Because Luis Robert Jr. has been injured for most of the season, we've been robbed of the sheer incongruity of his place on this White Sox team.
In the one pitch that directly involved Robert, the White Sox scored one run. Over the course of the other 134 pitches seen during the White Sox's other 34 plate appearances, they scored zero.
Robert pinch-hit for Nicky Lopez against Seattle closer Mike Baumann and rocketed a first-pitch fastball over the left-field wall to tie the game at 1. It was as if to say, "Was that so hard?" Because for the rest of the 10 innings, the White Sox offense made baseball look just about impossible.
The White Sox had just two other hits and three walks the rest of the night, although thanks to the Manfred Man in the 10th, they still had enough chances to go 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position. Korey Lee started the third with a double, only for Lopez to pop out on a bunt attempt to start the process of stranding him. In the ninth, Gavin Sheets followed Robert's homer two batters later by drawing a walk against Mike Baumann and advancing to second on a wild pitch, but Paul DeJong struck out and Danny Mendick, facing Taylor Saucedo for a second straight night in an ostensible attempt to gain a righty-lefty matchup, once again flailed at changeups well out of the zone and grounded out.
Mendick then took second base for the 10th, and although Zach DeLoach's groundout did a job by moving him to third, Lenyn Sosa's grounder couldn't escape a drawn-in Josh Rojas at third, and Andrew Benintendi could not replicate Robert's heroics off the bench, striking out.
Steven Wilson was then saddled with the unfortunate task of needing to strand his mandated runner, and while he got a harmless flyout and issued an intentional walk to set up the double play, Mitch Haniger wouldn't allow him to succeed. Wilson got ahead 0-2, but Haniger stayed alive for seven more pitches. He got a sweeper at the top of the zone on No. 9, and he muscled it into shallow right field for the walk-off single.
While Wilson took the loss, the bullpen did not blow it. Jordan Leasure took the eighth and had a runner on second with one out after a single and sac bunt, but Victor Robles ran into a double play by misreading the depth of a flare that DeJong caught easily behind second base. In the ninth, Michael Kopech walked Julio Rodríguez with one out, but located well enough while managing the runner at first and retired the next two hitters without issue.
Pedro Grifol managed in fear of the bullpen by letting Jonathan Cannon start the seventh after dodging trouble on three hard-hit balls in the sixth. Lopez avenged J.P. Crawford's leaping grab an inning before by stopping a sharp grounder with a diving attempt for the first out, Zach DeLoach's knee left a king-sized divot on a sliding catch in right field, and Andrew Vaughn smothered a 100-mph Rodríguez grounder for the 1-2-3 inning.
When Cannon came to the mound in the seventh, he validated the warning signs by hanging a first-pitch changeup to Luke Raley, who lofted it out to right for the game's first run.
Cannon recovered to close out the seventh, and Robert's homer got him off the hook for a deserving no-decision. He allowed just four hits and a walk over seven innings in his best work to date. His constantly under-construction arsenal showed signs of vulnerability, because just about all the contact made off Cannon was firm ...
... but he also got 17 whiffs on 104 pitches, and at least two on each of the five pitches he threw, so saying he was lucky doesn't paint the whole picture, either. The simplest way to frame it is that he didn't create his own trouble, and the Mariners couldn't make him pay.
Bryce Miller had an even easier time against the Sox offense, as he threw just 92 pitches (64 strikes) over seven innings. The Sox had a chance to shave an inning off his outing, but then they saw just six pitches in the fifth, and nine pitches in the sixth, which made a seventh inning a no-brainer. He needed just 12 pitches for that one.
Bullet points:
*Pedro Grifol tried challenging an unsuccessful steal attempt by DeJong in the fourth, but was told that he didn't do so in time.
*Korey Lee answered DeJong's CS by cutting down Raley at second base with ease.
*Corey Julks and Lenyn Sosa were involved in an unfortunate defensive moment for a second time this series, as Sosa pursued a pop-up he had no chance of catching, and Julks didn't call him off, instead pulling up short. Cannon pitched around it.
*The Mariners are 16-6 in one-run games. The White Sox are 5-13.
