Six Pack of Stats: White Sox 7, Orioles 6 (10 innings)

FanGraphs

Do the White Sox (6-9) still suck? Not to get too down on our guys, but this game really felt like one team just wanted to not lose it a little big more than the other. The pitching performances were by and large dreadful, but hero-everyman-bombadier Jake Burger and doubles machina Yasmani Grandal took the White Sox on their backs, with late help coming on a GWRBI from the enigmatic Oscar Colás.

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The Starters

Michael Kopech allowed three earned runs in five innings, and if that sounds sort of good, well, it really wasn’t. The start was inefficient, wild, and not particularly dominant. It could be construed as average, but I don’t think a 5.40 ERA is average, nor is 97 pitches to get 15 outs. On the other hand, Kopech’s six hits, two homers and four walks, leading to three earned, against four Ks, actually LOWERED his ERA to 6.32, if you want to know how his season has been going. Beyond those two home runs, Kopech allowed seven more “hard-hit” balls of 95 mph+ exit velocity.

Here’s how his consummate No. 5 starter-quality effort looked:

Baseball Savant

And here’s Kopech’s pitch mix:

It was old pal Kyle Gibson facing the White Sox, and overall, he wasn’t really any better than Kopech, with seven hits, two walks, a homer and four earned, one K, and eight hard-hit balls over 5 1⁄3 innings. Unlike Kopech, Gibson threw what Baseball Savant characterized as seven different pitches, but really, if you’re going to be mediocre, tighten it up, Gibson. The sinker, sweeper and curve seemed to be ones to stick with coming out of today.

Baseball Savant

Pitch visuals, below:

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Pressure Play

Facing Jimmy Lambert, Adley Rutschman grounded out in the top of the 10th — but drove home the lead run for Baltimore. The play had a game-high 5.26 pLI.

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Pressure Cooker

In his only appearance of the game, Ryan O’Hearn pinch-hit for James McCann with the bases loaded and two outs in the seventh. O’Hearn faced 4.84 LI against Kendall Graveman, and won the battle by drawing a walk to give Baltimore a 5-4 lead.

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Top Play

Yasmani Grandal had been having a “good” game, 2-for-4 with a double. However, in the 10th with the White Sox down, 6-5, Grandal clocked a second, game-tying double that added .613 WPA to his docket for the day. Good day -> great day.

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Top Performer

If you read some of our SSS comments, Yasmani Grandal should be put out to pasture. Well, his enormous .625 WPA kept the offense in the game today, going 3-for-5 with double two-baggers, including the game-tying two-base hit leading off the 10th inning.

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Smackdown

Hardest hit Shortstop Jorge Mateo did his best Luis Robert Jr. impression this afternoon, with the two top exit velocities and three of the top nine in the game. His wackest smack of the game, however, came in the sixth inning against Keynan Middleton, a 112.4 mph single to left.

Weakest contact It may be the cutest awful contact seen this year, but Andrew Benintendi led off the game for the White Sox by tapping a 30.7 mph dribbler back the mound — and thanks to a throwing error by Kyle Gibson, it turned into a de facto leadoff triple!

Luckiest hit There were three .100 xBA hits in the game today, but only Andrew Vaughn in the fourth saw his (infield tapper to third base) end up a single.

Toughest out Wow, Jake Burger had himself a day, and that’s including getting ripped off on his screaming meemie out to right field in the eighth, extinguished despite a .760 xBA.

Longest hit: It was a Jorge Mateo homer, in the third off of Michael Kopech, that landed farthest from home: 424 feet.

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Magic Number: 0

With today’s revelation that Oscar Colás is digging around Instagram where he should not, indeed the clock has re-set once more.

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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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