Alright boys, today is the fourth & final game of the series against the Tigers.  The Sox have won the first three and have outscored the Tigers 22 to 9.  The Sox are now 14-11 on the season (.560) and sit just two games back of the Twins for the Central lead.  As I mentioned yesterday, the Sox have a tough series coming up agains the Cubs and sweeping the Tigers would allow us to enter that series with momentum intact.

On the mound for the Sox is Lucas Giolito, who has struggled to live up to expectations so far this year.  He’s currently 1-2 with a 4.08 FIP on the season, but has battled two issues that are more or less related: 1st inning woes & poor fastball command.  Giolito’s FIP is a whopping 6.94 in the 1st vs. 3.45 in all other innings.  For those who watched him closely, being unable to locate his fastball early in games and especially in the 1st has really hurt him.  Lucas & Coop definitely need to find a way to get him comfortable from the get-go or the Sox will quickly find themselves trying to claw back from a deficit early in the game.

As for the Tigers, they will have 27 year old right-hander Spencer Turnbull on the mound.  He has a very interesting pitch mix, primarily being a sinker-slider type while coming up through the minors until recently developing a four seamer that per FanGraphs “moves unlike any other four-seam fastball” generating both high ground-ball & whiff rates.  He now uses the four seamer 43% of the time, with the sinker more a complimentary pitch to keep batters off-balance.  Given his arsenal, Spencer generates a lot of ground-balls (54%) and that could be troubling for a group hitters who are prone to hit the ball into the ground.  They’ll have to be patient today and wait for pitches they can elevate and while watching out for Turnbull’s slider which is a wipe-out pitch for him.  Overall, this should be a pretty good match-up even if not as exciting as yesterday’s.

Let’s fucking go boys!!!!!

Let's get a WIN and get ready to beat the blue weenies. Lucas has to get his 1st inning nonsense corrected

 

Has Abreu had a day off yet? Play Collins again and let Jose get the day off imo. 

47 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Alright boys, today is the fourth & final game of the series against the Tigers.  The Sox have won the first three and have outscored the Tigers 22 to 9.  The Sox are now 14-11 on the season (.560) and sit just two games back of the Twins for the Central lead.  As I mentioned yesterday, the Sox have a tough series coming up agains the Cubs and sweeping the Tigers would allow us to enter that series with momentum intact.

On the mound for the Sox is Lucas Giolito, who has struggled to live up to expectations so far this year.  He’s currently 1-2 with a 4.08 FIP on the season, but has battled two issues that are more or less related: 1st inning woes & poor fastball command.  Giolito’s FIP is a whopping 6.94 in the 1st vs. 3.45 in all other innings.  For those who watched him closely, being unable to locate his fastball early in games and especially in the 1st has really hurt him.  Lucas & Coop definitely need to find a way to get him comfortable from the get-go or the Sox will quickly find themselves trying to claw back from a deficit early in the game.

As for the Tigers, they will have 27 year old right-hander Spencer Turnbull on the mound.  He has a very interesting pitch mix, primarily being a sinker-slider type while coming up through the minors until recently developing a four seamer that per FanGraphs “moves unlike any other four-seam fastball” generating both high ground-ball & whiff rates.  He now uses the four seamer 43% of the time, with the sinker more a complimentary pitch to keep batters off-balance.  Given his arsenal, Spencer generates a lot of ground-balls (54%) and that could be troubling for a group hitters who are prone to hit the ball into the ground.  They’ll have to be patient today and wait for pitches they can elevate and while watching out for Turnbull’s slider which is a wipe-out pitch for him.  Overall, this should be a pretty good match-up even if not as exciting as yesterday’s.

Let’s fucking go boys!!!!!

Maybe give him an opener against good opponent if that first inning woe continues? 

Against the tigers he must find a way but against better teams you could save him facing the top of the Lineup once with an opener.

Thank you for including the start time!

46 minutes ago, Yearnin' for Yermin said:

Has Abreu had a day off yet? Play Collins again and let Jose get the day off imo. 

He hasn’t and I agree!

5 minutes ago, Leonard Zelig said:

Thank you for including the start time!

I live to serve!  ?

2 hours ago, Kyyle23 said:

 

Hold on... 

The main point is that they thought they could get back on track against us, but has Detroit really lost TWENTY STRAIGHT GAMES to Cleveland, or was that the writer's hyperbole?? Really burying the lede there, ESPN.

Yeah I would like to see more of Collins. He needs the ABs to get going. 

12 minutes ago, MiddleCoastBias said:

Hold on... 

The main point is that they thought they could get back on track against us, but has Detroit really lost TWENTY STRAIGHT GAMES to Cleveland, or was that the writer's hyperbole?? Really burying the lede there, ESPN.

No, literally 20. But they're also 6-15 against us in our last 21 meetings, so the premise still is not great

Wtf is "Field level Media"?

 

 

Man, how do they expect Collins to do anything when his play time is so sporadic?

 

Second, Abreu has played every single game this year. Give the dude a day off. He isn't a spring chicken. Let Collins build on yesterday.

2 minutes ago, Yearnin' for Yermin said:

Man, how do they expect Collins to do anything when his play time is so sporadic?

 

Second, Abreu has played every single game this year. Give the dude a day off. He isn't a spring chicken. Let Collins build on yesterday.

4 games left then we play 2 in 4, I think its fine.

As long as Robert is back tomorrow for the start of the Cubs series, I don’t hate this lineup. Hopefully Grandal will be back tomorrow too.

Dammit....no Robert. Hope to get clarification from Renteria about his status for the Cubs.

Is the current taxi squad roster published somewhere?

4 minutes ago, ChiSox59 said:

Is the current taxi squad roster published somewhere?

The team roster pages have invitees, plus the 40-man guys that aren’t on the active roster. I see Jake Burger was added yesterday.

23 minutes ago, flavum said:

The team roster pages have invitees, plus the 40-man guys that aren’t on the active roster. I see Jake Burger was added yesterday.

I was going to start a thread about Burger.  That is great news.  If he could become an asset that would be huge.  This lineup needs some more balanced OBP guys.

Man would it be nice to sweep this series.  The easiest way to make the playoffs would be to beat the Twins and Indians head to head.  Short of that, every extra game you can pick up against the Detroit and KC's of the world still count.  .500 will put this team into the playoffs, but if they can play themselves into the top 2 positions, that is even better.

39 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

Man would it be nice to sweep this series.  The easiest way to make the playoffs would be to beat the Twins and Indians head to head.  Short of that, every extra game you can pick up against the Detroit and KC's of the world still count.  .500 will put this team into the playoffs, but if they can play themselves into the top 2 positions, that is even better.

if Clevinger and Plesac are out the rest of the season, Sox will overtake the Indians for 2nd (especially if Dunning is consistent and Cease keeps winning). Really interested to see how that plays out. 

Edited August 20, 20205 yr by EloyJenkins

Being able to sit down and watch a weekday day game means a global pandemic is only like 99% bad

Take no prisoners

 

There’s the nice Change