It's getting a little old to write a recap that contains some variation of "Though the White Sox won, they lost [important player]."
The Sox took the opener against the Brewers on Monday even though Carlos Rodón was limited to two innings with a shoulder issue. On Tuesday, they beat the Brewers despite Nick Madrigal and Edwin Encarnación departing early.
They returned to the win column tonight in literally wild fashion, but this time Aaron Bummer needed a trainer escort off the field. He tweaked his left biceps during a battle with Jose Ramirez with two on and two out in the seventh, and the White Sox said he will be reevaluated on Saturday.
Despite the loss of Bummer -- and despite issuing eight walks and hitting a batter -- the Sox still stitched together nine shutout innings against Cleveland.
Little about this game was pretty. Dylan Cease threw five shutout innings despite issuing leadoff walks in four of them. He threw just 52 of 99 pitches for strikes, as his 2019 high-and-gloveside fastball returned. Fortunately, he had the kind of changeup he never showed last year, and he was able to toggle between the offspeed and his slider to grab strikes in fastball counts, of which there were plenty.
(One of those changeups was letter-high to Sandy Leon, which resulted in an awkward checked swing with the bases loaded. It bounced calmly to third, where Yoán Moncada circled it, stepped on third and fired to first in one smooth motion to defuse a bases-loaded jam in the second.)
The relievers weren't much more precise. Rick Renteria showed his intent to win this game by bringing in Bummer for the sixth. He walked two batters over his 1⅔ innings, and he also bounced a throw to first on a comebacker that should've ended the seventh. That left him out to face Ramirez, and he didn't make it out of that at-bat intact.
Evan Marshall came in for him and survived loud lineouts to right that ended the seventh and eighth innings. He also issued his own walk to Carlos Santana.
Only when Alex Colomé entered could everybody breathe easier. Partially because Adam Engel sent Nick Wittgren's first pitch of the eighth halfway up the bleachers in left field that made it a two-run game, and partially because Colomé carved up the bottom of Cleveland's order with two strikeouts around a tapper back to the mound.
Before Engel's blast, the Sox also struggled to capitalize on their opportunities, though they had far fewer of them. The Sox had Aaron Civale on the ropes in the first inning with Luis Robert walking and Moncada singling him to third, but José Abreu chased a 3-1 slider out of the zone to load the count, then bounced into a run-scoring double play.
The Sox had the same situation in the sixth inning after Engel reached on an even more embarrassing PFP error by Civale, and took third on Robert's single up the middle. Civale worked over Moncada with a strong three-pitch sequence, then got Abreu to bounce into another double play. That one ended the inning.
The White Sox outhit the Indians 6-4, but thanks to all the walks from their pitchers, they only had half the at-bats with runners in scoring position. The Sox were 0-for-4 with four stranded, while the Indians went 1-for-8 while stranding 10. Just like shedding a productive player in every W, that's not really a great template for sustained success.
Bullet points:
*The White Sox threw a nine-inning shutout while walking eight batters for the sixth time in team history. The last time was Sept. 27, 2017, in a Tyler Danish start against the Tigers. Before then, you have to go all the way back to 1974.
*James McCann struggled to get pitches on the edges from Jordan Baker, but he had a great night behind the plate in terms of blocking, creative pitch-calling, and he gunned down a runner, too. He called 25 changeups from Cease, which blew away his previous career high of 18 in a game.
*Zack Collins dropped to 0-for-13 on the season.
*Robert bounced back from his golden sombrero by going 1-for-3 with a walk and a K from the leadoff spot. Eloy Jiménez handled every chance in left field without issue.
*Matt Foster is the opener for Saturday's game, and the White Sox are playing on ESPN's "Sunday Night Baseball" for the first time since 2013, since the Cardinals and Cubs are postponed due to St. Louis' COVID-19 issues.
