Joey Cantillo pitched seven sparkling innings for his first major league win, and the Cleveland Guardians beat the Chicago White Sox 5-3 on Monday night.
Cantillo was working on a perfect game before Andrew Benintendi grounded a single into right field with two outs in the seventh. Benintendi advanced on a wild pitch and scored on Andrew Vaughn's single, but Korey Lee bounced to third for the final out of the inning.
Cantillo (1-3) struck out a career-high 10 in his fifth start and sixth major league appearance overall. The 24-year-old left-hander, recalled from Triple-A Columbus earlier in the day, stepped into the rotation after Alex Cobb was scratched Saturday because of a blister.
David Fry and Bo Naylor homered for the AL Central-leading Guardians, who had dropped three of four. Steven Kwan reached three times from the leadoff spot and scored two runs.
It was a franchise-record 13th consecutive home loss and No. 15 in 17 games overall for the lowly White Sox. At 33-112, they are approaching the majors’ modern record for most losses -- 120 by the 1962 New York Mets in their inaugural season.
Bryan Ramos hit his first big league homer for Chicago in the eighth, a two-run drive off Nick Sandlin. Emmanuel Clase handled the ninth for his 43rd save in 46 opportunities.
Fry lifted Cleveland to a 3-0 lead when he hit a solo drive off Jared Shuster (1-4) in the third. Naylor went deep against Enyel De Los Santos in the fourth.
Chicago White Sox
It was the 14th homer of the season for Fry and No. 12 for Naylor.
Chicago dropped to 5-23 since Grady Sizemore took over as interim manager on Aug. 8, replacing Pedro Grifol. Sizemore, 42, was a three-time All-Star outfielder while spending the first eight years of his playing career with Cleveland.
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“I have nothing but good memories from my time there," Sizemore said before the game. "I guess it’s always a little exciting and a little motivation when you’re playing your old team, but just trying to focus on our guys really and just put together another good series.”
TRAINER'S ROOM
White Sox: 3B Yoán Moncada (left adductor strain) is going to continue with his rehab stint with Triple-A Charlotte for now. "He’s been responding well, but at this point, we want to continue to make sure he’s in a good spot and he feels good about where his body’s at before we make a decision on bringing him back,” general manager Chris Getz said.
UP NEXT
Jonathan Cannon (3-9, 4.53 ERA) starts for Chicago on Tuesday night. The rookie right-hander pitched 5 2/3 innings of one-run ball in an 8-1 victory at Baltimore on Wednesday. Cleveland had not announced its starter.
