Gamethread: White Sox at Royals

The Chicago White Sox (56-55) are back today, looking to steal the series closer from the Kansas City Royals (46-66) and score another series split. Splitting a series against a mediocre team ... Is anyone else having déjà vu?

First, let’s check in on our All-Star shortstop (cries):

On the bright side, we have our ace and mustache king, Dylan Cease, leading the way for the South Siders this afternoon. Now let’s not forget that just a few days ago, he went ahead and made a little history, surpassing Jacob deGrom in number of consecutive starts allowing a run or less. Can you believe that this guy didn’t even make the All-Star team?! (No, I will not let it go.)

Over this historic 76-inning run, Cease has racked up 95 Ks and posted an exceptional 0.59 ERA — giving up just five earned runs. He has a 32.8% strikeout rate, and opponents are batting just .197 against him. Dylan will continue to look to his slider in hopes of fooling the Royals offense, especially the hot bats of Kyle Isbel and MJ Melendez, who seem to be beating us up a bit recently. Let’s keep the Cy-Cease train running and coming back home with a win.

We have quite the pitching matchup today, with Zack Greinke on the mound for the Royals. While he has a 3.86 ERA against the White Sox this year, he has been much stronger at home, with a 2.23 ERA over 48 ¹⁄₃ innings. White Sox bats have been struggling pretty much all year, but especially over the last several games, where it’s seemingly impossible to score more than three runs. They will continue to look for August Abreu to shine and Eloy Jiménez to keep mashing the ball — hopefully with runners in scoring position.

Let’s take a look at the lineups for today:

You can find the action on MLB.TV, NBC Sports Chicago, and ESPN Radio AM 1000. Let’s go get a win!