Gamethread: Diamondbacks at White Sox

Four days until the regular season!

Next Sunday, the White Sox will be playing a regular season game against the Los Angeles Angels, my first regular season coverage at SSS, but today they will be playing one of their last spring training games against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Camelback Ranch.

In their last outing against the D-backs, the South Siders came back in the ninth inning to help secure a tie, so hopefully today they can start that momentum earlier and secure an easy win.

Even though there seems to be a lot of panic around what the starting lineup is going to look like for Opening Day, a lot of anger about the Eloy Jiménez injury, or just straight-up confusion from a lot of fans as to why our future DH, Andrew Vaughn, is suddenly playing LF, it’s important to look at the positives that have came from recent spring training success and take a few deep breaths. At 11-11, the White Sox have evened up their record, which was well below .500 at the start of the spring, and have been heating up on all cylinders as of recently. We are seeing more solid at-bats from star players in the lineup like José Abreu, Yoán Moncada, and Tim Anderson, and solid outings from all of our starting pitchers.

Speaking of starting pitchers, Dallas Keuchel will be on the mound today, looking to shave down his 7.11 ERA so far this spring. Keuchel had a rough first outing, allowing five runs in just 2 ¹⁄₃ innings pitched against the Kansas City Royals. But he turned it around his last outing on the mound against the Chicago Cubs, and went four innings while only allowing one hit. A decent outing today will help give him some confidence going into the regular season as a key starter for the team.

Here is a look at the rest of the starting lineup:

Anderson will lead it off, and we have the return of Vaughn out in left, while Zack Collins looks to continue his hot streak at the plate. Collins currently holds a .325 average with three home runs, and may be an answer to the current DH situation for the regular season. Abreu looks to continue his offensive surge, while Yermín Mercedes will fill the DH spot for today’s lineup.

As for the D-backs pitching, Merrill Kelly will get the start. Kelly has a 6.59 ERA and a 1.68 WHIP in four starts this spring, but does also have 11 strikeouts through 13 ²⁄₃ innings pitched.

Here is the rest of the D-backs starting lineup:

The game will start at 3:05 p.m. CT, and will be available to watch on NBCSCH, along with radio coverage on ESPN1000. Also, you can tune into MLB.TV as it will be the Free Game of the Day. It’s also being broadcast live on the MLB Network, but only in the Chicago market.