For about a week, it looked like the White Sox remembered how to open series like a standard, functional Major League Baseball team.
Alas, old habits die hard. The White Sox were shut out for the ninth time this season, and the seventh time in Game 1 of a series. Sonny Gray limited the Sox to just a double, two singles and a walk over seven innings, and he, JoJo Romero and Ryan Helsley combined to retire the last 14 White Sox who came to the plate.
They mounted a couple of mild threats. In the second, Andrew Vaughn doubled to right field with one out. Andrew Benintendi followed by hoisting a high fastball to right, but while Statcast said it would've been a homer to Guaranteed Rate Field, Lars Nootbaar ended up flagging it down on the warning track. Vaughn advanced to third, but he stayed there when Paul DeJong, after a standing ovation in his first plate appearance returning to St. Louis, struck out.
An inning later, Nicky Lopez singled with two outs, moved to second on a wild pitch and stole third as Tommy Pham took ball four, but Eloy Jiménez's 107.3 mph screamer found Nolan Arenado's glove for the third out.
Arenado also broke hearts on the other side of the ball, driving in all three St. Louis runs with a two-run double off Brad Keller in the first, and another RBI double that ended Keller's night with two outs in the fourth.
Keller ran into immediate trouble in his first start with the White Sox. Willson Contreras sliced a double out of Tommy Pham's reach in right center with one out in the first, followed by a Paul Goldschmidt walk. Both scored when Arenado bisected the left-center gap. Keller was able to get a couple of groundouts to escape the inning, and he ended up getting through 4⅔ innings before Arenado once again struck with a run-scoring two-bagger to the right-field corner.
Credit Jared Shuster for making Pedro Grifol's life easier. He stranded Arenado to end the fifth, then finished the remaining three innings on 55 pitches to spare the rest of the bullpen.
Bullet points:
*The Cardinals outdefended the White Sox. Arenado made a couple of nice plays at third, and Masyn Winn stole a second single from Martín Maldonado with a diving stop and long throw.
*On the White Sox's side, DeJong made a nice diving stop up the middle for a fielder's choice in the second, but he rushed a wide throw on a Winn grounder for an error. Lopez also cost Shuster a pickoff of Contreras because he lost his balance and couldn't extend enough for a tag, but Shuster ended up getting the strikeout of Goldschmidt to make it moot.
*The White Sox were 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position; the Cardinals 1-for-6.
*The Sox have now been outscored in Game 1 of series by a score of 61-13.
*Only those 1907 Brooklyn Superbas have been shut out more times over the first 32 games of a season, as they had 11 on their record.
