Dylan Cease threw a no-hitter Thursday against the Nationals this afternoon, but the White Sox rotation trying to build itself up again in his stead earned their own honor. The Rangers broadcast referred to them as "pesky" in their ability to repeatedly keep games competitive into the later innings throughout this four-game sweep in Texas.
To truly be seen by your peers, it just means more.
Rookie Jonathan Cannon did not complete six innings of two-run ball in truly commanding fashion. He struck out just one on nine swinging strikes, allowed eight hits, and all of his problems stemmed from the general issue of the opposing hitters making too much viable contact. After Marcus Semien hammered a front hip sweeper for a solo shot in the third, the Sox defense allowed a hustle double to Nathaniel Lowe of all runners to lead off the fourth. But the two softer singles Cannon allowed subsequently would have scored the run even if the Rangers first baseman wasn't working with an extra 90 feet.
A few days earlier Brian Bannister spoke to the difficulty of Cannon adjusting to a new approach that's "not intuitive for everybody, prioritizing the seams on the baseball above velocity or other mechanical cues." And as a kitchen-sink contact-heavy righty, just emerging intact from the cloud of dust thanks to three double plays is a measure of success at this stage of his career.
If Cannon snagging an 109 mph Wyatt Langford liner to start an inning-ending double play in the fifth is evidence of above-average defense going forward, then it's another attribute for his profile. If not, well at least Langford couldn't elevate Cannon's sinker any higher than his head. Cannon has four quality starts in his young big league life and this was one of them.
So for those with a growth mindset about building up mid-rotation starters, it was a decent day at the office for a franchise that would need to really nail this coming trade deadline to become a contender before Cannon hits arbitration.
For those horrified anew every day by their favorite team's slow but steady creep toward infamy, devoted followers of the 'White Sox score five runs challenge,' or inscrutable bettors on the total runs scored over, the top half of innings had less to offer. Max Scherzer left his previous start with arm issues, and that specter of risk was probably all that was keeping him from completing seven innings of dominance, rather than merely striking out nine over six.
Brooks Baldwin hasn't yet had a good swing on anything that wasn't middle-in, but he worked a pair of walks, the first of which put him in position to score on Korey Lee's first-pitch double to left-center in the third. Eloy Jiménez looked like he might have his first legitimately driven extra-base hit of the month in the seventh, but his available speed was no match for a good throw from Leody Taveras in center, and he wasn't in place to score on the two-out pinch-hit single from Paul DeJong that followed. Nick Senzel check-swing grounded out to first to strand a pair to end the threat, and remains hitless for his White Sox tenure.
Maybe that graf didn't read like the offensive highlights of the day, but I assure you that they were. Old friend David Robertson recorded six straight outs through the top of the Sox order to end it, and it definitely wasn't nearly as dramatic as that sounds.
Bullet points:
*Sox hitting struck out 49 times in 134 plate appearances over this four-game series, which sure, add another wrinkle at this point. Why not?
*Marcus Semien's homer was his seventh against the White Sox in 51 games. He's actually a below-average hitter for his career against the franchise that drafted him, but the season is long and there's ample time to debate carving out a 2014 roster spot for Paul Konerko while Semien got Lenyn Sosa treatment all over again.
*Luis Robert Jr. has three homers as a leadoff man so his surface numbers look great out of that spot, but he's struck out 11 times in 22 plate appearances there after an 0-for-4, 3 K day. Efforts to maximize his boom-or-bust profile remain tricky.
*Robbie Grossman's trade away from the White Sox was referred to by the Rangers broadcast as "the best thing ever in his life," so they can't all be rave reviews.
