BOSTON – So it goes for these White Sox, who have found all kinds of ways and taken all avenues to defeat imaginable in 2024.
With All-Star left-hander Garrett Crochet starting against the Red Sox Saturday at Fenway Park, a road to victory was presented early with a two-run homer from Andrew Vaughn against Cooper Criswell in the first inning.
Exactly how they’d draw it up.
Only to see the Red Sox bash Crochet for four runs in the bottom of the first inning of a 7-5 defeat, the Sox’ 111th of the season.
“That’s baseball, man,” said Vaughn, who had three hits. “It really is.”
It’s baseball the Sox way, that’s for sure. Lose late, lose early and in between.
A single, double, RBI groundout, home run and double is how the Red Sox greeted Crochet. Tyler O’Neill’s homer clipped a ruffled a hanging green sign above the Green Monster in left. Connor Wong’s double thumped off the Monster.
Along the way, former White Sox Romy Gonzalez singled, stole second and third on Crochet and scored a run.
“Didn’t command the fastball to the glove side, everything was kind of just mid-thigh,” said Crochet, who struck out 10 Red Sox over six innings in a White Sox victory on June 7 in Chicago. “In hindsight guys were just turning and burning. And I kept attempting to go back in there. Something I’ve been burned by before this year and wish I would have learned by now. Just kind of how it went down.”
It was 4-2 Red Sox after a 36-pitch first for Crochet, who was on a short leash to begin with as his innings and pitches are watched in the late stages of his first season as a starter and his first since coming off Tommy John surgery.
Crochet (6-11) lasted just two innings, finishing with a scoreless second and three strikeouts and one walk allowed. His ERA, at 3.02 while he was tossing a scoreless inning in the All-Star Game, is up to 3.83. He’ll have three more starts left if he goes to the end of the season, albeit more shorties.
After Crochet was gone, the Red Sox tacked on three more runs to build a 7-2 lead, one on O’Neill’s second homer and 27th of the season, against Enyel De Los Santos in the fifth.
A 7-2 Red Sox lead was trimmed to 7-5 on former Red Sox Andrew Benintendi’s three-run homer into the bullpen in right in the seventh.
The Sox lost their 19th straight series and are 5-40 since the All-Star break.
It’s not like they’re trying to lose, if that’s any consolation.
“The goal every day is try to put together a win,” interim manager Grady Sizemore said Saturday. “Individually, we’re trying to get the most out of these guys, but we want to play a clean game, we want it to look competitive, we want to be fighting every day and improve every day.
“You want it to look like a quality team that’s playing good baseball.”
It’s hard to look that way at 32-111, the Sox’ record after Saturday’s loss. They must finish 11-8 to avoid tying the 1962 Mets record for 120 losses in a season.
“If we’re sitting here harping on it all the time and focusing on the record and wins, it can be draining,” said Sizemore, who has seen the team go 4-25 since he took over for fired manager Pedro Grifol. “That’s why I tried to stay away from that message. We’re not in the playoffs, so regardless of the record, who cares, let’s try to compete and win series and win as many games as we can.”
Sizemore wants to finish on a high note. But it’s impossible for anyone to visualize.
“Not worried about anything but playing good,” he said.
“Try to get better and have fun but also play the game the right way, play hard, play clean, try to be aggressive, put the pressure on the other team and be competitive.”