Jake

Your strength or his weakness? Hicks chooses Adell's weakness because Hicks's four-seamer is usually not a great pitch but it works here.

I'm really surprised Mune hit that pitch that way. I can hardly remember him turning on and squaring up a high inside heater like that before. It really wasn't that bad of a pitch by Messick.

If you wonder why the Sox have had some bad takes, consider the umpire's issues calling Messick's pitches

A lot of guys weak against RHP coming up for the Guardians. Not sure if I want to go with Hicks so early but I'm not totally against it either.

Perfect no-challenge by Hedges

Balls in play by the White Sox: 103mph, 112mph, 98mph, 96mph, 110mph, 112mph

Hope the next reliever is loosening

From what I read pregame, there should be a stiff breeze blowing in from right or right-center throughout this game. I think that's what you're seeing in that route from Braden

His xStats show conventional splits. And if teams batted their lefties against him his splits would look even more normal in all likelihood.

Two missed strike calls in that AB

I don't know what it is really but right-handers really struggle against Messick's 4-seamer. Not just the Sox hitters. It's got good velo and shape, but nothing spectacular. Something about his delivery or pitch mix must make it really play up.

That four-seamer is really catching our guys off guard

Balls in play by the Sox: 103mph, 112mph, 98mph

That ball might have gone out on a warm day in Chicago. Today a little chilly and the wind is blowing in.

He only went down because he was getting called off and trying to get out of the way

Guardians lineup is interesting as they clearly set it up with an expectation of seeing lefty pitchers. I wonder how long the Sox will oblige them (and which righty they will go to when it's time to match up against those righties). Note that JRam and Angel Martinez are both a lot worse at hitting RHP.

Messick doesn't throw his 4-seamer low very often at all, so I think Pham just thought he was getting a sinker that would miss low.

FWIW, Messick's Statcast expected stats show conventional platoon splits.

Need the strike zone box please

Did I just hear correctly that Messick listens to Higher by Creed to pump himself up???

Tomorrow you have Davis on the bump and probably Grant/Hagen in some capacity, not to mention some other guys depending on how they navigate the final 4 here.

I think it's gotta be Fedde time now that I think about it

Alright...need to cover 4 more innings. I'm curious to see what the plan is for that.

It's the Anthony Kay experience folks

He's on the roster to get you middle innings against an extremely right handed team. I don't think you can hide him with the way the pen was used yesterday. I'm very curious how the Sox plan to navigate the rest of these innings now.