Six Pack of Stats: White Sox 5, Royals 3 (10 innings)

The Chicago White Sox picked up their 17th win of the season after defeating the Kansas City Royals, 5-3, in 10 innings. The White Sox move to 17-17 and are now 2 ¹⁄₂ games back of the AL Central-leading Twins. The Royals drop to 12-21, already seven games out of first place.

The Starters

Johnny Cueto started for the White Sox and went six scoreless innings, giving up two hits and two walks while striking out seven batters.

Cueto used a five-pitch arsenal in his 81-pitch outing, using his slider a game-high 32 times. He saw the most CSW success with his sinker, generating a 52% CSW rate. While losing an inch of the vertical break on the pitch, he gained 19 rpm of spin and an inch of horizontal break.

Cueto’s 81-pitch outing looked like this:

Baseball Savant

Brad Keller started for the Royals, going seven innings and giving up three earned runs on eight hits while striking out three batters.

Keller used a four-pitch arsenal in his 96-pitch outing. He used his slider 46 times, generating a 33% CSW rate despite losing spin and both vertical and horizontal break.

Keller’s 96-pitch outing looked like this:

Baseball Savant

Pressure Play

With one out and the tying run on third with the White Sox leading 3-2 in the bottom of the eighth, Royals left fielder Andrew Benintendi singled to right field to make the score 3-3.

The RBI-single had an LI of 4.21, the most of any plate appearance.

Pressure Cooker

White Sox reliever Kendall Graveman had a game-high pLI of 2.58, a few hundredths of a point higher than Royals shortstop Nicky Lopez’s 2.50.

Top Play

With two outs and a runner on second in the top of the 10th, White Sox center fielder Luis Robert homered to give Chicago a 5-3 lead. The home run added .490 WPA for the White Sox.

Top Performer

Nearly all of Robert’s .498 WPA on the game resulted from his two-run home run in extras.

Smackdown

Luckiest hit: With nobody on and two out in the top of the seventh, White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson hit a ground ball single to short. The single had a .090 xBA, the lowest of any hit during the game.

Toughest out: Leading off the bottom of the seventh, Royals first baseman Carlos Santana hit a 98.5 mph line out to second base. The line drive had a .900 xBA, the most of any out.

Hardest hit: Leading off the top of the sixth, White Sox first baseman José Abreu lined a single into center field. The ball was hit 111.3 mph, narrowly beating Royals right fielder Kyle Isbel’s 111.2 mph double in the bottom half of the inning.

Weakest contact: Leading off the bottom of the fifth, Carlos Santana hit a 58.4 mph ground out to first.

Longest hit: Luis Robert’s home run traveled 425 feet, the only batted ball of the game to travel at least 400 feet.

Magic Number: 10

In his White Sox debut, Johnny Cueto generated 10 called strikes with his sinker. Cueto’s ability to paint the zone with the pitch commanded his scoreless first start as a South Sider.

Glossary

Hard-hit is any ball off the bat at 95 mph or more
LI measures pressure per play
pLI measures total pressure faced in-game
Whiff a swing-and-miss
WPA win probability added measures contributions to the win
xBA expected batting average