The Chicago White Sox had been aiming for his or her first collection win since early August.
Instead, they made two errors and gave up a grand slam within the first three innings Wednesday in opposition to the Washington Nationals.
The Sox dropped the collection finale 13-3 in entrance of 23,275 at Nationals Park. Lane Thomas hit the grand slam within the third inning in opposition to Jesse Scholtens, giving the Nationals an 8-1 lead.
“We made a couple errors that were costly,” supervisor Pedro Grifol mentioned. “Other than that, we didn’t pitch very well and we didn’t hit.”
The Sox surrendered three residence runs, walked seven and hit two batters on Wednesday. They misplaced two of three within the collection and are a season-worst 37 video games underneath .500 at 58-95. Their final collection victory was Aug. 7-9, once they gained two of three in opposition to the New York Yankees at Guaranteed Rate Field.
Here are three takeaways from Nationals Park.
1. Michael Kopech labored on his slider as an opener.
Michael Kopech acquired the groundball he wanted.
With a runner on third base and one out within the first inning on Wednesday, Joey Meneses hit a grounder to 3rd. Yoán Moncada threw residence and caught CJ Abrams in a rundown. But shortstop Tim Anderson couldn’t deal with catcher Carlos Pérez’s throw again to 3rd cleanly and Abrams scored on the error.
Kopech bounced again with a strikeout and flyout to wrap up his one inning because the opener.
Kopech mentioned he felt “pretty good, overall.”
“There’s still some adjustments that I know need to be made,” Kopech mentioned. “I was working on a different slider grip and a different approach to my slider and I thought I threw some good ones today. So I think that’s a positive to take away from it.”
Kopech allowed the one unearned run on one hit with the one strikeout. He hit one batter. Nine of his 14 pitches had been strikes.
“Strike-throwing is a big part of this game,” Kopech mentioned. “It’s been a big part of what I needed to work on this year. To make even small strides in that is something to be excited about as far as improvement moving forward.”
After making 26 begins, Kopech acquired some work out of the bullpen. He had three aid appearances earlier than taking the opener function Wednesday.
Grifol described Kopech’s inning on Wednesday as “just OK.”
“His stuff was down a little bit,” Grifol mentioned. “Threw strikes. Had the hit by pitch. Just OK. I don’t think he was strong today, not as strong as he usually is.”
According to MLB Statcast, Kopech’s common four-seam fastball velocity Wednesday was 93.9 mph, whereas his common for the yr is 95.2 mph.
2. Season ends for reliever Gregory Santos, however Garrett Crochet is reinstated from the IL.
Gregory Santos confirmed large development all through the season, working his means into some conditions as a better.
The right-hander gained’t pitch once more in 2023 after occurring the 15-day injured checklist Wednesday with proper elbow irritation.
“We’ll just err on the side of caution and shut him down for the rest of the year and let the doctors continue to evaluate him,” Grifol mentioned earlier than Wednesday’s recreation.
Santos went 2-2 with a 3.39 ERA, 5 saves and 66 strikeouts in 60 aid outings. Among major-league aid rookies this season, he ranks ranks fourth in appearances, fifth in strikeouts and innings pitched (66 1/3) and tenth in ERA.
“He was probably the seventh or eighth guy in the bullpen and worked his way into leverage slowly,” Grifol mentioned. “At the beginning, he wasn’t pitching in that kind of leverage. He kept performing and performing and had a really good year, a great year.”
While the Sox misplaced Santos, they regained Garrett Crochet. The Sox reinstated the left-handed reliever after he had been positioned on the IL on June 17 with left shoulder irritation.
3. Avoiding walks pays off for Mike Clevinger.
Mike Clevinger felt he was on the identical web page with catcher Yasmani Grandal.
“How we were going to set guys up, how we were going to go around with the patterns the second and third time through,” Clevinger mentioned Monday. “Credit to (Grandal).”
Clevinger went the space in Monday’s 6-1 victory. He allowed the one run on six hits with seven strikeouts and no walks.
He prolonged his streak of begins with out a stroll to 4, the longest by a Sox starter since José Quintana additionally went 4 straight from June 26 via July 12, 2015.
It was the staff’s first full recreation since Dylan Cease achieved the feat on Sept. 3, 2022, in opposition to the Minnesota Twins and the primary time in a highway recreation for a Sox pitcher since Lucas Giolito on Aug. 21, 2019, at Minnesota.
“What you do hope is that it becomes a competition (for the pitchers) that ‘this is what he did and this is what I want to do next time out,’” Grifol mentioned Tuesday. “And it’s wholesome. It’s late within the season for that however it’s at all times good to see a teammate throw a whole recreation. It’s a rarity and it’s good to have pitchers which might be continually on me telling me ‘I want to finish that.’
“Cease hasn’t finished one of those (this season) but he’s always talking about it. (Clevinger) is always talking about it, the guys we moved were always talking about it. It was really nice to manage guys who want to start the game and finish it.”
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Source: www.bostonherald.com