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MIAMI – Garrett Crochet labored and worked up a sweat, an unusual happenstance for the White Sox left-hander who is expected to be named to the American League All-Star team Sunday.
After breezing through two innings in the White Sox’ 4-3 loss to the Marlins Saturday, with 19 of 22 pitches poured into the strike zone, Crochet threw 25 pitches in the third, then an all-time high 45 in the fourth. He managed to keep the damage at one run in each inning, and left after four innings with a 3-2 lead.
The Marlins, who would overcome a 3-0 deficit, made Crochet work, fouling off 28 pitches against him.
“I don’t really have an answer,” Crochet said. “Clearly they had a good plan going into the game. Clearly they executed it well. I didn’t feel like I threw too many pitches over the heart but when I did, they resulted in base hits.”
Michael Soroka took over in the fifth as the Sox tried to win for the sixth time in their last nine games. Following a leadoff walk to Jake Burger in the seventh, Dane Myers tagged Soroka with a 420-foot two-run homer that put the Marlins in front, 4-3.
Continuing his first experience as a starter with a flourish, Crochet looked ready to breeze through another start but things got wonky in a third inning that included Dane Myers’ RBI single following a walk and hit batsman. Vidal Brujan took a pitch off his padded elbow that may have been in the strike zone.
Crochet faced seven batters in a fourth inning that took 26 minutes, saw the Marlins foul off 17 pitches and finally ended with Jake Burger popping out on a 10-pitch at-bat with the bases loaded.
“Had no intention of throwing him 45 pitches,” manager Pedro Grifol said. “The AB started at 35 and Burger runs a 10-pitch at-bat with the bases loaded.”
“They make a lot of contact, especially against lefties, whether it’s hard or weak contact they get the pitch count up and that was the story today,” catcher Korey Lee said. “Sometimes you have to tip your cap.”
The four innings was Crochet’s shortest outing in more than two months. In his last 12 starts, he went at least five, and he pitched six or more in nine of those. Crochet gave up five hits, walked three and struck out five. The three walks were the most in his last 10 starts.
“The thing I’m most upset about is probably the three walks,” Crochet said. “Only one of them scored but a lot of unnecessary traffic I caused to myself.”
One more for Garrett
There was speculation that Crochet would get a long rest going into the All-Star break but Grifol said Crochet will likely start Friday against the Pirates, three days before the break begins, then be on the back end of the rotation coming out of the break for an extended rest.
“It might be a short start, but he will pitch one more time,” Grifol said. “The one thing we are keeping in mind is if he’s in that game, we want him to be available for it.”
Double down
Gavin Sheets and Andrew Vaughn hit back-to-back doubles in the third against Yonny Chirinos giving the Sox a 3-0 lead. The Marlins (31-58) dropped the Sox’ major league worst record to 26-65.
The Sox struck out 13 times, including three by Luis Robert.
