Garrett Crochet's first miserable inning of his starting career was far more than the White Sox offense could absorb.
After striking out the side in the first, Jeimer Candelario greeted Crochet with a leadoff double in the second. By the time the smoke cleared, Crochet gave up five runs over the course of nine batters and 37 pitches, and the White Sox never made it a game afterward.
A couple of bad breaks exacerbated the issue. The White Sox had an opportunity to get a second out at third base when Santiago Espinal went from first to third Luke Maile's RBI single to left field that made it a 2-0 game, but Lenyn Sosa fumbled the exchange. Crochet responded by striking out Bubba Thompson, but he still had one out remaining.
He should've gotten that out when he locked up Jonathan India with a 3-2 fastball on the inside corner, but Jansen Visconti didn't give him the call to load the bases, and Spencer Steer then unloaded them with a double that produced the final score.
Otherwise, Crochet was fine. He struck out 10 batters over 4⅔ innings, and the Reds didn't notch a hit in any of the other eight frames. He just made his share of mistakes with command, resulting in two other walks and a hit batter, and White Sox pitchers are going to need every break when they're holding the ball thanks to the kind of support they're receiving.
Case in point: The White Sox offense needed three chances to get its first hit off Nick Lodolo. Zach Remillard's apparent bunt single with two outs in the second was overturned because the replay showed his attempt to reach the bag with his last step came up short. Gavin Sheets briefly looked like he'd thwarted history in the fourth inning with a line drive to the right-center gap, but it floated long enough for Stuart Fairchild to make a tremendous diving catch in the alley.
The sixth inning's attempt finally took, as Robbie Grossman's muscled grounder left of second base was perfectly placed, and the only thing Santiago Espinal could do was block it. With the infield single on the books, the White Sox could drift to a more ordinary form of shutout. They've been blanked in five games this year -- one in every series -- and haven't scored more than one run in eight of 14 contests.
Still, there were a couple of embarrassing moments along the way. Lenyn Sosa struck out with Kevin Pillar on second in the fourth, and while it initially appeared he walked back to the dugout rather than forcing the Reds to make a play on a ball that bounded to the backstop, the actual ruling was a dead ball because Sosa had whiffed on a pitch that had hit him in the foot; a wholly separate brand of embarrassment. In the ninth, Pillar --- who accounted for half of the White Sox's six baserunners -- was picked off with one out and the Sox trailing by five.
Bullet points:
*Michael Kopech pitched the ninth, and erased a walk by picking off Elly De La Cruz. That walk was the only blemish for the White Sox bullpen over the remaining 4⅓ innings, as Deivi García pitched 1⅓ perfect innings, followed by Dominic Leone's easy seventh, and Jordan Leasure's breezy eighth.
*Gavin Sheets was robbed of two hits, as Steer made a sliding catch in left field. In center, Thompson ran down a deep drive by Martín Maldonado in the eighth inning, completing the set.
