-year-old still has zero problems striking guys out and has rung up 157 batters this season. His 30.3% strikeout rate ranks in the top 8% of MLB pitchers. deGrom’s fastball averages around 97 mph, though his off-speed pitches — slider, curveball and changeup — all fool batters, with all three pitches generating a whiff rate above 40%. His slider seems to be his most effective pitch, with opponents batting just .163 and slugging a measly .227 against it.
After being ejected from yesterday’s game for heckling the ump, Joc Pederson will get another day off, with Justin Foscue remaining in the leadoff spot after a decent performance Monday. Corey Seager has been swinging a hot bat lately, and after two doubles and three RBIs yesterday, that is now apparent. In the past two weeks, Seager has the third-highest batting average in MLB (.419) and the sixth-highest OPS (1.164), and he’s actually hit lefties better this year (.256 BA vs. .222 against righties).
Texas Rangers Lineup
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First pitch is scheduled for 6:40 p.m. CDT, and it should be a beautiful night for a ballgame: 78º with partly cloudy skies. Watch on CHSN or listen on ESPN Chicago 1000 AM.
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