The White Sox entered tonight’s game with a collective 25.7 percent strikeout rate. If the season had ended this morning, that would have been a new major league record. (The Brewers set the mark at 25.6 percent last year.) The Sox surely helped their cause to that end tonight, because their 18 strikeouts against Eduardo Rodríguez and three Red Sox relievers came just shy of the nine-inning record.
Rodríguez was utterly dominant through the first four innings, striking out 10 batters without allowing a single baserunner. Carlos Rodón was able to keep up for a while, but he gave up a pair of solo shots in the top of the fifth.