CHICAGO — It’s too early to look at the standings, but one month into the MLB season, the Chicago White Sox can feel good about themselves after ending April without falling out of contention.
Colson Montgomery’s bases-loaded, RBI single gave the Sox a 3-2, 10-inning win over the Los Angeles Angels on Wednesday afternoon on the South Side, leaving them with a series sweep and a .500 record for the month.
OK, slow down. The Sox are only 14-17 after their 1-5 start, which is still under .500 if my math is correct.
But considering where they were at this point of the season the last four years, it’s reason enough to celebrate. So the players did just that, mobbing Montgomery in right field after the walk-off hit and tearing the jersey off his back like they were skinning a rabbit. It was a scene they hope to repeat with some frequency in 2026.
“Especially with a young group like us, we feed off the excitement of walk-offs and wins,” Montgomery said.
With an off day Thursday before another West Coast trip to San Diego and Anaheim, Calif., the Sox finished April at 13-13, the first time they’ve gone .500 in a calendar month since June 2023, when they also were 13-13.
In Will Venable’s first season as manager, the Sox went 5-21 in April 2025 and were dead on arrival on May 1 with a 7-23 record. In their record-setting, 121-loss season under Pedro Grifol in 2024, it all began to fall apart with a 6-21 April, after an 0-3 record in March.
In ’23, also under Grifol, the Sox finished 7-20 in April following a 1-1 March. An 8-12 record in April in ’22 under Tony La Russa proved to be a harbinger of a .500 season, and the beginning of the end for the core from Rick Hahn’s rebuild.
In other words, atrocious starts have ruined the Sox’s season before anyone had a chance to get excited. So this sudden change of atmosphere, modest though it may be, has been a most welcome diversion on the South Side.
“It feels like we’ve found different ways to win some of these ballgames that maybe last year we wouldn’t have won, or maybe even earlier in the year we wouldn’t have won,” Venable correctly pointed out.
The division-leading Detroit Tigers were only .500 Wednesday night and 1 1/2 games ahead of the third-place Sox. It’s not a strong division, and the Sox will get plenty of chances later this year to prove themselves against the favorites.
“There’s a lot of belief in this clubhouse that if we start sniffing .500 and then get above it, there’s no turning back,” starter Erick Fedde said.
The Sox are now 5-3 in one-run games, a recurring problem last year when they went 15-36.
“We’re a team that’s never going to give up or back down until the game is over,” Montgomery said. “That’s who we are. We’re all going to compete until the end.”
Fedde had a strong performance before a kid-dominated Weather Day crowd of 15,901, allowing only solo home runs to Mike Trout and Vaughn Grissom over seven innings.
The Sox trailed 2-1 in the ninth when Tristan Peters was hit by a pitch and stole second, setting fans up for Sam Antonacci’s two-out, RBI triple to right that tied the game at 2-2 and sent it to extra innings.
After a scoreless 10th inning from Seranthony Domínguez, former Cubs left-hander Drew Pomeranz was ordered by Angels manager Kurt Suzuki to intentionally walk Miguel Vargas to face left-handed hitting Munetaka Murakami, whose 12 home runs lead the majors. But Pomeranz walked Murakami to load the bases, and after a force play at the plate, Montgomery came through in the clutch to end it.
It was a wacky series for the Sox, who endured a three-hour rain delay Monday in a comeback win led by Murakami’s three-run home run. Sources said MLB mandated that the game be played despite the long delay so the teams could avoid playing a doubleheader.
In Tuesday’s 5-2 Sox win, switch-hitting rookie catcher Drew Romo became the seventh player in MLB history to hit his first two career home runs from each side of the plate, which he called “the best day of my life.”
Romo told me Wednesday morning he received 55 text messages and celebrated in the clubhouse with “a funny tradition we do when someone hits their first home run.” Later on, he watched the video of the home runs “over and over.”