The Chicago White Sox and Texas Rangers will continue a four-game series on Saturday evening at Globe Life Field. This series is tied at one win apiece after the White Sox picked up a 2-1 victory on Friday to cash in as a -179 favorite. Chicago is two games out of the AL Central lead at 54-52, while the Rangers are well out of playoff contention at 47-59.
These teams met in Chicago back in mid-June, with the Rangers taking two of three on the road.
The White Sox are finally starting to generate some momentum of late, and grabbed another win on Friday as Dylan Cease continued to pitch like a truce ace to lead the charge in Texas. Seby Zavala tied the score with a sac fly in the third before Eloy Jimenez added a go-ahead solo shot the next inning that would hold up the rest of the game.
Cease went six strong innings, allowing one run on two hits and three walks while striking out five. The bullpen handled it from there, and Liam Hendricks nailed down his 22nd save. Jimenez and Josh Harrison both both recorded multi-hit games to pace the Chicago offense.
The White Sox remain down somewhat on the money line for the season while going just 47-59 on the run line. Overs are 47-53-6 for the White Sox, with six of their last seven games going under the betting total.
Chicago's offense has been surprisin gly below average on the season at 4.34 runs per game on a .699 combined OPS. The pitching staff is also right in the middle of the pack with a 3.94 collective ERA including a mark of 3.94 from the bullpen.
Jose Abreu is having another productive season to pace the Chicago lineup with a .302/.383/.477 line, 14 homers and 55 driven in. Luis Robert has also been effective at the plate, batting .301/.338/.460 with 12 homers, 11 stolen bases and 54 driven in across 75 games when healthy.
Michael Kopech is set to make his 20th start of the year, hoping to continue a strong campaign as he's gone 4-7 with a 3.12 ERA over 95.1 total innings. The 26-year-old pitched well in a losing effort to the Kansas City Royals on Monday, when he allowed two runs on six hits and one walk while striking out three over seven innings.
Utilityman Danny Mendick is sidelined for the rest of the year by a torn knee ligament. Starting pitcher Jonathan Stiever is recovering from lat surgery. The bullpen is missing some key arms with Aaron Bummer (strained lat), Kyle Crick (elbow inflammation), Garrett Crochet (Tommy John surgery), Reynaldo Lopez (strained back) and Vince Velasquez (blister) out.