We're often told managers make decisions based on information to which the public is not privy, which is always an encouraging way to introduce a discussion of late-game moves.
In successive offensive innings, Pedro Grifol declined to pinch hit for Martín Maldonado (.071 batting average, .235 OPS) with the bases loaded and two outs in a 3-3 game in the sixth, and opted to pinch run for Corey Julks--by all indications a solid average runner who had stolen his third base of the season earlier in the day--after his leadoff double in the seventh.
Results and game events have a way of occasionally excusing managers from more scrutiny of a process that doesn't pass the initial smell test. And in the first two cases, the game gave Grifol some wiggle room for postgame interviews. Maldonado recovered from an 0-2 count to deliver a professional-looking routine fly out to end the sixth. While Ellis did nothing Julks couldn't have been tasked with, as Nicky Lopez bunted him over to third, it's from there he scored a go-ahead run on Gavin Sheets' left-on-left bloop single with no threat of Tommy Pham's injury in Milwaukee repeating itself.
"It's just an elite baserunner," Grifol said of deploying Ellis. "If we happen to not being able to move him over on a bunt, then I know he can probably steal third base and still get into scoring position with less than two outs."
But this is not a Sox roster strong enough to repeatedly save managers from themselves. Maldonado came up again in the eighth after Lenyn Sosa's one-out double. Sosa even advanced to third on a wild pitch by the time Maldonado was well on the way to striking out against Kenley Jansen, and Ellis followed with a few tepid attempts at a two-out bunt attempt against a Hall of Fame closer before doing the same. Korey Lee was in the hole with a bat in the bottom of the 10th ready to pinch hit, so he was available for earlier chances.
"I didn’t feel I needed to pinch hit right there," Grifol said postgame. "I think he’s really valuable behind the plate, but I understand. I get it. He’s not swinging it. It’s a hot topic every time he catches. It’s going to continue to be a hot topic. And I’m going to continue to make decisions that I feel is best for the team, not just offensively. Defensively as well. Bottom line is we took a 4-3 lead into the ninth, and yeah, we could have extended it there, but I like what he does behind the plate and I like him in these types of games in these types of situations."
But protecting a one-run lead for two innings, even against a banged-up Red Sox team resting the achy knees of both Rafael Devers and Tyler O'Neill, has been a big ask for the White Sox bullpen of recent. And that's for the normal pen. The version where Jordan Leasure and Michael Kopech (who was ill on top of throwing 33 pitches on Saturday) weren't available held the 4-3 lead all the way up to Tanner Banks trying to record his third career save in the ninth, but David Hamilton's leadoff double over Oscar Colás' head to right put the wheels in motion for Reese McGuire's revenge in the form of a game-tying sacrifice fly.
"We’re talking about the Maldonado one, I’m kicking myself in the ass about making the decision on Colás-Mendick," said Grifol, referencing Colás striking out against the left-handed Brennan Bernandino earlier in the sixth--which, sure, let's put that one in the discussion too.
"I’m going to go back and forth on that one 150 times, because that one is one I probably--if it happens 10 times, I probably make the decision five, six, seven times," Grifol continued. "Today, I didn’t feel it. But I thought giving Colás the at-bat right there, he was going to make hard contact somewhere with the infield in. But the Maldonado one, that one I’m 100 percent. I’ll talk about it all day long. But the Maldonado one, it comes up every single day and I like what he does behind the plate and I value that, tremendously. Some people don’t. I do."
Spurts of dysfunction so concentrated it threatens to alter the game result is supposed to be the White Sox' home turf, and by the time Michael Soroka dropped a feed at first and mishandled a comebacker in a two-run Red Sox 10th, they had reclaimed their throne. But Boston spent the weekend infringing upon their territory.
Three-straight failed efforts of fancy defense (Reliever Justin Slaten dropping Dominic Smith's throw from his seat on a grounder down the line, Hamilton botching a glove flip on a potential double play ball, Connor Wong throwing a back pick into right field) gifted the White Sox the presence of Sheets and Andrew Vaughn on the corners in the bottom of the fourth. In the spirit of chaos, this is when Paul DeJong lifted exactly the sort of wind-aided fly ball the conditions had been calling for all afternoon for his team-leading 12th home run of the season, staking the White Sox to a 3-1 lead through four.
As a high-contact fly-ball pitcher who deploys a broad mix of non-signature pitches at below-average velocities, Chris Flexen's performances are often inscrutable. A warm day with the wind blowing out should have been disastrous for him, but he refuses to be fenced by such logical conclusions. Bullet liners off the bat of Jarren Duran (who scored six times this series) and David Hamilton (who line a solo shot into the Red Sox bullpen) accounted for the two runs of damage across Flexen's five serviceable innings.
After Flexen left with a 3-2 lead, the effort to deliver him his third win of the season without the team's top two relievers lasted all of two outs.
Bullet points:
*DeJong has homered five times in his last nine games to enter "puncher's chance of reaching 20 before he's traded" territory. I'm old and bitter enough to remember when he started half of the team's first 10 games because Braden Shewmake seemed intriguing. The expected batting average on DeJong's two extra-base hits were .100 for the homer and .090 for the automatic double.
*Luis Robert Jr. is 3-for-20 with 10 strikeouts since returning. One of his hits has stayed in the park. He said himself that regaining his timing would take, well, time.
*Vaughn has a nine-game hitting streak, and has still scored in every game since spraining his finger. I asked him pregame if he would play with a sprained finger for the rest of his career if it meant he scored in every game, and he said "Yes," so quickly I couldn't scrounge up a follow-up.
*Maldonado spoke postgame and clarified that he's switched to contacts to address his vision problems. He says he's seeing the ball better and his chase rate is down, but his last hit was on May 11 and he's 0-for-his-last-35.
"The only thing you can control is keep working, put in my work on a daily basis. I’m doing that. The outcome at the end of the year is going to show up. I couldn’t be this bad for the whole season."
