The White Sox are now 0-5 against the Orioles this season, but at least the eighth inning provided evidence of why they're closer in the 2025 standings than anybody would've ever imagined.
The White Sox trailed this one 8-2 after seven, in a game that looked like Monday night's game, just doubled. The White Sox scored two runs in the first inning instead of one, and then spent the middle innings suffering the backlash.
The eighth inning should've ended with the score still 8-2, for that matter, because with two outs, Miguel Vargas swung over a Chayce McDermott curveball for strike three. It's just that Samuel Basallo failed to block it, the ball sprung to the backstop, and Vargas reached safely to extend the inning while Chase Meidroth scored from third.
The White Sox needed so much help to reactivate their offense, and the Orioles were willing to give it to them. Meidroth reached on a four-pitch walk to open the inning, and then advanced the rest of the 270 feet without the benefit of a hit, including a first wild pitch that moved him to second. Vargas' lucky strikeout only exacerbated the issues.
Mike Tauchman provided the inning's first contribution from the White Sox when he floated a single to right, after which McDermott caught a spike on his delivery and balked both runners into scoring position. Lenyn Sosa capitalized by smashing a single through the left side to make it 8-5, and when Rico Garcia came in to relieve McDermott to face Andrew Benintendi, his first pitch landed just over the wall in center field. Benintendi's 20th homer made it a one-run game.
(Even then, Colton Cowser probably should've caught it, but his leaping attempt got stuck on the wall going up.)
Just like that, it was 8-7. And while Edgar Quero flied out to deep left for a third out, the Orioles extended another hand when Jackson Holliday got eaten up by Meidroth's line drive for a generous single with one out in the ninth, putting the tying run aboard. Unlike Benintendi, however, Kyle Teel and Colson Montgomery both had to face a lefty, and Keegan Akin struck out both to end the game.
(Teel should've walked on a 3-1 fastball that was up and in, but he went around.)
"Trying to do too much," Teel said. "I wanted to end the ballgame right there, but you know, I swung at a bad pitch and that was it."
At least the 12,428 on hand had something to cheer for, because on FromThe108 Bobblehead Night, the White Sox spent most of the night making their fans want to drink.
Once again, they opened the game in resounding fashion, with Meidroth singling and Teel homering off Dean Kremer for the quickest possible 2-0 lead. Teel then singled with one out in the third, and they spent the next five innings going hitless until the dropped strike three opened the door.
That's about the time Shane Smith started getting clobbered. His resurgent second half hit a speed bump starting in the third inning, when he gave up three hits over the first four batters to tie the game at 2. From that point forward, Smith's evening was a slog. His attempt to bury an 0-2 curveball to Basallo ended up staying up enough for Basallo to launch a 420-foot homer to right, giving the Orioles a 4-2 lead in the fourth.
"Maybe if I throw a better pitch he doesn’t hit it for a homer," Smith quipped in response to a Sox Machine reporter asking if he spied anything funny about giving up hits on two different 0-2 curveballs. "This outing reminds me of what I went through in June and July. Not something I’m unfamiliar with. And need to bounce back."
Smith didn't make it out of the fifth, as he gave up three-quarters of the cycle to the first four hitters. His night ended after 4⅓ innings on Dylan Beavers' RBI triple, which was the ninth hit and the fifth for extra bases.
Perhaps he gets off the hook if Wikelman Gonzalez didn't start the seventh with six straight pitches out of the zone, with the seventh a grooved fastball that Beavers lodged into the seats behind the visiting bullpen for an 8-2 lead. Perhaps that's the margin that allowed the Orioles to let the guard down. Regardless, ending the five-game losing streak will inevitably require the White Sox to be better self-starters.
"To be honest with you, yes, it's a learning opportunity but I'm gonna flush it," Teel said. "That's it."
Bullet points:
*Meidroth extended his hitting streak to 12 games with another successful night, reaching base three times and scoring twice at the top of the order.
*Montgomery went 0-for-4 with a walk and three strikeouts. He's struck out in 25 of his 62 September plate appearances.
"Just some swing and miss in the zone," Will Venable said. "He’s making OK swing decisions. Early in the count there, just some swing and miss in the zone. He’s working on his move a little bit to clean it up and he’s not far away."
*The Orioles could've put the game away in the sixth inning when Fraser Ellard loaded the bases with a single and two walks, but Gunnar Henderson's line drive found Lenyn Sosa a step back from the bag, and he completed the 3-unassisted double play in the same motion.
*Basallo had a rough night behind the plate, as the Orioles threw five wild pitches.
