The Chicago White Sox can hit, and Cleveland can most certainly pitch. The South Siders were able to tally 11 hits, but they could not string enough of them together and the lineup collectively ended up leaving 24 box score runners on base; Leury García was responsible for seven of those runners. Interestingly, every starter recorded a hit besides Leury and Adam Engel — but only three runs were scored.
Of course, the strike zone was all over the place. Both sides saw balls inches out of the zone called for strikes, but the South Siders definitely saw more. Zack Collins, with two outs and bases loaded, saw four straight balls, but one was called for a strike. That bases-loaded non-walk loomed large, the two times the Good Guys had the bases loaded with only one out looms larger, and the starting pitching looms largest.
On the bright side, Yasmani Grandal tallied his first RBI single with the White Sox, Codi Heuer is having a fantastic start to his major league career, and Luis Robert has tallied a base hit in each of his four career games.
Luis Robert now has 5 career hits.
— Christopher Kamka (@ckamka) July 28, 2020
All 100+ mph exit velocity
115.8 mph single
103.5 mph double
102.4 mph single
111.4 mph home run
101.5 mph single#WhiteSox
The Starts
Dylan Cease pitched a rather “meh” game. He only pitched 2 1⁄3 innings, and he was plagued by the home run ball. Off of seven hits (two of which were homers), Cease gave up four runs while only striking out one. He was bounced from the game early.
Aaron Civale was hot to start this ballgame. He struck out four of the first five batters, including Tim Anderson. However, he was not unhittable throughout the whole game. In fact, after TA7 struck out, he proceeded to homer and tally a double against Civale. Overall, Civale gave up two runs off of seven hits. However, he was able to pitch a quality start by pitching a full six innings.
Pressure Play
García found himself in two of the highest-pressure situations — and both times he could not handle the pressure. With the bases loaded in the top of the eighth, Leury recorded a 5.06 LI fielder’s choice, where the runner was thrown out at home.
Leury has had a rollercoaster start to the year. His defense was awful in the first game, but he came back the next day to homer from both sides of the plate. Today, he fell back down by squandering two bases-loaded situations.
Pressure Cooker
Zack Collins faced the highest total pressure in the game at 5.05 pLI, which is pretty impressive given he only had one at-bat/ But my goodness, it was a big one. In the top of the eighth, the bases were loaded, with two outs. Collins was thrown into this situation over Adam Engel because Engel was hitless, and Collins has a great eye. Collins never swung at a ball, but a pitch well out of the zone was called for a strike, forcing Collins into protection mode with a 1-2 count. He worked the count full, but ultimately flew out to left to end the inning. Yes, Zack worked a walk before that fly out — but it was not granted to him.
Top Play
The best single-play WPA occurred very early in the game. With a runner on first, Francisco Lindor homered to right-center field for a .151 WPA play that gave his team a quick 2-0 lead.
Game MVP
Civale earned the MVP honors for the opener. WIth a cumulative .190 WPA, he blew away his own team in that department, and he outdid TA7’s .126.
Magic Number: 3
This is Tim Anderson's 3rd career game with 3 extra-base hits, tying his career-high.
— Sarah Langs (@SlangsOnSports) July 28, 2020
The others: Sept. 2, 2018 & May 5, 2018.
After today, Tim Anderson has three career games with three extra-base hits. The 2019 batting champ is looking to go back-to-back tonight!