Ian Happ homered leading off the game against Garrett Crochet, Cody Bellinger followed with a two-run blast and the Cubs tacked on back-to-back home runs in the third against White Sox All-Star Garrett Crochet.
A seven-run lead had the makings of a Cubs rout.
It turned into a Cubs’ 7-6 win before 38,127 fans, the Sox’ second sellout this season at Guaranteed Rate Field in interim Sox manager Grady Sizemore’s first stint at the helm in place of Pedro Grifol, who was fired as Sox manager Thursday with a 28-89 record.
The Cubs (58-60) improved to 3-0 against the Sox (28-90) in the crosstown series, all the wins by a 7-6 score. The Sox are ahead of the pace to break the 1962 Mets’ record 120 losses in a season.
“We lost, but it kind of felt like a win, in a way,” said Andrew Benintendi, who hit two homers.
“A win is a win,” Bellinger said. “For sure, we’re going to take the win. And it was an exciting game.”
The Sox scored four in the fourth and got solo home runs from Benintendi in the fifth and seventh innings. Andrew Vaughn, who homered in the fourth against Jameson Taillon, flied out with the bases full in the ninth against Hector Neris to end it in the ninth.
Touki Toussaint (3 1/3 innings), Justin Anderson, Chad Kuhl and John Brebbia combined on 6 2/3 scoreless innings of relief in the Sox bullpen’s best performance of the season.
The Sox bullpen had allowed 25 runs in 27 2/3 innings since the July 30 trade deadline.
Benintendi, not known for his throwing, threw out out Pete Crow-Armstrong at the plate in the fifth inning. The homer marked the second time Benintendi went deep in three straight games during his career. He has five homers in his last five games.
Crochet lasted 2 1/3 innings, allowing seven earned runs on nine hits including four homers and a triple but walking none and striking out five. He threw 67 pitches, 47 for strikes before being replaced by Sizemore in favor of Touki Toussaint.
Isaac Paredes and Nico Hoerner hit consecutive homers in the third.
How many more starts Crochet makes as the Sox monitor his workload in his first full season as a starter is not known. What is known is Crochet’s performance since he pitched a scoreless inning for the American League in the All-Star Game looks like this: 13 1/3 innings, 13 earned runs, 20 hits, 20 strikeouts, seven walks.
Since May 10, Crochet had allowed four homers in 77 2/3 innings over 15 starts.
“Felt good, I just wasn’t really getting the ball to the glove side at all,” Crochet said. “That’s been my strength all year. When I’m not doing that well, the game kind of spirals like it did tonight. The cutter, I feel like I was backing up and leaving it arm side. It’s a simple fix I’ll be able to work on in my bullpen.
“The fact of the matter is it’s been this way for three, four weeks now. I kept telling myself, that was a bad stuff day or my stuff felt good and my arm was a little late and it was a timing thing. But I just have to be better.”
Crochet’s velocity against the Cubs topped out at 97.6 mph.