ARLINGTON – The only positive for the White Sox to take away from an 8-0 loss to the Rangers Saturday night is that Globe Life Field has a retractable roof and the visitors didn’t have to play in the searing 99 degree heat of Arlington.

Otherwise, it was a fairly forgettable night and one of those games to remember as the White Sox are running lower by the day on a 2022 schedule with 55 left to play. Their second setback in three games to the Rangers (48-59) dropped them to 54-53 overall, while they slipped to three games behind the Twins in the American League Central and one game behind the Guardians, who both were victorious.

Run production once again was an issue for Tony La Russa’s crew, which has scored only four runs over three games at Globe Life. Dane Dunning, who was part of the White Sox trade sending Adam Eaton to the Nationals at the start of their rebuild in the 2016 offseason, held Chicago to one Yoán Moncada infield hit over seven innings.

“Yeah, very good,” White Sox first baseman José Abreu said of his former teammate. “He was locating all of his pitches like he was supposed to and it was tough to hit him. Today we just tip our caps to him and just try to move forward."

“A lot of movement down in the zone. Ground balls, chased,” La Russa said. “Breaking ball out of the zone, we chased. But the main thing was down in the zone, we put it in the ground. We only had five, six balls in the air, so give him credit.”

Credit is one thing, but the White Sox offense has made Texas pitchers struggling to find their mound footing look pretty good. The South Siders rank second in the AL with a .256 average and eighth in runs scored at 458, but are 10th in OPS and 12th in home runs.

Limiting their chasing out of the zone has been a problem discussed by La Russa on numerous occasions this season. He still believes there’s time for the White Sox offense to get things right.

“We were taking our swings. I don’t think we were real happy with our plate discipline,” La Russa said. “That doesn’t mean they weren’t trying. You can try, but then you’ve got to execute. We chased.

“[Hitting coach] Frank [Menechino] kept telling us, get the ball up. Ball down, and he had good movement. Made pitches. Got ahead in the count. Do the things he’s supposed to do to get guys out. You can fix it, because we’ve done it at times. Just have to stay on it. Haven’t cured it yet.”

Michael Kopech also struggled pitching-wise for the White Sox, allowing four runs on five hits over 3 1/3 innings, as the native of Mount Pleasant, Texas, made his first start at the venue of the team he went to see growing up. Kopech cruised through the first two innings before allowing three runs during a 38-pitch third.

La Russa removed Kopech with runners on first and third and one out in the fourth at 74 pitches.

“He sees the game through his own lens, and if he thought I wasn’t going to put us in a position to possibly win today, then he made that decision,” Kopech said. “I think in hindsight, he made the right decision. Don’t like to admit that, but I wasn’t doing what the team needed today. It’s why I didn’t go deeper.”

Going deeper is Kopech’s primary goal in his first full season as a starter.

“Take some stress and innings off the bullpen. Give us the best chance to win: 3 1/3 is not doing that,” Kopech said. “We all would have liked to play better today, but it starts with me. I've got to do a better job of getting the ball to the bullpen later.”

Saturday’s loss also dropped the White Sox to 6-5 in a stretch of 19 straight against teams with sub-.500 records. As Abreu implored on Thursday, they have 55 games to play their best and shed this inconsistency if the playoffs are on their mind.

“That has been the way that we've been playing the whole season,” Abreu said through interpreter Billy Russo. “One step ahead and then two back, back and forth. We just have to keep grinding and find a way to move forward."