CHICAGO — 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.
“That was a beautifully pitched game,” Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said.
Asked if the seventh was Cantillo’s last inning no matter what, a grinning Vogt played it coy.
“Let’s just say I was not too upset that the hit happened,” he said. “Yeah, I mean you get to that point in the game and we have to think of his health, we have to think of the rest of the season.”
David Fry and Bo Naylor homered for Cleveland, and Steven Kwan reached three times from the leadoff spot and scored two runs.
The Guardians increased their AL Central lead to 3 1/2 games over second-place Kansas City, which lost 10-4 to the New York Yankees.
“It means a lot,” Cantillo said of his first win. “I mean, a little weight lifted off, I guess. … We know how important that is to just get that win. A team win.”
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.
“I was looking at the score a couple of times and I say, ‘What’s going on? Come on, guys. I know we can do it,’” Ramos said. “Finally Benny got a hit. After that, the team kind of got going.”
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.
It was the 14th homer of the season for Fry and No. 12 for Naylor.
“Our guys had great at-bats for the majority of the night,” Vogt said.
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.
“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.
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