White Sox Minor League Update: September 6, 2022
Outside of Charlotte, each team struggled to score runs, but there were decent pitching performances from Matthew Thompson and Tommy Sommer
A good bullpen game — in fact, a bullpen game that that took a no-hitter into the seventh inning! The way Charlotte spread out the innings was really weird, Jason Bilous, who is a starter, came in for the fifth and sixth. Tanner Banks, a former starter, came in for the third and fourth. Meanwhile, the first guy up, JB Olson, hasn’t been a starter in his professional life, and he went the first two — just a really weird pitching plan tonight. But it certainly worked out really well for everyone. Banks was the best of the bunch, retiring four of the six batters he faced via strikeout.
Meanwhile, on offense, Charlotte could not match the excellence of a shutout, but it did enough and then some, with the help of a couple of errors. Yolbert Sánchez and Zach Remillard led the gang in hits with two, and they both added a stolen base. Remillard gets the edge because of a double, and one of the two RBIs, though. Micker Adolfo and Lenyn Sosa had the team’s other two hits. Sosa also had the second RBI.
The Barons get blanked in a rain-shortened game — the shortest game possible, as it ended after five completed innings. Matthew Thompson got the start today and had one of his good ones. Four innings of work, with five strikeouts while allowing just one run, bringing his ERA in Double-A below 6.00. The offense obviously did not do well with no runs scored, as just two batters had hits today. Oscar Colás had two of those and Bryan Ramos had the other. Colson Montgomery continues to really struggle in Double-A, with a 0-for-2 performance and no walks.
Well, Tommy Sommer did his job, but none of his fellow arms did, and few Dash bats were able to ride the Sommer wave. He went six and allowed just one run, lowering his ERA to 2.89 in High-A. In this one, Sommer had a bit of a strikeout pitch, getting six — just as many innings as punch-outs. He just did the typical Sommer thing, which is keep guys off of the bases. The bullpen just wasn’t good behind him. It allowed five runs the next three innings, to lose the game in semi-blowout fashion.
The offense, similar to their A-ball counterparts in Kannapolis, did reach base enough to score more runs, but it was walk-based. W-S walked six times and earned eight hits. They went 2-for-13 with runners in scoring position, so that is where the minimal runs came from even with 14 batters on base. Every hit was a single, too, so there was not much pop to speak of. Caberea Weaver and Alsander Womack each had two of those singles. Andy Atwood was the lone man to reach base three times, getting to first base on a single and two walks.
Two bad innings and an overall bad performance by the offense dooms Kannapolis. The second inning saw two unearned runs scored after a Jayson Gonzalez error. Manuel Veloz was on the mound for that, so the runs weren’t his fault; that doesn’t mean he was good today, though. He walked three batters as he struggled with command. Jesus Valles took over and cruised through two innings, before running into trouble in the sixth. He gave up an inning-opening homer and two more runs before getting pulled. He was doing so well, with eight strikeouts, but was burned whenever a bat even touched one of his pitches. The only pitcher to go unscathed was Eric Adler, though his two hits allowed in one inning gave the impression he really wanted to give up a run.
The offense was pretty close to nonexistent. Its one run scored was unearned — a double play that scored Brooks Baldwin. Kannapolis did get five walks, so it showed good command of the strike zone — it just couldn’t get anything going to men on base. The Cannon Ballers went 1-for-11 with runners in scoring position. The weekly MVP, Logan Glass, had the only extra-base hit of the day, a double.