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As I was doing my research for fantasy baseball season one of the things that seemed to be agreed on was that with the exception of the very best starting pitchers they wouldn’t have much impact this season. There where also people who thought that starters would only pitch 3 or 4 innings per start. Now either these experts where wrong or after last night Lucas Giolito has moved into the upper echelon of starting pitching.

Through five starts this season Giolito was 1-2 with and ERA of 4.88. On August 20th he went 7 innings against the Detroit Tigers. He struck out 13 and didn’t give up any runs. Last night it was Giolito’s turn to start. This time against the Pittsburgh Pirates and made it a memorable start.

Last night Giolito threw the 19th no-hitter in Chicago White Sox history. He also recorded the most strikeouts 13 in any no-hitter thrown by a White Sox pitcher.

It took Giolito 101 pitches to no-hit the Pirates last night. He did walk one batter and of course there where some good defensive plays to help keep the no-hitter in tacked.

Jose Abreu made two good plays on throws from Tim Anderson. On one play Abreu had to come off of 1st base to handle a throw from Anderson, but was still able to tag the Pittsburgh runner trying to reach base safely. The other play saw Anderson one hop a throw to 1st base that Abreu was able to pick cleanly for an out. The other quality defensive play was the final out of the game. On what may have been the only bad pitch Giolito made all night he left a pitch up and Eric Gonzalez hit a line drive that looked like it might be headed for the rightfield corner. Luckily Adam Engel took the proper angle on it and was able to cut the ball off and make the catch to end the game and keep the no-hitter for Giolito.

Giolito was the 16th pick in the 2012 draft by the Washington Nationals, but thing didn’t go all that well for him with Washington. After pitching in part of four minor league seasons with the Nationals Giolito was called up. He made 4 starts for Washington and pitched in 6 total games to end the 2016 season. Giolito had his issues; he pitched 21 1/3rd innings and went 0-1 with a 6.75 ERA. After having those struggles at the major league level Washington traded Giolito along with Reynaldo Lopez and Dane Dunning to the White Sox for outfielder Adam Eaton.

After being drafted as high as he was Giolito was looked at as someone who would develop into a #1 starter. He spent most of the 2017 season in AAA Giolito was called up and made 7 starts that season and pitched well. In those 7 starts Giolito went 3-3 with a 2.38 ERA. After showing that potential Giolito spent the entire 2018 season in the starting rotation and he had his issues. He made 32 starts that season pitching 173 1/3rd innings. He went 10-13 and posted a 6.13 ERA which I believe was the highest for any starting pitcher that season. It should’ve come as no surprise that there was talk that Giolito would never become the pitcher people thought he would be when he was drafted, but last season he showed he could develop into that. Giolito pitched in 29 games covering 176 2/3rd innings. He went 14-9 ad his ERA came down to 3.41. He also had 3 complete games; 2 of which where shutouts. Now you add a no-hitter to Giolito’s resume and it looks like the White Sox got a pretty good deal.

Giolito’s next start is scheduled for this coming Sunday against the Kansas City Royals; so we’ll see if he can continue to pitch well or if there might be a little bit of a no-hitter hangover.

The White Sox could use for Giolito to turn into that #1 starter people thought he’d be coming out of the draft. Right now the White Sox would make the expended playoffs, but they’d be one of the two wild card teams. As it’s turning out the AL Central is looking like it’s going to be a tougher division than people predicted it to be. The Minnesota Twins currently lead the division by 1 1/2 games over the Cleveland Indians and the White Sox.

With the win last night the White Sox are 18-12; so their season is officially half way over. They’ll have seven more games against the Twins and three more games against the Indians to try and make up some ground and not have to play in that wild card game.

Do you see the White Sox making the playoffs? And if they do get into the playoffs; would you consider that a surprise?

While we’re in the AL Central the Indians and the Twins are playing the third game of a three game series today. Minnesota won the first game 3-2 behind Kenta Maeda while Cleveland took the second game 4-2 behind Shane Bieber. Interestingly for the rubber match today the Indians are bringing Mike Clevinger back from the teams alternative training site to make the start in today’s game. The Twins will be countering with Jose Berrios.

I found it interesting that Clevinger is being brought back up, but Zach Plesac is not. Without going into the whole story I’m sure you remember that Clevinger and Plesac had some issues in Chicago after going out on the town after a Plesac start.

I understand that Clevinger is the better pitcher out of the two, but I really think what he did ended up being worse than what Plesac did. Remember Clevinger actually got on the team plane and flew back to Cleveland with his teammates potentially exposing them to Covid-19. Now it’s possible Plesac would’ve gotten on the plane as well, but he got caught sneaking into the team hotel and was given a rental car and had to drive back to Cleveland alone.

Adam Plutko took a couple turns in the starting rotation and top prospect Triston McKenzie made his major league debut while Clevinger and Plesac where at the alternative training site. It looks like Plutko will head back to the bullpen while McKenzie will stay in the rotation along with Clevinger.

So what does this mean for Plesac? With the trade deadline 5 days away you have to wonder if his days in Cleveland are numbered.

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