Andrew Benintendi hit a home run and Adrian Houser scattered four hits over seven innings to lead the Chicago White Sox to a 1-0 victory over the visiting San Francisco Giants on Saturday afternoon.
Houser walked one and struck out five before departing after throwing 88 pitches, 62 for strikes. Grant Taylor, who hit 100.9 mph with a fastball on the radar gun, struck out two during two hitless innings of relief to pick up his second save.
Michael A. Taylor doubled and had two hits and Vinny Capra also had two hits for Chicago, which picked up just its second victory in its last nine home games.
Christian Koss had two hits for San Francisco, which lost its fourth 1-0 game this season. Robbie Ray (8-3) suffered the loss, allowing one run on four hits over six innings. He walked two and struck out six.
San Francisco, which won the series opener, 3-1, on Friday, nearly took a 1-0 lead in the second inning but right fielder Andrew Slater snatched Jung Hoo Lee’s line drive at the top of the fence to rob him of a home run.
The Giants blew another good scoring chance when Brett Wisely and Koss opened the sixth inning with back-to-back singles and advanced to third and second on a balk. But Houser got out of the jam when he struck out Rafael Devers and Wisely got picked off wandering off third on strike three by catcher Edgar Quero. Heliot Ramos then flew out to end the inning.
Benintendi then gave Chicago a 1-0 lead in the bottom half of the inning with his 10th home run of the season, a 388-foot drive to right that just barely cleared the glove of Mike Yastrzemski.
The White Sox missed a chance to add an insurance run in the seventh when Taylor’s drive to right hit the top of the fence but bounced back onto the field for a double. Josh Rojas then singled to right, but Taylor was thrown out at home when he missed touching the plate on a head-first slide.
–Field Level Media
