Naylor’d: Cleveland drops Sox, 5-1

Eight hits? Good. One run? Um

This will be an especially brief recap with polls, as we anticipate augmenting this recap with a on-the-ground report from Melissa Sage-Bollenbach, who might be thinking she’s lucky to have had her first Cactus League game rained out yesterday after today’s offensive performance.

Suffice to say, as much as we’d love Jesse Scholtens to become a solid middle relief option out of the MLB pen and/or a legit emergency starter laboring in Charlotte, if he is the clear (only) MVP of your ballgame, you did not have a good ballgame.

The offense? Well, the White Sox did get out to a 1-0 lead in the top of the first, courtesy of Elvis Andrus leading off with a double off of White Sox Killer Triston McKenzie, and one out later an Andrew (3-hole) Benintendi single. The first out was an unproductive one from No. 2 hitter Oscar Colás, a ground out to short that Andrus still managed to advance to third on.

The White Sox would leave seven more on base after that, and push home no more runs.

Worse, the Guardians struck right back down 1-0, as with one out Cleveland went single-HB-walk to load the bases for Josh Naylor. Yeah, you know what happened next:

[Oh wait, I can’t show you Naylor’s grand slam because there was no broadcast of the game, two weeks before the start of the regular season. Cool!]

That clubbing came off of Nick Avila, who is a young Rule 5 reliever who the White Sox ostensibly want to keep, and not return to San Francisco 25k lighter. Why he was thrust into a starting (opener) role vs. someone, anyone else, not sure. At least Lucas Giolito, yesterday’s rained-out starter, got some work in for a B-game back at Camelback Ranch.

Anyway, read Melissa’s terrific take on a bad result. She did a great job filling in some details on what appears in the box as two-dimensional loss.