KANSAS CITY — After two weeks of mostly fun baseball, the White Sox suffered through a stinker in the City of Fountains, dropping Tuesday’s game to the Royals, 5-3.
Starter Reynaldo López had a serviceable start, struggling through six innings and giving up three runs on six hits and a walk, with seven strikeouts and a 54 game score. Fernando Abad coughed away the tie game, with an interminable, 31-pitch eighth inning.
Things started pretty swimmingly for the Sox, as red-hot Leury García doubled off of the wall in left-center with two outs in the second, followed by an RBI single from Yermín Mercedes and an RBI double from James McCann.
K.C. came right back in the third with a series of four singles and a walk gave the Royals a 3-2 lead.
Chicago has been good with its offensive counterpunches all season long, and tonight was no exception. A Yoán Moncada walk and another García double tied the game back up, 3-3.
But a leadoff double for McCann in the seventh was wasted, and in the eighth Abad issued a one-out walk to Adalberto Mondesi, followed by a Brett Phillips triple and Yairo Muñoz single that put the game away.
The White Sox send Gio González out in the rubber match against Mike Montgomery on Wednesday.
NOTES: Fernando Abad (0-1, 13.50 ERA in two games) was designated for assignment after Tuesday’s game ... the White Sox recalled Jace Fry (1 ⅔ scoreless innings at Charlotte, with two walks and four strikeouts) ... the team also demoted Knights reliever Connor Sadzeck (6.75 ERA in four games) and promoted Brady Lail (6 ⅓ scoreless innings) to Charlotte.
Around the majors
- First Star of the day was Ian Happ, who went 3-for-6 with a double, two homers, seven RBIs and two runs in the north siders’ 14-3 trouncing of Baltimore.
- Danny Santana was the Second Star, going 3-for-4 with two home runs, four RBIs, two runs and a walk in Texas’ 11-4 win over the reeling Yankees.
- Vince Velasquez of the Phillies was today’s Third Star, throwing 7 ⅔ innings of scoreless, one-hit ball, with a walk and nine Ks in Philadelphia’s 9-1 clobbering of the Brewers.
- Cleveland put a five-spot up in the fifth inning vs. Detroit to take over first place in the AL Central from the White Sox.
- Stephen Strasburg fell to 0-3 with a 6.95 ERA as Seattle scored three runs in the eighth inning to knock off Washington, 3-0.
- The A’s struck for three in the eighth and rode three home runs to a 4-3 win over the Red Sox.
- Sonny Gray ran his record to 3-0 with a 1.80 ERA with a 3-1 Reds win over San Francisco.