Mike Vasil continues to impress; White Sox lose to Tigers after rain delay

After a 1-hour, 35-minute rain delay, the White Sox couldn’t have gotten off to a worse start Wednesday night when left-hander Jared Shuster, the starter for a bullpen game, allowed four runs to the Tigers in the first inning.

Once manager Will Venable brought in right-hander Mike Vasil, the rookie steadied the ship, throwing 3⅔ scoreless innings. He allowed the Sox to chip away at the Tigers’ lead and eventually tie the score, but Colt Keith’s eighth-inning bloop double just inside the left-field line eluded Andrew Benintendi and sent the Sox (19-43) to a 5-4 loss.

“That ball down the line on [Benintendi] just beat him to the spot there,” said Sox manager Will Venable, whose team fell to 3-16 in one-run games.

Four Sox relievers (Steven Wilson, Brandon Eisert, Jordan Leasure and Caleb Freeman) followed Vasil and allowed one run in 4⅓ innings. But Vasil’s ability to give the Sox multiple innings was huge as they covered for right-hander Jonathan Cannon, who went on the 15-day injured list Tuesday with a strained lower back.

Vasil has continued to impress since being claimed off waivers from the Rays, throwing innings in bulk. Against the Tigers, Vasil said he didn’t think he did a good enough job of getting ahead in the count but was pleased with his execution in big spots.

He kept the Tigers, who entered Wednesday with the fourth-most runs in baseball, off-balance by mixing speeds. Vasil was even a bit surprised by how well he has performed.

“I think it’s probably going a little better than I figured, especially at the best level of baseball,” he said. “But the whole goal of the entire offseason was just to pitch well, no matter where I was. That was my main goal, and I’m doing that right now.”

Vasil found out Tuesday night he was pitching Wednesday. He said he was prepared to throw however many innings the club needed.

“In my mind, I told [pitching coach Ethan Katz], ‘I’ll go five if you need me to,’ ” Vasil said. “Realistically, I knew that could be three, could be four, could be whatever. Preparing for that is just like any other day. It’s the same stuff, same routine.”

Vasil came to the Sox with 73 minor-league starts. Given the uncertainty surrounding Cannon, Vasil could be a temporary solution for the rotation.

“What’s really valuable about Vasil is he can do a bunch of different things and pitch in different roles for us,” Venable said. “As we find solutions down the road here for innings, he’ll certainly be in consideration.”

After falling behind, the Sox scored two runs in the third and one in the fourth to make it a one-run game.

Korey Lee led off the fifth with a double. Mike Tauchman walked and Chase Meidroth singled to load the bases. After Miguel Vargas flew out to center field, Andrew Benintendi tied the game with a sacrifice fly. Austin Slater pinch-hit for Joshua Palacios and lined out to center to end the inning.