Montgomery's early blast sets tone for White Sox

MINNEAPOLIS – It’s been a frustrating season for Colson Montgomery, no doubt about it. His OPS is 125 points lower than his rookie performance and has been below the league average for most of the year. His strikeouts are up and his walks are down.

But Montgomery proved again on Friday that he can still change a game with one swing of the bat.

Montgomery’s three-run homer capped a four-run first inning as the White Sox held off the Twins, 7-4, at Target Field.

The blast was No. 28 on the season for Montgomery, who made a big splash as a rookie with an .840 OPS and 21 homers in just 283 plate appearances.

This year has been a different story. Montgomery’s average was still below .200 three weeks into the season. Since then, his high-water mark has been .239 on April 24. He’s got five four-strikeout games (compared to zero such games last year) and even on Friday, when he added a single to his first-inning homer, Montgomery struck out twice. And he has fewer two-walk games this year than last (three to two).

But he got the White Sox off to a flying start with his long ball in the first inning. Twins starter Dean Kremer retired the first two hitters before Miguel Vargas singled. He moved to second on a wild pitch and scored on Andrew Benintendi’s base hit.

Braden Montgomery followed with a single, setting up Colson Montgomery, who deposited a 1-2 splitter from Kremer into the right-field seats to put the White Sox on top 4-0 before the Twins even touched their bats.

The Twins eventually tied the score, thanks in part to a pair of first-inning homers of their own by Brooks Lee and Kody Clemens. But the White Sox scored single runs in the third and fourth to grab a two-run lead, then tacked on an insurance run in the eighth. They took advantage of Twins miscues for their last two runs, one scoring on a passed ball and the other on a wild pitch.