Eric Wagaman scored with one out in the 13th inning when Jordyn Adams’ grounder deflected off third baseman Miguel Vargas’ glove, leading the Los Angeles Angels to a 4-3 win over the Chicago White Sox, who suffered their 117th loss on Wednesday.
Instead of winning back-to-back series for the first time in four months, the White Sox now share the record for the third most losses since 1900 with the 1916 Philadelphia Athletics.
Chicago (36-117) must win 7 of their final 9 games to avoid breaking the post-1900 record of 120 losses held by the 1962 expansion New York Mets. The 2003 Detroit Tigers hold the American League record with 119 losses.
Things won’t get easier for the White Sox as they begin a three-game series at San Diego on Friday. The Padres currently hold the first NL wild card spot and are just 3 1/2 games behind the struggling Los Angeles Dodgers in the NL West.
“We get the same question every day; we’re focused on one series at a time and one game at a time. Everything else is irrelevant right now,” said interim manager Grady Sizemore. “It’s going to be a hard series in San Diego.
They’re playing for something, and we have to play our best ball to have a chance.”
After the series in San Diego, the White Sox will finish the season with a six-game homestand against the Angels (Sept. 24-26) and the Detroit Tigers (Sept. 27-29).
The Angels had the bases loaded in both the 10th and 12th innings but finally secured the win in the 13th.
“We had opportunities throughout the game to do something; we just couldn’t stretch that run, especially in extra innings. But we kept going and finally caught a break,” said Angels manager Ron Washington.
Wagaman was the automatic runner on second base and moved to third on Logan O’Hoppe’s ground ball to right field. With the infield drawn in, Adams hit a sharp grounder off Jairo Iriarte (0-1) that Vargas couldn’t field cleanly, giving the Angels their fifth walk-off victory of the season.
