Athletics 7, White Sox 4: Run out of Oakland

Your standard watched-while-working bullet-point recap:

*Remember how I said the White Sox outclassed the A’s in the first game of this series? Well, Oakland flipped the script here, starting with the pitching matchup.

*As the numbers foretold, Sonny Gray was good, and Mike Pelfrey was not. Their lines sum it up:

• Pelfrey: 3.1 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 5 BB, 1 HR, 99 pitches
• Gray: 6 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, 1 HR, 98 pitches

For the second straight game, an overwhelmed White Sox starter gave up a home run on his last pitch.

*More than pure pitching talent, the A’s also pantsed the White Sox on the basepaths. The A’s stole five bases in five attempts, four of them by Rajai Davis, and the White Sox didn’t put up a competitive effort to stop any of them.

*The A’s kicked the game out of reach in the fourth. With runners on second and third and one out in the fourth, Jed Lowrie punched the ball past a drawn-in infield to extend the Oakland lead to 6-0.

*The White Sox could only get a little bit better than halfway back into it. Matt Davidson’s 18th homer of the year cut Oakland’s lead to 6-2, and it was a majestic rocket over the center field fence. Todd Frazier added his own two-run blast, but it came with two outs in the ninth and the Sox trailing by five.

*The Sox didn’t have many scoring opportunities otherwise. Their only other threat came in the fourth inning when Melky Cabrera led off with a ground-rule double, but Jose Abreu lined out to center, and Lowrie flagged Avisail Garcia’s soft liner up the middle. Cabrera gambled that it would get through, and he lost, resulting in an unassisted double play.

Record: 37-47 | Box score | Highlights