Game thread IC - White Sox at Royals

Brady Singer tunes up for the stretch run with a rare evening start

Tonight marks Brady Singer’s 20th start on the season, and it will be only his ninth under the lights. As play begins tonight, the Royals are a mere 1.5 games behind the Red Sox for the final playoff spot in the American League. If the Royals make it to the post-season, they will assuredly have to play many games in the evenings and so Singer must accustom himself to these starts. It takes on added importance when you realize that Singer has been significantly better in daytime starts - a 2.55 ERA, 56/18 K/BB in 60 innings - versus his night time appearances - 4.09 ERA, 43/14 K/BB in 44 innings. Singer last pitched in a day game, Sunday, against the Red Sox and things didn’t go well. That said, pitching against their bleached counterparts should be an excellent opportunity to improve his numbers tonight.

Singer has pitched two games against the White Sox this year and the Royals won both of them, though they did not take the lead until after Singer had left the mound.

For the White Sox part, they will counter with rookie Jonathan Cannon. Cannon has been fine in his first MLB season, pitching to a 4.47 ERA and 4.19 FIP over his first 10 games, eight of which have been starts. He doesn’t strike out many, but he also doesn’t walk many. He does give up home runs. If Cannon’s name seems familiar to you, that’s probably because he made his major league debut against the Royals in Chicago back on April 17 - coincidentally, the night of Singer’s second start against the Sox this season. Cannon went 5 innings and allowed only a single run in a game that would ultimately go to the Royals when Hunter Renfroe and Salvador Perez both went deep against the bullpen.

Cannon has been a bit uneven this year; after debuting against the Royals had two poor starts before he was shifted to the bullpen for a scoreless, three-inning relief appearance. He followed that up with seven innings and one run to the Mariners before pitching 8.2 scoreless innings against the Astros in mid-June but has given up 13 runs in 18.2 innings over three starts and a bulk relief appearance since then while striking out considerably fewer hitters than before.

Lineups

Adam Frazier continues to lead off for the Royals for lack of a better option. He’s not great there, but Maikel Garcia has been significantly better batting eighth - he has a hit in each of his five games while batting in that spot - so maybe it evens out. Drew Waters gets his second start in the big leagues, this year, batting seventh and playing in left field. Hopefully, it goes better than his first two, which saw him accrue no hits or walks while striking out twice in seven at-bats.