Today in White Sox History: June 18
The Big Bastard runs it up one more time
1933
Right in the middle of a 24-game homestand (!), the White Sox drew the biggest crowd in Chicago history at the time, 53,398, to a doubleheader split against the Yankees.
The White Sox, surprisingly playing better than .500 during the dark ages of 1920-50, dropped the first contest vs. New York, 6-4, with Ted Lyons taking the loss. But in the nightcap, the South Siders rewarded their faithful with a 5-4, walk-off win to move to 30-27 and 5 1⁄2 back of first in the American League.
It was a furious finish for Chicago, who trailed all game but score one in the seventh and then a game-tying three in the bottom of the ninth. Evar Swanson knotted the game, 4-4, with a two-run single with one out in the ninth.
In the 10th, Whit Wyatt sat the Yankees down three straight, and the White Sox immediately set to rallying. Luke Appling led the inning off with a double, and after an intentional walk to Red Kress, Jimmy Dykes laid down a bunt to move the runners over that he beat out; on pitcher Wilcy Moore’s overthrow to first base, Appling came around to score.
The next season, Dykes would become player-manager of the White Sox, and would stay at the helm of the team until 1946.
The White Sox would surpass this attendance mark seven times at Comiskey Park after this, but this game remains the eighth-biggest crowd in White Sox (and Chicago baseball) history.
1961
Eddie Gaedel, who came to fame as a pinch-hitter for the St. Louis Browns in 1951 and a Martian leader who landed in Comiskey Park and kidnapped Luis Aparicio and Nellie Fox eight years later, was found dead at his apartment on the South Side of Chicago.
The centerpiece of Bill Veeck’s follies had endured a difficult life, unemployed and alcoholic at the time of his passing. The 3´7´´owner of a 1.000 career MLB OBP was followed home from a bowling alley and beaten and/or mugged, and it was his mother who discovered him dead, in his bed, bruised. A coroner found that Gaedel had suffered a heart attack during or after the assault.
Only one representative of Major League Baseball attended Gaedel’s funeral: Bob Cain, the Tigers pitcher who walked Gaedel in 1951. (Cain had been traded to Detroit from the White Sox three months before the infamous Gaedel game.)
2006
Jon Garland became the first White Sox pitcher since 1971 to homer in a regular season game when he hit a two-run shot off of Esteban Yan in the eighth inning in Cincinnati. The Sox won easily, 8-1. Garland scored two runs in the game, as well.
2019
It was a huge moment, and seemingly a big step forward for the rebuilding White Sox. In a 1-1 tie at Wrigley Field, former top Cubs prospect Eloy Jiménez blasted a two-run home run into the left-field bleachers, giving the Sox what turned out to be a 3-1 win. The shot came in the ninth inning, and he did it while breaking his bat! Jiménez was acquired by the Sox along with top pitching prospect Dylan Cease for pitcher José Quintana on July 13, 2007.
2023
A brilliant individual performance by Sox starting pitcher Lance Lynn was all for naught.
Lynn, who had been badly struggling all season, found a comfort zone in Seattle and wound up striking out 16 Mariners — tying the franchise record — on a Father’s Day Sunday afternoon.
But the Sox offense was so embarrassingly bad it only managed one run, and Seattle wound up winning the game, 5-1, tacking on additional runs off of Reynaldo López when Lynn left in the eighth inning. Lynn was charged with three runs in the game.
The 16 strikeouts tied Jack Harshman for the team record. Harshman, a converted position player, struck on 16 Red Sox on July 25, 1954 at Fenway Park in a game the White Sox won, 5-2.