Aaron Bummer deserved a better fate.

That sentiment came from White Sox manager Tony La Russa, after his setup man yielded two unearned runs in the bottom of the eighth inning during the Angels’ 4-3 Opening Day victory Thursday in Anaheim. But the 27-year-old southpaw, being the ultimate competitor, wasn’t totally buying La Russa’s theory.

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“Tony said something to me at the end of the game and I said the same thing back to him, saying at the end of the day, it's about getting the job done. Winning or losing,” Bummer said. “We're happy if we win and we're pretty pissed off if we lose. To take a small victory out of that, I'm not going to do that. At the end of the day, it's got to be better.”

That eighth inning began with a David Fletcher single off Bummer’s glove. Shohei Ohtani followed with a ground ball to second baseman Nick Madrigal, but Madrigal’s throw to Tim Anderson pulled the shortstop off the base.

A Yasmani Grandal passed ball moved Fletcher to third, and Mike Trout followed with a single past third baseman Yoán Moncada to tie the game on a 3-1 sinker clocked at 96.3 mph. La Russa described Madrigal as an outstanding defender, pointing out a slick play he made up the middle against Anthony Rendon to open the second.

“Going to his left, the ball took a little hop towards the first-base side,” said La Russa of Madrigal’s eighth-inning play. “It was tough all around because Fletcher gets a good jump, he’s all over it. Ohtani is there, so it wasn’t made to order. Probably just trying to get the force, not going to turn a double play there. Tough throw for him. Knowing him, he’s taking it hard, but really I can’t say he messed that up.”

“Most good players are hard on themselves and take their craft very very seriously,” White Sox right fielder Adam Eaton said. “He’s no different. I’ve gotten to know him very quickly and he takes his craft seriously. The beauty of it is we play again tomorrow. I know him and TA are trying to get on the same page and they will.”

Bummer struck out Rendon, but Justin Upton drew an 11-pitch walk in the biggest at-bat of the game. With the bases loaded, Albert Pujols hit a high chopper to Moncada to score the eventual winning run.

“Give him credit, because he kept battling and at the end of the day, I wasn't able to finish him off,” Bummer said. “He made me keep working and he won the at-bat. I still felt pretty good about having Pujols up next, knowing if I made my pitches with Pujols, we're going to be able to get a double play and get out of the inning there, but it just didn't happen.”

The White Sox had taken the lead in the fifth with Eaton’s two-run homer, and despite allowing Max Stassi’s solo blast in the bottom of the frame, Lucas Giolito had the White Sox in a position to win. Giolito was very effective in his second straight Opening Day start, becoming the first White Sox right-hander to do so since Jaime Navarro in 1997-98.

Giolito worked 5 1/3 innings, covering 87 pitches, and struck out eight against two walks. He retired Ohtani on a line drive to right, before being removed by La Russa for Codi Heuer in the sixth.

“Early in the season, I had thrown a lot of pitches for five innings. In the sixth go out there and get that first out and the bullpen will take it from there. It’s all good,” Giolito said. “It was pretty solid.

“It wasn’t as deep as I would have liked, a lot of pitches. I felt pretty good about it though, a good one to build off of for the rest of the year."

Everything was lined up perfectly behind Giolito, with Heuer giving way to Bummer, who would've given way to closer Liam Hendriks in the ninth. It’s easy to trust a White Sox bullpen considered by many to be the best in the game, and Bummer’s reputation as a late-inning leverage hurler is just as lofty.

Things didn’t work out on this night, spoiling La Russa’s return to the dugout for the first time since he won the 2011 World Series with the Cardinals. And while La Russa strongly stood behind Bummer, the reliever wasn’t satisfied with being almost successful.

“We talk about it daily, about winning each day. We lost today, so that's on me in my opinion,” Bummer said. “I've got to go out there and go be better. So that's my goal for tomorrow.

“I'm going to be better tomorrow than I was today. That's kind of my thought process moving forward and that's a lot of guys on the team. We did a lot of things right today, but we didn't finish it off. The bullpen didn't hold it down. It's a tough one to swallow, but we've got tomorrow to get out there and get another win."