The White Sox just wrapped a trying but encouraging week. They braved the onslaught of two AL East playoff contenders, climbed back to .500 with a pair of series wins despite dealing with multiple key injuries, and set themselves up nicely for soft stretch in their schedule, which began with a Tuesday night’s hilarious starting mismatch of Jose Quintana vs. Kyle Gibson.
Ah, well.
1. An encouraging April effort provided some optimism that Sox hitters were stepping down from their spots on the board of directors of the ‘Kyle Gibson is a Quality Mid-Rotation Starter Foundation,’ but Tuesday night found them newly dedicated to their advocacy work.
Gibson entered the evening with an ERA over 6.00, but had set a season-high in strikeouts by the fourth inning, and completed a season-high seven innings without a scratch against him. His previous season-low for earned runs allowed, was of course, that April 11 start against the Sox.
Despite their mostly uninterrupted silence, Sox hitting did manage to get the first two runners on in the third with Adam Eaton, Jose Abreu and Melky Cabrera coming up, and then promptly made three-straight weak outs. They did not have a better scoring opportunity.
This was the first shutout Twins pitching has recorded all year
2. Staked to his normal amount of run support, Quintana was mostly his sharp self throughout the night, striking out eight and walking just one over the night, but his few mistakes loomed extremely large.
Brian Dozier lifted a center-cut 94 mph fastball high, high and out to left field to lead off the second inning, granting the Twins an insurmountable 1-0 lead. Four innings later, for emphasis, after Quintana issued a two-out walk to Joe Mauer that he claimed was not intentional, Dozier got a hold of a curveball without enough dip and dropped it into the left field bullpen to put wobegon Minnesota up 4-0.
When that ball bounded behind the fence, it looked like it would be be enough to seal the deal, and dear reader I will not lie to you, it was.
3. On that second home run, Cabrera banged his wrist against the fence as he leaped to try to snag it. He left the game before the seventh inning, and is considered day-to-day going forward. Or he hurt it on a swing, or it could be both!
In all, the Sox put out someone who has been a top-3 starter in the AL so far this year, faced the worst team in the league, while they were starting a guy who would have been kicked out of most any other team’s rotation, and lost in humiliating fashion, while their best hitter got hurt. They got a lot done on Tuesday, but none of it was good.
4. Tim Anderson led off again, collected two hits again, and stole the second base of his career. He also only contributed one at-bat to the White Sox 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position. In all, he was a top performer of the night.
5. Chris Beck pitched a scoreless inning in the eighth, and was fairly un-dominant while allowing a hit and a walk while striking out one. What was most interesting is that he sat in the mid-90s and touched 97 mph. For a guy whose prospect status was dampened by not showing bat-missing ability as a starter in the minor leagues, that kind of uptick in velocity in relief could be very interesting.
Interesting on another night, in the future, maybe another season.
Team Record: 38-39
Next game is Wednesday at 7:10pm CT on CSN
Lead Image Credit: Caylor Arnold // USA Today Sports Images