McAdam: In a familiar ballpark, Chris Sale finally finds himself again

In recent days, it's been fashionable -- and entirely obvious -- to point out that, after five weeks of the 2019 season, Chris Sale still didn't have a win.

Moreover, the Red Sox hadn't any in the first six games he had started.

That was enough to make you do a double-take, or at the very least, squint a bit as you re-read that stat. Wait, what? There's no way that can be true!

It was true, of course.

But the number that was most shocking about Sale had nothing to do with wins -- individual or otherwise. And the reason had nothing to do with the devaluation of the starting pitcher win, or the way we evaluate the effectiveness of starting pitchers in 2019.

No, the number that stood out was this: .271 batting average against.

That seemed even more incredible. The guy with an overpowering fastball, the darting slider, the confounding changeup was suddenly being hit around almost 30 points better than the major league average (.244). Game after game, hitters were barreling up pitches they wouldn't have dreamed of hitting hard in seasons past.

On Friday, pitching in the ballpark where he first established himself, Sale began a course correction. In 20 at-bats, the Chicago White Sox managed just three hits, none until two were out in the fourth inning. He later gave up two doubles -- one, an end-of-the-bat opposite-field shot to right, the other struck better to left.

In six innings, you could say -- generously -- that the White Sox hit exactly two balls hard.

Sale wasn't necessarily as overpowering as he's been in the past. He wasn't throwing his four-seamer at 97-98 mph, the way he once did and perhaps will again. But at 94-95 mph, he was still plenty effective, dominant even.

And even when Sale was in the strike zone, the White Sox couldn't do much against him. They swung through a number of pitches, beat some others into the ground (five groundouts) and generally appeared to be overmatched.

It was like old times and Sale seemed to acknowledge that, if only vaguely.

"I just kind of got back to some old things that I used to do,'' he said. "I talked to (Alex Cora) and Dana (LeVangie) a lot this week and kind of got back to doing some things I used to do and things that made me successful. I changed a couple of things and kind of focused on some things that made me successful before.''

Sale, cryptic as ever, didn't specify what was different, other than to say the adjustments weren't mechanical.

"Just pitching...just pitching stuff,'' he said, "more just being in the zone (with) quality pitches and just kind of executing in certain counts and being where I needed to be.''

Who knows what Sale is referring to here? Maybe he was more aggressive with his fastball. Maybe the game plan was adjusted. Perhaps he pitched backward on occasion. Whatever it was, it worked.

It hasn't been a typical season for Sale, of course. He was rocked on Opening Day in Seattle and when he didn't even hit 90 mph with his fastball in his next start in Oakland, the red flags shot up. Surely, he was hurt.

There was plenty of second-guessing about the team's plan to bring Sale and other starters along cautiously in spring training, and when he was battered for five runs in just four innings in the home opener against Toronto, things reached full-blown panic.

But Sale has been building, experimenting and slowly getting to this point. At some point -- recently, he hinted -- something clicked. It's been a challenge, as he noted.

"Sometimes you figure it out and you ride that wave,'' he said, "and sometimes you're out there in the middle of the ocean, trying to find it. A lot of people in here have helped me get to this point and I'm obviously happy with how we got it done tonight. Hopefully, I can keep riding that wave.''

It's been a long, strange trip, but it's still early May and plenty of time for Sale, especially now that he's recalibrated.

Suddenly, it isn't necessary to analyze the radar gun readings with all the seriousness of a scientist attempting to crack some indecipherable code.

On his seventh try, Sale finally found a win, yes, and so did the Red Sox with him on the mound. But watching the White Sox hitters appear overmatched, unable to barrel much up, there was the sense that, more than that, Sale had again found himself.