Gamethread: Twins at White Sox

The White Sox (45-56) suffered a 6-2 loss yesterday and have dropped the first two games of this series against the Twins (63-40). Yesterday’s game was the White Sox’s fourth consecutive loss. Tonight, they will turn to Iván Nova as they attempt to break this losing streak.

Nova is coming off an excellent start, when he allowed only one run in a complete game against the Marlins. That ended up being a 9-1 victory, and it was the last time the Sox found themselves in the win column. That was also the first time this season that a non-Giolito pitcher has thrown a complete game for the Sox. Overall, Nova has a 5.49 ERA, 5.34 FIP, 4.78 xFIP, and 0.7 fWAR this season.

Martín Peréz will start for the Twins. Peréz, a 28-year-old lefty, has a 4.37 ERA, 4.18 FIP, 4.43 xFIP, and 1.7 fWAR. As Statcast indicates, Peréz does not allow sharp contact often. Though his four-seamer (.385 xwOBA against) is mediocre in terms of velocity and spin rate, his cutter is much more effective (.246 xwOBA against). Peréz also throws his cutter most often (31.6% of his pitches this season), so the Sox should be expecting a lot of those.

In his career against the White Sox, Peréz has a 4.88 ERA in 27 ²⁄₃ innings across four starts. After the way the past few games have gone, the White Sox would welcome that kind of performance from Peréz.

Here are tonight’s starting lineups:

The game will start at 6:10 CST, and it will be televised on WGN. WGN 720 will have the radio coverage. Let’s get back on track.