KANSAS CITY -- If the White Sox had a solution for their 0-7 start to the second half of the 2019 season, they would have immediately fixed it.

But the best that they could come up with after falling to the Royals, 6-5, on Thursday afternoon at Kauffman Stadium was that baseball simply plays out this way sometimes. Their confidence has not dropped.

• Box score

“Starting tomorrow, we're going to be good,” said Jose Abreu, who had two hits and two RBIs in the team’s fourth straight loss to the Royals, through interpreter Billy Russo. “We're in a good position. It's just part of the season. People who have been around know how this goes.”

“I’m not down on my guys,” White Sox manager Rick Renteria said. “We are going to keep playing and keep doing what we have to do to try to put ourselves back on track.”

Thursday’s action started well enough for the White Sox, as Royals starting and winning pitcher Brad Keller did not record an out through the first four hitters that he faced. The White Sox had scored one run, had the bases loaded with nobody out and were poised to put up a crooked number in an early attempt to avoid dropping a season-worst nine games under .500.

By the time the third inning had come to a close, the Royals held a 5-3 lead and neither White Sox starter Ross Detwiler nor manager Rick Renteria were still in the game. A 3-0 advantage, built by the two-run first and Yoan Moncada’s opposite-field solo home run in the third, had disappeared.

It’s been that kind of run for the White Sox. The good is never quite good enough, and the bad seems to only get worse. Renteria was ejected in the second after a Yolmer Sanchez leadoff single for arguing balls and strikes with home-plate umpire Adam Hamari, although Renteria had a little different take on the situation.

“God bless him, he turned around and said he wasn’t going to have something or take something today,” Renteria said. “I was kind of confused about it to be honest. I just asked him, ‘Please pay attention to the field.’

“[Sanchez] got the base hit. He turned in and said something. I might have yelled out, ‘Both ways,’ or something previous to the base hit. He didn’t respond at that moment. But that was it. He looked in and said he wasn’t going to have it. I just asked him to please pay attention to the field. He said don’t tell him what to do. I asked him to pay attention to the field. He said goodbye.”

Detwiler allowed five runs on eight hits over 2 1/3 innings, striking out one and walking one. All five runs scored in the third after Detwiler stranded the bases loaded during a 27-pitch first. Dylan Covey allowed one run over 2 2/3 innings in relief, and Renteria said after the loss that he was inclined to give Covey a start when Thursday’s turn comes through the rotation.

To the White Sox credit, they had the winning runs on base in the ninth against closer Ian Kennedy before AJ Reed took a called third strike to end the game. Moncada had a key at-bat in the inning, working the count from 0-2 to full before lining the ninth pitch to center for a two-out single.

Those sort of good moments should, and will, mask the second-half woes. After all, this team is about the rebuild. But the bottom line is that the Royals swept a four-game series from the White Sox for the first time since July 25-28, 1994, and the White Sox, who have been outscored 50-17 in the second half, join the Mariners as the Majors' only winless teams since the All-Star break.

They definitely miss Tim Anderson and Eloy Jimenez. They also have to get better with who they have.

“Absolutely, absolutely. We need them. We're missing them,” Abreu said. “But we need to deal with what we have here until the organization gives us a chance to bring the people up that can help us here.”