Six Pack of Stats: Rangers 5, White Sox 2

FanGraphs

The White Sox (31-43) dropped the fourth of their last five Monday, picking up where they left off on their West Coast road trip, losing to the Rangers (45-27), 5-2. Tanner Banks made his first career start, but like the rest of the rotation, he received no run support. Once again the offense was unable to drive anyone in with runners in scoring positing, and the pitching staff was unable to hold Texas off for long. We move on to Cease day tomorrow, in hopes of a W.

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The Starters

Tanner Banks made his first career start today, and while he wasn’t lights out, the offense wasn’t really there to back him up, but what else is new. Banks didn’t walk anyone today, but he did give up a homer in his 3 2⁄3 innings, striking out three Rangers, and ultimately giving up three runs on five hits. In his 63-pitch outing, he mostly relied on his fastball, which was thrown 44% of the time, topping out at at 94.8 mph. For someone that has never started in the majors, it really wasn’t too bad of an outing — unfortunately Josh Jung had Banks’ number today, and the South Side bats remained dormant. After today’s outing, Banks now sits at a 4.70 ERA.

Here’s the breakdown of Banks’ 63 pitches:

Baseball Savant

Outside of throwing for two more innings, Andrew Heaney had a similar start to Banks. Heaney, too, relied mostly on his fastball, topping out at 94.7 mph, walked none, and gave up five hits, though he was able to secure today’s win in the series opener. The fastball was thrown 60% of the time, and was his most effective pitch. Heaney was able to lure Sox batters to his pitches, 17 called strikes + whiffs, with a 31% CSW, racking up six strikeouts.

Here’s what Heaney’s 90 pitches looked like:

Baseball Savant

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Pressure Play

Yasmani Grandal came up with the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth inning, and with the opportunity to tie it, he succumbed to the pressure. The play had a 4.57 LI.

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Pressure Cooker

Josh Sborz faced the most pressure today, with a 2.42 pLI. He navigated his way through a stressful eighth inning, striking out Grandal and Jake Burger with the bases loaded to end the inning. Pain.

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Top Play

Jonah Heim’s bases-loaded, two-run single in the seventh was the top play today. It put the Rangers up, 5-2, with a .177 WPA.

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Top Performer

Luis Robert Jr. was today’s top performer, going 2-for-3 with a solo blast in the sixth. He finished with a .197 WPA.

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Smackdown

Hardest hit: Mitch Garver’s line out in the sixth left the bat at 109.4 mph.

Weakest contact: Rough day overall at the plate for Yasmani Grandal, as his ground out in the sixth left the bat at just 58.7 mph.

Luckiest hit: Not many exceptionally lucky hits today, though Eloy Jiménez’s single in the sixth had a .330 xBA.

Toughest out: Elvis Andrus’ line out in the second was smoked off the bat at 108.8 mph, and had a .720 xBA.

Longest hit: Luis Robert Jr.’s homer traveled the furthest today, at 433 feet.

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Magic Number: 9

The South Siders strung together nine hits throughout today’s nine innings, but they went 0-for-9 with RISP, left nine on base as a team, and struck out nine times against the Texas pitching staff. Somehow, though, they are still only 5 1⁄2 out of first in the AL Central.

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Glossary

CSW called strikes plus whiffs
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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