By Zachary McMahon –
The Chicago White Sox hosted the Boston Red Sox on the series finale on Sunday afternoon at Guaranteed Rate Field in Chicago. The White Sox have won the last two games, while the Red Sox were trying to split the series with the win.
Rafael Devers injured his left knee in the eighth inning, and did not play in the series finale, so Bobby Dalbec played at third base in the game. Tyler O’Neill missed his second game in a row with a knee injury, so Rob Refsnyder played in right field, while Connor Wong was the designated hitter and Reese McGuire was in at catcher.
The White Sox selected the contract of Sammy Peralta from Triple-A Charlotte before the game, and then sent down starting pitcher Nick Nastini, and designated lefthander Shane Drohan, a Rule-5 pick from the Red Sox this season. Peralta pitched in 16 games for the White Sox last season, going 2-0 with a 4.05 ERA and had 18 strikeouts.
On May 26, Peralta was claimed off waivers from the Seattle Mariners. A couple of days after on May 28, Peralta was designated for assignment after the team selected the contract of Jake Woodford to replace Mike Cleavenger who went on the 15-day injured list. Woodford started on Thursday’s opening loss to the Red Sox.
It was a bullpen game for the Red Sox as Zack Kelly made his first career start in the major leagues. Kelly went the first two innings without giving up a hit, but he did give up two walks. It would be Greg Weissert who would give up the first hit when he pitched in the third inning to Corey Julks, who singled.
In the fourth, Jarren Duran lead off with his 10th triple of the season, which leads the MLB as no other player has more than 7. The last time a Red Sox played had 10+ triples in a season was
Jacoby Ellsbury in 2009 with 10. This was Duran’s 47th game this season, and the last player to have 10+ triples in a 50-game span was Nomar Garciaparra in 2003, as he would have a total of
13 that season, which was the most since hall of famer Jim Rice had 16 in 1978. The last time an MLB player had 10+ triples in a 50-game span was Eddie Rosario in his rookie season with the Minnesota Twins in 2015.
Later in the inning, Enmanuel Valdez walked, and Refsnyder brought home Duran on a double play.
However, bad defense by the Red Sox would overshadow that as three errors would cause Paul DeJong to hit a three-run homer in the bottom half of the inning, his second straight game with a homer. He would later hit a ground rule double off Brennan Bernardino, and have a third straight multi-hit game, extending his on-base streak to six games, in which he has scored five runs in the stretch.
The Red Sox would climb back however off a solo homer by David Hamliton in the fifth. In the sixth Garrett Cooper, who was pinch hitting for Dominic Smith, grounding out for Duran to come home for his second run of the game, so the game was tied at three.
Gavin Sheets, fresh off a grand slam in Saturday’s game, brought home the go-ahead run on a single, in which it was Duke Ellis, who was pinch running for Julks after a leadoff double in the seventh.
Kenley Jansen came in the eighth, and struck out three batters in the inning, while giving up a double to third baseman Lenyn Sosa. At the top of the ninth, Hamilton hit a double for his second extra-base hit of the game, as it would be his second game with multiple extra-base hits in his career, as he did this on May 17 against the St. Louis Cardinals with a double and his first career triple.
After Hamltion stole third, McGuire brought him home on a sacrifice fly to tie the game up at four. Jansen returned in the ninth, and delivered another shutout inning as he caused Nicky Lopez to fly out to Duran and struck out both Luis Robert Jr. and Sheets to end the ninth and got the game into extra innings. This was the first time that Jansen has pitched two-innings in a Red Sox uniform, and the first time since 2021 with the Los Angeles Dodgers.
In the tenth, Ceddane Rafaela would become the ghost runner at second base after grounding out to end the eighth. Mike Soroka came in to pitch for the White Sox in relief of Tanner Banks who blew his save opportunity.
Soroka dropped the ball trying to get the speedy Duran out at first from a toss from Andrew Vaughn, and it advanced Rafaela to third. After Duran stole second, Jaime Westbrook, who pinch hit for Valdez in the sixth, hit a sacrifice fly where Oscar Colas caught it on the warning track, and Rafaela came home to score and Duran went to third.
Refsnyder brought home Duran on an RBI single to center, and the score was 6-4 Red Sox.
In the bottom half, Cam Booser went in for Jansen as he was the last possible pitcher from the bullpen in the game, as they used seven pitchers to this point. Booser struck out his first two batters in Vaughn and DeJong, and Danny Mendick, who pinch hit for Colas, lined out to Duran as Booser would pick up his first major league save as the Red Sox split the series with Chicago with a 6-4 win in 10 innings.
Through the game, the Red Sox bullpen put up 17 strikeouts, which is the most the Sox pitching staff has put up this season, with Jansen leading the charge with five. It was a true team effort as they used all their available position players in the win.
The Red Sox will have an off day on Monday before playing a six-game homestead against the Philadelphia Phillies and New York Yankees while the White Sox start a seven-game road trip against the Seattle Mariners and Arizona Diamondbacks.
The White Sox will start on Monday in Seattle with Erick Fedde going for them, while the Red Sox will be going with Kutter Crawford to open up the series against the Phillies, who will be playing after splitting a two-game series in London with the New York Mets. In the meantime, the Red Sox will find out about the statuses of Devers and O’Neill, and if they will go on the injured list.
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