Yours truly, coming from the ballpark on this rainy day (but hey, the Hawaiian shirt was worth it alone).
It was a welcome sight to see a game even get started at all after the abysmal drive in, but given the second sellout of the season and the Chicago White Sox at .500, it was a can’t-miss game.
But, to the game, an 8-4 loss to the New York Yankees, because that’s the important part for you all. (But also, yes WIN05, I went to a Reynaldo López start ... never doing that again).
The first inning went by quick for everyone. López got three outs on batted balls, including a nice backhanded play from José Rondón at third. Chad Green had a surprisingly wonderful time with the top of the Sox lineup, as he struck out the side, which coincided with my very quickly-eaten bratwurst and a few eyerolls.
Unfortunately, those eyes kept rolling kept in the second. López was getting hit hard — just not hard enough for balls to get over the fence. In the bottom of the frame, Eloy Jiménez joined that parade, as some people in the neighboring section shouted “Hi Mom!” after a 111 mph single off the wall. But it was all for naught, as strikeout machine Green got Welington Castillo swinging to end the inning.
According to our eyes this is the hardest hit single in the history of ever. pic.twitter.com/13jatnmXQL
— Chicago White Sox (@whitesox) June 16, 2019
After another iffy but successful inning from López, the bullpen game officially started for the Yankees as Nestor Cortes Jr. entered the game. After a couple strikeouts from Cortes, the Sox lineup had gone 1-for-9 with eight strikeouts in their first go-around against Yankees pitching.
Let me repeat: The Sox lineup had gone 1-for-9 with eight strikeouts in their first go-around against Yankees pitching. A Yankees bullpen game, in fact.
A couple of hits, Leury García’s very lucky single and an infield single from Tim Anderson, brought up Jose Abreu with a chance to do some harm. He nearly did, falling just short of a homer on a ball caught by Aaron Hicks near the warning track.
In the fourth, the first two Yankees reached base on hard-hit singles. This is where DJ and friends began to get restless, as the perceived López meltdown seemed to be on the horizon (we are quite dour on Reylo). Unfortunately, that pessimism was warranted and I was off to get some dip n’ dots after a Gary Sánchez two-run double and a two-run home run by Gleyber Torres.
López kind of settled down after that. He continued to get hit hard, and did allow one more run, but the big damage was already done. He finished with a line of six innings, five earned runs, and just four strikeouts. He was only able to muster five swing and misses and honestly, without some stellar defense, particularly from Anderson, his outing would have been much worse. Juan Minaya replaced him, as the reliever’s run of only pitching in low-leverage situations continued. Minaya allowed a home run right out of the gate, and then another run on a fielder’s choice to push the Yankees total to seven.
Meanwhile, the strikeouts continued for Sox batters as they made Cortes Jr. look like Lucas Giolito. The bright side of the lineup was, of course, Jiménez, as he added another single in the seventh inning. His second hit was not as hard-hit as the first, but it was the same result with less fanfare as the sellout crowd started to empty.
After the 50/50 raffle of course did not go our way, the game finally got exciting again for the White Sox. For really no reason, Welington Castillo got angry at the strike zone and was thrown out of the game. Ricky Renteria came out after him to try and stop Beef from getting braised, but was not successful. Ricky got himself ejected as well, in what seemed clearly to be yet another rally the troops offing ...
... and it worked.
In the next half inning, after the ejections, the Sox got a couple of runners on and were threatening. After a throwing error by DJ LeMahieu, the Sox finally got a run to cross the plate. The next at-bat, by DH-turned-catcher James McCann, saw a launch of a three-run homer to right to trim the deficit to three.
New York was able to add one more insurance run in the top of the ninth for Aroldis Chapman, but he didn’t need it. He shut down the Sox in the bottom of the ninth, and just like that, they are back under .500 again.
If you were keeping track at home like we were at the ballpark, Sox bats struck out 16 times in the game, as every hitter in the starting lineup was K’ed at least once. Not an awe-inspiring night in the slightest, even with the late-inning rally.
But again, those Hawaiian shirts!
I can’t cue it for the game, but if I were Ashley, I would cue the sunglasses for those shirts: