A recent slide coupled with a surge from the Kansas City Royals has the Cleveland Guardians' lead in the American League Central shrinking. After losing two of three at the Los Angeles Dodgers over the weekend, Cleveland enters the game at the Chicago White Sox on Monday with a 2 1/2-game edge in the division. The Guardians (81-62) are eager to turn the page on their 4-0 loss Sunday, the fourth time the team has been blanked in the past 20 games.
"I think that's baseball," Cleveland outfielder Will Brennan said. "We're going to have stretches (where) we're going to murder teams, and then we're going to have stretches where we get shut out. .
.. If we don't get on base and we don't execute our plans, we're gonna get shut out.
" Despite being limited to five runs in the series, Cleveland remained just one game behind the New York Yankees and Baltimore Orioles for the AL's best record. "(Three) games isn't going to get us down," Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said. Chicago (33-111) returns to Guaranteed Rate Field after a 2-4 road trip to Baltimore and Boston, avoiding separate sweeps in the finales of both series.
On Sunday, the White Sox erupted for a five-run ninth inning to key a 7-2 victory against the Red Sox. Luis Robert sparked Chicago's 12-hit attack with a 3-for-4 effort while Andrew Vaughn and Lenyn Sosa contributed two hits apiece. Dominic Fletcher's RBI double in the ninth stood up as the winning run.
Zach DeLoach added a two-run single. "I thought all day, the at-bat.