The Chicago White Sox lost to the Boston Red Sox by a final score of 16-7 on Thursday night. It was a disaster of a game where just about everything that can go wrong did go wrong for them. It was just no fun to watch at all.
Before the game, we learned that Joe Kelly is going on the 15-day IL because of a hamstring issue. He is probably going to be out for three to four weeks which is not good. He was just starting to settle in this season and now he is going to be out for a while.
The game started with Dallas Keuchel on the mound. That has mostly led to disaster for the White Sox so far this season and that was no different this time. They were down 6-0 before Jose Abreu (the four-hitter) even took a single at-bat. That is unacceptable.
The offense didn’t have the wind taken out of their sails, however, as they kept trying to climb out of that hole that Dallas Keuchel dug them into. Unfortunately, Tony La Russa decided to punt on the game when the score was 7-5, and looked like the White Sox could come back.
Everything went wrong for the Chicago White Sox in this game on Thursday.
Tanner Banks is a 30-year-old rookie for a reason. He has also gone back to AAA until Kelly’s injury for a reason. You can’t expect him to pitch in high-leverage situations like that and get something positive out of it.
He gave up a bunch of runs and that led to the White Sox being unable to come back. When he was replaced by Bennett Sousa later after giving up the game, Sousa didn’t help him much. He got what should have been the final out of an inning to ground it to him but he airmailed the ball over Jose Abreu’s head at first. Even more runs scored for Boston on that play.
The White Sox were lucky to take one out of three games in this series. Lucas Giolito kept that Red Sox offense at bay and handed it to the late-inning bullpen guys with a lead which is why they were able to win that one. They lost the series 2-1 but managed to win the season series 4-2.
Now that this series is over, we can only hope that the White Sox make smart decisions with Dallas Keuchel going forward. He should not start another game for the rest of the season. Not one. Tony La Russa also has to be better otherwise this team has no chance at all.