Chicago White Sox out of AL Central contention

It was a homestand to forget for the Chicago White Sox.

six games. six losses.

And to top it off, the team’s pursuit of the American League Central title is officially over after Sunday’s 4-1 loss to the Detroit Tigers in front of 33,549 at Guaranteed Rate Field.

The Cleveland Guardians, who began the Sox’s slide Tuesday, are division champions.

“It’s obviously very disappointing,” Sox starter Dylan Cease said.

The Sox began the season as the popular pick not only to win the division, but also to compete for a shot at the World Series. Now they are on the verge of missing the playoffs completely, trailing the Seattle Mariners for the final wild-card spot by 7½ games with nine to go.

“We definitely didn’t play up to our ability,” Cease said.

Asked about the week, which featured three losses to the Guardians and three to the Tigers, acting manager Miguel Cairo described Sunday as “the worst.”

“That’s not acceptable,” Cairo said. “That’s not baseball. That’s not what the Chicago White Sox are about. It was terrible.”

Asked if it was about execution or effort, Cairo said: “You can put it either way. Execution. Effort. Everything.”

The Sox squandered a strong outing from AL Cy Young Award candidate Cease, who allowed four hits in six scoreless innings.

The Tigers tied the game with a run in the seventh and scored three more in the eighth to complete the sweep.

[ [Don’t miss] Column: Now speculation can begin on who will manage the Chicago White Sox next season. Who will it be? ]

“You’ve got to come back Tuesday (in Minnesota),” Cairo said. “So they better bring some effort. It was kind of embarrassing.

“You saw for six series the way you are supposed to play the game. And you saw (Sunday), it was a totally different team. There’s nine more games. Got to finish strong and hard.”

The Sox were outscored 16-6 in the Tigers series.

“If you watch (Sunday’s) game, that was bad besides Cease,” Cairo said. “(He) pitched really good and kept us in the game.”

Cease described his outing as “all right.”

“I want my fastball command to be better, but I did a good job grinding,” said Cease, who had five strikeouts and three walks. “It was one of those grind games. It was good enough.”

Cease began the day second in the majors in ERA and opponents average, fourth in strikeouts per nine innings and fifth in strikeouts.

He received defensive help in the second with a leaping catch by left fielder AJ Pollock at the wall to rob the Tigers’ Kerry Carpenter. Cease made a big pitch in a big spot in the fifth, getting Javier Báez to pop out to catcher Seby Zavala with the bases loaded for the final out.

[ [Don’t miss] Tony La Russa won’t return to manage this season, and the Chicago White Sox will address his 2023 status ‘when it’s appropriate’ ]

[ [Don’t miss] Tony La Russa and the Chicago White Sox: How the manager fared in two managing stints with the franchise ]

The Tigers loaded the bases with no outs in the sixth. Cease induced a double play as Jonathan Schoop grounded to third. Yoán Moncada threw to the plate to get the lead runner and Zavala fired to first to get Schoop.

Jeimer Candelario fled out to center as the Sox maintained a 1-0 lead.

“He’s been pitching like that all year round, and it was good to see him give us a chance to win,” Cairo said.

The Tigers tied the game on an RBI double by Victor Reyes against Reynaldo López. They scored three runs in the eighth against Kendall Graveman.

After the disastrous week, the Sox are left to ponder what went wrong in a lost season.

“It was tough,” Cease said. “After a disappointing season, for it to be sort of capped off by this, it’s tough. I still like us to finish strong with our last nine.

“We’re definitely disappointed. We take the game serious. We compete, so when you compete and it doesn’t work out, it’s frustrating. We’re disappointed, but we’ve got a lot of professional guys here, a lot of guys with a lot of big-league time. We’re not sulking. We’re showing up to play the rest of the games.”