White Sox Pitcher Aaron Civale Allows Career-High Run Total In 9-5 Loss To Guardians

CHICAGO –– White Sox pitcher Aaron Civale had been on his best run of the season, but Friday's results against the Cleveland Guardians went in the complete opposite direction.

The Guardians tagged Civale for five runs in the first inning, and his night was over after just 3.1 innings with eight hits, nine earned runs, two walks and six strikeouts. The nine earned runs marked a career-high for Civale, 30, a seven-year MLB veteran with 131 career starts, and gave the White Sox their fifth straight loss, 9-5.

"Felt like we were making a lot of competitive pitches, a ton of foul balls, a lot of weak contact throughout the day. Long first inning, not ideal," Civale said. "But we just tried to do the best we could to compete and definitely made my share of errors, but felt like the balls found the ground when they got hit hard, and then when they didn't get hard they also found the ground. But just one of those days."

Civale struck out All-Star Steven Kwan to begin the game, but the Guardians quickly loaded the bases with a walk, a double by Jose Ramirez and a hit batsman. Carlos Santana gave Cleveland a 2-0 lead in the next at-bat with a double.

Civale was one pitch away from getting out of the inning, but his cutter missed high to walk Bo Naylor in a ten-pitch at-bat. He left a 1-0 cutter over the heart of the plate in the next at-bat, and C.J. Kayfus made him pay with a three-RBI double that gave the Guardians a 5-0 lead.

The cutter was one pitch Civale especially regretted, part of a strenuous 40-pitch first inning.

"I thought the execution was good minus, like I said, a few pitches, specifically the cutter there to Kayfus there in the first inning," Civale said. "But it's the 37th pitch there, it's a lot of tax in a short amount of time."

The Guardians put runners on the corners in the fourth inning with a pair of hits that had exit velocities below 80 mph. But Civale balked in a run, and then gave up an RBI single to Daniel Schneeman, which had a 105.7 mph exit velocity.

Schneeman's hit knocked Civale out of the game. He was replaced by Mike Vasil, who walked two batters and gave up a single in a fourth inning that ended with a 9-1 White Sox deficit.

Friday's outing was a step in the wrong direction for Civale, who tossed 17.1 scoreless innings in his last three starts. During that stretch, he allowed just seven hits while walking three batters and totaling 20 strikeouts against the Pirates, Cubs and Angels.

The White Sox acquired Civale and cash considerations in a trade on June 13 with the Milwaukee Brewers for Andrew Vaughn. Civale's ERA rose from 3.99 to 4.91 after Friday's start, while Vaughn has turned his season around in a major way, slashing .358/.426/.667 with seven home runs, 28 RBI, 10 walks and 12 strikeouts.

Civale's turn in the rotation comes up next on Wednesday against the Detroit Tigers, barring any unforeseen circumstances.

"I think we'll just try and figure out if there is anything to pick up from today," Civale said. "And then if not, just flush it and roll forward."

The White Sox tried to make a comeback, as Jacob Amaya, Curtis Mead, Brooks Baldwin and Kyle Teel each drove in runs. But the deficit was too large to overcome. Chicago hosts Cleveland on Saturday at 6:10 p.m. CT, with Sean Burke and Joey Cantillo as the probable starters.