Amid an ill-timed losing streak that effectively eliminated them from postseason contention, the White Sox’ effort has not been a question to acting manager Miguel Cairo this week.
“Since Aug. 31, they decide to play, they decide to battle,” said Cairo after Thursday’s loss to the Guardians. “They went and did everything and I’m proud.
“I’m proud of what they’ve been doing. Just because we lost this series, if you look back from Aug. 31 we won, what, six series, and they fought. They give everything. We just fell short to a really good team.”
But Cairo struck a much different tone in his postgame media session Sunday, after the Sox fell 4-1 to the Tigers to wrap up an 0-6 homestand.
“Today was the worst one,” Cairo said of the three losses this weekend in a Tigers sweep. “Today, that’s not acceptable.
“That’s not baseball. That’s not what the Chicago White Sox are about. It was terrible.”
The Guardians officially clinched the AL Central with Sunday's White Sox loss. Cleveland now holds a 10-game division lead.
MLB
Cairo, when asked if the issue was more effort or execution Sunday, said, “execution, effort, everything.”
“You’ve got to come back Tuesday,” Cairo said of the Sox’ next series in Minnesota. “They’re all playing, Tuesday until the last game. They better bring some effort.
“It was kind of embarrassing.”
That was the most specific Cairo got when asked what stood out about Sunday’s effort. He did make clear he felt the Sox came out differently than the first two games of the Tigers series.
“You watched the game today,” Cairo said. “That was bad, besides [Dylan] Cease pitched really good and kept us in the game.”
Cease battled through traffic to throw six shutout innings, working around four hits and three walks.
But the Sox tallied just six hits and surrendered four runs across the seventh and eighth innings, and the latter brought out boo birds from fans.
Cease, speaking after his outing, said on a personal level, there’s not a challenge bringing the same effort and focus level after the disappointment of the Guardians series.
Whether that series had a deflating effect on the team, Cease did acknowledge the disappointment the White Sox are feeling within the clubhouse.
“We’re definitely disappointed,” Cease said. “We take the game serious. We compete, so when you compete and it doesn’t work out it’s frustrating.
“We’re disappointed, but we got a lot of professional guys here, guys with a lot of big-league time. We’re not sulking. We’re showing up to play the rest of the games.”
The White Sox are set to be eliminated from wild card contention in the coming days. Their elimination number is three.
They have nine games remaining — three at the Twins, three at the Padres and three vs. the Twins — to finish on a more positive note.
“We got to show up and bring it," Cease said. "It’s still major league baseball. There is no half-assing it. You got to bring it every day. So I think that’s our plan.”
Said Cairo: “You saw for six series the way you're supposed to play the game, and you saw today, it was a totally different team.
"We’ve got to go back, get a day off tomorrow, regroup and there’s nine more games. Just got to finish strong and hard.”