Guardians sleepwalk through 2-0 loss to White Sox after three-hour rain delay

Thank God there were fireworks after the game Saturday night, because the Cleveland Guardians themselves provided none during the game in a 2-0 loss to the Chicago White Sox.

I would be curious to know which experience the fans in attendance found to be more miserable: Having to wait out a three-hour rain delay or having to watch the Guardians muster all of five hits and one walk against White Sox starting pitcher Johnny Cueto?

I can attest that the latter was an utterly joyless viewing experience. For the second night in a row, Cleveland’s lineup looked overmatched against a Chicago starter. Cueto doesn’t have swing-and-miss stuff. He survives solely on inducing weak contact and the Guardians played right into his hand, barreling up maybe a handful of his pitches.

Cueto barely even broke a sweat en route to pitching 8.2 shutout innings.

Cleveland starting pitcher Shane Bieber wasn’t as effective as his counterpart, unfortunately. He did not seem to have the sharpest command, walking three batters in the first three innings alone. But to his credit, he managed to keep the White Sox off the board until sixth inning, when Jose Abreu hit an RBI double to score Luis Robert from first to give Chicago a 1-0 lead.

The White Sox scored their second run under the dumbest circumstances possible. Bieber’s night ended in the seventh inning after he allowed back-to-back singles, culminating in Yasmani Grandal being thrown out at home by Myles Straw. James Karinchak took over with one out and Elvis Andrus standing on second base, though Andrus would end up stealing third.

After Josh Harrison flew out to right, Will Benson threw a one-hopper to home plate to hold Andrus at third base. But Luke Maile looked unprepared for the short hop and it knocked his mask off. Andrus was initially going to stay at third but saw Maile lose sight of the ball, so he broke for home, scoring easily. Benson was later charged with an error on the play.

Andres Gimenez made a nice play in the eighth inning, which is nice, I guess.