White Sox Conclude Cold Homestand With Series Against Tampa Bay
White Sox conclude current homestand with series against Tampa Bay Rays, who sit in last place in the American League East division.
The Chicago White Sox entered their six-game homestand on Thursday leading the American League in home runs at 14. After getting swept by the Detroit Tigers at home, the Sox ended their previous series with zero home runs hit at home.
With the temperatures in Chicago being less than pleasant since the start of this month, the White Sox bats became extremely cold over their past three games. The Sox scored just eight runs in their series against Detroit, with seven of those runs coming on Thursday. Detroit was able to mount a comeback victory on Thursday and kept the Sox scoreless on Sunday.
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The Sox offense will need to get back on track in their next series before they have a road trip. As the Sox look to get their first win at home this week, they will face the Tampa Bay Rays in their next series. Tampa Bay is entering this series with the worst record in MLB at 1-8 and after blowing a five-run lead on Sunday.
This past offseason, the Rays signaled their direction towards rebuilding when they traded All-Star Evan Longoria to San Francisco. Tampa Bay also traded Steven Souza Jr. this past February to Arizona. The Rays designated Corey Dickerson for assignment and traded starting pitcher Jake Odorizzi to Minnesota.
With the Rays missing the postseason for the fourth consecutive season in 2017, the decision to rebuild for Tampa Bay was an easy choice to make. However, Chris Archer still remains with the team along with Kevin Kiermaier. Archer will start for the Rays on Monday in a game that has been rescheduled from 7:10 PM CST to 1:10 PM CST.
Miguel Gonzalez will start for the Sox on Monday afternoon. Gonzalez is looking for his first win of the season. The Sox will start Carson Fulmer on Tuesday and James Shields in the series finale on Wednesday. Tampa Bay will start Blake Snell on Tuesday and haven’t announced the starter for Wednesday’s game as of Monday morning.
Next: Takeaways from Tigers Sweep of White Sox
The Sox will have a chance at winning their first home series of the year against Tampa Bay. But they will need to do a better job of scoring with runners on base. In their series against the Tigers, the Sox failed to score with runners in scoring position often. Hopefully, the Sox bats can heat up at home despite the cold weather.