Slow start sinks Rodon, White Sox
Carlos Rodon has had little room for error in his last two starts.
The White Sox's left-hander faced the Indians' Corey Kluber at Cleveland last week, and he squared off against the Rays' Blake Snell Monday at Guaranteed Rate Field.
Rodon stumbled early against Kluber, made a quick recovery and delivered a strong start.
Against Snell, last year's American League Cy Young Award winner, Rodon came out flat again. It happens, but it was a classic case of bad timing.
"A guy like that, you've got to be on your game," Rodon said after the Sox dropped their third straight home game, a 5-1 decision to Tampa Bay. "He's pretty good. You guys saw it today. He's got a nice breaking ball and a heavy fastball, complementing each other and he's got a changeup and slider to back it up."
Rodon has one of the best sliders in the game, but his fastball was nowhere to be found early.
While giving up 2 runs in the first inning and 2 more in the second, Rodon threw 65 pitches, and 35 were sliders.
"The slider was good," Rodon said. "Later on in the game, it seems like there was a lot of swing-and-misses, but I'd like to have that fastball going in the strike zone more often. Just falling behind hitters, not establishing the strike zone, that's how you get yourself hurt. I put the damage on myself out there walking five today."
The Sox were able to do very little damage against Snell, who allowed 1 run on 6 hits over 6 innings while striking out 11. Jose Rondon's first home run of the season in the fifth was the extent of the offense.
"He's got really good stuff," White Sox manager Rick Renteria said of Snell. "His breaking ball falls off the table. He can throw it short, make you chase, it has hard bite and it's kind of late. It get swings out there.
"He does have a different gear, gets up to 97 (mph) and he can pretty much elevate it out of the zone. It looks like it's going to stay in there and it ends up rising. This guy's an excellent pitcher."
Rodon had an excellent outing against Kluber and the Indians, giving up 1 run on 2 hits while striking out 9 in 6 innings.
He couldn't follow up with another one against Tampa Bay.
"It was a little different today," Rodon said. "As soon as I stepped on the mound I tried to forget about what happened in the bullpen and compete. I just didn't have it. I tried to grind out 5 innings, but obviously the pitch count drove up in the first two innings. That's not going to cut it. Efficiency was not good today."