White Sox manager Rick Renteria is burning up his bullpen unnecessarily

Rick Renteria

The White Sox entered Tuesday's game against the Pittsburgh Pirates with a 99.6% chance of qualifying for the postseason.

So why is manager Rick Renteria treating every game as if it is the seventh game of the World Series?

The Sox lost, 5-4, to the last-place Pirates, but the way they got there was more concerning than the loss itself. Was it really necessary to burn through five relief pitchers to try to win this game? Not in my world.

Starter Dylan Cease got a quick hook after throwing only 79 pitches. He took a 3-2 lead into the sixth inning, and he gave up a leadoff single. That would be all. Not sure why.

Codi Heuer, pitching for the third time in the past five days, was able to finish the inning without giving up the lead.

Enter Matt Foster, who worked a 1-2-3 seventh inning. Foster was pitching for "only" the third time in the past six days, so I thought he might have another inning in him.

Nah.

Renteria needed to go to Evan Marshall, who was pitching for the fourth time in the past five games, for the eighth inning. Marshall gave up two runs to surrender a 4-2 lead and couldn't finish the inning. Ross Detwiler entered and managed to strand the go-ahead run on third base.

But Detwiler gave up two singles to start the bottom of the ninth. Enter Jimmy Cordero, who has appeared NINE TIMES in the past 12 games. A passed ball, an intentional walk and an error later, the Sox were in the loss column.

Good thing Renteria pulled Cease early to make sure the Sox won this one, huh?

The Sox have played 42 games, and Cordero has already made 21 appearances. Marshall has pitched 20 times, and Steve Cishek has pitched 18 times. All three of these men have more appearances than they do innings pitched.

And that doesn't even get into the 40-pitch outing Alex Colome had in Friday's win over Kansas City. Colome was then asked to save the game Saturday night, too, which he did, but at some point he might wear out as well.

Would it kill Renteria to let guys pitch more than one inning? Would it kill him to let a young pitcher like Cease work his way out of his own trouble for once?

The Sox are in really good shape to make the playoffs. But will the bullpen have anything left for October with this kind of usage, or overusage, as the case may be?

Forget about October. Who is going to pitch in relief Wednesday? Probably at least one or two guys who pitched Tuesday night, and that's a problem.

It's time for Renteria to back off the throttle a little bit. He's got to stop micromanaging so much, even if it means losing a few more games.