Thirteen — 13! — batters had hits as White Sox sank the Mariners, 18-9
Though they fell one short of the their total number of runs in February
Goodness gracious. The Sox had 17 hits, walked seven times, had one batter hit by a pitch, went 9-for-19 with runners in scoring position, and belted four homers. Sure, a gale blowing out helped, but it blew out for both teams, and the Mariners only had two runs before putting up a TD and an extra point in the ninth.
Pity some of those White Sox runs couldn’t be saved for the regular season.
The Sox scored early as Chase Meidroth (who was Mee-droth to the Seattle TV crew until someone whispered in their ears a few innings in) worked the first of his three walks (had a hit, too), followed by doubles by Josh Rojas and Lenyn Sosa, who apparently would just as soon stay with the big league club when the season starts.
That made it a quick 2-0, and an eight-run third made the lead double-digits. That’s right, the Sox scored eight runs — not in one week, but in one-third of an inning.
The 8-spot featured three RBIs each from Luis Robert Jr. and Brandon Drury, Drury’s in one long ball and Robert’s on a two-run single and a later single. La Pantera’s audition for a possible trade started and ended with backward K’s, but had those two hits in the middle.
The Sox ran it up to 18-2, thanks mostly to a six-run seventh that included an Andre Lipcius long ball. Just to round things out, Adam Hackenberg drilled one out in the ninth.
About the only batters not to make a case for regular-season consideration were veterans Joey Gallo (0-for-3) with two K’s. Same went for Austin Slater, though Slater managed to draw a walk so his line wasn’t quite as bad.
On the pitching side, starter Shane Smith atoned for a terrible game five days ago with two clean innings with three K’s, nibbling right at 100 mph with his four-seamer. Only Nick Nastrini gave up any runs until the ninth, and those came as he was over 50 pitches and as a result of his own error.
The Mariners took advantage of another Shane, namely Murphy, to score seven in the bottom of the ninth. But when you’re down 16 to begin an inning, any rally only matters for individual stats.
The win moves the Sox to 2-6 for the spring, virtually identical to their 2024 regular season percentage. They take on the Dodgers tomorrow afternoon.
Oh, yeah — Spring Training is for announcers, too. Not only did the Mariners crew mispronounce Meidroth’s name, but they kept insisting the new park the Sox want to build would be on the north side. Maybe they meant the north side of Chinatown.