CLEVELAND -- The White Sox are one win away from something they haven’t done at home since Oct. 14, 1906.
That was the last time Chicago clinched a playoff series on its own turf, back when the White Sox beat the Cubs at South Side Park to win the World Series in six games. Now, after Monday’s 4-3 win over the Guardians at Progressive Field, that piece of history is suddenly within reach again.
The White Sox rode a three-run sixth inning and a sharp outing from Sean Burke to take Game 2 of the American League Division Series and grab a 2-0 lead in the best-of-five set. They’ve now won four straight to start the 2026 postseason, and the numbers behind that position are as strong as the scoreboard: teams that jump ahead 2-0 in best-of-five series have advanced 83 times in 93 chances, an 89% clip.
Game 3 shifts to Rate Field on Wednesday, and a win there - or Thursday if the series goes that far - would send the White Sox to the ALCS for the first time since 2005. That was the year they went 11-1 in the postseason and won the World Series, starting with a 3-1 run before ripping off eight straight victories.
Monday’s turning point came in the sixth, when Miguel Vargas opened the rally with a single to left after drawing walks in each of his first two trips against Gavin Williams. Vargas was the lone hitter who consistently solved the Cleveland right-hander, who struck out 11 across five-plus innings.
Munetaka Murakami then moved Vargas up with a grounder against reliever Erik Sabrowski, and pinch-hitter Randal Grichuk worked a four-pitch walk. A wild pitch advanced both runners, but Sabrowski still had a chance to escape before Tommy Pham lifted a short fly to left.
Braden Montgomery shut that door. The switch-hitting rookie lined an opposite-field double down the right-field line, bringing home two runs and flipping the White Sox in front, 3-2. Chase Meidroth added another run with a single off Hunter Gaddis.
Chicago had already been forced to respond after Cleveland struck for two runs in the first against Anthony Kay and Sean Newcomb. It was the first time the White Sox had trailed in this postseason after 27 innings, and they had led for 24 of those 27. From there, though, the Guardians were mostly quiet against Burke, who gave up one hit and one run while striking out six and walking one over 5 1/3 innings.
Grant Taylor took over after Burke allowed a two-out Chase DeLauter single in the eighth, even though Taylor had thrown four innings on Saturday. Then Jo Adell greeted him with a first-pitch triple that nearly left the yard in left-center. Nathaniel Lowe followed with a lineout to left to end the inning.
The next two games at Rate Field are already sellouts, and White Sox fans will get the home playoff setting they’ve been waiting for since 2021, when the club last hosted a postseason game. The Blackout theme will be back, even with first pitch set for 3 p.m. CT.
“Shout out to all the fans that stuck with us, rolled with us, stuck with us through the struggles,” said catcher Kyle Teel, who scored the White Sox first run off Williams. “And now we're doing big things, and just to have the opportunity to play in front of them and showcase what we're about and play to win a ballgame is just really special.”
In Other News...
White Sox Face 3 Arbitration Calls They Really Can't Get Wrong
The White Sox have plenty of winter decisions ahead, but the arbitration class offers a cleaner test of how much they want to reward progress and preserve value. Miguel Vargas looks like the most obvious keep after a breakout season that changed the conversation around him, while Brenton Doyle brings veteran outfield defense that still carries real weight on a roster trying to sort out its fit. Huascar Brazobn also fits the kind of low-cost, upside bet a team can justify when the alternatives are more expensive or less established.
Still, the process is rarely about the three players a club wants to retain most. Joey Bart, Chris Murphy and Jordan Leasure sit closer to the edge of the roster calculus, where projected arbitration salaries and organizational preference can matter as much as upside or familiarity. For the White Sox, the challenge is not simply trimming the list, but avoiding the kind of misstep that leaves them paying for the wrong pieces while the more useful ones slip away. [Read more 🡒]
White Sox Have A New Guardians Threat To Worry About
The White Sox are getting a familiar kind of postseason problem in the Guardians, and now Cleveland has added another power bat to the mix in Jo Adell. Acquired from the Angels at the 2026 trade deadline, Adell made it onto the Guardians ALDS roster against Chicago after a regular season that showed both sides of his game: plenty of punch, with 23 homers and 94 RBIs, but also the swing-and-miss that has long come with it.
What makes Adell especially interesting in this matchup is the way he fared against left-handed pitching. He hit .320 with a .971 OPS against southpaws, a split that hints at a useful platoon fit for Cleveland if it wants to get the most out of him in a short series. For a White Sox club already trying to map out every edge it can find, adding a bat with that kind of split-oriented threat gives the Guardians one more wrinkle to manage. [Read more 🡒]
White Sox Turn To A Different Game 2 Look With Control At Stake
After opening their best-of-five series at Progressive Field, the White Sox are preparing a different look for Game 2 as they try to seize control against Cleveland. Chicago is expected to lean on a lefty-heavy lineup against Guardians right-hander Gavin Williams, a matchup tweak that speaks to how closely both clubs are now studying the margins in October.
Williams brings strikeout stuff and some postseason experience, which is exactly why the White Sox will need their adjustments to matter early. Game 2 will be spread across TBS, HBO Max and TruTV, with Spanish-language coverage on Univision and TUDN and radio coverage on ESPN Chicago WMVP 1000 AM and ESPN Radio, giving the matchup plenty of places to be watched as the series turns. [Read more 🡒]