White Sox 9, Tigers 5: Vargas Homers Twice in Detroit

August 14, 2026 - Detroit - Miguel Vargas went 4-for-5, homered twice, and treated Comerica Park like a launching pad the Chicago White Sox have been using all summer. Final: 9-5 over the Detroit Tigers. Chicago's lead in the AL Central is 3.5 games. Vargas's third multi-homer game of the year is why the night felt decided in the fourth even though Detroit had already led 3-1.

Tristan Peters and Braden Montgomery had three hits each. Munetaka Murakami went deep. Ben Malgeri answered with two homers of his own and still went home with a loss.

Malgeri makes it 3-1. Then the fourth happens.

Montgomery's RBI single in the first put Chicago up 1-0. Malgeri's two-run homer in the second flipped it. Eduardo Valencia doubled in another run in the third. 3-1, Tigers, and Jackson Jobe still had a chance to make a Friday start look like a statement.

He did not get out of the fourth.

Peters tied it with his seventh homer of the season. Three batters later Murakami went solo, and Chicago had the lead for good. Montgomery tripled in two more. Five runs in the inning. 6-3. Jobe lasted 3 2/3 innings, nine hits, six runs, four strikeouts, one walk. He fell to 1-1.

Vargas was not done. He homered in the sixth and again in the eighth. Three runs scored, three driven in, four hits. That is a cleanup night in a park that used to belong to somebody else.

Urquidy gets the win. Malgeri cannot carry it.

Sean Newcomb opened with 1 1/3 hitless innings. José Urquidy threw 3 2/3 innings of relief, three runs, five hits, three strikeouts, and picked up the win (1-1). Chicago's bullpen finished it. Detroit never got the last three runs back.

Malgeri's first career multi-homer game led the Tigers. Gleyber Torres and Valencia had two hits each. Ten hits, five runs, and a 0-for-the-fourth-inning pitching problem. Line: White Sox 9 runs, 14 hits; Tigers 5 runs, 10 hits; no errors.

Chicago's order did not lean on one swing. Peters tied it. Murakami took the lead. Montgomery's triple emptied the extra bases Jobe had left on. Vargas's sixth- and eighth-inning homers were the distance. Fourteen hits is how you win in Detroit when the other club also homers twice. The White Sox did not need a complete game. They needed the fourth, and they got five runs out of it.

Central math in August

Chicago is 63-58. Detroit is 60-62. A 3.5-game lead in mid-August is not a parade. It is a cushion you protect by winning the games where Vargas goes 4-for-5 on the road. The Tigers still have the bats to hang around. They did not have the fourth inning.

Saturday: Anthony Kay (9-5, 3.96) for Chicago, Troy Melton (7-1, 1.46) for Detroit.

I would take Vargas's night over any single pitching line on this card. Malgeri's two homers deserved a better script. Jobe's fourth inning wrote a different one.

AthX Engine angle

Vargas led every hitter on Friday with 17 AthX Engine hitting fantasy points. Peters had 9. Murakami and Montgomery had 8 each. Malgeri still scored 12 hitting fantasy points in a loss. The White Sox tied Houston and the Athletics for the team lead at 16 fantasy points. Detroit finished at 0.

That 16-to-0 team gap is the fourth inning in one number. Fantasy points measure production. Price is the market. They are related, not identical.

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*Sources: ESPN recap, MLB.com gameday, AthX Engine daily scoring for August 14, 2026. AthX Engine fantasy scoring is for information only and is not financial advice.*