Shane McClanahan sat for 19 minutes in the top of the fifth inning as the Rays scored three runs to knock Dylan Cease out of the game. He worked for about 4½ minutes in the bottom of the inning, navigating a four-batter inning in 15 pitches, and then sat for another 24 minutes as his teammates smacked around Jake Diekman for five runs over two outs.
With Tampa Bay blasting their way to a 12-2 lead, Kevin Cash didn't see a need for reheating his ace. Instead, he went to the front end of the bullpen, which gave the White Sox a sorely needed opportunity to pad some stats.
The White Sox came into this game with the league's worst batting average against relief pitching at .177, and if that's not bad enough, they were hitting .123 against bullpen arms since Tim Anderson got hurt.
Four innings against the front end of the Rays bullpen gave them that opportunity, and because they couldn't score more than one run over the first three innings -- with Zack Burdi pitching the first two -- Kevin Cash had the 10-run margin he needed to close out the game with a position player.
In came Luke Raley, who was one of four Rays with three hits, and one of three Rays with a homer and three RBIs, and the White Sox could (relatively) feast. Oscar Colás slapped a 56-mph lob inside third base for his first extra-base hit since April 7. Romy González scored him by slicing a 57-mph lob into the right-field corner for his first extra-base hit, and Randy Arozarena played into the first White Sox triple of the year. Adam Haseley then lined 57 mph into right field for his third RBI since the end of the 2020 season.
The White Sox accrued six hits off Rays relievers -- if you include Raley -- over 18 at-bats, which raises their average to .143 off bullpens since Anderson's injury. It didn't make a difference in the big picture, because the White Sox looked dead from the second inning onward en route to their eighth straight loss, but even moral victories have been in short supply, so here you go.
Bullet points:
*The Rays looked familiar with Cease's stuff after seeing him in consecutive starts. Colás played a Brandon Lowe single into a triple to start the second, but the Rays were on him the rest of the way.
*Cease generated just 11 whiffs on 99 pitches over 4-plus innings, and the "plus" included four batters he failed to retire in the of the fifth. They hit eight balls over 100 mph, and they also fouled off 20 pitches off Cease alone, whereas White Sox hitters hit just 14 foul balls over nine innings.
*The Sox made their own adjustments to McClanahan, whiffing only eight times over 73 pitches after swinging and missing 32 times last Saturday. He gave up a couple runs on five hits and two walks over five innings, so it wouldn't have been a cakewalk for him if the Tampa Bay offense hadn't shortened his night.
*Lenyn Sosa had a game he didn't need defensively, making mistakes in consecutive innings. He couldn't catch Elvis Andrus' backhanded flip from his stomach on what would've been a sensational play during Cease's false start in the fifth, and then he failed to get the lead runner after a bobble in the sixth, even though salvaging the out at first remained available.
*Luis Robert Jr. had a decent game among the wreckage. He reached base twice in three plate appearances (a single and a walk), and he made a leaping catch at the wall in right-center.
*Jake Burger scored both White Sox runs when the game was still theoretically within reach. He walked and scored on a Sosa double in the second, and then he hit a solo shot in the fourth, after which we learned that the White Sox have a home-run outfit.
*Pedro Grifol earned his first career ejection, and it's because his first baseman is 5'10". Andrew Vaughn's stretch to catch Yasmani Grandal's throw pulled him off the bag according to first-base umpire Marvin Hudson.
*Vaughn also committed an error when he let Wander Franco's grounder get past him in the sixth inning, which is why four of the five runs on Diekman's tab were unearned.
*Joe Kelly pitched for the first time since April 8 and gave up a homer to the first batter he faced.
