Davis Martin’s Pitch-Tipping Meltdown and Second-Half Collapse Face Their Biggest Test Yet vs. Reds

Davis Martin takes the mound at Rate Field on Thursday afternoon trying to prove his worst month as a big leaguer is finally behind him. The Chicago White Sox right-hander was an All-Star snub through the first two months of the season, but since June 1 he has been one of the least trustworthy starters in baseball, and his last turn through the rotation included the discovery that opposing hitters were reading his pitches before he threw them.

Martin, 29, opened 2026 by posting a 2.00 ERA and a 0.99 WHIP over his first 11 starts, striking hitters out at a rate that had him firmly in the Cy Young conversation entering the summer and arguably deserving of his first All-Star nod. Since then, the collapse has been dramatic: a 6.83 ERA and 1.73 WHIP across his last 12 starts, a stretch that has turned a season-opening breakout into one of the more jarring in-season reversals in the American League. He now carries a 9-6 record and a 4.17 ERA into Thursday’s 2:10 p.m. ET start against the Cincinnati Reds, still respectable on the surface but built almost entirely on a first two months that feel increasingly distant.

The White Sox handed Martin a rotation spot out of camp banking on the swing-and-miss stuff and command he flashed in limited big-league action the year before, and for two months he delivered on that bet in full. His strikeout-to-walk numbers in April and May ranked among the better marks in the American League, and scouts around the league started circulating his name as a potential trade chip if Chicago fell out of contention. Instead, the White Sox have stayed in the mix, which makes Martin’s second-half slide all the more costly — a team relying on him as a mid-rotation stabilizer has instead had to manage a pitcher who has become one of the larger question marks in its staff.

The Fenway Meltdown and the Tipping Discovery

The nadir came on August 4 at Fenway Park, when the Boston Red Sox rocked Martin for nine earned runs in five innings during a 14-2 rout, highlighted by a six-run first inning that included a grand slam off the bat of Caleb Durbin. The comfort Boston’s hitters showed in that opening frame wasn’t a coincidence. Injured White Sox catcher Kyle Teel, watching from the dugout, noticed Martin was tipping his pitches and alerted both Martin and starting catcher Joey Bart mid-game. “Some of the adjustments we made there after, we started getting a lot more weak contact, a lot more swing and miss,” Martin admitted afterward. “I definitely think there’s something to it.” The outing pushed his rolling total to 23 earned runs allowed over his previous 25 2/3 innings.

Five days later, Martin’s next start against Cleveland offered no real evidence of a bounce-back — a rain delay limited him to just one inning, in which he allowed two runs. It marked his third straight start with an ugly first inning, giving him 12 first-inning runs allowed across that span. Pitching coach Zach Bove pointed to fastball execution and location as the root issue more than any single mechanical flaw, and Martin himself said this week he’s “100% sure” he identified and fixed the tip that Boston exploited, calling it “a pretty easy one” to correct.

What’s at Stake Against Cincinnati

Thursday’s matchup pits Martin against Reds right-hander Andrew Abbott, and the betting markets have taken notice of Martin’s turbulence. Chicago opened as a moneyline favorite, but his strikeout prop has become one of the more debated numbers on the board, with sportsbooks setting the line at 4.5 and odds shops split on which side offers value given his diminished swing-and-miss stuff over the past two months. Bettors weighing action on the total or any live markets around the White Sox rotation can check out the latest coverage from BI’s DraftKings Sportsbook Review before placing a wager on how Martin bounces back.

For the White Sox, working on three days of rest after the abbreviated Cleveland outing, this start carries real weight beyond one game. Chicago has watched a rotation anchor turn shaky just as the stretch drive begins, and how Martin responds against a Cincinnati lineup that’s proven vulnerable to swings and misses against right-handers will say a lot about whether the tipping fix actually holds or whether the underlying command issues that predated it are the real problem. Fans tracking the odds shift in real time throughout the afternoon can also lean on BI’s odds calculator to see how each inning moves the number. A clean start would go a long way toward restoring confidence in a pitcher who, three months ago, looked like one of the best surprises in the American League.