Six Pack of Stats: Twins 4, White Sox 3 (10 innings)

@FanGraphs

The White Sox are in Minnesota to take on the dreaded Twins, and it went exactly as expected. Both pitchers had pretty good outings, Luis Robert Jr. stayed hot, and the White Sox made really dumb errors when it matters the most.

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The Starters

Lance Lynn had a rough start by immediately getting the game tied back up after the Sox started with two runs. He looked gassed, but was able to come around and keep the Twins to just three runs. Lynn had 18 whiffs on 53 swings and a 35% called strike whiff rate. His exit velocity improved, and his cutter had a called strike whiff rate of 47%. In the six innings pitched, he reached 10 Ks, and just three earned runs on 98 pitches.

Lynn’s 98-pitch outing looked like this:

Baseball Savant

Pablo López was outstanding on the mound. Lopez went 7 2⁄3 innings, only giving up three hits and one walk. He kept the White Sox in a trance, unable to hit anything off of him after a rough first frame.

López’s 98-pitch outing looked like this:

Baseball Savant

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Pressure Play

Oscar Colás had a great chance to give Chicago the lead in the 10th, but flied out to left instead. The out had a 4.57 LI.

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Pressure Cooker

Jhoan Durán faced a lot of pressure after allowing Luis Robert Jr. to tie the game and eventually go to extra innings. His pLI is the highest I’ve seen, and this is my third season writing about baseball: It came in at 10.40!

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Top Play

Michael A. Taylor’s bunt in the 10th won the game for the Twins, thanks to an error by Hanser Alberto. His poor throw allowed Willi Castro to cross home plate. Perhaps partly by luck, Taylor ultimately gets the credit for the winning play, carrying a .370 WPA.

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Top Performer

Taylor took game honors, with a .466 WPA. However, we can’t ignore Luis Robert Jr. strapping the White Sox to his back and trying to carrying them to a win, with a .390 WPA.

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Smackdown

Hardest hit: Byron Buxton’s home run was extremely powerful, leaving the bat at 107.5 mph.

Weakest contact: Speaking of carrying the White Sox on his back, Luis Robert Jr. is even getting weak contact to fall; his first-inning safety was tapped at 50.7 mph.

Luckiest hit: Luis Robert Jr.’s weakly-hit single only had a .220 xBA.

Toughest out: Matt Wallner’s fourth-inning line out had an .800 xBA.

Longest hit: Do you remember that hardest hit answer? Well, it’s the Buxton home run again, traveling 423 feet. It also happened to be his 100th career home run.

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Magic Number: 3

In his White Sox debut, Keynan Middleton had a perfect inning with three strikeouts.

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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

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