The White Sox got what they came for at Progressive Field: a split, and the slim AL Central lead that comes with it.
It was hardly tidy. Chicago spent the afternoon surviving defensive messes, blowing extra outs, and leaving the bases loaded twice. But the final line still matters most, and the Sox walked out of Cleveland with a 7-6 win after a game that seemed determined to go sideways at every turn.
The biggest early jolt came from Kyle Teel, who opened the scoring with the first opposite-field homer of his career. That 2-0 lead didn’t last long.
Chris Murphy’s inning unraveled with help from the defense behind him, starting with a foul popup that Teel couldn’t corral and a wet-turf slip by Sam Antonacci on a routine fly to left that turned into a leadoff double for Travis Bazzana. Two batters later, Chase DeLauter crushed an up-and-in fastball to right to tie it.
The Guardians kept pressing. Kyle Manzardo walked, moved up on a wild pitch that looked more like a passed ball, and Gabriel Arias’ grounder handcuffed Miguel Vargas.
Murphy should’ve gotten out of the inning after striking out Cooper Ingle, but after a mound visit, Will Venable went to Erick Fedde instead. That didn’t stop the damage right away, as Daniel Schneemann singled to center for a 3-2 Cleveland lead, and Tristan Peters then airmailled the cutoff man to let both runners move up.
Chicago answered in the second when Peters made up for some of the mess with a solo homer that tied the game at 3. In the third, Vargas led off with a double and scored on Andrew Benintendi’s single, and Colson Montgomery followed by launching a two-run homer to right center for a 6-3 edge.
That cushion vanished in the fifth. Chase Meidroth rushed a throw after a sharp diving stop, Montgomery let a grounder skip through him on an extra hop, and Gabriel Arias punished the inning with a three-run blast that made it 6-6.
From there, the Sox had to grind. They loaded the bases with nobody out in the sixth after Braden Montgomery walked and Meidroth and Peters singled, but Erik Sabrowski limited the damage.
Randal Grichuk lifted a fly too shallow to score a run, then Sam Antonacci chopped one to first. Kyle Manzardo charged, but couldn’t handle it cleanly enough to get the out at the plate, and Chicago scraped across the go-ahead run.
That was all the offense the Sox got the rest of the way, even after another bases-loaded chance in the eighth went by the boards. Still, Trevor Richards and Sean Newcomb did enough to protect it, with Newcomb working around two runners in the eighth before a dominant ninth for a 1⅔-inning save.
It could have been easier, and it could have fallen apart. Instead, the White Sox held on.
The series split also left Chicago 4-3 against Cleveland with two series completed and two more still to come. Six of those seven games have been decided by one run, and the lone exception was Saturday’s two-run White Sox win.
Fedde’s outing was the kind that usually qualifies as good enough: 5.1 innings, eight hits, three runs, two earned, one walk, four strikeouts, and one homer allowed. He gave Venable a path to use only three relievers, counting the opener. On the other side, Steven Voght burned through seven arms after Bibee lasted four innings in a game delayed 1 hour and 27 minutes by rain.
Antonacci had a rough day reading balls in left, but he did help preserve the lead in the eighth by running down Khalil Watson’s windblown drive to the left field corner with two runners on. He also spent a couple innings at second base and made a diving stop in the seventh to keep the leadoff man off the bases.
The wind played a role throughout, knocking down potential homers from Antonacci and Braden Montgomery, both of whom settled for flyouts in front of the 375 sign in the right-center power alley. Peters’ solo shot in that same direction barely cleared the fence, even though it looked gone off the bat.
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