Gamethread: White Sox at Mariners

Happy Sunday, Sox fans! This afternoon, the Chicago White Sox will visit Peoria (not the one in Illinois) to take on the Seattle Mariners. We saw one ace last night help take down Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic (Lance Lynn), and today we get to see Dylan Cease on the mound but in a much less stressful and meaningful atmosphere. Nonetheless, it will be nice to see Cease get his ERA down (hopefully) from 18.00! Robbie Ray will get the start for the Mariners.

Cease is currently 1-1 in Spring Training. After his first outing, he silenced the worriers a bit by going three innings with one earned run, two walks, and four strikeouts against the Oakland Athletics. The key for this season for Cease will be to keep that walk total down and his control in check, especially after admitting that the pace of play (pitch clock) has been a challenge for him. Cease relies on five different pitches, starting with a slider used 42.9% of the time. He follows with his fastball (39.8%), curveball (13.9%), changeup (2.4%), and sinker (1%).

Ray spent his first full year as a Mariner last season, where he went 12-12 with a 3.71 ERA and 1.19 WHIP. The star lefty will try and have a bounce-back season and reach his full potential. He has appeared in two games this spring, with his last being against the Angels where he pitched three innings with four hits, one run, and a whopping six strikeouts. That’s a way to make a statement in the spring. Ray uses five pitches, throwing his fastball the most at 39.4%. He follows with a slider (37.2%), sinker (20.8%), curveball (1.9%), and changeup (0.7%).

Elvis Andrus will lead it off and play second, followed by Hanser Alberto at third and Eloy Jiménez in right. Jake Burger gets the start at first with Andrew Vaughn still being day-to-day, Yasmani Grandal is the DH, and Oscar Colás is in center. Romy González goes to left, Seby Zavala is behind the plate, and Erik González is at shortstop.

The Mariners have a split-squad day today, so we won’t be seeing their full lineup. But AJ Pollock and “The Chain” lead off against us today.

The game will not be on NBCSCHI, but will be televised through the Mariners broadcast on Root Sports. Game time is at 3:10 p.m. CT.