It's seldom great when the White Sox's second-most thrilling plate appearance of a game results in a walk.
Granted, it was a very good walk. Leury García overcame a terrible strike call during Larry Vanover's woeful night, a Scott Barlow slider off the plate that should've been the third ball of the battle, but instead turned into an even count. García fouled off six consecutive pitches, then held off a slider in the dirt for the third ball he was denied. A fourth ball immediately followed, and García took his base after 12 pitches, which brought the tying run to the plate.
Everybody probably had dreams of Yoán Moncada turning on a Barlow slider and crushing it over the Goose Island for a game-tying homer. Instead, he hit a soft grounder into the shift. He was desperate enough to make the walk count that he dived into first base, but the situation was already out of his control.
Thus, García's ultimately fruitless walk slotted behind José Abreu's triumphant fourth-inning solo shot for the team's best offensive moment. Back in the lineup one day after a scary collision with Hunter Dozier, Abreu accounted for half the White Sox's four hits. For his first, he hammered a Mike Minor slider, the ninth pitch of his own protracted battle, well over the Sox bullpen to show that the bandage on his left cheek was the only lasting mark from the frightening incident.
Alas, that only made it a 4-1 game, because everything else about the night didn't go the White Sox's way. Carlos Rodón had his first off night, giving up four runs on eight hits and three walks over 5⅔ innings. Rodón couldn't throw either of his secondary pitches for reliable strikes, and the Royals had enough contact in their bats to damage the fastball. It didn't help that the combination of Vanover and Zack Collins wouldn't award him legitimate low strikes, as he had five calls go against him at the bottom of the zone. The frustrations also seemed to carry over to the running game, as the Royals stole four bases in four attempts.
It could've been worse, because Rodón needed 78 pitches to get through three innings before settling in well enough to throw just 10 apiece in the fourth and fifth. Despite all the high stress situations early in the game, Tony La Russa sent Rodón out there for the sixth, where even Hanser Alberto's leadoff single didn't knock him out of the game. He faced three batters and threw 12 pitches, and while La Russa wanted the lefty-lefty matchup, I'm not sure Jarrod Dyson and Nicky Lopez were worth the strain.
Besides, the White Sox couldn't mount a successful rally off Minor and two Royals relievers. Minor, who already was the first left-handed starter to face the White Sox in a game his team won since 2019, became the first lefty starter to pick up a win against the White Sox since 2019 by allowing just four baserunners over seven innings, striking out seven. The White Sox didn't get a first batter on base until Abreu opened the ninth inning with a single, and they only had two at-bats with runners in scoring position all night. His changeup neutralized a White Sox lineup that wasn't at its deepest, what with García and Billy Hamilton in the same outfield, and Zack Collins behind the plate.
Maybe La Russa would've gone to the bullpen earlier if he knew Evan Marshall looked like his old self. Marshall retired all four batters he faced, two by strikeout. He had all three of his pitches working in any count, with particularly sharp action on his breaking ball. Matt Foster survived two singles for a scoreless eighth, although perhaps he shouldn't have come out unscathed, because his flip home on Dyson's squeeze attempt forced Collins to cover a lot of ground on his tag. The replay showed that Kelvin Gutierrez was probably safe, but the replay room couldn't prove a negative with regards to Collins' mitt touching Gutierrrez's arm, and so the run never crossed the plate. See? Not ever Vanover miss went the Royals' way.
Bullet points:
*Moncada had a less than stellar night at third, letting an Alberto grounder handcuff him for a single, and firing low on a 5-4-3 attempt that Nick Madrigal still turned.
*The five spots after Abreu went 0-for-18 with six strikeouts, although Dyson robbed Andrew Vaughn of extra bases with a fine diving catch.
