Blue Jays 10, White Sox 5: Matt Davidson pitched again

The White Sox gave up 10-plus runs for a third straight game, which was probably expected after Reynaldo Lopez gave up back-to-back homers on his second and third pitches of the night.

So let's skip to the end, because that's where the fun was.

The White Sox put Patrick's idea to the test by sending out Matt Davidson for a second pitching appearance, and it went just as well as the first. He didn't get a strikeout this time, but he got a lineout and two weak grounders while throwing eight of 10 pitches for strikes, one of them a swing and miss over an excellent curveball.

Now we'll wait to see if Matt Davidson: Two-Way Player benefits from the Benetti Bump.

The Sox then tried like hell to get him the most unlikely of victories, but their attempt at a comeback from eight down fell six runs short.

Before the ninth inning, there wasn't much to this game. Marcus Stroman pitched well, getting 13 groundouts to just one flyout over his 6⅔ innings, and limiting the damage to a pair of runs.

Lopez didn't pitch well, which is a theme of late. His line shows more homers allowed (five) than innings pitched (4⅓). He only got five swinging strikes, and four of them were on his fastball, which was the only pitch he had. Then again, three of his five homers came on his heater, so maybe he didn't even have that.

The Sox also got a classic CB Bucknor performance with a full story arc.

Beginning: OK, it wasn't directly Bucknor here, but Rick Renteria and Don Cooper were ejected after a strike-him-out-throw-him-out that was neither because Fieldin Culbreth ruled that Kendrys Morales' swing did not break the plane. It was a missed call based on the traditional standard, and with Lopez already trailing 2-0, the manager and pitching coach tried to get behind their struggling starter. In the end, they just missed a bad game.

Middle: This one was Bucknored. Thyago Vieira loaded the bases with a single and two hit batters in his White Sox debut, then spiked a fastball that got past Omar Narvaez. Narvaez turned around and couldn't locate it immediately. He found it at his feet as the runner was coming home, but the play was called dead because Bucknor had trapped the ball in his arms before releasing it.

That looked like a weird accident. But for some reason, Russell Martin was allowed to score even though it didn't get lodged in the umpire's gear. Let's see if there's an explanation for it afterward.

End: He rung up Narvaez on an iffy strike three after a bad strike two, and seemed to take pleasure out of it.

The good news? Bucknor's game is out of the way, none of the calls would've made a difference.

Bullet points:

*Vieira's White Sox debut was one to forget, as he gave up two runs over two-thirds of an inning, and allowed an inherited runner to score. He threw just 12 of 22 pitches for strikes.

*Tyler Danish, conversely, had a 2018 debut that worked. He pitched a 1-2-3 seventh with two strikeouts.

*Nicky Delmonico racked up a couple more extra-base hits, both triples.

*Abreu committed his eighth error of the season, booting a hard Yangervis Solarte grounder in the third. Solarte didn't reciprocate, robbing Abreu of a double with a fine splits-and-stab.

*Yolmer Sanchez did come up with a nifty sliding stab of his own at the hot corner.

*Stroman got the better of Tim Anderson, getting a double play and two of his three strikeouts in those battles. He punctuated the second one with a little skip, so the beef remains strong.

Record: 36-67 | Box score