White Sox's miserable homestand continues with 5-4 loss to Rays

Maybe the Chicago White Sox's clutch is frozen.

Opening the season with five games on the road at Kansas City and Toronto, the Sox scored runs in bunches, mainly on homers.

The trend continued with 7 runs in Thursday's home opener against Detroit, but the White Sox's offense has since been unable to produce much of anything.

"I think that's more a byproduct of slowing the game down a little bit, making sure you don't try to do too much," Sox manager Rick Renteria said. "Ultimately, the result is based on putting yourself in the position to get a good pitch that you can handle and do what you can, put a good swing on it."

After a 20-minute snow delay Monday, the White Sox lost to the Rays 5-4 at Guaranteed Rate Field. They were 2-for-16 with runners in scoring position.

In Sunday's 1-0 loss to the Tigers, the Sox were 0-for-3 in the same situation, and they were 0-for-8 with RISP in a 6-1 loss to Detroit on Saturday.

"We feel like we are in every game," said left fielder Nicky Delmonico, who hit his first home run of the season Monday, a 2-run shot off Rays starter Chris Archer in the fifth inning. "It's just that one hit or that one at-bat that can change the game."

With two runners on and no outs in the ninth inning against Tampa Bay closer Alex Colome, Yolmer Sanchez, Tim Anderson and Leury Garcia all grounded out to seal the White Sox's fourth straight loss at home.

"I know they want to try to come through," Renteria said. "I know they want to get the big hit. I think that the biggest thing is allow them right now to marinate on what's going on and let them gather their thoughts because I know what they're wanting to do. I know the result that they're wanting to get.

"It's a great question, can you develop clutch hitters? I think you just develop guys that slow the game down and give themselves a chance to go through a process and put a good swing on a pitch that they can handle."

Slow start:

When he's on top of his game, veteran White Sox starter Miguel Gonzalez is attacking the strike zone and frustrating hitters with a variety of off-speed pitches.

Gonzalez (0-2) wasn't sharp in his first start of the season, allowing 5 runs on 8 hits and 2 walks over 5 innings against the Blue Jays.

In Monday's outing against Tampa Bay, the right-hander lasted just 4⅓ innings and gave up 4 runs on 8 hits and 2 walks.

"It was tough, but I'm feeling good," Gonzalez said. "I'm healthy and that's the important thing. Got to keep grinding."

Gonzalez was 7-10 with a 4.31 ERA in 22 starts for the Sox last season before being traded to the Rangers. He is back on a one-year, $4.75 million contract.

"His (strike) zone might have been out of sync a little bit," manager Rick Renteria said. "He had quite a few runners on but he tried to minimize the damage to the best of his ability today. I don't want to make excuses for any of these guys because they're all throwing in that (cold) weather, but they're still working through that stuff, too."