Six Pack of Stats: Orioles 5, White Sox 3

The White Sox made it to Baltimore to face the red-hot Orioles at the lovely Camden Yards. After a few humiliating losses to the Orioles at Sox Park earlier this season, the Sox hoped to exact some revenge. Alas, that was not in the cards for the South Siders, as the newly-constructed wall in left field robbed them of home runs, and well, they are playing like garbage, anyway.

The Starters

Dylan Cease had a solid outing that went into the sixth, allowing only three hits. Unfortunately, a run in the sixth would knock him out, as the Orioles made it 4-2. Cease was charged with all four runs, had four strikeouts, and had three walks. While his start was a little rocky, he pulled through and ate some innings for the Sox. Well, he should have, unlike Michael Kopech, Cease, had an extra two days of rest!

Cease’s 93-pitch outing looked like this:

Baseball Savant

Austin Voth made it into the sixth inning, only keeping the White Sox to two runs. He allowed seven hits, walked three, and struck out three. While he didn’t last as long as Cease, he certainly better suppressed runs, and it greatly helped the O’s.

Voth’s 93-pitch outing looked like this:

Baseball Savant

Pressure Play

You know the drill. Bases loaded, two outs, someone strikes out swinging. This time it was José Abreu against Félix Bautista in the eighth inning. The LI was a whopping 5.19 for the play.

Pressure Cooker

Cionel Pérez actually faced the most total pressure when he walked one and gave up a hit. His pLI was 2.60.

Top Play

Ryan Mountcastle’s three-run home run in the first essentially secured the O’s a win early on, as they would carry that lead throughout the rest of the game. Mountcastle’s home run tipped the scales with a .226 WPA.

Top Performer

Félix Bautista saved the game for the O’s despite working his way into a jam in the eighth. He still shut the Sox down with a WPA of .240.

Smackdown

Hardest hit: José Abreu’s fifth inning line out left the bat at 111.2 mph. Worth noting, Eloy Jiménez also had two very hard-hit balls, a ground out at 107.2 mph, and his home run that was launched off the bat at 103.2 mph.

Weakest contact: Cedric Mullins’ first-inning single exited the bat at just 28.3 mph.

Luckiest hit: AJ Pollock’s single (thanks to some poor O’s offense in the eighth) had an xBA of just .160.

Toughest out: José Abreu’s very hard-hit ball mentioned above was the toughest out, with an xBA of .760.

Longest hit: Ryan Mountcastle’s home run in the first traveled 420 feet.

Magic Number: 3

Does three represent Sox limbo? At the moment, they are three games back in the American League Central. Somehow still contenders, but at this point, it feels like purgatory.

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