Bryan Ramos went from first to third on a fifth-inning single by Nicky Lopez during the first game of Tuesday’s doubleheader against the Washington Nationals.
Ramos later scored on a sacrifice fly, but the Chicago White Sox third baseman had to leave before the seventh inning of the eventual 6-3 loss with left quad tightness.
Ramos — who has impressed since arriving from Double A on May 4 — was not in the lineup for Game 2, which the Sox won 4-0 behind seven strong innings from starter Erick Fedde and two Andrew Vaughn home runs in front of 11,138 at Guaranteed Rate Field.
Manager Pedro Grifol said Ramos is day-to-day.
“He probably won’t play (in Wednesday’s series finale) just because we have a day off the next day,” Grifol said after Game 2. “We can give him a couple of days to see if he’s ready to go first day in New York.”
Grifol liked the aggressiveness Ramos showed on the fifth-inning play, which led to Lopez taking second when left fielder Eddie Rosario’s throw to third base got past Trey Lipscomb.
Grifol also noted after Game 1, “I didn’t like the fact that he missed a hit-and-run. That was supposed to be a hit-and-run. Nicky did a good job there and he missed a hit-and-run. He made that play a little closer than what it should have been.”
Ramos scored on Braden Shewmake’s sacrifice fly to cut the deficit to 3-2. Tommy Pham drove in Lopez with a single to tie the score.
Photos: Chicago White Sox split doubleheader with Washington Nationals
The Nationals scored three in the eighth against reliever John Brebbia, who was in his second inning of work.
“With a doubleheader, just 10 pitches (in the seventh), felt he could go back out,” Grifol said.
Sox starter Chris Flexen allowed three runs on seven hits with five strikeouts and one walk in 4 2/3 innings while Eloy Jiménez hit a solo home run in the loss. Ramos went 1-for-2 with the run before exiting.
“He’s looked great at the plate,” Flexen said of Ramos, who is hitting .281 in 10 games. “Also he’s looked very comfortable defensively. He’s made a lot of great plays to bail us out of a lot of jams.”
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Vaughn provided the power in Game 2, hitting a three-run home run in the third and a solo home run in the eighth. It was the second multi-home run game for Vaughn in his career.
“Just went back to my roots and tried to simplify everything,” said Vaughn, who has three home runs this season. “Just keep it simple. Stay up the middle and try to hit the ball hard.”
Fedde shined against his former team, allowing three hits and striking out six while allowing no walks in seven innings.
“I was trying to really downplay it all week and try not to think too much of it,” Fedde said of the reunion.
He pitched for the Nationals from 2017-22 before excelling last season in the Korea Baseball Organization.
“Every start I go out there, I want to try to pitch well and do my thing,” Fedde said. “Of course, it’s always in the back of your head, you want to pitch extra well. I’m glad it went the way I wanted to and it’s a good feeling.
“Any time I can go seven (scoreless), I’ll take it. My command of the zone wasn’t great today, but I did a great job of bouncing back from 2-0, 3-0 counts and making pitches and defense was great behind me. (Catcher Martín Maldonado) was relentless, he never gave in to those guys. And we had a good game.”
