CHICAGO -- Last year, the Rays were the talk of baseball for the first month of the season. They won 13 straight games over two virtually flawless weeks, ended April 2023 with only six losses and rode that momentum to a 99-win campaign.

The Rays’ performance over the past month has often felt like the opposite of that all-encompassing excellence. It reached what they must hope is a low point Sunday afternoon, as the White Sox handed Tampa Bay a 4-2 defeat to cap a three-game sweep at Guaranteed Rate Field.

The White Sox entered the weekend having won only three of their first 25 games. It was their first sweep since taking three in a row against the Tigers last June, the first time the Rays have been swept in any regular-season series since last July 17-19 at Texas and the first time Tampa Bay has been swept by any American League Central opponent since dropping three straight to Chicago from Aug. 3-5, 2018.

Last year, the Rays lost their 16th game of the season on May 27, falling to 38-16. They boarded buses bound for Milwaukee on Sunday night with a 13-16 record, three games under .500 for the first time since they were 5-8 entering play on April 16, 2021.

“We’ve got guys that have a track record of being really good, and I don't think anybody here doubts that we are really good,” said starter Zack Littell, who held the White Sox to two runs over six innings in the series finale. “This is obviously a super-tough stretch, but I can also say that nobody in here is happy with how they're performing.”

The White Sox racked up 21 runs this weekend, more than a quarter of the 77 they’ve scored this season. Things looked especially bleak for the Rays on Sunday afternoon as their scuffling lineup was throttled by right-hander Erick Fedde, who allowed two runs and struck out nine over a career-high 8 1/3 innings.

But considering all that has gone wrong for the Rays -- a bevy of key injuries, a few wildly underperforming stars, an often-porous defense, a surprisingly suspect bullpen and some mind-boggling struggles hitting with runners in scoring position -- there’s an argument to be made that they’re lucky to not be in a worse position.

“If I'm being honest, we're fortunate to be where we're at. Simple as that. We have not played good baseball,” manager Kevin Cash said Sunday morning. “I'd like to think better days are ahead of us. I'm confident in that. We've got to get some guys healthy, but this group that's here right now also is fully capable of playing better baseball. I'd like to see that turnaround pretty quick.”

Indeed, the urgency to right the ship is growing by the day. That’s especially true for an offense that hit just .200 (7-for-35) with runners in scoring position this weekend. Isaac Paredes played a part in both runs on Sunday, clubbing his seventh homer in the fourth inning and scoring on a ninth-inning double by Harold Ramírez.

The Rays are still without injured left-handed hitters Brandon Lowe, Josh Lowe and Jonathan Aranda, and they’re not getting what they expect to see from regulars like Yandy Díaz (.232 average, .597 OPS), Randy Arozarena (.152, .483), Ramírez (.255, .571) and Jose Siri (.173, .520).

“We all know we didn't have a good month,” Díaz said through interpreter Manny Navarro. “I think we've got to take advantage of these three losses, and hopefully this will get us going a little bit.”

The Rays have worked their way out of similar slumps in the past. They went 8-16 last July and bounced back to win 34 of their final 53 regular-season games. They scuffled through a 12-17 stretch in the first half of 2022. They won 100 games in ‘21, but they were 19-19 on May 12.

They believe they have enough talent to pull off a similar turnaround this year -- and more than enough time to make it happen.

“It’s going to all click. It seems like we’re just not all playing good together. Like defense, offense, pitching, it’s not all clicking at the same time,” starter Zach Eflin said Friday night. “It’s 162 games in a season. You’re going to go through dead spots. You’re going to go through spots where you win 13 in a row.

“I think it’s really just keeping our heads high and showing up with as much energy as possible each and every single day. That’s really the one thing we can control right now is our attitude and our will to win, the passion for the game, the energy. Sucks that we’re kind of in a little rut, but we’ve got a long way to go.”