Antonacci's Walk-Off Single Stuns Cleveland in Wild Ninth
Sam Antonacci delivered a two-run single to center in the bottom of the ninth to lift the White Sox over the Guardians 6-5, swinging the win probability from 23% to 100% in one swing. The Guardians had led 5-4 heading into that final half-inning — and even had a challenge overturned in their favor moments earlier — before Antonacci ripped the heart out of Cleveland's bullpen.
Anthony Kay set the tone for Chicago, throwing six innings of three-hit, zero-run ball with eight strikeouts. That kind of start should have been a comfortable foundation, and for six innings it was — the White Sox built a 3-0 lead on Montgomery's RBI double in the second, a Benintendi single that plated Antonacci in the third, and Grichuk's 374-foot solo shot to left in the sixth. Cleveland, though, wasn't done.
The seventh inning is where this game got genuinely strange. Watson singled to right to score two, then Hoskins singled to center to score a third, and just like that it was 3-3. Antonacci answered immediately with a single to right that scored Montgomery and pushed Chicago back in front 4-3. Three lead changes in one inning — the story of the seventh was pure chaos, and neither team could hold an edge for more than a few minutes. The Guardians carried that energy into the ninth, when Bailey singled to score Bazzana to tie it at 4, then Manzardo hit a sacrifice fly to center — with a Cleveland challenge overturning the call on the field — to give the Guardians a 5-4 lead with Rocchio standing at third.
Then Antonacci happened. With the White Sox down to their last out and win probability sitting at just 23%, he lined a single to center that scored Montgomery and Peters, completing a two-run rally that flipped the game entirely. Cleveland challenged the call on the field and it was upheld — meaning the runs stood, the lead stood, and the Guardians walked off the field on the wrong end of a gut-punch. Antonacci finished 2-for-4 with 3 RBI, and it's hard to argue he wasn't the entire ballgame. Rocchio went 3-for-5 for Cleveland, which looks like a footnote now but speaks to how close the Guardians came to stealing this one. The White Sox, who appear to be one of the genuine surprises of the 2026 season, found a way to win ugly — and that's often the mark of a team worth watching.